Jim Styles - Living as a Member of God's Family - Class 5 - Living for Others and Not Just Ourselves

Automatically transcribed. Accuracy is good but not perfect, and words are sometimes wrong. Trust the audio over the text.

1. 0:00

   Everyone, we’ve come to the end, right? Well, actually it ends in the exhortation tomorrow. But I I hope this week that, you know, I I like to throw out a few things for people to talk about and think about things I’ve worked on over my lifetime. And they’re just things that Sue and I have decided we we think we’ve learned the hard way and this there are ideas for people to discuss.

2. 0:24

   So whether you agree with everything or not, it’s it’s always good discussion to fine tune our understanding of the truth. It’s not BASF material it’s it’s more just looking at the how this all works out. I I felt bad yesterday though in rushing through God’s election. I just wanted to in the end just finish up a couple of things for 5 minutes maybe on God’s election because I didn’t give you the passages. Besides Romans not have convinced me that that that’s what Paul’s actually talking about. I I think that the basic concept though, that I had to come to myself is that I had to get out of this mindset of thinking it’s about me and my children and my family and my ecclesia and realize no, no, it’s it’s not mine. It’s God’s.

3. 1:05

   It’s all God’s and he has the right as Job is learning slowly in our second class that you know, we can’t control behemoths, we can’t control Leviathan. So how would we ever think we can pick out and pick and choose who who God invites to his family? It’s his choice, and so we pray about it a lot more.

4. 1:25

   But you look at how this comes up elsewhere in the scriptures. In Luke 10, you see what happens when Jesus is talking about the fact that he rejoiced in the Spirit and thanks God that he had hidden these things from the wise, hidden them from the wise and prudent, and revealed them to bathe Even so, Father for it.

5. 1:46

   So it seemed good in your sight. And as he says in verse 22, Luke 10, all things have been delivered to me by my Father, and no one knows the Son except the Father and who the Father and who the Father is. He’s got the Son and the one to whom the Son wills to reveal Him.

6. 2:03

   See, that’s not everybody getting an opportunity. That’s not random chance. It’s like who the Son wills to reveal him. It’s now Jesus’s choice as well. That’s one of the things Christ has been given the authority of making those kind of decisions. Or in John chapter 6, Jesus pointed out in verse 37 that all that the Father gives me will come to me. All that the Father gives me, Not everybody, it’s those whom the Father gives him.

7. 2:31

   Or verse 44. No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him. This is God’s calling. This is him pulling out of this world, people that he’s drawing to him, and I will raise him up at the last day. And in verse 65 he said, therefore I’ve said to you that no one can come to me unless it has been granted to him by my father. These are passages we sort of read over them sometimes or whatever, or just sort of maybe just don’t understand, or we make up some other excuse.

8. 3:02

   But it’s all about the Father granting us to come to him. It’s his invitation or in Acts chapter 2 that issue where that when Peter was out preaching to the Jews in Acts 2 and he said to repent and be baptized. But in verse 39 he goes on for the promises to you and to your children and to all who are afar off. We might think that well that’s everybody right to all who are afar off or the gospel has preached all the world, but that all has to be clarified by as many as the Lord our God will call.

9. 3:36

   See, it keeps coming up in the scriptures. This idea of narrowing the field whoever God is calling and that’s that’s what you see. Or in X chapter 16, when called when Paul was out preaching and he’s talking to Lydia and she hears the word, it says that the Lord opened her heart to heed the things spoken by Paul. He opened her heart.

10. 3:59

    See, that’s like Paul’s statement that he makes in Ephesians chapter one when he’s praying for the the Ephesians of Ecclesia and prays that that the God of of the Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give you a spirit of wisdom and of revelation and the knowledge of him. That God will give you this. He reveals it to them, having the eyes of your hearts enlightened so that you may know what is the hope to which he has called you.

11. 4:25

    This is God working in our lives allowing us to understand. It’s not how much I study the scriptures, although that’s important. We have to be praying at the same time that God will open our eyes. I’m not going to get it myself. John Thomas would have been the 1st to admit that he didn’t come to the truth because he studied so hard and studied so hard and he found it.

12. 4:49

    He would have been the first one to tell us that God had opened his eyes. He had to do the studying, but he had to be praying that God would enlighten him when so many people of his day and age were not enlightened and give God the glory in the end. You see, it’s not about all that study we do. It’s about God finally revealing it to us. Not that we sit there and just say and ensure that, well, I’m going to exhort tomorrow, so I’ll just wait until it comes to me.

13. 5:15

    That isn’t how it works. We still have to do our part, brother and sister and young people. We’ve got to do the legwork. But at the same time, there were so many people out there studying the Bible who don’t understand and God allows us to understand. That was a great lesson of Paul, that he finally realized for all of his research with Gamalia and all that study they did and all the qualifications that he had, it wasn’t until Christ blinded him and opened his eyes that he finally understood.

14. 5:44

    And I I really think that’s why Paul could write Romans 9. So in the end, you know, you look in Romans 8 where he actually mentions about those who are called according to his purpose. So those are just some of the passages you can look at. And there’s more than that. You’ll see as you’re doing the readings, but the implications of that subject are that it causes us to pray for our children. We pray for them.

