Heart Verse Traditions
Notes
Transcript
Me
Me
I remember some 10 years ago, I was struggling with lust. I hated it and yet it controlled me.
I did everything I knew to do to defeat it. Alter calls, speaking in tongues, hours a day of reading the Bible and prayer.
All the traditions I grew up with seemed powerless over my lust.
And then one night - I read a sermon by Charles Spurgeon.
I realized I was loved by God - even though I hated myself.
I realized he fully accepted me because of Jesus.
And it was that realization of God’s love and acceptance that began to lead me to freedom.
My heart - my desires, will and passions had a new love.
Those traditions were good but they could not change my heart and therefore could not change my behavior.
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We
We
Today maybe some of you are struggling in sin and you feel powerless.
Maybe some of you like me are dealing with Lust.
Or maybe
Hatred towards others
Unforgiveness
Lying or talking behind people’s backs
Maybe its laziness or an addiction.
You feel powerless and nothing seems to work
You desire to be holy and pure but deep within you feel sick, something is wrong, and you are powerless to change it.
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Today as we read through Jesus addresses this very issue.
The one thing, I want you to remember is this.
Change Comes Through Relationship and Obedience.
Change Comes Through Relationship and Obedience.
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God’s Word
God’s Word
Some Pharisees and teachers of religious law now arrived from Jerusalem to see Jesus. They asked him, “Why do your disciples disobey our age-old tradition? For they ignore our tradition of ceremonial hand washing before they eat.”
Some Pharisees and teachers of religious law now arrived from Jerusalem to see Jesus. They asked him, “Why do your disciples disobey our age-old tradition? For they ignore our tradition of ceremonial hand washing before they eat.”
Jesus replied, “And why do you, by your traditions, violate the direct commandments of God? For instance, God says, ‘Honor your father and mother,’ and ‘Anyone who speaks disrespectfully of father or mother must be put to death.’ But you say it is all right for people to say to their parents, ‘Sorry, I can’t help you. For I have vowed to give to God what I would have given to you.’ In this way, you say they don’t need to honor their parents. And so you cancel the word of God for the sake of your own tradition. You hypocrites! Isaiah was right when he prophesied about you, for he wrote,
‘These people honor me with their lips,
but their hearts are far from me.
Their worship is a farce,
for they teach man-made ideas as commands from God.’”
Then Jesus called to the crowd to come and hear. “Listen,” he said, “and try to understand. It’s not what goes into your mouth that defiles you; you are defiled by the words that come out of your mouth.”
Then the disciples came to him and asked, “Do you realize you offended the Pharisees by what you just said?”
Jesus replied, “Every plant not planted by my heavenly Father will be uprooted, so ignore them. They are blind guides leading the blind, and if one blind person guides another, they will both fall into a ditch.”
Then Peter said to Jesus, “Explain to us the parable that says people aren’t defiled by what they eat.”
“Don’t you understand yet?” Jesus asked. “Anything you eat passes through the stomach and then goes into the sewer. But the words you speak come from the heart—that’s what defiles you. For from the heart come evil thoughts, murder, adultery, all sexual immorality, theft, lying, and slander. These are what defile you. Eating with unwashed hands will never defile you.”
The delegation came all the way from Jerusalem - Important to them.
Tradition of hand washing
Talmud - Oral tradition - held by many to be above the Words of God.
Jesus replied, “And why do you, by your traditions, violate the direct commandments of God? For instance, God says, ‘Honor your father and mother,’ and ‘Anyone who speaks disrespectfully of father or mother must be put to death.’ But you say it is all right for people to say to their parents, ‘Sorry, I can’t help you. For I have vowed to give to God what I would have given to you.’ In this way, you say they don’t need to honor their parents. And so you cancel the word of God for the sake of your own tradition.
Matthew 15:3-
Jesus turns their argument onto themselves.
Their tradition to give money to the temple/ don’t have to take care of parents or the poor.
Jesus makes the point that tradition does not always = God’s Word.
