(Disclaimer: This transcript is auto-generated and may contain mistakes.)

All right, brethren. If you have a look at Ephesians chapter 4 verse number 13, it says, till we all come in the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God unto a perfect man. The title for the sermon this morning is A Perfect Man. Now I am going to start a new series on these Sunday mornings. I'm going to, you know, I still go chapter by chapter through the Bible. I'll be doing that on the midweek services for now. But like I said, I do want to start a new series. And the title for the new series is similar to the title for the sermon today. The title for the new series is The Perfect Man. The Perfect Man. But the title for the sermon this morning is A Perfect Man. A Perfect Man. Okay. Now, why did I decide to put this series together? Now, just my, you know, different conversations that I've been having over the past couple of years. In fact, going through all the way back to, you know, being a pastor, I've now been pastoring for four years, praise God, you know. I've had lots of different discussions, lots of different interactions with people. And it's actually my wife, Christina, that gave me, obviously, she gave me the idea for this series. And she's told me, basically, she said, look, because I've been saved since I've been four years old, I've been saved since I've been a child. And, you know, Christina, she got saved. She was the first soul that I got saved. She was like 19, I think, when she got saved. And because I've been saved since I'm four years old, I've been going to church pretty much my entire life. I've been able to apply many of the biblical teachings in my life, you know, as a child, as a teenager, in my early adulthood, you know, even to this day, you know, I'm able to apply biblical doctrines in my daily life, right. And it's not that no one else has, of course, we all do, we all do. And we can all strive to be a perfect man. And I'm not here trying to say I'm a perfect man or anything like that, okay. But you can see that this is definitely one of the goals that God would want us to achieve in our lives. And because I've been saved for such a long period of time, it's like a lot of the things that I've learned and I worked through is subconscious. It's not obvious to me. Let me just give you another example of this. My daughter, Isabelle, she just recently got her learner's license, okay. And yesterday, I took her for her first drive. Very first time she got behind the wheel and she drove, okay. She drove for one hour and all we did was drive up and down the street non-stop, okay, for a whole hour. But at the end of the hour, Isabelle had a headache, right. There's a lot of focus. You're going into this for the first time, you're learning how to drive, you're learning about the pedals, you're learning about the steering wheel, you're learning about the gear stick, and you've got a lot of focus, a lot of concentration. You don't want to crash the car, you don't want to hit pedestrians, etc. And you want to make sure you're pressing the right pedal at the right time, right. You want to be braking when you should be accelerating or vice versa. And so it requires a lot of concentration, doesn't it, when you're trying to learn how to drive. But then I've been driving since I've been 16 years old and I'm now 40. So, you know, I've been driving for decades and many of you have been driving for decades. But wouldn't you say that when we drive, when we get behind, you know, the steering wheel, we don't have to give it that much focus. I mean, you know, to some extent, you know, we are thinking about the road, we are thinking about drives, obviously, or you'd be crashing the car. But many times, and I'm sure all of you that have been driven for a long time, I'm sure you can also understand this, you know, when this takes place. Like you might be driving from point A to point B, and you get to point B. And because you've got other things on your mind, let's say you're going to work. Men, you go to work, you might be thinking about, as you're driving, you might be thinking about, okay, when I get to my workplace, I've got to finish this project, I'm going to do this, I'm going to do that. Maybe you plan out your day on your drive to work. And then when you finally get to your workplace, you get to point B, you look back and go, man, I don't even remember the drive. I mean, it's almost like I was an autopilot the whole time, right? It is so second nature. It's almost like just subconsciously, you flick the switch on autopilot, you know, your brain was using your body, you're not that focused, you're thinking about other things, or you might be having your quiet time, your fellowship with the Lord God and praying about many, many other aspects while at the same time you're driving. Well, I would say that this would be a similar idea. The series is that perhaps I've been saved such a long time, according to my wife, where there are certain things that I just don't really think about. I'm on autopilot as a Christian. And because I'm not thinking about these things, I don't tend to preach about these things. And so maybe for people that have not been saved for that long, there are things that I may be, wrongly as a pastor, I have assumed that this person will know that they know all these things simply because I know all these things. And I'm just, again, it's just subconscious. I don't give it a lot of thought. And I just assume other Christians know these things. And so I decided, well, maybe my wife is right. I sat down and for an entire day, just the whole day, I just started to write just brief sermon outlines of what I want this series to be about. And I came up with 28 sermons, okay, 28 sermons. And then I showed my wife, you know, I was going to say a joke. I was going to say, then my wife wrote all my sermons out for me. But no, no, that didn't happen. That didn't happen. But you can kind of see where I'm coming from now. Why I've told this the perfect man. And of course, as a pastor, I should be someone that is looked up to as a mature Christian, as a Christian with a lot of experience. And maybe yeah, even as a Christian who might be operating on autopilot, I don't give things a lot of thought in my life. I just automatically apply biblical principles, biblical understandings to things. And it's not that hard. I don't need a lot of focus. I don't need a lot of concentration. It just it just comes naturally. And so I started to realize, yeah, that might be a fault in my preaching. Maybe I've not covered things that are just subconscious to me. Okay. Now, when we talk about being for the sermon this morning, a perfect man, I'm not talking about in terms of salvation, we can say that yes, you know, the moment you got saved, you are perfected in a sense because your soul has been saved, your spirit has been resurrected. And you've been forgiven of your sins. And if you were to die today, you'd be 100% sure you'd be in heaven. So your salvation is perfected. It's complete, isn't it? That's the other word for perfect. It doesn't mean that you don't make mistakes. But perfection basically means that you're complete. And the moment you believe on Jesus Christ, yes, you have been made perfect. Your salvation is complete, your soul is saved. But that's not what I'm referring to today. Nor am I talking about being perfect as far as the resurrection, the new resurrected body, we know that even though we are saved, we're