After the morning service we will observe the Lord’s Table and enjoy lunch and fellowship together.

Pastor Don Fortner will be with us on Thursday, Nov. 10. He will also be preaching at Dingess, WV. on Friday 7:30 P.M. and Saturday morning at 10:30.

Because He Loves-We Love

1 John 4:19

By the grace of God, I do believe that I love Christ. I know that I don’t love Him like I should. I know that I don’t love Him as I desire to. Yet, I do know that I love Him. The beloved disciple John tells us in our text a great truth that very few know. He tells us that “We love Him, (Christ) BECAUSE He first loved us!”

Salvation is of the Lord! This is the theme of redemption throughout the Bible. There is a reason that I love Christ, and it is BECAUSE He first loved me. His love for His people is the cause of their love for Him. He loves-we love. That is the order of our salvation.

Pastor David Eddmenson

Law And Grace

Rom. 11:5-6

No two things in the world are any different than law and grace. They are as opposite as light and darkness. They can no more agree than fire and wat­er (Rom. 11:5-6). What is so amazing is that, while law and grace are so diametrically opposed, the human mind is so void of spiritual understanding and turned away from God that the most difficult thing for a human to do is to discriminate between the two. Men insist on mixing what God has positively put asunder.

The man who knows the place of the law and the glory of God's free grace, who can rest in Christ alone for all that the law requires and justice de­mands, knows the gospel. The first real difficulty in conversion is to get a man LOST, truly lost! A lost sinner is hard to find. There are plenty of weak people, even sinful people; but only the Holy Spirit can produce a LOST sinner. No law, system of works, or moral code can do him any good.

The second difficulty in conversion is to teach a man THE GOSPEL. Few there be that really find it. This gospel of God's FREE GRACE in Christ comes to the lost sinner without any return on his part. It is the gift of God from beginning to end. Even re­pentance, faith, and good works are His fruit.

The third difficulty in conversion is to bring a believing sinner to REST all of his days in the same grace and love that took him in. We are chosen, called, and kept by His free grace. Faith rests in Christ alone! Faith even excludes itself as a work in salvation, for faith is not a thing upon which the sinner rests or pleads. He rests in Christ and pleads the Saviour's merits. It is not the FACT that we believe but the PERSON whom we be­lieve!

Pastor Henry T. Mahan (1982 bulletin)

For I say unto you, That except your righteousness shall exceed the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees, ye shall in no case enter into the kingdom of heaven" (Matthew 5:20).

There are three kinds of righteousness, or at least three kinds of righteousness which bear that name. There is inherent righteousness, of which we have none. There is imputed righteousness, which is all our justification. And there is imparted righteousness, when God the Spirit makes us new creatures, and raises up in the heart that "new man, which after God" (that is, "after the image of God") "is created in righteousness and true holiness." When the Lord, therefore, said, "Except your righteousness shall exceed the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees, ye shall in no case enter into the kingdom of heaven," He did not mean only an external righteousness wrought out by His obedience to the law for them, but an internal righteousness wrought out by the Holy Spirit in them.

Thus we read of the inward as well as the outward apparel of the Church, "The King's daughter is all glorious within; her clothing is of wrought gold." Two kinds of righteousness belong to the Queen; her imputed righteousness is her outward robe, "the clothing of wrought gold;" but imparted righteousness is her inward adorning, which makes her "all-glorious within." This inward glory is the new man in the heart, with all his gifts and graces, what Peter calls "the divine nature," "Christ in the heart, the hope of glory.” J.C. Philpot

ADDICTED TO THE GOSPEL

I beseech you, brethren, (ye know the house of Stephanas, that it is the firstfruits of Achaia, and that they have addicted themselves to the ministry of the saints) (1 Cor. 16:15).

The word addicted means; to surrender one’s self habitually, or to become dependent upon, or to be very enthusiastic about. We usually use this word in a negative way, but here in reference to the believer it is very positive, "they have addicted themselves to the ministry."

Believers have surrendered to Christ, submitted to Him, His rule and reign (Psalm 110:3; Acts 2:36; Phil. 2:9-10).

Believers are totally dependent upon Christ for all of their salvation (1Cor. 1:30; Phil. 4:19).