Matthew 15:7-
You hypocrites! Isaiah was right when he prophesied about you, for he wrote,
‘These people honor me with their lips,
but their hearts are far from me.
Their worship is a farce,
for they teach man-made ideas as commands from God.’”
When your heart is not right with God, your acts of worship are seen by God as fake.
Guard your heart above all else,
for it determines the course of your life.
heart = Will, desires, love, passions
Then Jesus called to the crowd to come and hear. “Listen,” he said, “and try to understand. It’s not what goes into your mouth that defiles you; you are defiled by the words that come out of your mouth.”
Then Peter said to Jesus, “Explain to us the parable that says people aren’t defiled by what they eat.”
“Don’t you understand yet?” Jesus asked. “Anything you eat passes through the stomach and then goes into the sewer. But the words you speak come from the heart—that’s what defiles you. For from the heart come evil thoughts, murder, adultery, all sexual immorality, theft, lying, and slander. These are what defile you. Eating with unwashed hands will never defile you.”
Holiness and purity is not an issue of having the right tradition
Or doing the right stuff.
It is not what you touch that causes one to be defiled but rather what is in your heart.
Reading your Bible does not = Holiness. You can be a wreck and be a Bible scholar.
Attending church does not = Holiness
Wearing a dress to your ankles does not = Purity
Not having cable or the internet does not = Purity
These may all be good things but they do not have the power to change who you are deep in side.
These may all be good things but they do not have the power to change who you are deep in side.
Change comes through relationship and obedience
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How Do We See True Lasting Change?
How Do We See True Lasting Change?
How Do We Become Holy and Pure?
How Do We Become Holy and Pure?
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Real lasting change comes through
A relationship with God and an Obedience to His Word.
A relationship with God and an Obedience to His Word.
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Tradition focuses on our actions as the source of our problems
Your a drunk because you drink too much
Your a lier because you lie.
Jesus focuses on the heart as the source of the problem.
You lie because your heart is deeply insecure and you are afraid people will not accept the real - plain - normal you.
You became a drunk because your heart longed for something more than God.
The problem is not with what you do
The problem is with who you deeply are.
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Jesus offers us true HOPE and FREEDOM
Through a relationship with God and Obedience to His Word.
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How Do We Gain A Relationship With God?
How Do We Gain A Relationship With God?
Do not love this world nor the things it offers you, for when you love the world, you do not have the love of the Father in you. For the world offers only a craving for physical pleasure, a craving for everything we see, and pride in our achievements and possessions. These are not from the Father, but are from this world. And this world is fading away, along with everything that people crave. But anyone who does what pleases God will live forever.
1 John 2:
Accept the reality that God is in love with you!
Accept the reality that God is in love with you!
Jesus came to reveal that God is crazy in love with you.
And as Moses lifted up the bronze snake on a pole in the wilderness, so the Son of Man must be lifted up, so that everyone who believes in him will have eternal life.
“For this is how God loved the world: He gave his one and only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life. God sent his Son into the world not to judge the world, but to save the world through him.
But God showed his great love for us by sending Christ to die for us while we were still sinners.
so that everyone who believes in him will have eternal life.
“For this is how God loved the world: He gave his one and only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life. God sent his Son into the world not to judge the world, but to save the world through him.
See what great love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are! The reason the world does not know us is that it did not know him.
This means that anyone who belongs to Christ has become a new person. The old life is gone; a new life has begun!
And all of this is a gift from God, who brought us back to himself through Christ. And God has given us this task of reconciling people to him.
Either way, Christ’s love controls us. Since we believe that Christ died for all, we also believe that we have all died to our old life. He died for everyone so that those who receive his new life will no longer live for themselves. Instead, they will live for Christ, who died and was raised for them.
So we have stopped evaluating others from a human point of view. At one time we thought of Christ merely from a human point of view. How differently we know him now! This means that anyone who belongs to Christ has become a new person. The old life is gone; a new life has begun!
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God loves you just as you are. He is crazy about you.
God loves you just as you are. He is crazy about you.
