Latest / Calvary Church with Ed Taylor Podcast / #20250713 - The Pursuit Of Spiritual Growth - 2 Peter 1:1-11

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#20250713 - The Pursuit Of Spiritual Growth - 2 Peter 1:1-11 · Calvary Church with Ed Taylor Podcast

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Welcome to the study of God's Word recorded live at Calvary
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Church in Aurora, Co. To learn more about the many
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resources available through Abounding Grace Media or to tune
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into our live stream services, visit us online at Calvary Co
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dot Church or download our free Calvary Church app.
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Now let's open our Bibles and study God's Word.
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Amen. There's four things I want to
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share with you guys. 4 main points of our text that we're
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going to look at. And these are spiritual
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principles and truths that if you apply them to your life, if
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you consider them, if you pray through them, what you'll find
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is that your walk with the Lord will begin to grow.
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You'll begin to see greater faith, greater maturity in your
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life. And so let me just lay them out
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for you really quick. These are going to be the four
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things we look at #1 is that it all begins with God's divine
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power. It begins with God's divine
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power #2 is it's us resting in God's and his great and precious
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promises. That's the second.
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The third is partaking of his divine nature, partaking of his
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divine nature. And lastly #4 it's the
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responsibility we have, or our responsibility, our role.
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Now we're in second Peter. In First Peter, he writes to a
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bunch of Christians that are going through some heavy stuff.
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We're talking persecution. A lot of them are fleeing their
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homes. It's a challenging season of
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life for the for a Christian. And he writes in First Peter and
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he says, guys, I want you to know that you have a living hope
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in Christ. And really the whole letter of
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First Peter is about this living hope that you have.
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Well, between the first epistle and the second epistle, about a
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year's time passes about a year's time.
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And Peter is now following up with them.
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And more than ever before, what's on the heart of Peter is
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for them to grow, to be established and to mature in
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faith. And that really ought to be the
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progression for you, for us daily, that we might grow,
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become established and mature in faith.
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And that's why he writes second Peter for them.
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Now, when we look at the first couple of verses there, he's
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basically his introduction, very similar to the first epistle
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there he talks about being a bond servant of Christ.
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He's an apostle. He's called by sent out by Jesus
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to do the things that he's doing.
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He let's them know, I'm just like you.
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I'm a fellow believer in Christ. And then he uses an important
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word in verse 2. He says grace and peace be
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multiplied to you in the knowledge of God and of Jesus
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our Lord. And you want to mark that in
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your Bible, the word knowledge there.
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The reason why that's important is because Peter uses the word
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knowledge some 13 times in this epistle.
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Second, Peter is only three chapters long and he keeps
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repeating, I want you to grow in knowledge, grow in knowledge and
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grow in knowledge. And this is important.
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That word knowledge in the Greek is the word epic gnosis and what
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it means. It means to have a correct
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knowledge. It means to have a precise
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knowledge, a personalized knowledge and experiential
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knowledge. And the reason why Peter
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communicates this so many times to them is that he doesn't want
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them just to know and to have an intellectual knowledge.
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He wants them to experience the Lord.
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And that's very important for you to understand today is that
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God doesn't want you just to know about him or know about his
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word and, and know about intellectually.
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He wants you to experience it. And that's the danger.
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Maybe you're here today, you've heard about Jesus, you heard
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about what he did on the cross and and yet you've never
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experienced his forgiveness. You never experienced his, his
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wonderful grace, his his God's Spirit working in and through
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your life, you grasping his plan for you.
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You know of it, but you've never experienced it.
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And there needs to be a crossing of a line to where you give him
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your heart and you fully experience all that God has for
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you, more than just knowing, but experience experiencing it.
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And So what Peter does starting in verse 3 all the way down to
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verse 10, as Peter begins to speak directly with the church,
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this 1st century church, these believers that have gone through
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great difficulty, trial, hardship, struggle.
