Getting to Know your Bible

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:11):
This is Getting to Know Your Bible, a program dedicated
to the proclaiming of the good News of Jesus Christ.
Here's Billy Lambert.

Speaker 2 (00:25):
Hello, I'm Billy Lambert. I am the regular speaker on
Getting to Know Your Bible, and I want to welcome
you today. This may be the very first time that
you have seen this telecast. I want you to know
that the thing that we emphasize on getting to Know
your Bible is a word of God. The Bible is

(00:46):
the greatest book that has ever been written. Many years ago,
there were those that wrote books that thought they would
replace the Bible. That's what Thomas Paine thought when he
wrote The Age of Reason. But the Bible continues to
live after century. Jesus said, heaven and earth shall pass away,
but my Word shall not pass away. So on getting

(01:07):
to Know your Bible, we're teaching from the timeless Word
of God. The Bible is God's book, the greatest book
that has ever been written. And today we're going to
be opening up the pages of the Word of God
and delivering a message to you from God's book. Today
we're going to be seeing a one of our classics

(01:29):
that is a production of one of our telecasts from
time in the past, and we want you to stay tuned.
We're going to be offering a free Bible Correspondence course
today and we will see information on the screen as
to how you can receive that course. And so we
want to pause at.

Speaker 1 (01:48):
This time to help you in your study of the Bible.
We want to send you this Bible Correspondence course. This
course is non denominational, it's based on the Bible, it's
conducted by mail, and it's free to receive this course.
Right to getting to Know your Bible. Po Box three
one four, Summerdale, Alabama three six five eight zero or

(02:09):
call toll free one eight seven seven seven one one
five two one four.

Speaker 2 (02:22):
Many people think that they're no good or fine hours
in their lives. If if if you were to ask them, well,
what have you been doing? It's all nothing. I've not
been doing anything. But you know, there's some people that,
like Peter. A lot of excitement went on in the
life of the apostle Peter, and and there was a

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lot of excitement in the lives of some people. Children
get excited. I read about a little boy that came
running in and he said, Mama, Mama, there's a bear
in the backyard. And the mother knew that it wasn't
a bear. She knew that it was a dog. And
she said, son, now you're telling me a flihood, you're
telling me a lie. He said, no, Mama, I'm telling
you the truth. There's a bear in the backyard. She said,

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you go to your room and you ask God to
forgive you for telling me a story. And so he
came back out after a while and she said, did
you do what I asked you to do? Said yes, ma'am,
I did. And God said he thought it was a
bear too. You know, children have a way of getting excited,
but it's hard to get some people excited. But the
apostle Peter had a very interesting and in exciting life.

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I want you to think about some of the things
that took place in the life of the Apostle Peter
that would that all of us would have been excited about.
For example, in the sixteenth chapter of Matthew, when Jesus
came into the coast of Cesarea Philippi, and that Jesus
asked the disciples the question who the men say that
I the son of man Am, And there were all

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kinds of speculations about his identity. But then he asked them,
just point black, well, who do you say that I am?
And this is how Peter responded in Matthew sixteen sixteen,
you're the Christ, the son of the Living God. And
Jesus said, blessed are you Simon's son of Jonah. For
flesh and blood is not revealed that to you, but

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my Father, which is in heaven. And that's when Jesus said,
I say also unto thee there Peter, and upon this
rock I build my church. And so Jesus Christ promised
to build a church upon the confession that Peter had made,
that is that Jesus was the Christ, the son of
the living God. That had to be a very exciting

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thing to the apostle Peter. Then in Matthew chapter seventeen, Peter,
along with James and John, went with Jesus up on
a high mountain, and Jesus was transfigured, and there appeared
with them Moses and Elijah. That's the occasion when Peter
said to Jesus, now, Lord, let me build three tibernacles
or tents or dwelling places, one for you, one for Moses,

