Not only are we to work on humbling ourselves and lifting up one another’s hands, the Scripture says, as they’re hanging down—comfort the feeble‑minded.  If you want to be great, we know, in God’s kingdom, then you must be servant of all.  We saw in Ephesians 4—and this will be the last little bit of review for us, but we saw in Ephesians, Chapter 4, it says, “With all lowliness and meekness, with longsuffering, forbearing one another in love.”  There’s never more of a need of humility and grace and long‑suffering than there is when God is stripping from each and every one of us these ugly weights and sins that beset us.  In this last day as God purifies us, our ugliness is going to be revealed to one another, and we need to be patient, loving, and kind to one another in the process.  Amen.  Don’t shout me down because I’m preaching good.

This is how the process works.  Because, you see, without the trying of our faith, this patience, this consistency, can’t be worked in us.  Remember, don’t limit patience to just endurance.  Patience, the word “patience,” when James is using it there (James 1:3), it talks about a consistency.  How many of you realize the thing that you lack and probably need in your life most is consistency?  Every one of us to different degrees, but every one of us lives a roller coaster Christianity.  We’re up.  We’re down.  Right?  You’ve always got to lift your hands up at the apex before you head down the hill.  And most of us, that’s what it is.  We have our hands up; we’re worshiping God, “O Lord.”  AAAAAH.  Here we go down.  Next thing you know, I’m at the bottom.  Aren’t you glad that those ups and downs are leveling out?  They’re less extreme.  We’re becoming more consistent.  We’re becoming more trustworthy to the kingdom of God.  We’re becoming the fruit of what the theme of this ministry is: “Commit thou to faithful men, who shall be able to teach others also.”  It’s a generation.  We’re training our kids.  We’re not losing the generations.

The church today—if you look around today, the biggest complaint I hear when I’m talking to preachers is, “We can’t keep our kids.  Our kids go off to college; you never see them again.  We can’t keep our kids.  They’re so ambitious and they’re running after money, and they’re—anytime there’s an offer made that’s $20 more, they head off after that.”  Generational Christianity: the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.  We’ve given our lives now for 50 years, and many of you working right alongside us here for 40 years or more.  And I don’t know about you, but I stand back, when I look at what God has done, and I marvel at what God is preparing among us.  Should Jesus tarry, a generation that stands, praise God.  But there has to be a care, a love for one another.  There has to be a vision of this kingdom that supersedes my own personal, selfish ambitions.  So that’s why, Ephesians, Paul speaking very clearly says it’s with all lowliness and meekness.  Philippians 2:3, he told us, “Let nothing be done through strife or vainglory; but in lowliness of mind let each esteem others better than themselves.”