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And what he begins to do is he begins to push them in this
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direction of this pursuit of spiritual growth.
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So let's read the text and then we'll come back.
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Starting verse 3, it says his divine power, God's divine power
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has given us all things that pertain to life and godliness
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through the knowledge of him who called us by glory and virtue,
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by which having been given to us exceedingly great and precious
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promises. That through these you may be
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partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption
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that's in the world through lust.
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But also for this reason, giving all diligence, add to your
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faith, virtue and to virtue, knowledge, knowledge,
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self-control, to self-control, perseverance, perseverance,
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godliness, to godliness, brotherly kindness, to brotherly
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kindness, love. For if these things are yours
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and they abound, you will be neither barren nor unfruitful in
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the knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ.
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We'll pause right there. We jump back in verse 3.
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Peter wants them to note the foundation of their spiritual
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pursuit in the Lord, the pursuit of spiritual growth.
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It begins in verse 3, knowing that it starts with God's divine
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power. That's the very foundation.
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It starts with what God does for us.
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You know, when you first give your life to Christ, you first
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become a Christian. You talk to God, you call out to
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God. You're like, I'm a Sinner.
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I know what I need forgiveness. God save me.
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He immediately saves you. And then he begins to prepare
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you for this life and this journey of walking with him.
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And how does he do that? Well, the Bible says he fills
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you with the Holy Spirit and the Holy Spirit becomes a comforter.
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The Holy Spirit becomes a counselor.
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The Holy Spirit begins to lead and direct your life.
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And from that point on, it's important to know everything you
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need is found in the Lord. Everything you need for, for
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this life is found in his divine power that he's given to us for
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you to walk with him and talk with him, to grow with him.
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His divine power becomes the source that is the, the, the
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foundation in the beginning of it all.
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And then all of a sudden what happens is, is we begin to grow
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and mature. We begin to experience what it
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is to be a Christian to walk with the Lord.
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You begin to read your Bible, you begin to pray, you begin to
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experience worship in his presence.
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And the way I like to picture it, the way I like to explain it
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is that we sit under the spout where God's glory comes out and
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he just begins to feel your life to a point of like overflowing
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to a point of like man, it's like Laura, that's too much.
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And he begins to feel your life and you begin to gush over and
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people were like, what happened to you?
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Like what? You're Jesus freak now.
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So I grew up in a Christian home.
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My parents are believers and my dad started going to Calvary
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Downey in the early 80s. He loved John MacArthur
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inductive Bible City that the way that Pastor John would teach
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through the Word. We went to church there for a
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little bit and but it was far away.
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A buddy of his told him, hey, there's a guy not too far from
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you in the next city over who teaches expositionally, but the
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guy wears like a Hawaiian shirt and super chill.
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My dad's like, what do you mean? He goes, yeah, you should check
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it out. So we went.
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It was Calvary Chapel, Downey and we began to go to church
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there and I was probably in 3rd grade or 4th grade, began to go
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to church there. My parents put me into Christian
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School that was there. My wife went to school there.
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We were a couple of grades apart, but we knew each other
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and and I had this great upbringing.
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But here's the problem, I knew scripture, but I didn't
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experience it. And it wasn't until I was 16
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years old that I was playing basketball at a park, and the
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Holy Spirit began to speak to me and convict me of sin in
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disobedience. There was a kid who came to our
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our algebra class, and he brought a Bible and he threw it
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on the desk. And I looked at it.
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He go, man, are you a Christian? He goes, yeah, how about you?
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I'm like, yeah, I'm a Christian, but my life didn't reflect it.
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Why? Because I had an intellectual
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knowledge, but I never experienced what it meant to be
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walking with the Lord. And then I my life was changed
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when I was 16. I gave my life to Christ and he
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radically changed me from the inside out.
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And one day I was in the sanctuary at Calvary Chapel,
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Downey. I'm sitting there with my best
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friend. We just gave our lives to the
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Lord. And my former principal was
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there and the assistant principal and they, I knew them
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really well. We were tight, not good reasons.