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and one for Elijah. But there was a cloud that
overshadowed them, and there was a voice out of the
cloud that said, this is my beloved son, in whom
I am well pleased hear you him. And so that
had to be an exciting moment in the life of
the apostle Peter. Back in Matthew chapter sixteen, Jesus had

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promised Peter that he was going to give him the
keys of the Kingdom. That's in verses eighteen and nineteen.
And if you have the key to something, that means
you can open it up. And Peter used the keys
of the Kingdom. And Acts chapter two, he of all
the disciples of all the apostles was selected to preach
the first recorded Gospel sermon under the Worldwide Commission. There

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may have been others that spoke on that occasion and
likely word, but his message is recorded in the second
chapter of Acts. He preached the sermon on the day
of Pentecost, when the church had its beginning, and he
preached a sermon about the Lord Jesus Christ. And in
preaching about Jesus Christ, there was response to his sermon.

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After he answered the question what shall we do? In
other words, what must we do to be saved. There
were some three thousand people that responded by being baptized.
You see the answer to the question what must I
do to be saved or what shall we do? Was
repent and be baptized every one of you in the

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name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins, and
you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. And
those that gladly receive the word were baptized. According to
verse forty one, that had to be an exciting event
in the life of the Apostle Peter. Imagine three thousand
people being saved on that occasion. Another exciting event in

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the life of the Apostle Peter would have to be.
In the tenth chapter of Acts, Peter was chosen to
use the keys of the Kingdom not only to open
up the kingdom to the Jewish world in Acts chapter two,
but to open up the Kingdom to the gentile world
in Acts chapter ten. And this is the occasion when
Peter was called to the house of Cornelius, who was

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a gentile. When Peter came into his house, Cornelius wanted
to fall down and to worship Peter, but Peter is
not to be worshiped then nor now. And Peter said
to Cornelius, I perceive of a truth that God is
no respect of persons, but in every nation he that
fearth him and worketh righteousness is accepted with him. And

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so it was on this occasion that Peter preached Jesus
to the house of Cornelius, that is, to the gentile world.
I would challenge you to go to Acts chapter two
and Act chapter ten, and to analyze the sermon that
Peter preached on the day of Pentecost in Acts chapter two,
and then analyze the sermon that he preached in Acts

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chapter ten, and you will find the same message, the
same content that is preached in both cases, because he
was preaching to them about the Lord Jesus Christ. But
it had to be exciting to Peter to preach the
first Gospel sermon to those that were gentiles. So there

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were a lot of fine hours in the life of Peter.
I believe the finest hour in the life of the
apostle Peter is in the twelfth chapter of Acts. Now,
keep in mind Peter is the one who had denied Jesus.
Keep in mind that Peter is the one who cursed
and swore that he did not know him. Peter is

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the one who warmed by the fire built by the
enems of Jesus. Peter is the one who followed Afar off.
But now we find Peter involved in preaching the gospel.
But his finest hour, I believe, is in the twelfth
chapter of Acts. In Acts chapter twelve, we learned in

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the first verse that Herod had stretched forth his hand
to persecute the church. And in verse number two he
killed James, who was the brother of the Lord. He
killed him with a sword. And because Peter was preaching Jesus,
Peter was put into prison. And when they arrested him,

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he was shackled, and there were soldiers that were on
either side of him, But there was an angel that
appeared under him, and he told him to arise, and
he left the prison. And when they came to the gate,
the gate opened on its own. Can you imagine something
like that happening today. And then Peter came to the

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house where the the brethren were gathered together. In Acts
chapter twelve and verse five, the Bible says that while
Peter was kept in prison, constant prayer was offered to
God for him by the church. So the church was
gathered together and they were praying for Peter, Peter in prison.
The church praying. But now Peter comes to the house

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where they're praying. And Peter begins to knock on the door,
and Rhoda comes to the door, and she is so
excited she recognized Peter's voice, and she because of her gladness,
because of her joy, she did not open the gate,
and she ran in and she announced that Peter stood

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before the gate. Now try to imagine here, the church
is praying for him to get out of prison. And
she comes and says, Peter standing at the gate. And
they said to her, you're just beside yourself, but she
kept on insisting, and so they said to her, well,
it's not Peter, it is his angel. And the Bible
says Peter continued knocking. Peter just kept on knocking. There

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is no record after Acts chapter twelve and sixteen, where
Peter ever looked back, where Peter ever followed afar off,
where Peter ever turned away from following the Lord Jesus Christ.

