[0:00] I would like to read a passage from John 17, friends. I haven't missed anything out, Stephen, no? Which one?
[0:17] Aye, that's okay. I didn't tell you I'd changed it around. Sorry, Stephen. Grace will tell me off after. I was reading it when I came in.
[0:28] It's funny, I thought that would be better there, but I failed to tell you. I had a feeling I hadn't told you. I don't know why that was. But now I feel better, I've confessed. John 17.
[0:40] And we'll read from a few verses at the end of 16, please. Verse 28. Of John 16.
[0:51] The disciples are really getting worried. The Lord is talking about going. Ah, but he has great, tremendous, profound comfort for them.
[1:03] Verse 28 of John 16. I came from the Father and entered the world.
[1:15] Now I am leaving the world and going back to the Father. Then Jesus' disciples said, Now you're speaking clearly and without figures of speech.
[1:31] Now we can see that you know all things and that you do not even need to have anyone ask you questions. This makes us believe that you came from God.
[1:42] Do you now believe? Jesus replied. A time is coming, and in fact has come, when you will be scattered, each to your own home.
[1:59] You will leave me all alone. Yet I am not alone, for my Father is with me. I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace.
[2:13] In this world you will have trouble. But take heart, I have overcome the world. After Jesus said this, he looked towards heaven and prayed, Father, Father, the hour has come, glorify your Son, that your Son may glorify you.
[2:36] For you granted him authority over all people, that he might give eternal life to all those you have given him. Now this is eternal life, that they know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom you have sent.
[3:00] I have brought you glory on earth by finishing the work you gave me to do. And now, Father, glorify me in your presence with the glory I had with you.
[3:12] Listen to these words, friends. before the world began. Explain that to me. The incarnation of Jesus Christ, God becoming man, is the mystery.
[3:32] There's no words to put to it unless you use the Bible. Give me the glory I had with you before the world began.
[3:43] I'm sure there are many wonderful mysteries going to get cleared up when we get to glory. Things we'll never imagine.
[3:58] Wonderful, wonderful words. This is eternal life.
[4:11] This is a definition of eternal life. John 17, 3. This sums up the seven I Am's of Jesus.
[4:24] I am the water of life. You'll never thirst. I am the bread of life. You'll never hunger. So on. This climaxes it.
[4:36] All of them. This is eternal life. Now, this is eternal life. That they know you.
[4:50] Now he's speaking to his Father in heaven. If you're a Christian, the same Father. If you're not a Christian, God is not your Father. It is explained in Ephesians chapter 1.
[5:11] The agape menace of God is the Greek word for his beloved. And in that beloved, a believer is adopted into God's family.
[5:22] We're not born Christians. Nobody is born saved. Nobody. So there has to be, friends, a change.
[5:38] Who brings the change about? It's brought about by God who so loved this world and every single person in it that he gave his only begotten son that whoever believes, whoever believes in them.
[5:58] If Bill Murtough will believe in him, he won't perish on judgment day but will have eternal life. Put your name in there.
[6:10] That's what the old preachers used to preach in Glasgow in the open airs. Put your name in there they used to preach in the open air. And of course anyone in the shops in Woolies or whatever they'd be like oh oh that's a bit personal.
[6:31] But they were faithful preachers and we had a different country when we were allowed to have open airs. We had a different country.
[6:43] Glasgow was a different place. When I became a believer that was the first thing I did. Somebody says where's your guitar bill? It's in the house. Right. The open air chapel shopping centre.
[6:57] That was me for five years in my first of my Christian life. Playing the guitar in public. Singing over a microphone with a number of other people going in and out shops and standing gossiping and standing and some drinking and that's what it was all about.
[7:13] That's what the Christian life was to me. Glasgow has changed. changed. We've changed. We've been changed.
[7:26] But the message hasn't changed. The message is still the same.
[7:37] this is eternal life.
[7:52] It's not enough to go to the park and enjoy the sunshine in the spring and say I know it's wonderful what God has made. I'm a believer. The devil, the demons believe that because they know it's a fact.
[8:08] James, the gospel of James, as it were. Even the demons believe but they've got the sense to tremble when they think about it.