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They turn around and their eyes get big and they're like, what
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are you doing here? I'm like, I'm worshiping the
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Lord. And they were blown away.
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Why? Because my life was radically
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changed. So good to experience the Lord.
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This is what happens again when we read there in verse 3, it
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says His divine power has given us all things that pertain to
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life and godliness. That word power there in the
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Greek is, is the word dunamis and what it speaks to.
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It speaks to God's divine ability, God's divine power and
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strength, God's wonder. It speaks to God's miraculous
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power, his strengthening power. It's the same Greek word that
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was used by Jesus when he spoke to the disciples after the
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resurrection. And he tells them to go to
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Jerusalem and wait for the promise of the Holy Spirit.
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And there it says in Acts 18, But you shall receive power when
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the Holy Spirit comes upon you, and you shall be my witnesses in
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Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, to the ends of the earth.
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This is God's power. The Holy Spirit comes upon you
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and empowers you to do what He's asking you to do.
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You see, our pursuit of spiritual growth must have the
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right source, and the source is the Lord.
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It's his. It's his power to the Spirit
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working in US. God's endless supply is ours for
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the receiving and for the enabling.
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For you today to be a powerful witness for Jesus Christ at the
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workplace, with your family members, with your friends, for
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you to have the ability, the power to overcome sin,
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temptation in the flesh. God's enabled you to find
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victory, the power to live fully for the Lord completely.
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And again, it's so important in this pursuit that we have in our
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spiritual growth is that it's not your ability.
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Too many Christians are living the Christian life and the power
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of their flesh and they're falling short and they're
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thinking and they're floundering.
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It's because they're not resting in the power that God has given
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us this resource that we have, this tremendous resource and
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wealth that he's blessed us with.
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There was a a lady that lived in the late 1800s and she died in
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1916. Her name was Hedy Green.
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It's a real person. And when she died, she left an
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estate that was valued at about $100 million.
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Like Buku Box Man, she had all the money in the world.
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What's crazy though, is that she she lived as if she had no money
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and she would eat cold oatmeal because it cost too much to heat
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it up. Her son suffered a leg
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amputation because she delayed so long trying to find a free
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clinic. Like crazy stuff.
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And people are like, she's crazy.
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She's crazy. Some people called her
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eccentric. And it's interesting because she
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foolishly hastened her own death by bringing on a stroke while
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arguing about the value of skim milk.
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Don't ever do that. It's not worth it.
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It's just not worth it. See, here's the bottom line is
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Hedy Green becomes a good illustration of how many
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Christians today live their life.
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Tremendous resource, tremendous power, but they live in their
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Christian life like in poverty. And the Lord has so much more
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for you, for us, for us to walk in tremendous resource,
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remarkable opportunity that we need to take advantage of.
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Resting in His strength, resting in His power.
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Again, what is so often the greatest hindrance in our
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spiritual growth is not resting in God's divine power.
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So what does His divine power help us with?
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What does this divine power will do for us today in our life?
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We'll look back at verse 3. It says His divine power has
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given us all things that pertain to life.
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And to what? Godliness.
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You guys with me. I know I'm not Pastor Ed.
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I know I don't measure up. I know.
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OK. I know you can help me though,
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right? His divine powers give us all
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things that pertain to life and what else?
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Godliness. Thank you.
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All things you want to highlight that word, all mark it, circle
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it. He's given you everything that
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you need. He didn't give you some things.
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He didn't give you a few things. He didn't give you part of
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things. The scripture says that He's
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given you all that you need for this life.
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The kind of man that you're supposed to be kind of husband
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God wants you to be. The kind of wife that the Lord's
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raising you up to be. The kind of mom that God wants
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you to be a son or daughter might be 1617 years old and
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you're God has given you everything for you to be a young
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man that honors God with your life.
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And maybe today you're struggling with your singleness.
