Christ's Commands

Introduction

I have a passion for Jesus!

50 years ago He reached down into the pit and pulled up

As the Psalmist said:

Psalm 40:2–3 NASB95

He brought me up out of the pit of destruction, out of the miry clay, And He set my feet upon a rock making my footsteps firm. He put a new song in my mouth, a song of praise to our God; Many will see and fear And will trust in the Lord.

Thank you Jesus for delivering me from the pit of destruction!

So, I have a passion for Jesus.

I also have a passion for the big “C” Church of the Lord Jesus Christ in general and the local church in particular.

It was because of the church that I met Jesus.

It was because of their prayers and their tenacity in pursuing me that I was born again.

But, even more than that I have a passion for the Church because scripture tells us very clearly that the Church is the Bride of Christ.

Ephesians 5:25-27 tells us that

New American Standard Bible: 1995 Update Chapter 5

Christ also loved the church and gave Himself up for her,

26 so that He might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word,

27 that He might present to Himself the church in all her glory, having no spot or wrinkle or any such thing; but that she would be holy and blameless.

Jesus loves His church.

If we are going to love Jesus, we are going to love what He loves and hate what He hates.

Jesus loves His church.

I believe that includes the local church.

Not only does Jesus love His church, and has given His life for her, but He has has chosen her to do powerful, life-giving things in these confusing, chaotic and evil times.

The church will do these powerful, supernatural things as it holds to the declaration that Peter made 2000 years ago:

That Jesus is the Christ, the prophesied anointed One of God.

He is the Son of the Living God.

We read about that declaration in:

Matthew 16:15–19 NASB95

He said to them, “But who do you say that I am?” Simon Peter answered, “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.” And Jesus said to him, “Blessed are you, Simon Barjona, because flesh and blood did not reveal this to you, but My Father who is in heaven. “I also say to you that you are Peter, and upon this rock I will build My church; and the gates of Hades will not overpower it. “I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven; and whatever you bind on earth shall have been bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth shall have been loosed in heaven.”

Jesus tells Peter that He, the Christ, the Messiah, is building His church — the gates of hell cannot stand against its advance.

When the Light of Jesus shines in His Church it invades the darkness of this world and the darkness cannot stand against Him.

Jesus is using His church AND He is using the local church IF it will surrender to Him and His will.

IF it will pray and seek His favor.

IF it will listen to the guidance of the Holy Spirit.

IF it will hold to His Word.

Jesus commissioned His church in

Matthew 28:18–20 NASB95

And Jesus came up and spoke to them, saying, “All authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth. “Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age.”

The local church MUST hold to His Word.

That includes the passage I just read.

We call it the Great Commission.

Generally, not all the time, but generally, the local church in the U.S. does a fairly good job at:

Going into all the world — or at least sending some of its own into all the world.

I’m not sure about the disciples things, but we DO make converts.

May the Lord help us to be better at making disciples!

We baptize people

But that command in Vs. 20 … that has really been kind of hit-or-miss.

In my almost 33 years of pastoring and my almost 50 years of being born again I have NEVER been in a church or pastored a church that systematically did what Jesus commanded in verse 20 :

Teaching those who have repented of their sins and surrendered to the Lordship of Jesus not just a list of commands, but teaching people to live in OBEDIENCE to the things Jesus commanded.

But with the Lord’s help we started doing that last year.

Because I have a passion for Jesus and His church, 2 years ago I asked the leaders of our church in Blairsville, GA to attend something our denomination calls the Acts 2 Journey.

It is a program of church revitalization.

Attending 4 sessions of teaching and working through those teachings led me to look at the Great Commission in a way that I had not done before.

First of all, the Great Commission is found in all 4 of the Gospels and the 1st chapter of Acts.

But the Holy Spirit led me specifically to vs.20 of Matthew 28 and focused me on Jesus command to teach His commands and Obedience to His commands.

I started going through the Gospels and listing the Commands of Christ.

