Jesus and Religion

Good morning. Wasn’t the break from the heat last week amazing? Praise God for that.

Be very careful this week however as the August heat is back. Drink lots of water and if you have to be out for extended periods be watchful for heat exhaustion and heat stroke.

School starts this Wednesday so please be in prayer for that change of season and be prayerful for the missionaries, the Christian teachers, coaches, admin, janitors, kitchen workers, bus drivers that God has placed in the schools to do His work!

Let’s pray

START OBS

This world and satan are okay with religion

The world and satan are okay with church

The world and satan hate Jesus

You can be religious and go to hell

You can be an active church member and go to hell

Religion doesn’t save

Church doesn’t save

Only Jesus saves

Jesus is the only way to the Father

Church should never be about church but always and only about Jesus

We have looked a lot lately at true Christian living and lifestyle

How it is about the heart

About your relationship with Jesus

If your heart relationship with Jesus is right

and real

and intimate

your lifestyle will match

You will make excuses to be at church

You will make excuses to be at Women’s group or Men’s group or our Wednesday night Bible study

You will make excuses to serve by teaching or helping with Sunday School

You will make excuses to teach or help in Children’s Church

You will make excuses to help in the back during service

You will make excuses to help mow the yard or help around the building

You will make excuses to visit nursing homes

You will make excuses to share the gospel with the lost

So many today try to be religious not Christian

So many today try to work their way to God

So many today try to justify sin instead of confess it

This morning we are going to look to 2 Old Testament passages because I believe they answer the question

Jesus or Religion

I Samuel 15:22

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“And Samuel said, “Has the Lord as great delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices, as in obeying the voice of the Lord? Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice, and to listen than the fat of rams.”

and

Hosea 6:6

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“For I desire steadfast love and not sacrifice, the knowledge of God rather than burnt offerings.”

Some may say

Pastor Josh obedience is works

Religion is works

How can these two verses point to Jesus and not works?

It depends on your heart

If you are obeying to gain favor

If you are obeying to gain salvation

You are religious and wrong

You obey because you love Jesus

You love Jesus because He first loved you

You love Jesus because of the cross

You love Jesus for the work

the transformation

He has done in you

So many people who truly believe they are Christians will hear away from me I never knew you from Jesus because their salvation was in religion and not from Jesus

God wants your love

God wants your love to be so authentic

so real

so meaningful

that it transforms you

that it drives you to obey

If your love is based on realizing what God through Jesus did for you

You were born a sinner

You sinned, all have sinned

That sin forces you to fall short of God’s glory

That sin results in God’s wrath which is hell and eternal separation from God

The only payment accepted for that sin is a perfect death

The death of a perfect sacrifice

Jesus was that perfect sacrifice on the cross 2023 years ago

He paid your price

All you have to do is apply that payment by believing in your heart that God raised Jesus from the dead and confessing with your mouth that Jesus is your Lord and Savior

If you truly have done that you will be changed from the inside out

You will also obey because you realize obedience is love

John 14:15

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““If you love me, you will keep my commandments.”

John 14:21

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“Whoever has my commandments and keeps them, he it is who loves me. And he who loves me will be loved by my Father, and I will love him and manifest myself to him.””

Jesus is very clear here

Love results in obedience

Obedience is how you love Jesus

Please allow the Holy Spirit to make this clear to you this morning

If you refuse to obey God and Jesus commandments you don’t love Jesus and are not saved

I am not talking about sinning

We all have sinned

We all will sin today

We all will sin in the future

When God convicts you of that sin yo confess and seek forgiveness

You repent

You turn and sprint the opposite direction of that sin

When you are convicted it breaks your heart because you chose sin over God

You loved sin more than God

Here is the truth

If you love Jesus

You were awakened by the Holy Spirit to your sinful condition

He awakened you to God’s wrath that would be poured out upon you because of that sin

He awakened you to the fact that only Jesus’ blood applied to your sin debt is the only way to salvation and heaven and forgiveness

The sad thing is so many want to stop right there

I got saved I am good

That is like booking a vacation to the most beautiful, peaceful place you can think of

for some a tropical paradise

for others the mountains

wherever that is for you it is like you book that trip you get on the plane and you arrive but you never leave the airport to fully enjoy and understand the place you are at

If you love Jesus but hate obeying

If you love Jesus but refuse to obey

Jesus just said you in John you were not good

If you love me keep my commandments

He goes further however

Luke 6:46-49

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““Why do you call me ‘Lord, Lord,’ and not do what I tell you? Everyone who comes to me and hears my words and does them, I will show you what he is like: he is like a man building a house, who dug deep and laid the foundation on the rock. And when a flood arose, the stream broke against that house and could not shake it, because it had been well built. But the one who hears and does not do them is like a man who built a house on the ground without a foundation. When the stream broke against it, immediately it fell, and the ruin of that house was great.””

Your foundation must be Jesus

You build upon that foundation by obeying Jesus

Again not to gain that foundation but because of the foundation

Once you accept Jesus as your Lord and Savior you are saved

You have gained forgiveness

You have gained heaven, in fact you are no longer a citizen of this world but a citizen of heaven

Your are in right standing with God

When God looks at you He sees Jesus’ blood not your sin

The problem again lies in this: many think that has happened when it has not

If you truly accept Jesus then you have the Holy Spirit

God

Living inside of you

He changes you from the inside out

You read the Bible, God’s Word

You hear it proclaimed

The Holy Spirit teaches you, shows you how to apply it to your life

Changes you to match the Word

You will see the fruit of the Spirit in your life

They way you think

They way you speak

They way you act

The way you react

You will be different and you will have an overwhelming need to obey Jesus because you realize the price He paid for YOU!