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You're thinking, Lord, when am I going to find that person?
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And you're rustling. You know, maybe you had a bad
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breakup and then you're struggling with your emotions,
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thinking I'm never, this is never going to happen for me.
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Maybe, maybe you're struggling in your marriage right now and
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you're very unhappy. You're discontented with your
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spouse. You feel like the pillars are
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are everything's falling out and you're wrestling with your
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marriage. God today has given you all that
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you need to endure. We just have to rest and receive
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in what the Lord has given to us.
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And this becomes the foundation, his power, his strength, his
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ability, and God is calling the church.
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God is calling us. God is calling you today to
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greater surrender and sacrifice, resting and what He's given you.
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It's not about you. See that the spit just came out.
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You know what that is passion right there.
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Boom. Passion's coming out of me right
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now. God's given you all that you
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need. And so what's the pathway?
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You know, how do we navigate through this, through this
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journey of faith and walking with the Lord?
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Well, he tells us in verse 3 again, it's going to be
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repeated. He says His divine power has
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given us all things that pertain to life and godliness through
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the knowledge of him. It's through knowing the Lord.
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Again, this, it's the same Greek word, epignosis.
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It's a concise knowledge, a personal knowledge, a full
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knowledge, an experiential knowledge.
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He wants us to know Him. And the more that we know Him,
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the more tools in our arsenal, if you will, for us to be able
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to fulfill the call and the life that He's.
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He's calling us to grow in Him. In fact, that's why you're here
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now. You're here right now, the
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Lord's beginning to minister to you and speak to you through the
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Holy Spirit. He's providing instruction, He's
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providing conviction. He's he's providing stirring.
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You come and now you're committed to the ministry of the
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Word. And then Wednesday night, you
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come on Wednesday, the ministry of the Word.
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And then you start serving an aspect of ministry and you begin
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to experience how to serve the Lord and serve other people.
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And then you start reading your Bible.
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Everything changes. You start growing in greater
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knowledge. You begin to grow in prayer, how
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to pray, how to pray with people.
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That's always a tough one. You know, You know, one of the
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things that Pastor Ed always talks about, like with ministry
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and as he was teaching the pastors and the staff here is
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that he would always tell us, you know, one of the greatest
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opportunities of ministering the church is 30 minutes before and
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30 minutes after. And he encourages us to the
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staff to to come early and to be here and to walk around and talk
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to people. And a really simple question you
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can ask everybody, How can I pray for you?
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Has Pastor Ed ever asked you that?
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I'm sure he has. He's done it to me.
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He'll text me. Hey, hey, Louis, what's up, man?
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How can I pray for you? I'm like, and then my, my text
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is like this long, you know, pray for everything.
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Give him my list. I know he'll pray for me.
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You learn to pray with people. You learn to worship you.
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You begin to lead lead people the Lord.
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You begin to experience all these things in the Lord and you
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grow in the knowledge of how to do this.
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You begin to experience this again.
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This is the foundation of our pursuit of spiritual growth.
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It begins with His divine power. Now, what other resources has
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God-given you? What are the things has
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God-given you to fulfill this pursuit of spiritual growth?
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Well, look at verse four with me.
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Look what it says. Verse 4 says by which we have
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been given to us exceedingly and great and precious promises that
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through these you may be partakers of the divine nature
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God has given to us. This is our second principle
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this morning that we need to remember and and and reflect and
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think about is that he has given you and I he has given us his
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great and precious promises. They're great man and they are
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precious. You know, here's the thing about
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promises though. Anybody can make a promise,
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right? Anybody can make a promise and a
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promise is only as good as the person who who makes it.
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And so this is God giving you promises.
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You remember when you were a kid and your BFF, your best friend,
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you're like a little kid and he comes over.
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I got to tell you something that but you can't tell anybody.
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Like I won't tell nobody. You tell me he goes, but you got
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to promise. You have to promise.
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You're not going to tell anybody.