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But Peter kept on knocking. He never ever gave up.
And that seems to be the finest hour in the
life of Peter when when he got to the point
in his life that he just kept on knocking. Well,
what you suppose changed Peter? What changed him from someone

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who would follow afar off, from someone who would deny
Jesus to a person who would become courageous and eventually
give his life for the cause of Christ. What changed him?
These are some things that possibly changed the apostle Peter.

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Number One, Jesus prayed for him in Luke chapter twenty two,
Verses thirty one and thirty two. Jesus said to Simon Simon,
Satan hath desired to have you that he may sift
you as wheat, But I have prayed for you that

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your faith fail not when you are converted strengthened the brethren.
Jesus prayed for Peter. He knew what was coming ahead
of him. But then Peter said, Lord, I'm ready to
go with you both to prison and to death. But
Peter just thought he was. It was not long after
that that Peter denied the Lord Jesus Christ. But Jesus

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had prayed for Peter. Isn't it encouraging to know that
other people pray for you? I have people continuously telling
me brother Lambert, I'm praying for you. There's one God
Gospel preacher who watches getting to know your Bible every
time we're on the air, and he says, I'm praying
that you live to be one hundred. I said, well,

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you may want to cut it off somewhere around ninety.
I appreciate the prayers of people. There was a wonderful
couple that attended a congregation near where I now preach
at the Spanish Sport Church in Baldwin County, Alabama. Brother
and sister Bille Ferris, and they had a list of
preachers they prayed for on their knees every night. They said,

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Brother Lambert, we pray for you every day along with
all these other preachers. Brother Ferris died, and but sister
Ferris came to go one day she said, Brother Lambert,
I still pray for you every day. I appreciate that.
That's encouraging, But we ought to be encouraged by the
fact that Jesus has prayed not just for Peter, but

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for us as well. In John chapter seventeen, verses twenty
and twenty one, neither pray I for these alone, but
for them also, which shall believe on me through thy word,
that they all may be one. Is Thou Father art
in me, an eye in thee, that they may be
one in us, that the world may believe that thou
hast sent me. Jesus not only prayed for those people,

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then he's praying for He prayed for us as well.
This I know that he ever lives to make intercession
on our behalf. Hebrews, chapter seven and verse twenty five,
Jesus prayed for Peter. Another reason that Peter continued to

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knock is that Jesus understood him. Have you ever said,
no one understands me. I've heard people say that. I've
heard young people say, my mother doesn't understand them, my
parents don't understand me. Well, I can rest assured they
do understand you. They've been young people before you were

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a young person. They understand. But sometimes we get to
the point we think nobody understands. But I can tell
you one who does, and that's Jesus. Jesus Christ is
our high priest, who is tempted at all points lack
as are we yet without sin, And that's the reason.
In Hebrews four, in verse fifteen, the Bible reads, we

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have not a high priest who cannot be touched with
the feeling of our infirmities. That simply means that we
have a high priest who is touched with the feeling
of our infirmities. And Jesus Christ does understand what it's
like to be human. Jesus Christ was God in the flesh.

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Verse Timothy three sixteen says, without controversy, great as the
mystery of godliness, God was manifest in the flesh. And
Jesus Christ was God in human form. He was not
half God in half man. He was all God in
all man. And Jesus Christ took upon himself the form
of a servant. According to Paul in Philippians chapter two,

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verses five and following, he emptied himself in the form
of a servant, and he was found in fashion, and
he was found in fashion as a man, and he
humbled himself unto death, yave the death of the cross.
Jesus knows what it was, what it's like to live
in a fleshly body. He knows all of the temptations.