[8:20] Human beings, we haven't got the sense anymore to tremble. God is just a word for blasphemy or anything else. I get sick and tired going on the television to watch something and all I hear is young women and young men saying, oh God, I want to throw the telly out the window.
[8:47] But grace won't let me because we like Doc Martin. And even he does it at times. But our country, we've lost the place and the space for God.
[9:04] God, and the respect, it's gone. But those who go to worship places, who hear the gospel, they've no excuse.
[9:25] And I know humanity because I'm one of you. people will go to church as a victory or a journey of comfort away from the bad world they live in.
[9:41] And that person's in danger of leaving the church and leaving the world and not be the Lord's. Because religiosity has a terribly dangerous, lovely, comforting side to it.
[9:55] And I warn you against it, friends, respectfully. I caution you. Just because a goat mixes with a sheep, it doesn't become a sheep.
[10:09] It's still a goat. goat. And when the Lord comes, what does the parable tell us? He will separate the sheep and the goats.
[10:22] And there'll be a lot of people, it's terrifying to think about what's going to happen in eternity to the people all the time who mixed with sheep who were a goat. But God knows the difference.
[10:37] They know the sheep, they don't follow the shepherd. Following a sheep, you'll get lost. Following a sheep that has a shepherd, the shepherd will separate you from the sheep.
[10:56] That's his job. nature has got such a grip.
[11:09] And now with the whole, I'm trying not to mention COP, but you know what it's all about, trying to save the world and nature.
[11:22] But I know people who go into their garden and if they were really honest, they would get down on their knees and worship God in the garden, but they don't.
[11:35] But that's what they're in there for. I feel near to God, many people. And so you have a beautiful garden, wonderful. But nature doesn't reveal to you what God thinks of your inner soul.
[11:54] That's what the Bible's for. That's why it's Christ-centered. That's why he's prophesied, forecast. That's why the record is there of him, not just forecast, but fulfilled.
[12:12] Be careful of loving nature beyond what you should. Because it's implanted in a human being. Unlike your dog or your goldfish or your budgie, it's implanted in you to appreciate what God has made.
[12:30] Because you're made in his image. But beyond that, it's his plan to save you. Nature won't tell you about that. because you're going to do it.
[12:42] Because you've still got your human nature which is sinful and you're born with it and it doesn't die.
[12:52] it takes you into eternity in darkness. I was going in the night shift.
[13:04] Four 12-hour night shifts. Two years I worked in night shift in Clydebank. Then I moved to Yarrow's to build frigates for the government.
[13:14] and in that two-year period I moved from Clydebank to Yoker to where Yarrow's is. And I was leaving about eight o'clock.
[13:28] When I opened the door to leave, the two children had just been put to bed, my two boys, by my wife. And I shouted, I'll catch you in the morning.
[13:40] when suddenly I was faced with two people, a man and a woman I had never seen in my life. One had a big evangelical smile.
[13:52] I never knew what that was to have seen her. She was to become a missionary in India. And the man, Jim, worked for a London city mission.
[14:05] And I'm stepping out as they're thinking I'm stepping to say hello. I'm stepping, sorry, I've got to catch the bus. We just want to talk to you about God. God.
[14:17] I've got a boat to build. God. Well, we're from the local Baptist church. Is there a Baptist? I didn't know where a Baptist was.
[14:31] No idea. I was brought up in a nominal Roman Catholic family with all its attendant superstitions. and all sorts of things.
[14:46] And I said, my wife said, she wanted to have shouted. So when I got home the next day, and I got up, and I loved to sleep after a 12-hour night shift.
[15:00] You have to wake me up, I'd still be sleeping when I have to start the next one. And she told me all about them. Yeah, they were Bible students from Glasgow.
[15:12] What do they do now here? Well, this is part of Glasgow. They're taking a life in their hands coming out here. She was a lovely Irish English accent, soft English accent.
[15:24] And Jim was the same lovely couple. They weren't husband or wife, they were just two students. This was part of their outreach. about four weeks later, I found myself getting out of bed early and getting ready for the coming.
[15:49] Why would I do that? Why would I get out of my bed? I've another 12-hour night shift to do. I was getting out of my bed to speak to them before I went to work.
[16:02] I was going off my head or becoming religious or something. And one night, Jim handed me a tract from the Beatitudes.
