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Matthew Porter: Welcome to Key Life. I'm Matthew Porter, executive producer for Key Life. We have a treat this week. Over the next four days, we're journeying through a entire classic sermon from Steve called "Harmony in the Band" based on Matthew 18:15-20. Steve delivered this sermon way back on March 27, 1988. It's brought to you by the Vault Project.

The Vault is an online collection of meticulously digitized and restored classic sermons from Steve Brown dating back to the early 1970s. We have literally hundreds of these sermons in the Vault already, and thanks to your ongoing financial support, we're adding more every single month. Get all the details at keylife.org/vault. I'll tell you more about the Vault on the other side. But for now, let's go back to 1988 for a sermon called "Harmony in the Band." Here's Steve.

Steve Brown: Father, we come before you this morning, glad for all that you have given and all that you have done and all that you are. You called us out to be different and to be a people called after your name. Father, we praise you not just for what you've done for us. That is great and wonderful and we're thankful. But we praise you for all that you are.

Father, you are creator and sustainer of all that is. You are big and we are little. Father, you're infinite, immutable. You're sovereign. You are everything and we are nothing. And so Father, being created for that purpose, we now as your people would lift our hearts in praise for everything that you are. Your worthy of all our praise and all our adoration and all our thanksgiving.

Father, we do thank you for the way you've intervened in our lives. We're not what we were, and we're not what we're going to be. But by your presence, the process of sanctification has taken place, and we see the difference, and we're thankful. Father, you know every person in this place. You know the needs that we have. There are some who are going through really difficult family problems.

Some have too much money and some too little. Some have unbelievable needs in terms of job or future. Some of us are afraid and some of us are tempted, and some of us have yielded. Father, you know the things that cause us to stay awake at night. You know the difficulties that cause our hand to tremble and our mind to grope for answers.

But Father, you come this morning, and that will be enough. Meet us at the point of our needs as you define those needs. Draw us to yourself and make us different, healed, cleansed and changed, forgiven and empowered. Father, we do pray for the one who teaches this morning, that you would forgive him his sins, for they are many. We've come to this place to see Jesus and him only, and we pray in Jesus' name. Amen.

Starting at the 15th verse of the 18th chapter of the gospel according to the tax collector, where Matthew says in his biography of Jesus, that Jesus said, "Moreover if your brother sins against you, go and tell him his fault between you and him alone. If he hears you, you have gained your brother. But if he will not hear you, take with you one or two more, that by the mouth of two or three witnesses every word may be established. And if he refuses to hear them, tell it to the church. But if he refuses even to hear the church, let him be to you as a Gentile and a tax collector. Assuredly I say to you, whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven. Again I say to you that if two of you agree on earth concerning anything that they ask, it will be done for them by my Father in heaven. For where two or three are gathered together in my name, I am there in the midst of them."

Ladies and gentlemen, the second coming of Christ is very close given the fact that I simply don't have any side observations this morning. We're going to go right to the main thrust of the text because we have miles and miles to go before we finish. And you say, well I don't see anything complicated about that text for which you ought to devote so much time.

You say, if your brother's been doing something bad to you, go tell him and then if he doesn't listen bring a couple more, and if he still doesn't listen take it to the church, and if he still doesn't listen, get that sucker. That's a proper exegesis of that particular text. Well, I want you to know that this has a lot more to say than that and so without further chitchat, let's get to the main thrust of the text.

Harold John Ockenga said one time in a conference I had attended when I was a young pastor that the prerequisite for renewal or revival in the church was unity and love among the people of God. I thought at the time that Dr. Ockenga had said it well. He always did. I thought that the way he expounded the particular verses were good. They always were.

But I was young then and I thought that sounds good, but we can still fight and do the job. I'm a lot older now. Dr. Ockenga's in heaven adding one more attraction to that place and I'm a little bit wiser now and I want you to know the older I get, the more I realize that he was right about that as well as many other matters. As a matter of fact, we can't get it going until we get it together. It's a simple statement of truth in the scripture.

I received a phone call a month ago from a young pastor in another state. He told me through the tears that the people in his church were out to get him. He said they had called a congregational meeting and voted for his resignation and he had won by five votes. I got a call last week and he said they dug people up from the graves, called another meeting, and people were there who haven't been in this church in 15 years, and they voted to have me removed and I lost by seven votes.