15. 6:07

    We don’t just do the readings with them. We don’t just try to get the truth into them and force it into them. We pray that God will do the impossible, like Jacob holding on to that Angel and he won’t let him go, which the Bible described as wrestling. He’s asking that Angel to do the impossible, save my family, because he realized that he couldn’t do it.

16. 6:29

    It was a total failure. Everything was falling apart. So we do everything we can to teach them God’s ways, but we realize we have to come to a realization that it is God’s choice. And if they do choose God’s family, if they’re baptized and they love the truth, we can rejoice in it and thank God that he did it.

17. 6:49

    Not me, not me. It’s it’s all about God. And you never give up because you you never know. God waits a long time to call some people. Sometimes they have to go through all these experiences of life, like the prodigal son, and then finally they come back. And so we pray and we pray and we keep praying.

18. 7:09

    We keep the door open all the time waiting for that, and that’s what we’ll do for our kids. I’ve also found in this subject that it brings peace to so many of our brethren and especially our sisters, who live with the guilt in our community of brothers and sisters looking at them and saying, well, you raised five children and two of them loved the truth and three of them walked away, and that’s because you’re just not a good parent.

19. 7:37

    Now, you might say, well, I’d never say that, but you talk to people and you’ll find out that is the perception that they have of our community. If you raise five children and all of yours come in, the truth, you can talk about all your children and they’re baptized and they’re all. And then they’re sitting there thinking, well, you must think I’m a bad parent. And we don’t know whether God has called them or not. Every generation, he has to remind us that it’s not us. It’s not what we will.

20. 8:05

    It’s not how hard we work. And he reminds us by having some of those children not called, some of them are not called just as they have been all through time. So you look, you look at this, it really does bring peace to those people because Abraham would have had to like, somehow reconcile for 14 years. He raised Ishmael.

21. 8:26

    He circumcised Ishmael. It’s like watching a child baptized and and God says, and yet, no, I’m, I’m going to work with Isaac. That would be really hard to take. And then in the end, you got to send Ishmael away. You got to his own him. He’s not even your son anymore. But that’s God’s election.

22. 8:43

    It’s his choice because Abraham, he can’t save Ishmael. And he would have realized that Isaac loved Esau and he he wanted him included. He loved him so bad, not just for his food, which he did like, but, you know, as a father, he would have loved that child and tried everything he could.

23. 9:00

    Or look at David with his children. His family’s a disaster, you know, such a godly man. And and look at what happened with his kids that God has to remind every generation, all of us today, he’s going to remind all of us with our kids now, our grandkids, that it’s all of God.

24. 9:15

    It’s his choice. It’s his. Now, see, that’s a little bit different than the Cain and Abel story some of you have wondered about, like, to what extent I would take this, but I really believe Cain and Abel were both invited. They were invited. And Cain walked away from the presence of the Lord.

25. 9:30

    And and we don’t know all these cases. We don’t know who the invitation goes out to. We just don’t know. So we keep the door open. We keep working with people. We pray for all of them and hope that God will bring them in. That’s what I have learned from this whole subject, So that’s enough on that.

26. 9:46

    What about today? You know, learning to live the subject today is about living for others and not just ourselves. I’ve really challenged the younger ones here that you are growing up in a challenging world because the world today is all focused with technology on me. You are the ME group. You know everything that you do today is about what do you want and it’s all focused around what you guys do.

27. 10:11

    I remember talking to my son who works at Ford Motor Company for years and I was talking to him about how Ford Ford Motor Company, at least in the United States, I don’t know about here but they totally changed their advertising. They the, the, the car companies used to tell us about how good their cars were, how good the service record was, how the design was good and they would show us all about how good their cars were. And now the advertising is the marketing. They they put up a car and they and they put some beautiful girl there while they have you driving through and they they’re selling a lifestyle.

28. 10:41

    Then they don’t tell you anything at all about the car. It’s it’s unbelievable. And he and he told me that that’s that’s what marketing does now they’re selling you a lifestyle. You get this car and look at what it’s going to do for your life and look at all the people you’re going to attract like you and this is what they do.

29. 11:01

    The marketing is totally changed to like it’s it’s all about you and your life and what you can have and and it’s not about the car anymore. This is what’s happened. So you know you’re looking around our world today. I I really think that the phones have have really played into this a lot where everybody’s out there today taking their selfies and you got to be able to reach far out there and make sure you hold it still. And my kids laugh at me because when I aren’t really very good at it and they’re always telling us that dad, you’re holding the phone wrong.

30. 11:30

    Especially mom says when you’re taking a selfie of a bunch of people you don’t do it like that. You got to turn the phone like that. And it’s like, yeah, I like the ones I can talk to and just say something and it says takes a picture, right. So anyways, but you know, you watched it.

31. 11:44

    This is happening all the time in our world. Everywhere you go, this is what you see. And people are just like putting themselves out there on the Internet. So everybody can see my life, follow me on Facebook and look at me on Twitter and all these, well, X now, but look at me on all these things and and they look at each other. Oh, I have so many followers now and it’s this is what you are being exposed to.

32. 12:08

    The older ones aren’t because we don’t even know how to do it. But that’s what’s happening. You are really being challenged today about it’s all about you. And I really worry that that’s going to affect our our, our, our life and the truth because it isn’t all about me. That’s really not what it is.