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He knows the snares of Satan that are out there,
because you see in Matthew chapter four, Jesus was tempted
by Satan in every conceivable way, through the lust of
the flesh, the lust of the eye, and the pride
of life. And yet we're told that Jesus did not sin.
He did no sin, neither was any god found in

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his mouth Verse Peter two, verse twenty two. So Jesus
knows what it's like when I am tempted. It's almost
like Jesus can get inside our skin and feel with
us and sympathize with us. He understands, and he understood
the apostle Peter. In Luke, chapter twenty two and verse

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sixty one, the Bible says, get the picture. Here, Jesus
is on the way to the cross, and there's Peter.
And it says he looked upon Peter. Here's the man
who had cursed and swore that he did not know Jesus.
I know not the man, and he followed afar off.
And yet Jesus looked upon Peter. It was not a

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look of criticism, it was not a look of scorn.
But it was a look of love. You know, the
Lord never criticized him for the sin that he committed.
He loved Peter, and he looked up on Peter. I

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believe that we need to be less judgmental of others today,
and we need to show more love to others today.
You know, in Matthew chapter seven, Jesus said, judge, not
that you be not judged, but with the same judgment
that you judge, you shall be judged. And then Jesus said,

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I don't try to cast the molt out of your
brother's eye when you have a beam in your own eye.
He said, you need to first cast the beam out
of your eye. Then you can get the moat out
of your brother's eye. And I think Jesus must have
had a sense of humor, because when you stop and

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think about what Jesus says in Matthew chapter seven, there's
a note of levity there. Here's a man, try to
picture it. He has a stick of wood sticking out
of his eye, and here's another man who has a
speck of dust in his eye. And the man who
has the stick of wood sticking in his eye wants

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to get the speck of dust out of the other
man's eye. Jesus said, you need to first get the
stick of wood out of your eye, and then you'll
be able to see clearly to cast the moat or
the speck of dust out of your brother's eye. You see,
we need to be less judgmental, and we need to
we don't always know all of the facts. No, no,

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we don't all know all of the facts. There was
a flock of sheep that went by, and there was
a man sitting by the side of the road. And
so here comes a man after the flock of sheep
had gone by, and it's the shepherd. He's trying to
catch up with the sheep. And he said, did you

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see a flock of sheared sheep go by? The man
sitting by the side of the road said, they were
sheared on one side. In other words, I don't know
what the other side looked like. Sometimes we want to
pass judge, but on what the other side looks like,
without knowing the facts. In the matter, Jesus Christ understood Peter,

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and he loved Peter, and he let Peter know that.
But Jesus sent him a message of love. In Matthew
chapter sixteen, that some of the women came to the
empty tomb of Jesus, and there was a young man
sitting there, and he instructed them to go tell the
disciples that Jesus has been raised from the dead. And

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after he says, go tell the disciples, he says, and
tell Peter. He singles Peter out. He gave him a
message of love. He wanted to know that he was special,
that he was, that he was someone that the Lord
put a premium on his influence and the work that

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he was going to do. You know, the Bible is
a message of love and a book of condemnation. Some
people think the Bible is strictly to condemn you, but
it's not. From beginning to the end, it is God's
love letter to the world. It is a message of love.

