As we conclude this conference on knowing God, what more can we say? In this message Scott Brown will bring together the threads of the teaching we’ve just received and seek to apply them for the days ahead.

We've had so many illustrations of what it means to love God and I want all of them and of course the Lord Jesus Christ summarizes all of them. You know he knew his father's love, he delighted in his father's will, he desired to pray, He submitted to his father's authority. So many very, very precious things. Dozens and dozens. I have such a long list and it would just take so long to communicate it.

I just encourage you to go back and look at the list and just say, Lord, help me to know you like that. I want to know you. It's astounding that a human being could know God. You can know God. And in knowing God, you can know what to do in every situation.

What a kindness it is toward human beings who are sinful, to have the resources of God, the Word of God. I want to quote from Jonathan Edwards works on knowing God. God is the highest good of the reasonable creature. The enjoyment of him is our proper and is the only happiness with which our souls can be satisfied. To go to heaven fully to enjoy God is infinitely better than the most pleasant accommodations here.

It's better than fathers and mothers, husbands and wives and children, or the company of any or all earthly friends. These are but shadows but the enjoyment of God is the substance. These are but scattered beams but God is the sun. These are but streams, but God is the fountain. These are but drops, but God is the ocean.

You know, I began at this conference wanting to address particularly the young person who grew up in the church, grew up in a godly family, who wants to know if they know God. And one of the helpful phrases in the Baptist Confession chapter on assurance is that the authors tell us that you don't need any extraordinary revelation to know God. There's no secret, secret thing to do. There are things that you do to grow your assurance, and there are also things that you can do to shrink your assurance and the confession speaks of both as telling you what you can do if you want to shrink your assurance of salvation but what you can do to grow it as well and that's such a wonderful help from the confession. Now I think it was probably a year and a half ago on one Sunday afternoon I was reading a book to my wife called Farm Sermons.

My wife is a farmer. And so I, Charles Spurgeon preached lots of farm sermons and he collected them up in a book, yeah that's called Farm Sermons. And I want to end this conference by quoting from this book. Interestingly enough, he's speaking about assurance of salvation and growing or shrinking your assurance, and he opens with Proverbs 24, 30. I want to close this conference with this text.

I went by the field of the sluggard, and by the vineyard of the man devoid of understanding. And there it was all overgrown with thorns. Its surface was covered with nettles. Its stone wall was broken down. And when I saw it, I considered it well.

I looked on it and received instruction. A little sleep, a little slumber, a little folding of the hands to rest. So shall your poverty come like a prowler and your need like an armed man." And Spurgeon uses this verse to illustrate the lazy Christian, lazy in treating his soul with the things that would thrill his soul in the knowledge of God. And he says that nature gives us illustrations for everything in life. And he says, to the spiritual mind, even thorns and thistles and overgrown gardens can have spiritual meaning.

And he's saying this proverb has spiritual meaning for lots of things, including your spiritual life. And he really, he asks, do we learn from nature? Do we learn anything from what God has created? And he says, many are stung by nettles, but few are taught by them. Some are hurt by briars, but there is one who is improved by them.

He says there are no useless plants. And then he turns and he talks about the slothful person. And of course he calls him as a man without understanding. And Spurgeon says he's unable to make use of his property. He knows the doctrines, but he does not do anything about them.

And he says that they have a creed. They do have a confession. Their creed is do nothingism. They will not even urge people to labor for the Lord because they say God will do his own work, Salvation is by grace. The notion of these sluggards is that a man is to wait and do nothing, he's to sit still.

And let the grass grow up to his ankles in the hope of heavenly help. To arouse himself would be an interference of eternal purpose. And then he turns and he speaks about using your time, about how you might grow or shrink your assurance. He says, Am I employing the minutes as they fly? Do we sow beside all the waters?

Do we in the morning sow our seed and in the evening stretch out our hand? And then he turns to the parable of the talents and he says this about it. Many have dormant faculties. And then he says, do what you can with what you have. And he talks about people who take very good care of their bodies, but do not take good care of their souls.

We have a world full of people who are trying desperately to take good care of their bodies. It would be really interesting to see what would happen to the fitness folks, which I'm actually in favor of fitness. But it would be interesting to know what would happen to fitness folks if they spent at least as much time on their souls as they did their bodies. And so Spurgeon says this, thy soul is uncombed. Thy soul is unwashed, unclad.

Your soul is a poor neglected thing. You're a Christian on half time. And then he compares the soul with soil. And he says land is meant to be cultivated. All soil is meant to produce something.

And then he takes an illustration from raising your children and He says, what is the natural produce of your children if you leave them untrained for God? Neglect is all that is needed to produce evil. Now remember, he's talking about how to grow your sense of assurance, to grow your joy in the Lord, so you're not running around your whole life long saying, am I saved, am I, am I not? There are things that you can do to strengthen Your assurance. Then he talks about what happens when you get slothful.

If you're a pastor, you've seen this. Spurgeon says that the slothful are normally discontented. They're normally fretful, they're selfish. They are murmuring because they are idle. These are the weeds that grow in the sluggards gardens.