33. 12:26

    It’s really all about God and his family. And yeah, guys do this too. I remember going to places and they even sold selfie sticks at the place so that you could like, make sure you get your stick way out there and take those pictures. It’s it’s it’s all about being able to broadcast back to everybody.

34. 12:42

    I got to admit, you know, we send Sue and I are sending pictures back to our kids all the time. We we send them back to our family on on WhatsApp or something like that but it’s Facebook. Do we have to tell everybody over in the United States like what we’ve been doing here at this Bible school?

35. 12:56

    It’s like I don’t think we really need to do that and it’s really opened up the door for child predators to be able to get on Facebook and look around and see what you’ve got what your house is like. And it’s there’s there’s there’s consequences from the some of this stuff today we we do have to be careful look at all these little icons.

36. 13:14

    I think there were a bunch of them but this morning Jack was going through the remember all those little pictures that you were going through and identifying all those things that they left on table last night but look at all those things. You know most of those I look at those and I don’t even know what they are but you know some of them the FI recognize but I don’t know most of the rest of them well maybe the yellow one with the guy in the middle.

37. 13:36

    I’ve seen that before. But our young, our young people, you all probably can identify every one of them, right? Or at least a bunch of them. These are all things that we have to be careful that these things don’t just eat up your life. And and that’s my warning to you today, because what this does is it takes away your opportunity to serve. And it comes time to work in a collegial life or work in your Cycs or help out at a gathering.

38. 14:03

    And and we’re sitting there scrolling down the phones all the time in the morning and we say, oh I don’t have time for that. This stuff eats up your life. I I’ve watched people scroll through Facebook and I keep wanting and where does it end? Doesn’t doesn’t the scrolling eventually end And it’s like they can scroll for hours and it just keeps scrolling And this is what’s happened in our world today. So it it’s not that all of this is bad but you have to work at controlling it.

39. 14:30

    You do and and the world today is not going to help you with that. You have to set parameters around you give it so much time or you limit, you know what? Who you’re gonna, who your friends are gonna be, or or whatever you do. There have to be limits that you apply because this world at large, they’re not gonna help you with that. They’ll just, they’ll be glad to eat up your time. More clicks, more clicks, more money, more advertisements, all that kind of stuff.

40. 14:52

    It’s all about clicks today. So you look at in Galatians chapter 5, when the Apostle Paul was trying to encourage the Galatians that you were called to freedom. He says in verse 13. But only do not use your freedom as an opportunity for the flesh, but through love serve one another. We have to have time for this in our lives. We have to set aside time to through love serve one another for the whole law is fulfilled.

41. 15:20

    In one word, you shall love your neighbor as yourself. But if we bite and devour each other, if we just get involved in ecclesial things and all we do is war and fight and all that kind of stuff, it’s a waste of time. But we we got to walk by the Spirit and not gratify the desires of the flesh and those who walk by the spirit, when you’re doing them for God, it will motivate us to do far more than we would ever have done for law.

42. 15:43

    So I really believe in this whole subject. The best place to be in looking for how this plays out is the life of Jesus Christ. No better. No better example than Jesus about how we can look at serving one another. You get down to the last night of his mortal life. You know, this is it.

43. 16:02

    He’s at the end. And for most of us, we would all be sitting there saying, well, you know, I got a really rough day tomorrow. And you know what can you all do to help me? That that’s the way we would be. I I know what we’re like. We we want to know like somebody help me get through this. And what does He do last night of his life? He sits down with His disciples, and He says with fervent desire. I have desired to eat this Passover with you before I suffer.

44. 16:30

    For I say to you I will no longer eat of it until it is fulfilled. Kingdom of God. And He spends that whole evening with His disciples, trying to help them understand, and at the same time hoping they could help him, which they didn’t. But he wanted them to. He wanted to help them to get through this, ’cause he knew it was going to be rough on them. And he wasn’t going to eat until eat and drink again until the Kingdom of God comes, he tells him in verse 21. But behold, the hand of my betrayer is with me on the table.

45. 17:02

    And truly the Son of Man goes as it has been determined. But woe to that man by whom he is betrayed. He wanted help from his disciples, but he didn’t get it. Didn’t get it. He did from Angel later on, but he didn’t get it from them. So what do they do? Luke 22 the the dispute arises amongst them about which of them should be the greatest. That’s what they’re worried about. All the disciples, all they could think about is, oh, you’re talking about the Kingdom, right? You’re talking, I heard something about the Kingdom in there, about all that suffering.

46. 17:32

    And then eventually there was going to be. Yes. Who’s going to be the greatest in the Kingdom? That was their focus, you know. And he says to them that, well, that’s what the people of this world do. But it shouldn’t be like that around you. He was the greatest among you. Let him be as the younger he who governs, as he who serves.

47. 17:49

    That’s what he wanted them to do. He wanted them to learn from this, that they would serve one another. Look at in Luke 22, he prays for Peter. He gets very specific to one individual. And he tells Peter, I pray for you that your faith should not fail. And when you have returned to me, strengthen your brethren, which again, you know, you find that after the resurrection, he still goes back to Peter. Feed my sheep.