going to continue to sin in these fleshly bodies. And we're going to praise God stop sinning, when we receive that new resurrected body, we'll be able to function physically in body and never sin. And yeah, that would be the perfection of our bodily salvation. Okay, but that's not what I'm referring to either. So one point is salvation, one point is the resurrection. What I'm talking about being perfect, man, I'm talking between that period, from the time that you are saved, to the time that you go home to be with God in heaven, or you you know, make it to the rapture and the resurrection, the time we have in this earth, we ought to be striving to be a perfect man, complete, mature. And again, I'm not talking about sinless here. None of us can be sinless. Amen. The new man is sinless. Of course, the old man continues to sin. I'm not talking about sinless here. I'm not talking about not making mistakes. I'm just saying mature, well rounded and perfected to some extent with the Lord God is able to look down on us and say, that is a perfect man. That is a perfect woman. And these this is achievable. This is achievable in our Christian life. Look at Ephesians 4-11, please Ephesians 4-11. It says, and this is, of course, referencing the local church, and he gave some apostles and some prophets, and some evangelists, and some pastors and teachers. Why? Why do we need all these men? For the perfecting of the saints. So this is about saints that are already saved. Saved the saints need to be perfected. In what sense? For the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ. Look at verse number 13. Till, so this is, this is what we're trying to achieve as we try to perfect the saints. Till we all come in the unity of the faith, that's number one, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, that's number two, and to a perfect man number three, and to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ. That's number four. There are four key things in this verse here that we strive to do as we are coming here preaching from God's Word in church. You see, if you neglect church, if you do not attend church, you will not develop into the perfect man. We need church. We need training. We need doctrines preached in order for us to take on that, you know, get to that level where God can look down upon us and say you are perfect. You are perfect, okay. Now in saying this, our church has been operating for four years, and I truly believe that every sermon that's ever been preached in our four-year history of our church, if each one of us took every sermon and made every change necessary that every sermon has called you to make a change on, you know, every doctrine that's been preached, you learn every doctrine, okay, if you apply every sermon for the last four years perfectly in your life, I would say you would already be the perfect man. Like I'm not saying that there's been anything in our preaching that has been missed. I don't believe anyone is purposely trying to avoid subjects in the Bible. If we just took everything on board, none of us can of course, you would be the perfect man already. I truly believe that, okay, but it's not humanely possible. I understand that when someone preaches a sermon, you know, there might be five points in a sermon, there might be six points in a sermon, and usually you may only be able to apply one of those things, you know, realistically. And many times people hear a whole sermon, they understand what is being taught, but they don't apply any of those things. Like their life will not change because of a sermon, and that's just between that individual and the Lord God, okay. But it's important that as preachers that we feed people the word of God, so they're able to do something with that knowledge, make a change in their life, and become more perfected as time goes on. And so once again, this is not talking about being like just this sinless amazing person, because once again when you look at verse number sorry verse number 13 again, there are those four elements, right. The first thing that was mentioned was the unity of the faith. The importance of preaching doctrines is that at the core fundamental level of our beliefs and our doctrines and our understanding, we ought to be on the same page, okay. Once again I don't expect that we're all going to agree with everything about every little aspect of the Bible, every little, you know, tertiary item of faith, but when it comes to the fundamental core beliefs, you know, the purpose for preaching doctrine is that as a church we be united in faith, in our beliefs, in our doctrines of our church. And then the next thing that says, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, of course Jesus Christ being the Son of God, this is very similar to how we read about other churches that were dealing with other Jesuses. We need to make sure that the Jesus we believe in is the Jesus of the Bible, the Jesus that saves. You know, the Jesus of the Roman Catholic Church does not save. The Jesus of oneness theology does not save. The Jesus of the Pentecostals, it doesn't save. The Jesus of the Jehovah Witnesses does not save. The Jesus of the Mormon Church does not save. We need to make sure that we have the right knowledge of the Son of God, and he is the Son of God. He's not the Father. He's not the Holy Spirit. We understand that through the Son we have access to the Father. Through the Son we get given the Holy Spirit to minister in our lives. And so that's the second point. That's the other important aspect of church that we come to understand the true Son of God. And then it says unto a perfect man, unto a perfect man, okay? And again this is what this series will attempt to do. Now when it comes to this series, the perfect man, these sermons are going to be standalone. You know, it's not going to feel like it's part of a larger series, but it's just things that I think are very important. Things that I believe if we just apply in our lives, it's going to make, you know, a significant difference in our Christian world. You know, it's going to play a major part into becoming that perfect man. And again, I do believe this standard of the perfect man is attainable in our current life. In our current, whatever situation you find yourself in life, I do believe being a perfect man in the eyes of God is attainable in this Christian life. Because then the fourth part is unto the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ. So even though we may reach the point of being a perfect man, we're still striving even as a perfect man to get to that stature of the fullness of Christ. We're trying to be more like Christ Jesus. And you know what? That's going to be a lifelong journey. That you will never get to that point where you're just because, listen, unless you get you become sinless in this life, then you'll never really be 100% like Jesus Christ. And that's why the new resurrected body, that perfection of salvation, the bodily resurrection is where we get to that point where we're actually like Christ. I'll just read to you from 1 John 3, 2, which says, Beloved, now are we the sons of God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be. But we know that when he shall appear, we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is. So when Christ returns and we're resurrected, the rapture, we're given those new bodies, we shall be like him. That'll be the completion of our journey as we mature and grow and be more like