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You got to swear. I swear.
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No, you got a real pinky swear. And then you had to say the
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solemn oath. You guys know it, right?
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You guys know it. I crossed my heart, I hope to
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die. Stick a needle in my eye, right.
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You remember that, the solemn oath.
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And it was like once you said that, that was like, now you're
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deemed worthy. Now I'll tell you my secret.
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A promise is only as good as the person who makes it.
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God promises. God gives to you and me his
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great and precious promises. Again, it's it's found in his
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word, the hope that we have, the fact that today you're here,
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you've been invited and maybe he didn't want to come and you're
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here in the hope. And the truth is this, if you
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give your life to Christ, he'll forgive you and radically change
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you. He'll save you from your sin and
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he'll reveal to you a real purpose for your life.
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That's great. That's so precious, it's so
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good. Again, so often one of the
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things that we have to learn to do as we grow in our walk with
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the Lord is to rest more and to find greater comfort and hope in
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God's Word. We got to put our expectations
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in the right place. Too often we place our hope in
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our circumstances, but they change and a lot of times they
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can change for the worst. So often we place our hope in
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ourselves. I'm going to do this, you know,
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I'm going to, I'm going to, I'm going to make this happen and
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I'm strong enough. And then you fail and you're
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like, man, that stinks. And then we place our hope in
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other people and they let us down.
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Well, Peter's communicating to the believers is that as they
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grow, they can put their help in God's Word.
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Because God's Word is great and God's Word is precious, We place
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our hope fully upon him. And This is why it's so
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important for you to understand today why you need to be a man
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or a woman in the Word. You need to study your Bible,
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read your Bible, understand what God's word says.
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This is why we need to memorize Scripture because the moment you
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go through something difficult, we remember that God's faithful,
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we quote that Scripture and it gives us hope in the moment.
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We learn about the nature and character of of God that when
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all hope fails, we remember that he's with us, He'll never leave
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us nor forsake us. And we cling to that great and
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precious promise and it gets us through the moment again, so
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important. Now here's here's the
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progression in our spiritual walk.
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Here's the progression in our pursuit of spiritual growth is
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that as we begin to do these things, something begins to
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change in you and God begins to do this work in your life.
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What's he do verse 4 by which having been given to us great
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and precious promises that through these.
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This is key. Mark your Bible.
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Mark this. You may be partakers of the
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divine nature. This is the third principle to
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to grasp, to understand is that God causes us to be recipients
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of his divine nature. What's that mean?
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What's that talking about? It's talking about God's
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attributes. It's talking about the, the, the
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nature and the character of God begins to fill your life, begins
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to fill your home, begins to fill your children.
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We think about God's nature, God's person.
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You know, we begin to reflect the heart of God in us through
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our lives. That's why the world expects so
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much from Christians and why often times they get
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disappointed when a Christian is a phony or a fake and they think
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they're just all hypocrites because they know the truth that
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when a real Christian is walking with God, they begin to reflect
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the nature of God, the heart of God, the person of God.
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What happens is people begin to see Jesus in your life.
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They start seeing the person of Jesus in you.
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You know, Calvary Church has a, a founding verse that was was
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key and I know it's still key in the church.
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It was one of the, the life verses of this fellowship and
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it's became our life verse at Denver Calvary as well.
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That life verse. It's the last 6 words found in
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the Gospel of John, chapter 12, verse 21, where it says, Sir, we
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wish to see who Jesus. And you know why that was so
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important to Pastor Ed? Because what he wanted more than
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anything in this church is that in everything that this church
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did was to reflect Jesus. The worship, the children's
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ministry. Right now, your kids are being
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taught the word of God and they're being loved on the
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junior high ministry. The people in the cafe who are
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wanting to bless you and give you something that you can enjoy
22:25
before and after service. The idea is we want you to
22:29
experience Jesus and that's the heart that should be the heart
22:33
of every believer today, as the great John the Baptizer said,
22:37
that I must decrease and Jesus must increase in my life.