48. 18:14

    But he warned them at that. I’ll tell you that the Peter that the rooster will not curl this day before you will deny me three times that you that you even know me. But he tried to warn Peter about the challenges that were coming. See, this was Christ’s focus on the hardest day of his life.

49. 18:31

    He’s focusing on how can I help you? How can I help you, Peter? How can I help all of you get through this? And then can’t you help me too. And but they didn’t. They they just let him down, you know. And that’s why when we’re involved in families and a collegial life and we get involved in situations, as a lot of you will do, or even in young people in CYCS, you get involved with situations.

50. 18:55

    What we got to do is remember like, Christ, we’re there to help people. We’re we’re not there for me and and what I can get out of it so much. But we want to help people and improve the situations. Don’t just be a a couch potato criticizer sitting on the sidelines criticizing what’s going on but unwilling to get involved and help. That’s Jesus, he he got involved. He was helping.

51. 19:18

    So in John 13 we find out that when supper actually this is supposed to be during supper, not as their King James as they’re being ended. Any of you that follow timelines on the Last Supper, you’ll find out that really messes you up as figuring out where we are. It wasn’t being ended.

52. 19:33

    It was during supper that the devil already having put it into the heart of Judas Iscariot, Simon’s son, to betray him. And Jesus, knowing that the Father had given all things into his hand and that he had come from God, It was going to God. He knows all of this. He sees in real everything that’s coming. And what does he do?

53. 19:51

    He gets down on the ground, takes, you know, something, a bowl of water and in a basin. And he begins to wash the disciples feet and to wipe them with the towel with which he was girded, because he understood that just tell them about you’ve got to be a you’ve got to serve one another.

54. 20:09

    To tell them and talk with words was one thing, but to get down on the floor and wash their feet at that point, that was a whole different story. And and let’s face it, for for all the brethren that, you know, you get up and give exhortations in ecclesias or you get up on a a day like this and A and a gathering. We say all these things what, what, what our children are really looking at is what do we do when we go home. You know, Dad, you said all those great things on the platform, but you know, now it’s time to wash the dishes. You know what?

55. 20:38

    What are you going to do? You’re going to just say, well, that’s somebody else’s job or, you know what, it’s time to change a diaper or or whatever it is. We are there to serve brethren. And this world would tell us that, oh, you know, you have to divide up the jobs. And that’s men’s work and that’s women’s work.

56. 20:54

    We can help. We, we can all help and jump in, you know, take out the trash, what, whatever it is. Nothing should be too low for us to be willing to do. Getting down and washing their feet, that’s about as low as we would think you could go. And Jesus was willing to do that. And that’s the spirit we should have of being willing to serve one another.

57. 21:17

    Don’t ever say I I can’t do that job because that’s beneath me. We can all help out. You look in John 13 as you’re still going through this. After he had finished washing their feet and taking the garments, he sits down again and he says to them, Do you know what I’ve done for you?

58. 21:33

    You call me Teacher and Lord, which is true? Or you know well, you know that’s right, for I am. And if I then your Lord and Teacher have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one anothers feet. We don’t literally do that today. You know. I don’t think you know you can do it. I guess is a ritual.

59. 21:51

    I’ve seen people do that where you can practice. I think one of our Cycs one times did that and we just all practice washing each other’s feet. But it was more like a ritual procedure you go through. It wasn’t some kind of daily thing. But what he’s trying to get at is the lowest jobs we should be willing to help one another to serve.

60. 22:08

    Never say I’m above all those things by giving you an example that you should do is I have done for you. That’s what he’s want. That’s what he wanted to leave for us to see on the hardest night of his life. And you, you look brothers and sisters for some of us who think we go home and we think like our life is really challenging and there’s a tendency to get into depression and maybe we get discouraged that things are spiraling down.

61. 22:33

    How did Jesus get through this life? How did he get through that night? He didn’t get it through by thinking about all the things that he’s going to have to suffer and why this wasn’t fair for him and why everybody else’s life is better than mine. He got through the night by serving his his, his disciples.

62. 22:53

    He got involved. He showed them he was trying to help other people, and that’s what motivated him to keep going forward. It was all about saving us and leaving us, an example that we could follow in his steps. And it’s a great warning to all of us that whatever is happening in our lives, look to Jesus, how did he get through it?

63. 23:16

    Not by just thinking about all how bad things were for him. He got through it by volunteering for jobs in the Ecclesia, helping out every way he could with other people. Never saying a job is is beneath me and I can’t do that. He got involved and that’s what kept him going. And if it worked for him, brothers and sisters and young people, that will work for us. It is a huge motivator.

64. 23:41

    Or you look in John 13 where he gives them a new commandment, he says a new command. It wasn’t really new, as John says later on in in his letters, but it was. It was new to them because they weren’t used to seeing this idea of like their leaders getting down and washing feet.

65. 23:58

    That was new to them, even though it was really old, but a new commandment. I give you that you love one another as I have loved you, that you should also love one another. And by this you know people will know. And you will know that you are my disciples if you have love for one another.

66. 24:16

    See, that’s the test that John then picked from the He. He took this to heart, and he wrote it right into his letters and his epistles later on. And he said, there’s that test for love. You know, you can say, well, I, I love everybody here. I love all the people in my ecclesia. Are you willing to, though, really get down there and serve for them, help them out, get them through their troubles? That’s the test as to whether or not we really, you know, love the Lord Jesus Christ.