Christ, okay? But just because that's something that's still in the future doesn't mean we can't make the steps. Step number one is to become that perfect man, right? If you feel in verse number 13, that we already have the unity of the faith, then I believe we have that already. If you believe we already have the right knowledge there of the son of God, I say we have that already. Now the next thing is, well, are we working towards that perfect man? You know, can God look down upon you and say, this is a perfect man, this is a perfect woman, that ought to be the next step. And if we achieve that, okay, that's not the end of our growth, that's not the end of our work for the Lord, we ought to be striving to meet up to that measure of Jesus Christ will ultimately be fulfilled at the resurrection. Let's keep going, verse number 14 there in Ephesians 4-14. What's the purpose of this? That we henceforth be no more children, okay? Well, that makes sense. If we're going to be perfected, we're going to be complete, we're going to be mature, we're no longer going to be children of the faith, but we're going to grow up and be spiritual adults, okay? And that's what I believe a perfect man is, a spiritual adult, okay? It says that we henceforth be no more children, tossed to and fro, carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the slight of men and cunning craftiness, whereby they lie in weight to deceive. But speaking the truth in love, look at this, may grow up into him, that's into Christ in all things, which is the head, even Christ. And so our entire Christian life, brethren, is to grow up, okay? Now maybe you've been saved a long time. You know, there are many people that have been saved for many, many years, okay? But they're still children. Can you believe it? They've not learned to grow. You know, when it comes to our physical bodies, we have no choice. Our physical bodies will become from child to teenager to adult, regardless of how mature mentally you are. But the spiritual life is not like that. You can actually remain to be a child your entire life, be saved. And you know, there are many people that we've won to the Lord, door to door soul winning, which will never get plugged into church, they will never start reading their Bibles, they're going to remain a newborn babe the entire life that they live, okay? And that's just the reality of it. But you know, the reason you're in church, I'm sure is that you say, well, I don't want to be a child of the faith. I don't want to remain a baby in Christ. I want to mature and grow. I don't want to be like a child that might get tossed to and fro with every wind of doctrine. I want to grow up and gain knowledge and become that perfect man. And so I do believe the perfect man refers to Christian maturity, of course, yeah, growing up into Christ and that spiritual adults. How would you describe a perfect man? You know, if you want to look at a Christian say, Moi, this person is a is a, again, not sinless. He does. It's not that he doesn't make mistakes. It doesn't mean he doesn't have any problems or any troubles. Okay. But what what fun qualities or yet would you find? What kind of attributes would you be thinking about? If you were looking upon someone as a perfect man? If you were judging yourself? Am I a perfect man? You know, what kind of attributes would you be looking for? And I'll give you some things that I personally think about. Number one, I would say, of course, not sinless. But generally speaking, this is someone who walks in holiness. Okay. He's separated from the world. There's something different about this person. Okay. It doesn't reflect just like every other man, or he doesn't just reflect a baby in Christ. There's definitely mature in his person, of course, not sinless, it's still going to make mistakes. I would say this person is spiritually and mentally strong. Okay, so you might go through difficulties and hardships, but it's like he doesn't crack. All right, it doesn't like it doesn't lose control of his emotions, he's able to get through those challenges and stay spiritually and mentally strong. I would say this person is a hard worker and productive, right? He fulfills the task that God has for him. And if it's a man, he goes out working and provides for himself and works hard. And if it's a woman, you know, she she's looking for the option to get married and have children to raise the children in nurture and admission of the Lord. You know, I would say that if it's a family man, if it's a married man, that it's very clear that this man is the head of his home, and that he has a submissive wife that he has faithful children. I would say that this man doesn't is not necessarily rich. It's not about being rich. But when it comes to his finances, he's got it together. He knows the biblical principles when it comes to his finances, right? It's not like he's struggling to to pay debts and struggling to pay for different things that he's got his finances together. He's organized and orderly applying those biblical principles. I would say this is a man that obviously loves God, obviously loves his church. He prioritizes his Lord and his church over other activities that might tickle his fancy. I would say this person is also zealous to win souls for the kingdom of God. He he has a love for the lost. He loves loves the gospel message. And he wants to take as many people with him to heaven as he can. I would say this man has a good reputation, not just amongst Christians, not just in the church, but a good reports, you know, in his workplace, a good report in his family, a good reputation. Everywhere he goes, people generally look at him go, man, that's a good man. That's a good woman. As far as I mean, look, it shouldn't be that difficult. We live in such a wicked world, it shouldn't be that difficult to stand out and be different and have that good reputation, right. And I would say that, once again, that he remains faithful, regardless of the problems that he finds himself in, he remains faithful to the Lord, he doesn't get angry at the Lord, he doesn't blame the Lord, he understands that whatever problem we're going through, God, you've allowed this, you're giving me this opportunity for whatever reason, Lord, and I'm going to remain faithful to you. Let's have a look at some biblical principles now, or biblical attributes of what makes up this faithful man. If you can go to James chapter one, go to James chapter one, and verse number four. James chapter one, verse number four. And as we work through this series, the perfect man, you know, this, this sermon right now, this this first sermon is basically just to be an introduction to the series. That's what I'm, that's how I'm looking at the sermon right now. Okay. An introduction to the series, but James chapter one, verse number four. It says, but let patience have her perfect work, that ye may be perfect, and entire, wanting nothing. So the Bible actually gives us the definition of perfect right here. Okay. That you may be perfect and entire. How else would we say that? Whole. Okay. You're whole. Okay. Wanting nothing. Wanting nothing means you're not lacking anything, right? There's nothing lacking in your life. Generally speaking, you've got it together. So this is a man, it's a woman who's got it together. They've got life in control, right? And really, it's the Lord that's helping them. It's the Lord that's, that's giving them the ability, the wisdom, the knowledge, the ability, the