Investing In Life

Intro:

Good morning!

I want to give you a heads up that we are quickly closing in on the end of this study.

I don’t have it fully mapped out yet, but I would guess that we have six or fewer Sundays left in this study.

I point that out this morning because you are going to see a bit of a shift in the way that the author is communicating.

These last two chapters are going to bring all that he has discussed into focus.

It is our purpose and goal to focus in with him and draw conclusions on what God has been teaching us this year.

It is timely and by his design that as we have spent a year in disruption that we are learning about being God’s love in a broken world.

This is timely for many reasons, but specifically, our world is broken and in need of love.

We have seen this, almost from the beginning of the study.

What we didn’t see coming at the start is that God is also preparing us to send some out to be God’s love in a new place.

A place where He is already working.

If you have not already, I would ask that you take these messages on how we are to live and love and apply them to your life.

God is being very pointed with our messages so that He can work in you the changes that are needed to prepare us for His work.

I took the time this week to watch the revival that Glen preached for FBC Dry Prong.

It was exciting to see God working in those people as they are beginning to understand what we know.

I cannot wait to see and experience what God has in store for us at West and at this new plant.

Last week we talked about the fact that God’s work in our lives has given us a voice in our communities.

We are leaders in our circles of influence because of what God is doing.

We need to see ourselves as such.

A great example is that God used David and Leah Hill this week in the revival.

David and Leah are new members here and new to abiding, but because they are abiding, they are seeing God’s work in their lives.

They shared testimony of what God has done in their lives as they learned to abide.

Their abiding experiences spoke truth and life into people’s lives.

The only qualifications they hold to speak are the experiences they gain through obedience.

I can tell you, people’s lives were changed by their encouragement this week.

This is the purpose of all of that we are doing in our TGP churches.

We are sharing with others what we are learning as we abide.

God desires to do a work in us and then for us to share that work with others.

We share the stories of what God is doing and lives are changed because of our testimony.

As we round out this study, please, take these messages to heart.

Your obedience to what God is speaking will open up opportunities to bring freedom into lives.

We need to allow God to work in you so that Christ can shine through you.

I’m saying all this because as we move into the remainder of the text we are going to talk about investing in life.

The danger here is that we forget all that we have learned this year and take this passage to mean we are to live for ourselves.

I was talking with Jacob Crump this week and he told me that his life group, in discussing the sermon from two weeks ago, came to the conclusion that what God is asking us to do is to live for one another and not for ourselves.

I’m so glad he shared that with me because that is one of the points that God has had for us in this series.

I hope that all of us are seeing that!

My intention today was to continue on in this series, but the Lord has another plan for us today.

We will continue forward next week, but today we are going to pause and hear what God has to say. .

In studying and praying over this text this week, the Lord revealed that we are not ready to move forward just yet.

We cannot move forward until we are resigned to live for God and not for ourselves.

This is not a new message, but one that we have heard all year, but until we make a decision to live in full obedience, we cannot be God’s love in a broken world.

Our will must be aligned with the will of the Father.

If there is any desire in us that is outside the will of God, we must dismiss it immediately.

We cannot say that we desire to know God but spend our energy pursuing what we want.

Ecclesiastes chapter eleven is going to talk about investing in life, but if we are still focused on what we want, we are going to use this passage to justify the things that we desire.

In my quiet time this week, I read Ezekiel 24.

God was telling Isreal, through the prophet Ezekiel that He wanted to do a work through them, but their disobedience was preventing that work.

Ezekiel 24:2–5 CSB

2 “Son of man, write down today’s date, this very day. The king of Babylon has laid siege to Jerusalem this very day. 3 Now speak a parable to the rebellious house. Tell them, ‘This is what the Lord God says: Put the pot on the fire— put it on, and then pour water into it! 4 Place the pieces of meat in it, every good piece— thigh and shoulder. Fill it with choice bones. 5 Take the choicest of the flock and also pile up the fuel under it. Bring it to a boil and cook the bones in it.

If you are someone that cooks a lot, you can see that God is giving them a great recipe.

This is basically a stew.

The inclusion of the best cuts and the best bones means that this is going to be an incredibly rich and filling stew.

God is using this illustration to communicate to Isreal and also to us the kind of work that He desires to do.

God wants to use us.

In this illustration, we are the pot, that God wants to use to bring richness to our lives and the lives of others.

Last week when I talked about us all being leaders, it is because we know God in a way that most don’t.

God obviously knows that and wants to share our stories with others.

He wants us to bring others alongside us so that they too can experience the richness that is found in an abiding relationship with God.

We know this.

We know the richness, but we are still stuck in thinking about ourselves only.

Look with me what God continues to say through Ezekiel.