I got to 62 of them.

Others list 59, others 120, still others have other counts.

Suffice it to say that the Holy Spirit convicted me about being a pastor in the Church of Jesus Christ as long as I have and NOT systematically teaching Jesus’ commands

NOT systematically teaching obedience to those commands

To be clear, I have preached and taught the Word of God since God called me to be a teacher and then a pastor.

But to systematically and relentlessly go through all His teachings?

Not so much

Commands of Christ

So, shortly before I came here for the first time last November, in the church that I pastor in Blairsville, we started a new Adult Bible study on Wednesday nights with the goal of systematically teaching obedience to the Commands of Christ .

To say this is a challenge would be an understatement.

Surprisingly, I have not found a curriculum to do what Jesus said.

Thankfully i did find some materials that I am using to synthesize lessons.

Most notably a book by Tom Blackaby entittled: The Commands of Christ; What it really means to follow Jesus

Another good resource is from John Piper entitled: What Jesus Demands From the World (actually for those who claim to be His followers)

Another book that is print only (not an e-book) entitled: The Commands of Jesus

And finally an online resource of about 1000 pages called: KNOWING AND LOVING GOD THROUGH LEARNING AND OBEYING THE TEACHINGS AND AND COMMANDS OF JESUS By Bernie Koerselman

I say all that to urge you to learn and obey the Commands of Jesus.

Neither of which will be easy.

I started our study using Blackaby’s outline to categorize the Commands of Christ.

He the divides the 59 commands that he found into 6 areas:

1: Coming to God| 2: Christ as Lord | 3: Character 4: Concerning Others | 5: Calling | 6: Cautions

Since November our church has covered the 8 commands that relate to Coming to God:

Be born again | Repent | Come as a child | Love God with all your being | Receive the Holy Spirit | Enter through the narrow door | Worship in Spirit and in truth | Abide in Me

We have continued to cover the commands that relate to Christ being Lord of our lives:

The first one being: Deny yourself

This category also includes:

Take Up My Yoke and Learn from Me | Follow Me | You Have Heard It Said . . . but I Say to You | Pray This Way | Do This in Remembrance of Me | Remember What I Said

Deny Yourself

If I were to guess the command that ALL of struggle with (perhaps most of all!) it is Denying Self.

And to be honest the church has really soft-peddled this one.

But Jesus said very clearly in:

Luke 9:23–25 NASB95

And He was saying to them all, “If anyone wishes to come after Me, he must deny himself, and take up his cross daily and follow Me. “For whoever wishes to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for My sake, he is the one who will save it. “For what is a man profited if he gains the whole world, and loses or forfeits himself?

Jesus is NOT calling us to indulge ourselves.

To give into every whim.

To surrender to every temptation the devil puts in our path

Jesus is calling us to deny ourselves and GIVE UP EVERYTHING

To give up ANYTHING that would hinder us following Him in obedience

I believe this command of Jesus to deny ourselves it at the heart of everything the Lord commands us to do.

In order to receive all that Jesus wants to pour into our lives:

Deliverance from drugs and alcohol

Freedom from the wicked things that want to enslave us

Eternal life

We MUST deny ourselves — we must allow the Holy Spirit to empty us of us.

Altar

Have you done that?

We are no disciple of Jesus who does not deny ourselves, take up our cross everyday and follow Jesus.

We are lying to ourselves if we think we can still have all of the world and its things AND Jesus.

That is called cultural Christianity and it is not Biblical Christianity.

Yes, a lot of churches may teach an easier way — but it is NOT Jesus’ way.

It is NOT the way that leads to deliverance.

It is NOT the way that leads to eternal life.

So, if you have not surrendered it all to Jesus I want to encourage you to do so now.

I pray that He will fill you with a passion for Him.

A passion for His Word and especially His commands

A passion for His presence experienced through prayer and worship

A passion for His Church, yes, even the local church

Can we seek the Lord in prayer?