enabling to just function in life and, and just do well, right? He's able to, to just, it just looks like every, every situation, he's prepared for that situation, right? His perfect, entire, wanting nothing. So notice that this is achievable. It's not like it's unachievable, definitely is achievable. Again, we're not talking about being at the level of Jesus Christ, because that is ultimately going to be fulfilled at the resurrection. But notice also in James chapter one, verse number four, which it begins by saying, let patience have her perfect work, that you may be perfect and entire, wants nothing. So the key that unlocks the perfect man is patience. Patience is a quality, you know, long suffering is a fruit of the Spirit that we must develop. If you are not patient, if you are not long suffering, you will not be the perfect man. You can just choke it down. If I don't want to work, if you say, look, I don't want to work with patience. I don't want to develop this in my life, then you're not going to be the perfect man. Okay, that's just patience is that which works the perfect man. Okay. And so of course, one of the other attributes of the perfect man in accordance this would be that his, his patient, meaning that he's gone through suffering, he's gone through difficulties that has helped him develop that patience. Can you please go to James chapter three, turn to James chapter three. And I'm going to read to you from first Peter 5 10, you go to James chapter three, I'll read to you from first Peter 5 10, which says, but the God of all grace, who have caught us unto his eternal glory by Christ Jesus, after that you have suffered a while, make you perfect, establish, strengthen, settle you. So what is it that makes us perfect according to first Peter 5 10, after you have suffered a while? Okay, so the perfect man is not a man who doesn't suffer. It's a man who knows how to conduct himself in the midst of suffering, right? He's able to see the hand of God, he's able to know how God is using this suffering to develop patience, or to develop something that man's life, right? That suffering makes you perfect. What else? establish, strengthen, settle you. These are other great attributes of a perfect man. He's stable. All right, he's not unstable, right? I'm sure you've we might, you know, think in our minds, people that we know, they're just unstable. They'll say one thing and do the complete opposite. You know, they get emote too emotionally excited or too emotionally upset about situations, you know, you know, they make storms that, you know, what has that saying go, you know, storm in the teacup kind of situation, right? Little problems, they just can't handle little issues, and it blows up and they create a massive storm because of a little problem. You know, that is not a perfect man. The perfect man is established, is settled, right? He's what has strengthened, he's strong, he's able to go through the suffering and still remain faithful, serving God strong, you know, not having lost control, not having that mental breakdown, etc. You're in James chapter three, verse number one, James chapter three, verse number one. What else can we learn about the perfect man? James chapter three, verse number one says, my brethren, be not many masters, knowing that we shall receive the greater condemnation, for in many things we offend all. So what this is saying is that if you're a master, you know, if you have authority, you can't help but offend people, you're going to offend people, like, it's, you know, there's one thing to offend people, because you've done wrong, you've actually sinned against somebody, that's one way to offend. But another way to offend people is to do nothing wrong, is to just, you know, speak the truth, just stand on biblical principles, you know, believe the Bible, and you're still gonna offend people. In other words, you know, regardless of, you know, what authority you may have upon someone, you're always going to offend the people that are under you. You know, as a father, I'm sure there are times I've offended my wife, I've offended my kids, as a pastor, I'm sure there are times that I've offended my church members, okay. But I hope the offense has been been by speaking the truth. I can't say that I'm always 100% doing that. I'm sure I've offended people by just being stupid, right? I'm sure I've offended people by saying nasty things or wrong things, or maybe being overly sarcastic and not thinking about the consequences of how someone might feel about that. I'm sure that has happened as well. But notice that it's something that cannot be changed, right? You cannot live a life and think, I'll never offend anyone. It's just gonna happen even as much as you strive not to do anything wrong, just doing right will offend people, okay? But we keep going there, which says in verse number two, if any man offend not in word, look at this, the same is a perfect man, and able also to bridle the whole body. What else do we learn about the perfect man? The perfect man is someone that does not offend in word, okay? Again, this is not talking about speaking the truth and standing on biblical principles, but I'm saying the perfect man is someone that's not going around causing problems, having constant conflicts. You know, if you find yourself constantly in conflict, you know, whether it's people in church, whether it's your family, whether it's your workplace, the problem is you, okay? It's not other people. It's not everyone else is a problem, and I'm just like wonderful and perfect. No, if you're constantly offending people, that's just your lifestyle. It's just your life measures up to just constantly having conflict and arguments. The problem is you. You are not a perfect man, you know, and I hope this series will help you develop and become that perfect man, but not only is it that the perfect man has control over his voice, over what comes out of his mouth, it says, and able also to bridle the whole body, right? His body is generally speaking again, because we're not perfect. We're not sinless, I should say. You know, this body needs to be subject to Christ. You know, this body belongs to God. He's purchased us with a price. This body is the temple of the Holy Ghost, and so the perfect man understands that he's got to keep his body pure, right? It's got to be for the purpose of the Lord God. This is not a body for fornication. This is not a body for intoxication. It's not a body for drugs, and it's not a body for pornography and all kinds of filthiness that people, you know, seek after. No, you know, this body needs to be bridled, needs to be under control, the control of the Lord. This is also another reflection of what a perfect man is, okay? So not a man who's involved in excessive sins, okay? Where, you know, basically he does the same kind of sins, the same level of sins as any ungodly, you know, wicked person in this earth would do. No, you know, that's not, that would not make up a perfect man, but generally speaking, a man who has control of his body would be that perfect man. Please go to Matthew chapter 5. Go to Matthew chapter 5 and verse 143. Matthew chapter 5 and verse 143. I hope as we're going through this, you can say, well, it's a high standard. It is a high standard. It is a high standard. When you think about an adult, I believe the Bible teaches that an adult, you become an adult at the age of 20, okay? And then you consider, you consider the adult and what they're able to do in