Ezekiel 24:6–14 CSB

6 “ ‘Therefore, this is what the Lord God says: Woe to the city of bloodshed, the pot that has corrosion inside it, and its corrosion has not come out of it! Empty it piece by piece; lots should not be cast for its contents. 7 For the blood she shed is still within her. She put it out on the bare rock; she didn’t pour it on the ground to cover it with dust. 8 In order to stir up wrath and take vengeance, I have put her blood on the bare rock, so that it would not be covered. 9 “ ‘Therefore, this is what the Lord God says: Woe to the city of bloodshed! I myself will make the pile of kindling large. 10 Pile on the logs and kindle the fire! Cook the meat well and mix in the spices! Let the bones be burned! 11 Set the empty pot on its coals so that it becomes hot and its copper glows. Then its impurity will melt inside it; its corrosion will be consumed. 12 It has frustrated every effort; its thick corrosion will not come off. Into the fire with its corrosion! 13 Because of the depravity of your uncleanness— since I tried to purify you, but you would not be purified from your uncleanness— you will not be pure again until I have satisfied my wrath on you. 14 I, the Lord, have spoken. It is coming, and I will do it! I will not refrain, I will not show pity, and I will not relent. I will judge you according to your ways and deeds. This is the declaration of the Lord God.’ ”

God does not play when it comes to sin and disobedience.

The sin and disobedience in the lives of Israel were turning this amazing meal into something nasty.

The same is true of our lives as well.

When we know full well how to walk with God and the benefits that come with it, yet we choose to live for ourselves, we are destroying what God is trying to make.

We are adding corrosion to the pot and the only way to fix that problem is to remove the ruined food and to heat the pot until all the impurities are burned off.

If you have spent much time using cast iron pans and pots, this is a process that you are aware of.

Now, remember, we are living after the cross and there is mercy and forgiveness for all that ask for it.

Our situation is not hopeless like Israel's was.

That does not give us permission to continue in sin though.

God wants to use us, but if we refuse to obey, we will lose the very thing that we love so much.

Ezekiel 24:15–24 NLT

15 Then this message came to me from the Lord: 16 “Son of man, with one blow I will take away your dearest treasure. Yet you must not show any sorrow at her death. Do not weep; let there be no tears. 17 Groan silently, but let there be no wailing at her grave. Do not uncover your head or take off your sandals. Do not perform the usual rituals of mourning or accept any food brought to you by consoling friends.” 18 So I proclaimed this to the people the next morning, and in the evening my wife died. The next morning I did everything I had been told to do. 19 Then the people asked, “What does all this mean? What are you trying to tell us?” 20 So I said to them, “A message came to me from the Lord, 21 and I was told to give this message to the people of Israel. This is what the Sovereign Lord says: I will defile my Temple, the source of your security and pride, the place your heart delights in. Your sons and daughters whom you left behind in Judah-will be slaughtered by the sword. 22 Then you will do as Ezekiel has done. You will not mourn in public or console yourselves by eating the food brought by friends. 23 Your heads will remain covered, and your sandals will not be taken off. You will not mourn or weep, but you will waste away because of your sins. You will groan among yourselves for all the evil you have done. 24 Ezekiel is an example for you; you will do just as he has done. And when that time comes, you will know that I am the Sovereign Lord.”

If we choose to follow our own desires, we will lose all that we have gained.

We are where we are with the Lord because of obedience.

What I’m communicating is not a theology of God’s discipline as much as it is a realization of what happens when we stop obeying.

Have you thought about this before?

We are who we are and know what we know because we abide.

It is only through abiding that we continue to grow in our relationship with God.

Israel, over and over again, would have these incredible experiences with God and then turn their backs to God and go after what they wanted instead of following God.

We have seen this with our own eyes, but somehow we exempt ourselves from the same outcome when we act just as they did.

Your knowledge and experience with God are a direct result of your obedience and when you make the decision to stop abiding, you are forfeiting all that you have gained.

This isn’t an instant process.

But one act of disobedience leads to another and they very quickly snowball.

Explain snowballing.

Every time we make seemingly small choices to exclude God, we are giving up a bit of what we know by experience.

I want to remind you that it is never too late to turn back to God.

1 John 3:4–10 ESV

4 Everyone who makes a practice of sinning also practices lawlessness; sin is lawlessness. 5 You know that he appeared in order to take away sins, and in him there is no sin. 6 No one who abides in him keeps on sinning; no one who keeps on sinning has either seen him or known him. 7 Little children, let no one deceive you. Whoever practices righteousness is righteous, as he is righteous. 8 Whoever makes a practice of sinning is of the devil, for the devil has been sinning from the beginning. The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the works of the devil. 9 No one born of God makes a practice of sinning, for God’s seed abides in him; and he cannot keep on sinning, because he has been born of God. 10 By this it is evident who are the children of God, and who are the children of the devil: whoever does not practice righteousness is not of God, nor is the one who does not love his brother.