[16:17] I had no idea what the Beatitudes were. I'd never had a Bible in my entire life. Blessed are they who hunger and thirst after righteousness, for they shall be filled.
[16:32] Now, I had no idea what righteousness meant in the context of the Bible, because I had no Sunday school, no boys brigade, nothing, anything like that.
[16:45] But what I did have was a life that didn't satisfy me, because I played guitar since I was 11 years old. And I was in pop groups up and down Scotland, even played at the Peter Keenan competition, and we were asked to go to Germany.
[17:05] I couldn't go, Johnny Mann couldn't go, because he was a drummer, because I was an apprentice, he was an apprentice. So we couldn't go. Now when I look back, I could see the providence of God.
[17:21] I could see him taking the door and just saying, no, that's not the way.
[17:32] And I'm thinking, what's going on here? My wife started to go to the local Baptist church, took the children. Next minute, well, it seemed like next minute, it was probably about a month later.
[17:47] I'd never gone to church, I was too tired at the weekend. But then suddenly, the pastor turned up at the door, as pastors do, and he said, Bill, I understand from your wife that you do some weight training in the yards.
[18:05] I said, we all do that. All the young fellows want to get as strong as oxys and end up breaking their arms. No, kidding, I'm on. with my Glasgow sense of humour. He said, but I've got a little group of boys on a Thursday night in the hall, and they're beginning to use weights, and I'm afraid.
[18:23] There's bolts to come on, and there's nobody. Now, here's the wonderful thing about this. Do you know that five months later, I discovered my wife and I were being prayed for in Ireland, in England, in Wales, as well as in Scotland.
[18:51] Because the Bible students, when they came back, they would give their information about the people they visited, and if anyone spoke to them, or slammed the door in their face, or whatever.
[19:03] We were being prayed for from that night, all those months. One night, after I began to get acquainted with who was who, and who was who, and I wasn't sure of half of those Christians, they were queer buddies.
[19:25] I'm thinking, I don't know if I should be here. I don't really sit in here. Oh, they want me to play the guitar in the church, yeah, that suits them. No, don't think so.
[19:42] And suddenly, something inside me, I told nobody about this, nobody knew about this, just me, travelling on the bus, two buses to Clyde Bank, I began to look out the window of the bus and began to look at people.
[20:03] Began to think, I wonder if many of them know about the things they are telling me about. I'm giving you this testimony of mine, because it only happens once, and my life changed forever.
[20:18] one night, I was over with the young folks, they were having a joke, and I'm trying to tell them, be careful, you don't drop them on your foot, that one weighs about six kilos.
[20:33] when the two students appeared in the door of the church hall in Drum Chapel Baptist Church, I thought, oh, can we have a chat to you, Bill, after you're finished?
[20:50] finished. Okay. That night, they led me to the Lord. But do you know this? They had led Kathy to the Lord an hour before, and hadn't told me.
[21:08] Very wise. When I went back at half past nine at night, she was waiting to tell me she was converted, and I was coming to tell her, I'd been converted on the same night.
[21:25] None of us could understand her. She was brought up in Kirkentillich, in the Church of Scotland, where we were married. And we got married in the Church of Scotland, in Hillhead, in Kirkentillich, where her family had lived for generations.
[21:43] She was a Boys Brigade officer, yet she was unconverted, yet went to Church all her life. You wouldn't have found me dead in Church.
[21:58] Yet the same night, the Lord saves us. I wouldn't be here, and I wouldn't want to be here, if he hadn't stepped in and said, this is eternal life.
[22:21] Not just God, but God's Son, working out God's plan for your life. He sacrificed himself for you. And that began to eat into my life over those three or four months.
[22:36] And the emptiness I felt, even playing and all the rest of it, and all the stuff with minibuses up and down Scotland and everything else. The emptiness just drained away.
[22:50] And fulfillment, and promise, and peace, and an appreciation of the mercies of God began to grow as I sought to.
[23:02] and I got a Bible, and with the help of good and honest, faithful, praying, studious Christians, we began to see and understand what God was saying.
[23:16] I can't even believe it now sometimes, David, how he managed to make me understand when I was thick as two planks, spiritually, until that night.