life. And then you consider a newborn baby. Wouldn't you say there's a massive difference in what they can achieve and what they can do, how strong they are, how productive they can be, a huge difference. And so the perfect man, spiritually speaking, is also a high standard. You know what, as I said, it might take, yeah, it takes, you know, obviously in the Bible, 20 years to be an adult. Hey, it might take you 20 years of your spiritual life to get to the point where you can say, hey, you know, I've developed into that perfect man. I believe, you know, at the end of the day, God's the one that judges. God is the one that looks down and claims whether you're perfect or not. But, you know, it may very well take 20 spiritual years that you're working, being in church, learning doctrines, applying truth, right? Living out our Christian life. You know, I'm not saying 20 years and you just, because like I said, you can be safe for 20 years and still be a baby in Christ, okay? Because you've not learned, you've not applied anything, you've not read the Bible, you've not been in fellowship, not been going to church, et cetera, et cetera. So it is definitely a high standard. And I want to show you just how high the standard is. In Matthew 5 43, the words of Jesus Christ, it says, you have heard that it has been said, thou shall love thy neighbor and hate thine enemy. By the way, the Bible never says hate your enemy, okay? So when Jesus Christ says this, this is not something that is coming from the word of God, though the first part is, thou shall love thy neighbor, that is definitely found in the scriptures, but hate thine enemy is not found in the scriptures. So this is a saying that people have been using, right? They've taken parts of the Bible and say, well, because the Bible says we ought to love our enemies, and therefore, I guess that means we're free to hate our enemies, okay? So Jesus Christ is dealing with this issue. Verse number 44, but I say unto you, love your enemies. I mean, isn't that a high standard? How easy is it to love your enemy? How easy is it to love those that want to hurt you, okay? It's not easy. It's a high standard. Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you and persecute you. Look at verse number 45, that ye may be the children of your father which is in heaven, for he maketh his son. This is how God deals with his believers or non-believers. This is how he deals with the saints or the wicked. It says, for he maketh his son to rise on the evil and on the good, and send the rain on the just and on the unjust. You know what Christ is saying here? Even God loves wicked people. Even God loves the unjust. Even God loves people that, you know, would look down and say, these are enemies to the Gospel. These are enemies to the Bible. He still sends the, he still gives them the sun. He still gives them the rain, okay? And it's showing that when it comes to our Lord God, you know, he's not, again, he's not a respecter of persons, okay? He's going to show his love to all of humanity, and of course the climax of his love is the sacrifice of his son. The Gospel, salvation, being open to all men. No matter how excessively wicked one is, or how one might be only four years old and believe the Gospel, Jesus Christ came and died for the sins of all men. God is not a respecter of persons when he comes to salvation, and that is the ultimate fulfillment of God's love to the whole world. It keeps going, verse number 46, for if you love them which love you, what reward have you? Do not even the publicans the same? If, and if you salute your brethren only, what do you more than others? Do not even the publican soul? Look at verse number 48. Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect. Is this saying because the Father is sinless, you need to be sinless as well? That's not what it's saying. It's saying the way that God the Father has shown his love to the just and the unjust, the good and the evil, that's a sign of perfection. That when we are striving to be perfect, even as our Father which is in heaven is perfect, that ought to be how we conduct ourselves. That we don't just love our neighbors, we don't just love our church members, we don't just love our brethren, our brothers, sisters, and the Lord, but we're able to actually love the unsaved. That we can actually love the lost. We actually generally love people, in general, because God created them. God gave them a soul. God gave them a personality, okay, and we ought to be able to at least love that person to the to the point of wanting to give them the gospel and seeing them saved. You know, there are two kind of extremes that I've seen in church amongst Christians, which is, you know, in contrast to what we just read here. There are some Christians, and I've come across many like this, that say, you know, I don't know what it is with me. They'll say, I can't get along with people in church. You know, I just, you know, sometimes I hate my bravery in church. No, I don't hate, you know, my brother and sister in church. I just can't get along with them. I can't connect. I can't relate to the people in church. But somehow, when it comes to the ungodly, when it comes to my work colleagues, when it comes to the people, my friends, you know, godless, I can get along with them. Why is that? You know, and sometimes that same person will blame the people in church and say, Well, must be them. They're too weird. That's so unusual. Okay, they're not normal or something, right? That's one extreme. That's, that's wrong. That's wrong. You know, a true sign of maturity is that you at least love your brethren. In fact, that is a demonstration that you have been saved that you actually love the brethren. You know, if people say I hate people in church, generally speaking, right? Every, you know, I just hate you. I hate Christians, you know, that's pretty much a sign that you're not even saved. Okay, because the new man can't help but love the people of God. It's your brother and sister, spiritually speaking in the Lord. The other extreme is, you know, and maybe this is someone that's trying to be hyper spiritual. That's, I just, I can't, I can't even be in the midst of ungodly people. You know, I go to work and they're unsaved. They listen to wicked worldly music. They tell dirty jokes and, you know, I can't even, I can't even get along with these people. I can't even work with these people. I can't do anything with these people. The only people that I can be attached to are my saved brethren. You know, the only people that I can truly feel comfortable with amongst it is just amongst the saved. And, you know, that's one, that's another extreme. You know, God wants us to be able to function in society. God, yes, you know, we ought to have a closer relationship, you know, a greater love for the brethren, but you know what? We still ought to be able to function in the world. We still have a life to live. We still have souls to save. We still have family to get along with. We still have work to do. We have to function in society. You know, we need to learn how to be like the father where he sends his reign on the just and on the unjust. Okay. The perfect man is what I'm saying here, brethren, is the perfect man is able to function in society. Okay. Whether it's amongst the godless or whether it's amongst the believers, he's still consistent. It's still the same person. Okay. He's able to get along with people, generally speaking, right? He's matured. He's