67. 24:43

    Do we really love one another? Or in John 14 when he goes on and he says, in my father’s house are many rooms, there’s a lot of spaces in my father’s house. And if it were not so, I I would have told you, I’m going there to prepare a place for you. That’s the focus.

68. 25:00

    His focus wasn’t on all the bad things that were going to happen to him. He’s going to be tortured and crucified and all this. What he did is he focused on the the end result. I’m going to my father’s house. I’m on my way to the father, he said in John 13. That’s where I’m going. Well, and for us, we’re honored we did the Kingdom, and that should motivate us to get through all the things of this life.

69. 25:23

    When we really do see what the Kingdom will be like, how wonderful it will be to join the angels in their work, it it motivates us. We’re going there, and he was going there to prepare a place for us, a place so that he could work with us and send the com, the comforter back to work with these people. That’s what he’s doing.

70. 25:41

    And so Jesus, he does. He gets crucified, He gets raised from the dead and he gets sends to heaven. And now he can work with these people and that’s what he was looking forward to working with all of us, like we would hope to do in the Kingdom for the mortals. He’s going to send them the the comforter so that it will help them get through those days. And he told me if I, if I don’t go, but I don’t go through this, I I won’t be able to help you.

71. 26:07

    And so I’ll send you the helper later on, as some of the versions actually put that. And so in John 14, he said, look, because I go to my father, you know, I can do greater works than all these things that you’ve seen so far. And whatever you ask in my name that I will do that the Father may be glorified in the Son. If you ask anything in my name, I will do it. I will do it.

72. 26:31

    Isn’t that interesting when we carefully read that it’s it’s it’s not that Jesus has to then listen and go ask God, is it OK if I do this? He has the authority today to make that decision. He’s been given all authority in heaven and earth, and he’s working with all of us today.

73. 26:50

    He’s sending out his angels to work in our lives. And if we ask anything in his name, you know that’s for the good of the family, you know, He says he will do it. And see, when you see that, you know, if you ask anything in my name, I will do it. It’s caused me to reread this whole idea and rethink the idea of ending our prayers in Jesus.

74. 27:13

    Name 3 words. See what he’s really talking about here. Isn’t that we Tech 3 words onto the end of our prayers. He’s talking about asking that we are living in his name. We are in Him. We are part of the family. We have that eternal life working in US. And if we’re doing that, we talk to Him and we are literally in His name.

75. 27:39

    It it’s it’s not just three words to tack on the end of a prayer. It’s a meaningful way of life that He’s after, not just three words and not that it’s wrong. And I say in Jesus name too. And I end prayer sometimes, but I I wouldn’t want people to just think that, oh that that’s it.

76. 27:56

    You got to put the right words on the end of a prayer. It’s not about words, it’s about a way of life. Which is why you don’t find people in the New Testament when they offered prayers. They don’t end their prayers in Jesus name. They they were living in the name. They were in him and been found in him. And it was a way of life more so than it was just three words that we tack on.

77. 28:19

    So in John 14, then he talks about going to the Father, and whatever you ask in my name again, I will do it. And if you ask me anything in my name, I will do it. Whoops. That’s the one We looked at. John 15. Look at this one. We, I think we looked at this one earlier in the week about being his friends. And this is my commandment.

78. 28:35

    He says that if you love one another as I have loved you, greater love has no one than this. And one laid on his life for his friends and I. You are my friends. If you do whatever I command you, but no longer do, I call you servants. For a servant does not know what his master is doing.

79. 28:51

    But I have called you friends for all things that I’ve heard from my father. I made no to you. See, that’s what friendship is really all about. Now I know there’s there’s some people that are worried that if we called Jesus my master and my friend, as is in our hymn book, you know, if we do that, that that’s lowering the relationship too low. That’s treating Jesus like our friend. We have some people who don’t even like calling Jesus our brother.

80. 29:17

    John Thomas used to call him our elder brother. He would use that term. But the Bible says that he calls us his friends. He wants a relationship with you, like a friendship. Even though we still at the same still respect him and understand he is our Lord and our master. But he’s he’s not like a slave master who mistreats us.

81. 29:39

    He’s a master who is our friend and we can trust him and we know he loves us and he cares about us. And on our generation we were growing up, we didn’t hear much about that. People were so worried about having a friendship and a relationship with Jesus, it sounded too evangelical. But it’s biblical.

82. 29:57

    Brothers and sisters, we we can’t resist what the Bible says. He He wants us to be his friends and he says in verse 16, look at you didn’t choose me. I chose you. This is that election idea. And then appointed you that you should go and bear fruit. That’s what. That’s the the Jesus Christ that we have. So he wants a relationship with us, one of the great reasons God gave his son.

83. 30:24

    If you if you think about why was it necessary that God have a son. Yes, he declared God right and everything he declared his father was right. He what we call the righteousness of God. But the problem all along with people, with human people, is God is so powerful, as Job would find out.

84. 30:42

    And he’s so overwhelming, as Job had said, I’d be afraid to even talk to him. But if he ever did come to talk to me, I would just like, cringe. He’s God and and what happens when he brings Israel to the mountain and the mountain’s on fire and it’s quaking? The people, they wanted to run away, they were scared of God.