So many confuse love with works

So many try to outwork their sin

So many try to build their own ladder to heaven

So many try to rely on the faith of their parents or their kids or their church or their pastor or whatever

So many will be driven away when they meet Jesus when they thought they were good.

God doesn’t want your religion He wants your love

He has defined your love as obedience

James 1:26-27

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“If anyone thinks he is religious and does not bridle his tongue but deceives his heart, this person’s religion is worthless. Religion that is pure and undefiled before God the Father is this: to visit orphans and widows in their affliction, and to keep oneself unstained from the world.”

Religion that is pure and undefiled before God the Father

Why does that matter?

If your religion is not pure and undefiled it will be rejected by God

Look at what God says is pure

First and foremost a bridled tongue

Listen cussing is the easy part of bridled tongue

Yes it is part of it, cussing is a sin

Even replacement words, words that are not cuss words but used to mean the same as cuss words

Bridled tongue

But it goes beyond that

gossip

lying

rude talk

arrogant talk

A bridled tongue is a tongue that only speaks to bring glory to God

Beyond that look at the heart of pure and undefiled religion

visit orphans and widows in their affliction

What does that mean well it means just what it says

orphans and widows must take a high priority in you life

seek them out

serve them

love them

show them Jesus

But it goes beyond that because the lost are orphans

They are fatherless because they do not have Jesus so therefore they do not have God the Father

Seek them out in their afflictions

in their addiction

in their greed

in their arrogance

in their rudeness

in their world.....seek them out

shine the light of Jesus into their darkness

But it goes even further

Keep oneself unstained from the world

When people look at you do they see the world or do they see Jesus

Ask those close to you what they see

If you have friends who are lost ask them what they see, world or Jesus

When your religion is based upon relationship it will be pure and undefiled

When your religion is based upon works or anything else it will be rejected

If you love Jesus you will also love God’s Word

II Timothy 3:15-17

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“and how from childhood you have been acquainted with the sacred writings, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus. All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work.”

God’s Word is sacred

God’s Word is able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus

God’s Word is breathed out by God

God’s Word is profitable for teaching

for reproof

for correction

for training in righteousness

so You may be complete

equipped for every good work

So why to you ignore God’s Word

Why do you not make a priority to be in God’s Word every day

Most, if not all in the sanctuary here this morning are Christians

We have a little over 100 people in our church database

That means they have been here to CCC

They have given us their information

Some attend regularly

Some attend occasionally

Most attend in person

Some attend online

Some don’t attend at all

I say that for this

If God’s Word was a priority to them, we would be full every Sunday and there would never be a ministry that was in need in terms of manpower and finances.

Why

Because God’s Word equips you for good work

Many don’t help in ministries because they feel it is not their work

If God led you here to CCC, if you are here God led you here then He will equip you to do the work that He has for CCC to do

What is that work, the ministries we already have

The ministries that He will bring

He will equip you which means you are not equipped unless you are in the Word every day seeking God and seeking transformation

If you seek God in His Word daily

If you truly seek to be transformed by His Word

Then you will jump at opportunities to spread His glory

You won’t have to wait until you are equipped because you are already equipped or you have faith God will equip you!

Our men’s discipleship group that meets on Wednesday nights from 7-8:30 pm has been doing a rightnow media study called Be A Godly Man

This study is based on

I Corinthians 16:13

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“Be watchful, stand firm in the faith, act like men, be strong.”

We have been walking through what it means to be watchful

to stand firm in the faith

to act like men

to be strong

This Wednesday we will look at Love

What does it look like for a godly man to love in a godly way

There have been a few who have not missed a Wednesday since it started or a few who have only missed one or two

Those guys have grown so much not because of the study, even though it is a powerful one but because of their love for Jesus and understanding the role that God’s Word plays in their growth as a godly man

Religion says do works

Religion says God loves you, you have accepted Jesus, just love people

Those are true but they are not pure and undefiled religion because what most mean by that statement is do what you want to do because God loves you so therefore He won’t send you to hell

We have shown through scripture that is not true here this morning

The thing we must understand is we are to mature in Christ

We do that by being in the Word of God everyday

We do that by entering the secret place everyday

We do that by being in prayer constantly

We do that by coming to church and hearing the Word of God proclaimed

By responding to conviction in your life by confessing and seeking forgiveness

We do that by doing the work God created for you to do

I Corinthians 13:11

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“When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I gave up childish ways.”

Children think all I have to do is accept Jesus

That is true, the only decision that matters in your life is the one that leads to accepting Jesus as your Lord and Savior

Jesus however never intended or desires for you to stay at salvation

He wants you to grow

In education we have benchmarks

Things children should be able to do as they grow and mature

If they do not hit those benchmarks by regular classroom instruction then we intervene and do all we can do to help them grow and mature as they should

The same is true with Christians

You begin as a babe in Christ

You don’t know what you don’t know

You love Jesus

You are on fire with the Holy Spirit but that love and fire never move past being saved into the work of obedience

It is a very superficial love for Christ that dies when things get hard

When persecution comes

When rejection comes

When being a Christian is no longer easy or popular

If you still speak like a child

If you still think like a child

If you still reason like a child

You are a child

You are not growing and maturing in Christ

You are depending upon religion not Jesus

Jesus wants you to be men and women of God

He grows you through obedience because in obeying you learn who He truly is

You learn that He is always there for you

That He never leaves nor forsakes you

That God truly does want all to come to repentance

That He uses His children to shine Jesus’ light into the dark world

That there are people and works that can only be reached and done by YOU

God created them for YOU to do and you gladly do them regardless of the cost to you because you love Jesus!

I don’t know where you stand this morning

Are you religious or are you a Christian

Do you love works or do you love Jesus

As this song plays pray that God through the Holy Spirit reveals to you where you are and respond accordingly

STOP OBS

Invitation song