grown. He understands that the ungodly are going to be ungodly. He understands the wicked are going to do wicked things, but there's still a life to live. There's still, you know, a society to live amongst. There's still a world that we have to function within. You know, if God did not want us to function in this world, he would have taken us to heaven a long time ago. Be ye therefore perfect. Notice that verse 48 is a command. It's not optional. It's not God. It's not God is not saying, well, if you want to be perfect, be perfect. And you know, it's up to you to know, be ye therefore perfect. This is something that we need to work toward. Okay. As we mature, as we grow. And again, church is so important. This is why God has given us pastors and teachers, evangelists, the things that we read about earlier, right? To perfect the saints. Be ye therefore perfect. Now it does require effort. It does require a lot of work. This is not supposed to be easy. Okay. It's not supposed to be easy. And, uh, and while it is a command, I do believe if you can turn to Psalms, please go to Psalms 37. Go to Psalm 37. I do believe that very few, very few Christians will actually get to that point where God can look down and say, this person is perfect. This person is entire wanting nothing. Okay. Even though it is a command that we ought to be striving for, I think it's very few that actually get to that stage. Psalm 37, 37, please. And we've not looked at this too long ago because we've been going through Psalms, but Psalm 37, 37, it says, mark the perfect man and behold the upright for the end of that man is peace. Notice that like, if it's just, if every Christian, every saints, you know, automatically just was perfect. Was that perfect man? Why would you need to mark the perfect man? Why, why is it the reason it's saying mark the perfect man is because they're not, there's not many of them. There's very few of them. If you come across someone and you say, boy, this person just has it together, right? You can see he loves the Lord. He's able to function well. He's productive. He serves the Lord. He loves the, you know, his family. He's just, he's just seemingly got it together, right? You say, well, I'm going to mark that perfect man. You know, there's maturity in that person. There's mental maturity, the spiritual maturity, right? In that man. You know, this man clearly is a good example of what a Christian ought to be like. Mark that perfect man and behold the upright for the end of that man is peace. You know, God wants us to really have peace. You know, even in a troubled world, even in a COVID world, even when things are going crazy and you just don't know, we know what one day might lead to the next. Okay. Even if we're in matching, what we know world war one day, right. Or world war three or something like that, right? The perfect man is still someone who's able to go through those years of difficulties and hardships and still remain at peace. Okay. And so it's good to set some examples to have some men, you know, ultimately at the end of the day, it's Jesus Christ that we need to set our eyes upon. But when we see perfect men or perfect women, we ought to mask that person and say, wait, this tells me that this is achievable. Even though it requires work and effort and time, it is achievable. Man can get to that point where we, this is a perfect man. That is therefore something that I want to get to. That is a level that I want to get up to. And I'm going to try to use these examples as my, as a motivation for me to get to that level as well. Okay. Can you please go to Genesis six, go to Genesis six and verse number seven, Genesis six and verse number seven. Now I want to give you some examples of where God looks down upon people and calls them perfect, the perfect man. And again, this is not about salvation. Okay. Because if it was about salvation, then we're all perfect men. Okay. But there's those times where God himself will, you know, identify one person in particular and say, this person is a perfect man. Genesis chapter six, please. Genesis chapter six and verse number seven. And I think now that when we consider what a perfect man is and put it all together, it gives us a better outlook because we're going to be looking at Noah here, you know, to get us a better idea of the kind of man that Noah was, right? Genesis chapter six, verse number seven. And the Lord said, I will destroy man whom I have created from the face of the earth, both man and beast and the creeping thing and the fowls of the air. For it repenteth me that I have made them, but Noah found grace in the eyes of the Lord. These are the generations of Noah. Look at this. Noah was a just man and perfect in his generations and Noah walked with God. Another sign of a perfect man. This perfect man walks with God. He's in fellowship with the Lord. He's praying to look, speaking to the Lord, right? Meditating on God's word, spending time with God. You know, if God looked down at your life right now, would he say, you know, this man, this woman, this child walks with me. If you say, well, I don't really walk with God as much as I should, then you need to work on that. You know, if you want to be the perfect man and that's a command, you should want to be the perfect man. You need to walk with God. Why was Noah chosen? I mean, think about God choosing you. And so God's saying to you, I'm going to destroy everything. Every man, every creature. I'm sick of this world. It's so wicked, but I've looked down and I've seen a just man, a perfect man in his generations. That's you. And you're, I'm going to use you to build an ark. You're going to be you and your family, your children, you know, your wife, they're going to be the only family that survived my destruction. Just think about the mental strength somebody has to have. Like think about the spiritual strength somebody has to have to say, boy, God, you know, I mean, this would boggle our minds, wouldn't it? You know, to see and understand God's destructive nature, destroying the entire world and just me and my family get away, you know, get away safe, safely from this situation. Think about the mental strength to then faithfully build this ark as well. And you know, to do the things that God asked from a man. No wonder he chose Noah. No wonder Noah stood out amongst his generation, amongst society, a society that is so wicked. Noah just stood out. God looked down to this earth and you know what, if it were not for Noah, you could, you know, yeah, that'd be the end. That would be the end. Okay. Noah was not just saved, but he got to a point where God could look down and say, this is a perfect man. Okay. And the perfect man is able to go through something like God's judgment, the destruction of the entire earth, and still come out on the other end. Now again, was Noah sinless? No. We know that after he got off the ark, he got drunk, he got naked, right, and became foolish a little bit there toward the end. Okay. I'm not saying the man is sinless. You know, I can almost understand when you just see the destruction of the entire world. You know, every single man and every animal, except those that were in the ark, ultimately destroyed, I can see that, you know, it was overwhelming. Okay. But still, he was able to accomplish such a great job, such a great mission for the Lord God, because he was that perfect man. Please go to Genesis 17. Go to Genesis 17, verse number one. Genesis 17, verse number one. Let's have