85. 31:02

    And So what he has done for us is said, OK, I’ll send you my son. He has your nature. He knows what you are like. He he’s not God. He’s one of you. And now you can talk to him, you can learn about him, you can come to him, and he can be the great high priest who will draw you into immortality with me.

86. 31:27

    That’s how far God was willing to go to save us, to take away all the excuses that oh, I I can’t do this because just God is too powerful. And I can’t ask him that. I can’t talk to him about that. There’s no excuses anymore because he has sent his son. He has brought it down to our level, our level. And you see, it wasn’t because we needed somebody to, like, get in between US and God so that he could, like, go to the Father. Now sitting next to God and saying, well, I know what these people are.

87. 32:00

    I know what Jim’s like. He’s fighting with this. He’s got this human nature. You know, I had it too. I know what he’s going through. So could you could you please forgive him for my sake? That’s not really what it’s about. That’s what Christianity would teach. That’s not what’s in the Bible though. Brother and sisters, that isn’t what’s happening. Jesus doesn’t even need to ask his father whether he can forgive us or not.

88. 32:24

    He has been given all authority in heaven and earth. What God realized is that we have a problem. I have the problem. I’m a Sinner and I commit a Sinner. I’m afraid to talk to God, so he has sent his son to convince me to draw nigh now with A to the throne of grace. We Paul says we can approach boldly with our high priest because he understands our we.

89. 32:49

    We realize He understands. We didn’t think God did, but think about it for a minute all along. God has always understood. He’s always known what it’s like for us to go through these things. He has loved us from the beginning. He did all of this to save us, you know, You know, if you think about it, like, who did this for David?

90. 33:10

    Who did this for Abraham? Who did all this, this pleading with God stuff? There was. There was. Jesus wasn’t around back then, but all these people had to come to get a relationship with God so that they would feel comfortable asking God for help and coming to the throne of grace and realizing he would extend mercy. That’s what he’s looking for, this loving, trusting relationship with us.

91. 33:34

    And so that’s what what Christ was trying to do in the end. And he tried to tell them, look, I’ve got to go away. If I go away right now, I’m, I’m sorry, I’ve got to leave you. But if I go away, it’s to your advantage, he says in John 16 and verse seven. I’ll tell you the truth.

92. 33:51

    It is to your advantage that I go away. For if I don’t go away, the helper will not come to you. But if I depart and I send them to you, then he will come. He’ll convict the world of sin and righteousness and of judgement, and it’s all because he’s going to the Father.

93. 34:07

    So you think about how this played out. Then with all this, he’s trying to convince the disciples to help him. They don’t catch on at all. He takes Peter, Andrew and and Peter, James and John, and he takes them up there. And he says, can you sit there for a minute and watch with me while I I talk to my father and he’s praying to God for help. And they let him down.

94. 34:26

    They fall asleep. They fall asleep. And so then you have the the situation where, well, they’re not going to help him. What’s God going to do? He sends the helper. He sends the Angel to help Jesus and to strengthen him, to to intercede between this mind of the flesh that he had, this this mind that we’ve the devil that’s in us that says I don’t want to go through this, I don’t want to go through it. Isn’t there some other way?

95. 34:52

    And the spiritual mind that’s saying I know I want to do your will, I want to do your will. And he needs somebody to strengthen that spiritual mind so that it rises up above the devil in him. And the Angel plays that role. He was the intercessor, as we would call it for Jesus.

96. 35:10

    Or like when you look at what’s happened in our world today, people have messed this all up. They they think that Jesus is the intercessor, pleading with God. Please forgive us because they think of the angry God. All that came from Christianity, not from our Bibles. He doesn’t have to plead with God.

97. 35:28

    God loves you. He wants to forgive you. He just wants to get us on board and he. And if we have excuses, he set his Son to take away all the excuses for us, drawing near to the throne of grace. And so when we read about intercession in the Bible with with Jesus, what it is, is it’s Jesus is interceding between the mind of the flesh and the mind of the Spirit, just like the Angel did for him. It’s our problem.

98. 35:56

    And you see this, like, for example, when you’re reading through Romans eight, you probably noticed that in Romans 8, the whole chapter at the beginning is about the mind of the flesh versus the mind of the Spirit. They’re at war with one another. There’s this war going on, and we got to be working on doing that, the Spirit.

99. 36:11

    And then Paul says, well, Jesus intercedes, and the King James puts in there for us. They’re not in the Greek. He intercedes. And who does he intercede with? Because, as John Carter said, read the context. The context is this battle of the mind of the Spirit versus the mind of the flesh and what Christ does.

100. 36:33

     He plays the role of the helper, and he strengthens our spiritual minds to overcome the mind of the flesh. He intercedes in in US between the mind of the Spirit and the mind of the flesh. Which is why later in Romans 8 he says he intercedes according to the will of God. He’s not begging God to forgive us, He’s trying to convince us to overcome, to fight the devil to beat it and and to God will forgive us. He knows that and and you see how Romans 8 ends up. It’s all about the love of God and the love of Christ and who’s going to separate you from that?