[23:30] That was the night. And that's why I say to you, if you don't have a testimony to Jesus, him in your life, you have no assurance.
[23:46] Even when you fail as a Christian, you know you can go back to the Lord because he died for all your sins. And you can get reassured, I still love you, nothing can separate you from my love.
[24:01] That's what Calvary is all about. Do you have a testimony? Because this is eternal life.
[24:17] This is Jesus' own words to his father in the presence of his disciples, the eleven faithful ones, to know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou have sent.
[24:35] Now I'm going to read you someone else's testimony, and we're going to sing our final hymn, because this testimony is the author of the hymn we're going to sing. We're going to sing Just As I Am.
[24:53] Listen to her testimony. At the age of 32, Charlotte Elliot, the daughter of the Reverend Charles Elliot, suffered a serious illness, which left her a semi-invalid for the entire rest of her life.
[25:14] A year or so later, she passed through a spiritual crisis, which resulted eventually in the writing of the hymn you have before you. At the time her father was vicar of Clapham in London, there came to stay at the house the Swiss evangelist, Dr.
[25:34] Cesar Milan, who, observing the young woman, closely felt something wasn't right. He therefore asked her straight out, are you a Christian?
[25:47] Oh, she really resented it and let him know she resented it. But later she apologized. And told him that she did not know how to come to Christ.
[25:59] How do I come to Christ? Okay. A vicar's daughter, surely she didn't know all that. No. Religion doesn't necessarily teach you the way of salvation.
[26:11] It's the Bible that does that. The evangelist said to her, come just as you are.
[26:28] That was his answer. She did so. She found peace of the heart to Charla. 12 years later, she was still living with her brother Henry, who was the vicar of St.
[26:44] Mary's in Brighton. A big bazaar was being held in the parish, raising money for the new school, but when the rest of the household set out for it, she felt too unwell to leave her room.
[27:00] Later on, on her own, overwhelmed by a sense of her own weakness and useless and latched into a mood of doubt and despondency, seeking something on which to rest her faith, she recalled the evangelist's words, come to him as you are.
[27:24] The words took hold of her afresh that afternoon and brought her peace and assurance again. reaching for the paper and the pencil, in no time at all, she wrote the hymn just as I am.
[27:46] And friends, I share this with you because even as a believer, there are times when you need reassurance. You may not feel like all of us.
[27:56] You're the Christian you should be. Don't go anywhere else but to the Savior. don't run to anything or anyone else.
[28:08] He's promised never to abandon you. Take him at his word. Now if you were to think of the words of that hymn, Just As I Am, which verse would you put down to the reality of the occasion on which she wrote it?
[28:25] Here's the one I think they would tell us. And this happens, I think, to every Christian on earth, at some point we feel like this. Just as I am, though tossed about, with many a conflict, many a doubt, fighting's within and fears without, O Lamb of God, I come.
[28:54] love. If you're a genuine Christian, I would find it difficult to believe you if you told me you'd never had such an experience. And for those of us here who don't know him as a personal saviour, take that man's counsel that she took.
[29:16] Come to him as you are. Don't be defensive. He loves you. And has secured an everlasting covenant, comfort for you, and nothing can separate you from him.
[29:35] Hallelujah. Hallelujah. Because that is where the peace comes that passes understanding. stand there. As we close, I want to just say to you, if you want prayer, then ask somebody here to pray with you.
[29:57] Or myself, or someone you feel closest to, a lady, another lady, but someone you trust, someone you, I say to you, don't let this opportunity go by.
[30:09] This may be your last time. And if you're needing assurance and fellowship as a believer, with all your inner conflicts and doubts and everything else, you are not alone and you're not the first and you'll not be the last to feel like that.
[30:30] So I say we should stand and sing it. And take it to yourself and remember this is eternal life, to know thee the only true God and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent.
[30:49] That's the Lord's own testimony. You've heard my testimony. This is Charlotte Elliott's testimony. A testimony to Jesus means you'll be a witness.
[31:00] If you don't have a testimony, you won't be a witness. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. God bless you as we sing it.
[31:17] Think about it yourself, the words, as you see them. Pray to the Lord, talk to the Lord, make it a place for just coming to him. And as I say, if any of you want prayer, just say so, or they'll be glad to pray with you.