Brennan Manning, the author of the Ragamuffin Gospel wrote,
The sinner is accepted before he pleads for mercy. It is already granted. He need only to receive it. Total amnesty. Gratuitous pardon.
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When we Embrace God’s Total Love For Us as a reality He seals His relationship with us by giving Himself to be with us always.
When we Embrace God’s Total Love For Us as a reality He seals His relationship with us by giving Himself to be with us always.
Peter replied, “Each of you must repent of your sins and turn to God, and be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins. Then you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.
and he has identified us as his own by placing the Holy Spirit in our hearts as the first installment that guarantees everything he has promised us.
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We call this Grace - Unmerited favor and love from God.
Grace does not excuse our sins, rather it empowers us to love God more than our sins.
Grace does not excuse our sins, rather it empowers us to love God more than our sins.
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When we accept this grace - Really deeply accept this grace as the reality
God not only forgives us
He makes us his residence - He begins to call our lives His home.
God becomes personal, a friend, a loving father who will never leave us or forsake us.
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When we Accept this Grace and Receive His Spirit We are Empowered to Live in Obedience.
When we Accept this Grace and Receive His Spirit We are Empowered to Live in Obedience.
Only when we accept this as the reality are our longings, desires, will and loves radically changed.
And we are empowered to live in obedience to His Word.
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Obedience is to live what we know.
Knowledge with out obedience is useless.
Our obedience is empowered by our love for him.
Our love for Him comes from accepting his unconditional, overwhelming love towards us, even in our wreckage.
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You
You
Your traditions will not free you
Your religion will not free you
Your self help will not free you
Your acceptance of God’s love towards you in Jesus will.
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Some of you here today are in the midst of a battle for your heart.
You have begun to depend on rituals for your freedom and sanity.
And you have forgotten the power that set you free - God’s love.
God’s word to you today is this -
“I know all the things you do. I have seen your hard work and your patient endurance. I know you don’t tolerate evil people. You have examined the claims of those who say they are apostles but are not. You have discovered they are liars. You have patiently suffered for me without quitting.
“But I have this complaint against you. You don’t love me or each other as you did at first! Look how far you have fallen! Turn back to me and do the works you did at first. If you don’t repent, I will come and remove your lampstand from its place among the churches. But this is in your favor: You hate the evil deeds of the Nicolaitans, just as I do.
Some of you are in despair over your struggles because you have lost your love for God.
Your love has been aimed in another direction and you are bringing destruction on yourself.
He knows you fully and has chosen to fully love you.
All your faults are seen by him, all your thoughts are known by him,
Return to your love for Him - Remember His love for you.
All your secrets are known by him.
And he still says to you - I LOVE YOU.
If you honestly want freedom from your inner demons
It first starts with accepting His unmerited love towards you.
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US
US
We can all get trapped in our rituals and begin to think the rituals are what bring us freedom.
We can even begin to see church as a ritual
Let us make an oath - That our times together will always be for the purpose of celebrating together and reminding one another of God’s incredible gift of love.
Let us remind one another that Jesus is our freedom and not our rituals.
Let us live in the realization of God’s love by loving others, even when they are different than us.
Let us celebrate his love for us while we were still in sin by loving our enemies with the same crazy love he had and has for us.
And let us share our lives with one another, giving our time, possessions, and heart as we remember how He gave up everything to show us love.
God’s word to us all today is this.
Then make me truly happy by agreeing wholeheartedly with each other, loving one another, and working together with one mind and purpose.
Don’t be selfish; don’t try to impress others. Be humble, thinking of others as better than yourselves. Don’t look out only for your own interests, but take an interest in others, too.
You must have the same attitude that Christ Jesus had.
Though he was God,
he did not think of equality with God
as something to cling to.
Instead, he gave up his divine privileges;
he took the humble position of a slave
and was born as a human being.
When he appeared in human form,
he humbled himself in obedience to God
and died a criminal’s death on a cross.
Change Comes Through Relationship with God and Obedience Towards His Word.
Change Comes Through Relationship with God and Obedience Towards His Word.
Philippines 2:2-8