22:41
We've become partakers of the divine.
22:43
This is what happens when you today purposely and with
22:47
intentionality seek to pursue a life of spiritual growth.
22:53
So important and and a dynamic with this of being a Christian
22:59
is that this doesn't happen by accident.
23:03
You know what, you're not just going to wake up tomorrow
23:05
morning like knowing the Bible, like I know all of script, John
23:07
316 and you're like quoting Scripture.
23:09
That's not going to happen. You're not going to wait today.
23:11
You might be, oh, that's a great Bible study tomorrow morning
23:13
when you wake up, you're not going to wake up levitating like
23:16
it's the Lord, right? It's not going to happen.
23:19
But what does happen is over time you grow in faith and
23:25
scripture and experience the Lord and walk with the Lord and
23:28
you have the the ups and downs. What does happen is that you
23:32
begin to be sanctified. It's a biblical term to be set
23:36
apart to and for God. God sanctifies you, but you
23:41
learn to sanctify yourself as well.
23:43
You present yourself to the Lord and He begins to work in you and
23:48
through you. You see, Peter knew this process
23:52
personally. If you're studied Peter.
23:55
Now, here's what's interesting about Peter.
23:57
There's no one mentioned more in the New Testament than Peter,
24:01
except for one person, Jesus. Peter's mentioned the most in
24:06
the Gospels and and so Peter was a guy that if you study the life
24:10
of Peter, like every person here can relate to him.
24:12
Impetuous. You know, he was emotional.
24:16
I mean, the guy got he tried to protect Jesus.
24:18
I got your back. Jesus whipped out a sword, try
24:20
to cut some guy's ear off and just like dude put it down, step
24:23
away from the machete, you know, don't do that.
24:26
He was just impulsive and like we can relate to Peter.
24:29
But here's the other thing that Peter is expressing to us.
24:33
God will change you like he changed me.
24:36
And Peter was wanting to encourage the church in this
24:38
process of spiritual growth. And so again we get to partake
24:43
of God's divine nature. Think about that.
24:45
Pray through that in your life. What's that look like in your
24:47
life? What needs to change in your
24:49
life? What areas of your life where
24:51
you're giving over the to the flesh and the Lord's like you're
24:52
not representing me. And the Lord begins to speak and
24:55
move. This leads us to the the last
24:58
and the final point of our time this morning.
25:02
And that's what he talks about from verses 5 all the way down
25:06
to verse 10. And this last spiritual
25:08
principle is truth is that you and I bear a responsibility.
25:14
We bear a responsibility. Look what he says in verse 5.
25:18
He says, but for this very reason, giving all diligence,
25:21
add to your faith, virtue and virtue knowledge.
25:23
And he begins to list these characteristics.
25:27
Notice what he says in verse 5, right at the beginning for this
25:29
very reason. In other words, he's making
25:33
reference to the first couple of verses we just read in light of
25:37
you knowing now that your source, your foundation, is
25:41
God's divine power. Because you know that God has
25:45
given you all things that pertain to life and godliness to
25:48
the knowledge of him, Because he's given you his great and
25:50
precious promises. Because God is faithful.
25:52
That's what Peter's saying. God is faithful with what he
25:55
does. In light of that, what's he
25:57
saying? Verse 5?
25:58
He says giving all diligence. Giving all diligence.
26:04
Now, if you've never done this, one of the things I would
26:06
encourage you to do when you read your Bible is reading
26:08
different translations. Pastor Ed, when he teaches and
26:11
prepares A sermon that he gives on Wednesdays or or Sundays, a
26:14
Bible study, he'll, he'll read and study out of different
26:16
translations. That's something I do as well.
26:19
And so I teach out of the new King James.
26:21
But then often times I'll go back, I'll go old school.
26:23
Let's bring her back to King James only.