101. 37:11

     Look at we have somebody who sits next to the Father who will send the help. He will help us in overcoming this. He’ll help us in this battle. That’s why he needed to send them the helper. Well, I just want to spend a minute of of talking about one of the issues that comes up in here.

102. 37:28

     We we have to be careful as we’re we’re serving today and we’re working out in our collegial life. One of the issues that comes up all the time is our hymns and our music. And I I just want to mention to the young and to the old that we’ve we’ve both got to be careful about how this plays out with us.

103. 37:45

     But what’s happening in our community is that we’re all being influenced whether we know it or not by the influence of the Christian Church and by humanism coming into our group. They’re always out there like the the marketers are in in our world today. And some of the ideas that that that they would like to throw at us is this idea like Jesus is suffering your punishment. Those of you that read the NIV, you probably have picked that up in Isaiah 53 and it says that he he bore our punishment. They just put it right in the text because that’s what they believe when they translate it.

104. 38:18

     Or this idea that Jesus needs to beg God to forgive us because they misunderstood our loving God. They didn’t realize he doesn’t need Jesus to beg. He wants to forgive us, and he’s using Jesus to help us get to that point that he can forgive us. That’s what our God has done. That’s what he did all along.

105. 38:37

     So you watch how this plays out in some of these things we We know the Father loves us. We know He loves us more than anyone has ever loved us more than Jesus. The churches wouldn’t do. They’d say that Jesus loves you more than God and the angry God gets helped out by his son who who gave himself for us and suffered our punishment and all that. We don’t believe that brothers and sisters and young people, that’s not what Chris Adelphian stand for. These other religions.

106. 39:03

     They built their whole idea about an angry God who’s just sitting there waiting to get you for all of your sins. They think that Jesus now defends us before God. He pleads with God to forgive us. That King James Eagan uses that word, an advocate, an advocate. In First John Two, they think he advocates for us.

107. 39:21

     He sort of talks God out of it, but it’s not biblical. I mean, who did that for Adam and for Noah and Abraham and Joseph and Moses and David or Job? Job wanted somebody to do that, didn’t he? He wanted that days minute calls it, or that mediator. He wanted him to get between him and God and he wanted somebody that could bring him and God to the same level.

108. 39:43

     And we could now talk this out and he was going to convince God that he was wrong. Show him all the evidence. That’s what Job was looking for. And in the end he realized I was all wrong. That isn’t how it works at all. God’s God was way above all of that. So you’ve got to be careful in all of our handbooks today that this stuff doesn’t creep into us just so you can see how it does.

109. 40:06

     Look at PTL 184. I know that my Redeemer lives. See, this is what people like out of Job, that he can play that role of the pleader. That Joe. Joe wanted this intermediator to come in this intercessor and plead with Job’s case before God in the court. And in the end, he just said, wow, I didn’t even know who you were, God. I’d heard of you by the hearing of the ears. But now I understand how it works. When you see those things like that in in our hymns, we have to be careful.

110. 40:35

     They’re not biblical concepts. You won’t find Jesus pleading with God to forgive us. They both want to forgive us. That’s Romans 8. Or you look in PTL 43, you know that they put in this idea that Jesus was bruised for iniquities, sort of giving you a their own, their own take on Isaiah 53 to bring us peace. He was punished because they were using an NIV and they thought that was the right thing. That’s what they believed, that they thought Jesus was punished to bring us peace and that he paid for the guilt that was mine.

111. 41:10

     They they really believe that. They think he paid for your guilt. It was a transaction, and he paid for all our sins. But it’s not biblical to teach that. You won’t find that in the real Hebrew text of Isaiah 53. That’s a transliteration of somebody’s idea. And for those of you that think that it’s just in the PTL, you know, I think it’s good for all of us, only ones, to realize if you’re a Green Book only person, that this stuff is in the Green Book too.

112. 41:35

     We we have to be careful that he talks about Christ pleading for us. He hears our cry, and he lives in glory now on high, pleading for us. He doesn’t plead for us. He pleads with us, He pleads with us. He He sends the helper to involve in our life and he sends his angels out pleading with us to overcome that that mind of the flesh and destroy that devil and overcome it and make good choices for him.

113. 42:03

     Or you look in in in our green book in 238 they copied this out of our you know your Bible. They write in first John 2. Some of the bibles have that Jesus is our advocate. Our advocate. You know and advocate you know what that is today. That’s somebody who gets involved between two parties and they advocate for you.

114. 42:22

     They they they they take your cause and they try to convince the other side that you were actually right and you should have a compromise. That’s what advocates do. That’s not what our Lord Jesus Christ does. Do you know what the word in the Greek is for? Advocate? Have you ever done a study on 1st John Two? That word in the Greek is Paracletos. It’s the helper from John 15, John 17. He is our helper.

115. 42:53

     He’s not our advocate. He’s helping us to come to God, not trying to convince God to accept us. That’s what he really is. Look at the NIV. Look what they do with this, just so you’re aware of those of you that use an NIV. They say in First John Two that if anybody does sin, we have one who speaks to the Father in our defence. That’s what an advocate is.

116. 43:16

     And they just put the words in there so you don’t misread it. They that’s really what an advocate does. It’s not biblical. Rather than sisters and young people, these are ideas that have crept in from the churches, but they’re not ideas that are actually in our bibles. And so you just check that out yourself.