a look at another man that God looks down and says, that is perfect. Okay. Genesis 17, verse number one. Well, actually, this, yeah, well, we're going to look at Abraham here. Okay. But look at Genesis 17, verse one. I'll put it together once we read it. Genesis 17, verse one. It says, and when Abram was 99, sorry, 90 years old and nine, the Lord appeared to Abram and said unto him, I am the almighty God. Walk before me and be thou perfect. Okay. Notice once again, the reason I wanted to read this, notice once again, that being perfect requires that we walk with the Lord. Walk before me and be thou perfect. You notice that all these little, you know, important aspects of our Christian life are necessary. Okay. In order for us to develop and become that perfect man. Now, again, to turn to another passage, please go to Job chapter one. Job chapter one, verse number one. And of course, Job is a great example of a perfect man. But go to Job chapter one and verse number one. Job chapter one and verse number one. It reads, there was a man in the land of Oz, whose name was Job. Look at this. And that man was perfect and upright and one that feared God and issued evil. Okay. When evil came, he didn't want to be part of evil, right? He kept away from evil things. He was a perfect man. Upright. Okay. God looks down at Job and says, this is a perfect man. So you can see it's achievable. Okay. It is achievable. Look, drop down to verse number eight. Job one, verse eight. And the Lord said unto Satan, has thou considered my servant Job, that there is, look at this, none like him in the earth. Do you think Job at this point in time was the only safe person? Of course not. Okay. There are many safe people at this point on time on the earth. Job lived around the time of Abraham, for example. Okay. But notice that when God looks down and says, look, this is, there is none like him on the earth. You know, he's perfect. A perfect and an upright man, one that fear of God and is sure of evil. You see how God is able to look down from his heaven, look upon the earth and identify the perfect man. You notice that this is not about being saved. This is about someone who has grown in his spiritual maturity. Okay. And he stands out. Again, it's very few and far between that you come across the perfect man. Okay. If we lived in the time of Job, you know, we knew we were one of Job's friends. We know Job's friends were pretty stupid, right? Ungodly. But if we were one of Job's friends, just in general speaking, right, we knew him. Would you say that's a perfect man. Hey, mark that perfect man. Mark Job. You know, Job is going to be a great example, a great encouragement, a motivating factor for me to become perfect for the Lord as well. But once again, when we look at Job, what did he go through? He suffered a great deal. I don't believe any of us are going to suffer as much as Job did. He lost his family, his children, his 10 children, first 10 children died, right? He lost his possessions. He lost his wealth. He got sick in his body. And, you know, Satan tried to destroy him. And, you know, Satan tried to cause Job to blaspheme against the Lord. And yet Job maintained his integrity throughout the whole challenge. You know, his own friends turned against Job. Job remained faithful unto the Lord. He was strong. He was mentally strong. He was spiritually strong, right? He was a perfect man. You notice that about the perfect man. Let's say Noah, say Job, they've gone through great hardships, great problems, but they were able to get through to the other side, okay, because they were perfect. And I truly believe if you develop into that person, the perfect man, the perfect woman, it doesn't matter what the world throws at you, you're going to get through it, okay? Once again, the perfect man is not someone that doesn't have troubles, doesn't go through problems. I'm not a perfect man. He's not someone that never sins. It's a perfect man who's able to remain faithful, strong, secure, get through those hardships. And at the end of his life, he's still at peace. He's still keeping his integrity, okay? He hasn't lost the plot. He remains faithful. How many people have we observed over the years who started very faithful to the Lord, seemingly strong in their faith, seemingly loving God and loving the people of God, loving church, and then they just fall away? They never got to that point of developing into the perfect man, okay? They fell away, right? For whatever reason, life got too hard, it got too challenging, it got too difficult, and they didn't remain faithful, okay? They became faithless. So I don't want anyone in our church to ever be that way. You know, we are all going to struggle and go through challenges, but I want to see you go through those things, remain perfect, be at peace, be strong, okay? And remain, you know, faithfully serving God no matter how hard, you know, this life can get. But yeah, Noah, the flood, and Job, and his great suffering, why could they go through this? Why is it that God allowed them and chose them for this purpose? Because they were perfect, okay? God knew they would be fine at the end of it all. Can you please go to Colossians chapter 4? Colossians chapter 4 verse 12. Now as I said, this entire series that I'll be working through, the perfect man series, is to help you get to that point, okay? It's going to be a lot of practical applications to your life, and I hope you pay attention and apply it, okay? But there are steps that we can take, okay? Just obvious steps that we need to take to develop that. There's no point in listening to this series and think it's just, that's it, now I'm going to be the perfect man. No, you need to put some work into it as well, okay? Colossians chapter 4 verse number 12. Colossians 4, 12. How can you become a perfect man? Colossians 4 chapter, yeah, verse 12. Colossians chapter 4 verse 12. It says, Epaphras, who is one of you, a servant of Christ, salute of you, look at this, always laboring fervently for you in prayers. Why is Epaphras constantly praying for the church in Colossae, the saints of the Colossian church? That ye may stand perfect and complete in all the will of God. You know what Epaphras was praying? He was praying for the entire Colossian church to become the perfect man, to become the perfect woman. He labored fervently in prayers. You know what? If you want to be the perfect man, you need to labor fervently in prayer and say, God, I want to be the perfect man. Lord, I need to mature. Lord, I need to grow and be more like Christ. Lord, I need to know more doctrine. Please help me. Ask God continually, look, laboring fervently, not just a quick prayer, you know, quick two seconds, Lord, make me a perfect man, but go before God with all your heart and say, God, please mature me. And then be like Epaphras, not just me, Lord, my whole church. Lord, please make New Life Baptist Church a perfect church, perfect men, perfect women, okay? And pray fervently for others as well. You know, if you skip the praying, it's not going to happen. Please go to the Lord God on your knees, eyes closed, bow your head before an amazing God and say, God, I need to become this perfect man. Please help me work toward that. Please go to 2 Timothy chapter three, 2 Timothy chapter three, verse number 16. A very common passage, very familiar passage to all of you, but maybe we've not really stopped and thought about what it's saying here. 2 Timothy chapter three, verse number 16. 