He says, I've known the sloth will become so peevish that nothing could please them. The most earnest Christian could not do right for them. The most loving Christians could not be affectionate enough. The most active could not be energetic enough. They detested all the sorts of wrong where God himself saw much of the fruit of the Spirit.

You know, the least you seek God, the more peevish you get, the more dissatisfied you get with your wife, your children, your husband, your church, Whatever. Then he urges the readers to take quick action. He says, he's talking about your calendar. He says, tomorrow is only found in the calendar of fools. Today is the time of the wise man, the chosen season of our gracious God.

Seize the present hour, quick, uproot the noisome weeds that without profit suck the soil's fertility with wholesome plants. And frankly what Spurgeon is saying is that if you really are a Christian, you can do something about the spiritual funk that you are in. Your passion might be low, you might say, well I don't have enough passion. Your energy might be low for God, your desire for the word of God is low. But there's something that you can do about it.

And that is to cultivate the soul. Your JC Ryle tells the story of two men that were given property in New Zealand. They were both given wonderful farms and one of the men, he just couldn't believe it. He couldn't believe that he'd been given the gift. So this man just kept going back to the county seat to verify, are all the signatures there?

Yes, okay. Well, were all the procedures followed? Yes. And he just keeps going back and back and back because he just can't believe that he's been given such a great gift. And then he talks about another man.

He's so delighted to have the gift. Every day he's working the farm. Every day he's cultivating it. Every day he's making it better and better and better. And he's not worried about whether it's his or not.

He's been promised it's his. The papers were enough, the process was enough, it's done. He's cultivating his land. And J.C. Ryle asks, after 10 years, which one do you think would do more for the Lord?

The one who is always worried, or the one who is always cultivating? And so that's what I'm gonna leave you with. Let's not go from here as sluggards. Let's go and seek the Lord with all of our hearts. Let's go and establish great priorities.

Let's go and put things in our schedules that are unbreakable. And let's do them every day. And cultivate the soil of your heart. The reality is the more you cultivate in the word of God, the more your joy, the more your strength increases. I would just counsel you to completely ignore all your feelings about putting your mind in the word of God.

Don't go to the Word of God because you feel like it. It's actually one of the most dangerous things you can do, unless you really do feel like it and you should go. But the problem is we go up and down. You know, human beings, we're fluctuating in our affections. And so, exercising discipline is really critical.

And I would just say, don't decide every morning whether you feel like getting in the word. You just get in the word, just open it up and start reading it and and and and kindle a fire and keep kindling it and don't make a decision every morning whether you're gonna get up and open your Bible to feed your soul make one decision and when it And when it comes time to the worship of God on the Lord's day, don't decide on Saturday night whether you're gonna go worship God. Make one decision, you're going to worship God. You're going to sing, you're going to fellowship, you're going to hear preaching, you're going to seek the Lord. And when it comes time to your weekly prayer time in your church, if you have one, I hope you have one, don't, and if it's on Wednesday night, don't get to the end of the day on Wednesday and say, oh, I think I'm too tired.

Oh, I think I'm too busy. Here's what our family did. We made one decision. We didn't have to revisit these decisions. We never revisited decisions.

We never asked, are we too tired to go to prayer tonight we never asked are we too busy to go to church what a ridiculous question unimaginable make one decision Don't have the field of the sluggard. Have the field of the one who knows God. Have the field of the one who sees the glory of God, the majesty of God, the sovereignty of God, the mercy of God, all these things that we've seen over and over and over again at this conference, go for the majesty. Go for the beauty and go for it every day. And don't go for it because you feel like it.

Go for it because it's exactly what your soul needs. Because God is good. What God does is he calls us out of our own ways. He calls us out of our own feelings into something greater. Something more beautiful, something more powerful.

God wants to get in the way of your life. And the chief way of getting in the way of your life is by his word. That's how we know God. So I am just so Delighted that we were able to have this conference. I've been so encouraged by the messages.

This is a spiritual retreat for me to just listen to the preaching. I love the preaching, and I need the preaching. I need men to come and tell me how to think about this world and my own soul. And it's always helpful. I pray it has been for you.

You know, next year we're gonna come back, The chief end of man is to glorify God and enjoy Him forever. I pray that you'll go back and be a huge blessing to your imperfect local church, that you would pour yourself out for it, that you would do the thing that Jesus Christ is doing. He's building his church. It's the only thing that Jesus is building in the world and all of us ought to pour our whole souls into what Jesus is building. And when you do that, you're pouring your soul into something that absolutely will not fail.

The gates of hell will not prevail against it. So would you pray with me? Please stand. I'm gonna pray and then we're gonna sing. We're gonna sing it out and then we will be dismissed.

Oh Father, you are so good. You are so wise And you reached down and showed us that we could know you. What a privilege, what a joy in this broken world to be surrounded by the fountains of living water that you provide, that only you provide. I pray that you would bless this people and give them gardens of joy in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.