117. 43:33

     Those of you that have Bible programs out and the electronic people, you can check all this stuff out. It’s actually the word paraclete and it’s the only time used outside of John. It’s in first John two look at the green Book 258. This is where it becomes really clear that he died, but lives alway and in the holy stands to plead for Saints who pray and to hold up feeling hands.

118. 43:55

     Our advocate, they’ve got both of them in there now. We’ve got him pleading for us and we have the advocate in there abides in heaven that fearing Saints may be forgiven and he ends up with who pleases households cause in heaven. I I hope you don’t have a relationship with God. I I hope after this week you’re not looking at your God, the God who we love and who loves us. As somebody who needs to be talked out of forgiving you, I hope that isn’t your relationship with God. That’s not, that’s not the God I worship. And like I told you at the beginning, if we don’t understand the love of God, it affects how we have a relationship with God and then it justifies us mistreating other people.

119. 44:39

     Our God isn’t like that. He doesn’t need somebody to plead with him. He wants to forgive you. He loves you, and he was willing to give your his own Son and put him through all of that so that he could get us to come to him and draw near to the throne of grace.

120. 44:56

     That’s the God who we worship, brethren and sisters. We don’t need someone who pleads. And the intercession. If you look in Romans 8, if you ever check that out, you’d see it’s an italics, that idea that he intercedes for us with groanings. See, he’s referring back to the Garden of Eden with the groanings. He uses that word in the Greek, like Jesus when he groaned in his spirit when he saw Lazarus and what he was going through. When he’s when he’s praying in the garden he’s trying to get, He’s fighting this battle of flesh versus the spirit and flesh versus the spirit.

121. 45:25

     And he intercedes with our minds to strengthen us by all the things that the angels do in our lives and the reading of his word and going to the classes, all those things. He’s trying to intercede with us according to the will of God. I think they’re on the same page for the sisters.

122. 45:44

     It’s not Christ pleading with God. It’s Jesus Christ trying to bring us to God. That’s what he’s doing. He’s not trying to change his father. Well, I challenge you. And I read through John Carter’s book, those of you that haven’t ever looked at Romans 8, that’s he just, he just appealed to the fact. Context, context, context.

123. 46:03

     Read the context of it. Don’t just take a verse out of a context and say that Jesus intercedes for us and then apply some meaning to it that you want to that you probably learn from from Christianity. Read the context. It’s the war of the spirit, the the, the old man versus the new man, and that’s what he brings out in Romans chapter 8.

124. 46:25

     If you look at in the Green Book in 262, there it is again. He pleads for us above. And the reason I’m bringing them all up is because if we’re not careful, we let these hymns influence us to where we buy into the Christian view of the atonement. And we do have to be careful that that’s not really what we want, the older ones and the younger. We don’t want our hymns to mislead us. And so we have to be careful.

125. 46:50

     We don’t throw out the hymn books. What we do is we pick hymns that preach truth in both of the hymn books or in all of the hymn books that we use. They all have good hymns. Most of them are good. But there also are some, some, some of the hymns that could be very misleading. PTL 177, the one about the father turning away because he can’t look at the sun up on the cross. And it’s it’s just not true.

126. 47:14

     It gives us the impression that this is this angry God punishing the sun. This is what the Christian churches teach. But we know in Romans chapter eight Brothers and Sisters, as as as he pleads, as he goes through that whole issue of intercession and mentions it twice. He ends that chapter and he and he deals with the fact that in all things God is working for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose. That’s the premise that we it’s the foundation that God is working for good because he loves us, and if we love Him, He’s loving us.

127. 47:51

     So what should we say then in verse 31 in response to all of this? If God is for us, who can be against us? There’s nobody that can be against us. He who did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all, how will he not also along with him, graciously give us all things? Do you believe that that’s the God that we worship? We want to become like Him and understand He wants to give us the Kingdom.

128. 48:17

     That’s what he wants. And who will bring any charge against those whom God has chosen. Now nobody’s going to do that. God chose us so that he could save us and and add us to his Kingdom. It is God who justifies. He’ll justify us, Paul said. He promises And who is he who condemns?

129. 48:36

     Who’s going to condemn you at at the judgement? See, Jesus Christ is, is he going to come and condemn you who died more than that, who was raised to life. He’s at the right hand of God and is also interceding for us and our war against sin. You you know, that’s what he says. He’s our helper now.

130. 48:55

     He’s helping us to to destroy the old man and and fight this and put it to death. Both of them are totally invested in saving you. They want you there so bad. And the only one that can get in the way of that is you. We are the only ones. They will justify us.

131. 49:13

     They will save us. They will plead with us to fight the war. Who’s going to separate us from the love of Christ? He says nobody’s going to be able to separate you from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus. And I’ll leave you with that for today. But you know, I hope during this week we could hopefully sort of re evaluate maybe our our our understanding and our relationship with our God.

132. 49:36

     It’s really important that we get it right that we see him as the loving Father who’s doing everything he possibly can to save us. And I am sure, as Paul said of this, that he who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ. So thanks very much for your attention this week.

133. 49:57

     It’s been really great being here. It’s really nice to have met a lot of you for the first time and he’s got a great place here and you got a whole bunch of great young people over there.