2 Timothy chapter three, verse number 16. It says, all scripture, all scripture, all of it, Genesis to Revelation, is given by inspiration of God and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness. Why? Why does God give us all this? Verse number 17, that the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works. What's going to make you perfect, brethren? All scripture. If you've not read the Bible cover to cover, you are not going to be the perfect man. You are not the perfect man. You cannot be the perfect man right now if you've not read the scriptures cover to cover, okay? This ought to be an important part of your life. You know, you can't be like, oh man, we're up to Leviticus here, we're up to Deuteronomy, Repetition, the Psalms, again, they're all just very similar. All scripture, you need it all, brethren. Don't be like, I'll just read Revelation because it's exciting, it's the future. And you know, Revelation, I was like that as a child. I think I gave you, I told you the story. I'd go to church and I was so bored of the preaching, my watered down Baptist union church, and I just read Revelation over and over and over and over. It's exciting, right? It's an exciting book, but you know what? If I just read Revelation, I would not be the perfect man. It's the last book of the Bible. God has given us so many other books, 65 other books before we get to the last book to help us be that perfect man. So we ought to be reading our Bible, not just reading the Bible. Notice what it said again, it says, it's profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness, okay? In other words, you have to allow yourself to be taught. Yes, correct it, correct it, right? When you hear something preached behind this pulpit or you hear, you read something in the Bible and you know you're wrong. You know you're not living up to the standard God wants for you. You know this is a sin that you're just not fighting. You're just allowing it to fester in your life and you know you're wrong. You say, I need to be corrected, God. You need to humble yourself and, you know, put away the pride and say, God, I'm not, man, I'm not perfect. I've got a problem in this area, God, you know, and be willing to be corrected. You know, if you're not willing to be corrected, you're going to get offended at New Life Baptist Church, okay? You know, we preach God's Word. We try our best, not just me, the other preacher. We try the best we can with the power of the Holy Spirit to preach uncompromising sermons. We want the truth to help you so you can grow and to learn. If you just get offended every time you hear something that you don't like, you're not going to grow into the perfect man, okay? You want to take the view that if I get offended behind the pulpit, no, it's not like someone's trying to actually, you know, just pull you aside, single you out and say, hey, you know, brother so-and-so, you know, the sins is done. Yeah, you, yeah, you know, it'd be fair for you to get offended if I ever did something like that, okay? Our job is just to preach the whole Bible, all scripture, okay? And you need to decide, you know what, the preacher behind the pulpit loves me. He's spent time preparing this for me. I might get offended by what I'm hearing today, but I know he does it because he loves me and he's doing it because this is God's way to make me a perfect man, okay? And this is why as preachers, we should not skip the Bible. We should not say, hey, this might be offensive. Hey, every word of God is pure. Every word of God is pure. It is all profitable to help us develop into that perfect man. And you must read all scripture, okay? All scripture is for that purpose. Can you now please turn to Hebrews, chapter 13. Hebrews, chapter 13. Hebrews 13 and verse number 20. Hebrews 13 and verse number 20. I'll give you a moment to turn there. Hebrews 13, verse number 20. So to become that perfect man, what do we do? We pray fervently for it, okay? Number two, we read all scripture. We allow ourselves to be corrected, right? And then Hebrews 13, verse 20. Hebrews 13, verse 20 says, What do we learn here in Hebrews 13, 20 and 21? In order for you to be made perfect, who is it that makes you perfect? Is it you? Well, you do play a part, but it's the work of God. It's the work of God. And so the third point that I have for you, brethren, in order for you to become perfect is you must allow the Lord to do a great work in you. You have to be willing to do this, okay? Don't be stubborn, okay? Be clay that is easily moldable in the hands of the potter, okay? God wants to make you into a beautiful, perfect vessel, and he's going to have to make some changes in your life, okay? Don't grieve the Holy Ghost when he convicts you about certain things, when there are certain issues that you need to change in your life. He will say, God, okay, I'm going to give over my self-will. I'm going to take down my pride. Lord, I'm going to open myself up, and Lord, whatever it is that you need to change in my life, please do it, even if it's going to hurt me. Please sharpen me, even if it's going to hurt me. I want to be more fruitful for you, Lord. I want to be more perfect for you, Lord. I want to be the perfect man, and Lord, I'm willing. Are you willing to say that? I'm willing, whatever area it is of my life, that I'm willing to give that over to you, Lord, so you can make a change in it. You can make me a better man. You can make me a better woman. Lord, whatever it is, whatever, you know, the my activities that I might love and the hobbies that I might enjoy, they may not be sinful, but Lord, if you want to take them away from me so I can just serve you better, Lord, I'm willing to give that up. Lord, if it's, I don't know, whatever issue it might be in your life, Lord, I'm willing to give it up if you want me to do that. Lord, if it's going to cause me some pain, I'm willing for you to work in my life. In other words, you have to be open to change. You have to be open to change in order to become the perfect man, and I'll say to you that the older you become, the harder it is. You know, we all know that the older we get, the more stuck in the ways we become, okay? So I'm talking to the children right now. I'm talking to the teenagers. I'm talking to the young adults right now, all right? If you have the easier journey, it's not going to be an easy journey, but you have the easier journey to become the perfect man, because a lot of us that are married, older with kids, we've lived our lives to some extent, we're kind of just stuck in our ways, and that's not an excuse. Again, we should be all willing to change, amen? We should all be willing to change, but it's just going to be much harder, okay? It's going to be more painful for us that are older to change and become the perfect man. As a young person, you're still easily moldable. You're still developing your thoughts and ideas around the world and around God and biblical issues, and you're still young enough to not make the mistakes that previous generations have made, and so this is a sermon for all of us, but I really want the younger people to focus today. I want you to be a perfect man, a perfect woman. You've got every opportunity to become this person. All right, brethren, in conclusion, I'll quickly read to you from 2 Corinthians 13 11, which says, finally, brethren, farewell, be perfect, be of good comforts, be of one mind, live in peace, and the God of love and peace shall be with you. Let us pray.