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How that God so loved the world that he gave
his only begotten son, that whosoever believeth in him should
not perish but have everlasting life. It's a message of love.
Listen to John chapter three and verse sixteen, fourteen, and fifteen.
As Moses lifted up the serpent and the wilderness, even

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so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that
whosoever believed in him should not perish but have eternal life.
And that's then in verse sixteen. For God's soul love
the world. How much did he love the world that
he gave his only Son, that whosoever believeth in him

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should not perish, but have everlasting life now verse seventeen.
For God set not his son into the world to
condemn the world, but that the world through him might

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be saved. The message of the Bible is not condemnation,
its salvation. The message of the Bible is not loathing,
its love. The Lord loves us. In Jeremiah thirty one
and three, he told his people in the long ago,
I've loved you with air everlasting love. And if you

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feel that you're not loved today, that you're left by
the side of the road without anyone caring anything about you,
I want you to know that Jesus loves you. He
loves you, and there's not a single person on the
face of the earth that God wants lost. He's not
willing that any should perish Second Peter, chapter three, in

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verse nine. And he loves all mankind. And we need
to let people know today that they are loved, that
we love them. And I believe that our preaching today
should show that we love people. Oh, of course, sometimes
there are some things that must be said from the

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Word of God for our benefit. Sometimes there's some rebuke
that must be done, but we need to let people
know we love them. Another reason that Peter changed from
a one who would follow far off to one it
would continue knocking is because the Lord gave him something

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to do. In John chapter twenty one, three times Jesus says,
do you love me, Peter? Do you love me Peter?
Do you love me Peter? And the third Peter was
a little bit grieved that he said to him the
third time, lovest thou me, And he said, Lord, you
know all things. You know that I love you. And Jesus'
response was, Peter, I want you to feed my sheep.

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I want you to feed my sheep. He gave him
something to do, but then Jesus finally focused him on
the next life. In John chapter twenty one, Verses eighteen
and nineteen, Jesus explained to Peter that he was going
to die at the hands of others. He said, when

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you were young, someone else you girded yourself, and you
were able to do things for your said. But when
you get older, you might going to be able to
do that. Someone else with gird will be putting your
garments on you. Someone will have to help you. Isn't
it the fact that when we get older that we

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have to have help in certain areas from other people.
That's the case in life. But then Peter was told
by the Lord the manner of death that he was
going to die. Origin and Tertullion suggest that he was crucified,
although there is no record in the Bible to this effect.

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It is believed by some that Peter, when crucified, requested
to be crucified upside down, because the reasoning was that
he did not feel worthy to be crucified like Jesus.
We don't know whether that actually happened or not, but
I do know that Peter died at the hands of others.

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He was focused on the next life. And the one
of the reasons that people stopped following Jesus, never follow
him at all, never think about their salvation, is because
they are focused primarily on this life and not only

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the life that is to come. We need to set
our affection on things that are above, not on things
that are below Class three Verses one and two. We
need to set our attention upon things that transcend time
and reach in to eternity. And it has been the
undoing of countless millions of people focusing only on this

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life and giving no fault to eternity. Have you stopped knocking?
Peter continued knocking. He never turned back, He never quit.
Gospel preacher told me of an incident that happened in
the state of Alabama. The church was having a gospel meeting.

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On their sign on one side, they had the sign
for the meeting on the other side where these words
never quit. A man was sitting there looking at that sign.
The preacher invited the man to come in studied with him.
The man related some of the things going on in
his life that were very troubling to him. And he
told the man to go home, go back to his

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motel room that night, and to read the Book of
Acts and to read the sixth chapter of Romans. The
man came back the next day and he wanted to
be baptized, and he went back home up north, and
now he and his family are in Jesus. He never quit.
He's continuing to knock today. I want to encourage you

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never turn back. I want to encourage you now to
call for the Bible course, and I want to thank
you for watching until we meet again. May the Lord
bless you and keep you. Is my prayer.

Speaker 1 (27:45):
Getting to Know Your Bible has been presented by Churches
of Christ. If you have a question about the church,
or if you would like the location of a Church
of Christ near you, or to receive the free Bible
course right too, Getting to Know your Bible peelbox three
one one four, Summerdale, Alabama three six five eight zero
or call one eight seven seven seven one one five

(28:07):
two one four Join us next time forgetting to Know
your Bible.