I told him that God was going to honor him. I said, "Son, you hang tough, you've been faithful and it's okay." But I also told him that God was not going to use that church. As a matter of fact, Jesus destroys temples by withdrawing himself from those temples, and it's going to happen in that church. And if you don't believe that, you believe in the tooth fairy.

Prove it. Let me show you some verses. You'll find the verses in the Old Testament and the New. In Psalm 133:1, "Behold, how good and how pleasant it is for brothers," in the generic sense, "to dwell together in unity." Amos 3:3, "Can we walk together, can two walk together except they be agreed?" John 13:35, Jesus said, "By this all will know that you're my disciples if you have love for one another."

Acts 4:32 in the early church, "Now the multitude of those who believed were of one heart and one soul." 1 Corinthians 1:10-13, "Now I plead with you, brothers, by the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, that you all speak the same thing and that there be no divisions among you, but that you be perfectly joined together in the same mind and in the same judgment. For it has been declared to me concerning you, my brothers, that there are contentions among you. Is Christ divided?"

Ephesians 2:14-15, "For Christ himself is our peace, who has made both one and has broken down the middle wall of hostility and division between us, having abolished in his death the enmity." Ephesians 4:3, "Endeavoring to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace." And I could go on and on and on. As a matter of fact, you got to get it together before you get it going.

Let me tell you a fact. The abortion on demand laws, ladies and gentlemen, would not be on the law books of our land except for one thing and it doesn't have a thing to do with liberals. Doesn't have a thing to do, ladies and gentlemen, with the Supreme Court. It doesn't have a thing to do with the left-leaning radical folks who are trying to stop us from being faithful to God.

It doesn't have a thing to do with NOW or the feminists. Let me tell you what it has to do with. Because the people of God simply can't agree and get together on their own agenda. Let me tell you something. We would have won the world to Christ, and if not won the world to Christ, as a five-point Calvinist, I'm not sure that everybody is elect, but everybody in the world would have heard the gospel by now, ladies and gentlemen, except for one thing and it doesn't have a thing to do with money.

Doesn't have to do with organization, it doesn't have to do with expertise. As a matter of fact, we are the best trained, best equipped, most sophisticated missionary folks in the history of Christendom. Doesn't have a thing to do with all of that. It has to do with the fact that we're in competition with our brothers and sisters.

Matthew Porter: Thank you, Steve. That was Steve Brown in a sermon called "Harmony in the Band." We'll dive deeper into part two of that sermon tomorrow, drilling deeper into the vital importance of unity in the church and why it's a must-have, it's not a nice-to-have. Do hope you'll join us for that.

But hey, if you don't want to wait, you don't have to. That entire sermon series is available right now in the Vault at keylife.org/vault. The Vault is an ongoing project where we're digitizing and preserving sermons from Steve going all the way back to the early 70s. And this sermon is just one in the Matthew series that spanned 132 total sermons. That's pretty impressive, right? Steve went through that from 1986 into 1989.

But hey, if you're interested in a shorter series or maybe even some one-off sermons, hey, we got that too. Again, get all the details at keylife.org/vault. That's V-A-U-L-T. Did you ever play hide and seek as a kid? Maybe even as a parent or grandparent? Now, I don't listen, I don't want to brag, but I am a champion at hide and seek with my kids. And considering my size versus theirs, that's saying something.

Hiding in that context, listen man, that's just pure fun and games right there. But when it comes to hiding what's in our hearts, ooh, not so much. In Steve's book, *Hidden Agendas*, he invites us to drop our masks and remember that we are forgiven, redeemed, accepted and loved. And for a gift of $15 or more to Key Life, that book is our gift to you. Just call us at 1-800-KEY-LIFE. That's 1-800-539-5433.

You can also email Steve at keylife.org to order that book or to mail your request, go to keylife.org/contact to find our mailing addresses for the US and Canada. Again, the name of the book is *Hidden Agendas*. And finally, before you go, would you join in the work of Key Life by giving? And we've made it pretty easy. You can charge a gift on your credit card or you can include a gift in your envelope.

And of course now you can give safely and securely by text. Just take out your phone, you know it's within three feet of where you are right now, and text "KeyLife" to 28950. That's "KeyLife," one word or two, doesn't matter. Just text that to 28950, then follow the instructions. And hey, if you can't give right now or maybe God's not calling you to do that, all good. But if you think about it, please pray for us, would you? Thanks.

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