There are a few things that I want to point out from this passage.

First, if we are living in sin, we are not abiding.

Deliberate sin and an abiding relationship do not co-exist.

If the Lord is convicting you of ongoing sin in your life and you are unwilling to address it, you are not abiding.

That is plain and simple.

It doesn’t matter if we say we are abiding, John, is telling us that if we are choosing to live in sin, we are not abiding.

Second, God’s children abide in Him and cannot keep on sinning.

We cannot lose our salvation, but we can walk away from God.

We see it happen all the time.

People will know the Lord through salvation, but for many reasons, that are all a result of sin, walk away from that abiding relationship.

They can repent and the Lord will welcome them home with open arms.

He will run to them as the father ran to the prodigal son.

Third, it is only through an abiding relationship that we can be made like Christ and love as Christ loved.

It is impossible to be God’s love in a broken world outside of an abiding relationship with Him.

It is only through connection to the vine that any fruit is produced.

Y’all remember that right?

When we remove ourselves from the vine by choosing to live in sin, we are not able to produce fruit.

We can call it fruit, but it isn’t.

We can spend a year talking about being God’s love in a broken world, but until we learn to make a daily decision to abide, we will never be.

We spent all of 2019 talking about Joining God to set people free, but have you joined God?

Have you done what is required in order to be able to love people as Christ loved them?

Have you died to yourself so that you can live in Christ?

We only find life in Christ by dying to ourselves.

We cannot skip this part of the process.

And what is it that God wants to do in us? He wants us to love Him and to love the world as He does.

God is preparing us to bring His love into the world.

Bring the bucket of rocks from Lee Heights and share the story behind them.

Glen has shared with us that every time God begins speaking of a new church, He brings up the story of the Israelites crossing the Jordan.

Yesterday this passage was in one of my daily readings.

Joshua 1:1–9 CSB

1 After the death of Moses the Lord’s servant, the Lord spoke to Joshua son of Nun, Moses’s assistant: 2 “Moses my servant is dead. Now you and all the people prepare to cross over the Jordan to the land I am giving the Israelites. 3 I have given you every place where the sole of your foot treads, just as I promised Moses. 4 Your territory will be from the wilderness and Lebanon to the great river, the Euphrates River—all the land of the Hittites—and west to the Mediterranean Sea. 5 No one will be able to stand against you as long as you live. I will be with you, just as I was with Moses. I will not leave you or abandon you. 6 “Be strong and courageous, for you will distribute the land I swore to their ancestors to give them as an inheritance. 7 Above all, be strong and very courageous to observe carefully the whole instruction my servant Moses commanded you. Do not turn from it to the right or the left, so that you will have success wherever you go. 8 This book of instruction must not depart from your mouth; you are to meditate on it day and night so that you may carefully observe everything written in it. For then you will prosper and succeed in whatever you do. 9 Haven’t I commanded you: be strong and courageous? Do not be afraid or discouraged, for the Lord your God is with you wherever you go.”

God has prepared a promised land for us.

He has given us the experiences to allow us to trust Him as we walk in obedience, wherever He brings us.

I’ve been asking you guys to pray about His call to stay here or to be sent to plant a church in Kolin.

Do you see know that the last two years of messages have been in preparation for this work that God is doing?

Here is the question I want to leave you with today.

Are you willing and ready to walk in obedience to abide daily?

We must start there.

If we are not abiding daily, we should not be asking about anything else.

We must ask God to give us a daily desire and the strength to abide.

Philippians 2:13 CSB

13 For it is God who is working in you both to will and to work according to his good purpose.

It is only in our daily experience with God that we have anything to offer the world.

I’ve been sharing examples of what the Lord is speaking to me the last month or so.

Today is no different than any other day.

The Lord is speaking every day, all we have to do is seek Him.

He wants to speak into our lives and transform us into His likeness.

Read with me what He said this morning regarding this transformative process.

“No Christian practice can take the place of experiencing God. It’s in experiencing God that we begin to live in response to the unconditional, unfathomable depths of God’s love.

It’s in experiencing God that we learn to discern and trust his perfect, pleasing will. And it’s in experiencing God that our hearts are transformed into powerful reflections of his wonderful character.” - first15.org

2 Corinthians 3:18 ESV

18 And we all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another. For this comes from the Lord who is the Spirit.

Through the daily time we spend studying, praying, worshiping, and abiding, we are made into God’s likeness.

We are transformed into His perfect love.

In that daily transformation, we are witnessing and testifying of the love of God.

It is out of the overflow of YOUR abiding relationship that the world is loved.

Bringing God’s love into a broken world is our task, but we can only do that as we abide.

1 John 5:2–3 CSB

2 This is how we know that we love God’s children: when we love God and obey his commands. 3 For this is what love for God is: to keep his commands. And his commands are not a burden,