26:25
And we go back and we read the King James, we go old school and
26:29
then we go to the Nazbe, the new American Standard, the NSAB.
26:32
And then we go to like the, to the new school, like the new
26:34
Living Translation. And then yes, we'll whip it out.
26:38
The NIV, the nearly inspired version.
26:41
It's inspired, but nearly, you know what I'm saying?
26:44
The NIV reads this verse this way.
26:46
The NIV says in second Peter 1/5, it says for this very
26:51
reason, make every effort. Make every effort.
27:00
So in verse 5, you want to highlight circle, mark that to
27:03
give all diligence. Or if you have one of those
27:05
other translations where it says make every effort, Do you know
27:08
why it's important to mark that? Because what Peter's
27:11
communicating to us is that you and I, in our pursuit of
27:15
spiritual growth, it requires work, it requires effort, it
27:22
requires giving all diligence. It's something that we have to
27:26
be intentional about. Tomorrow morning, most of the
27:29
people in this room will have responsibilities, job and work.
27:34
And if you want to grow tomorrow morning in your walk with the
27:36
Lord, you have to make time because time is not going to be
27:39
given to you. And so you got to wake up
27:42
earlier and you have to get your coffee and then get your Bible
27:46
and turn on the light and say, Lord, speak to me and read the
27:49
Scripture and you will have a moment with the Lord where God
27:52
gives you for that day what you need.
27:54
Now some Christians struggle with this.
27:57
Peter says make all diligence, make every effort.
27:59
And some believers are going to struggle because they get
28:01
uncomfortable with the idea that our walk with the Lord requires
28:05
some work, or our walk with the Lord requires effort or it
28:09
requires labor. And the reason why some
28:11
believers struggle with this is that they might begin to think
28:14
that it opposes grace and it doesn't.
28:18
And and there's this idea that it poses grace and it becomes a
28:21
form of legalism. It can become a form of
28:23
legalism, but that was never God's intent.
28:26
The idea is for you to do your part, for you to bear a burden
28:29
of responsibility, and you find this throughout Scripture in the
28:34
Bible. When you read your Bible in
28:36
entirety, one of the things you walk away with and understand is
28:39
that the Scripture clearly teaches about the sovereignty of
28:41
God, God's in control, and God's working and moving the life life
28:44
of man, right? But what you also find right
28:47
next to that so often is while you have the sovereignty of God,
28:51
right next to that you will always have the responsibility
28:54
of man and both are always working together.
28:57
That's what's happening here in second Peter chapter 1, verses 3
29:00
and 4 talks about God's responsibility, his divine
29:03
nature, his great and precious promises, partaking, you know,
29:07
all things that pertain to life and godliness, the knowledge of
29:09
him. And then he says you give all
29:12
diligence, make every effort God's part, and then the burden
29:17
of responsibility that we carry as we pursue and seek after the
29:21
Lord. So look what he says.
29:23
He says for this reason, verse 5, giving all diligence, he says
29:27
add to your faith. Another word to highlight mark
29:31
that word add. It's an important word.
29:34
Add to your faith. The ground floor of Christianity
29:39
is faith. In order for you to be saved
29:42
today is to understand that that God loves you and God has grace
29:46
for you. He gives you what you do not
29:48
deserve. We do not deserve forgiveness.
29:50
Yet because God loves you, He wants to give you forgiveness
29:53
today. It requires you to put your
29:55
faith and trust in Jesus Christ. And today I hope you would do
29:58
that. Last night we had a person give
30:00
their life to the Lord. This morning, first servant, we
30:02
had a person give their life to the Lord.
30:04
And at the end of second service, we're going to give you
30:06
a chance to give your life to the Lord.
30:08
But faith is the ground level. It's first floor.
30:12
But here's the problem, sadly, with too many believers is that
30:17
they start and end with I believe, and they don't mature
30:22
into anything else. What's sad about many churches
30:25
today is that they don't bring the church into fuller faith.
30:28
Why? Because they're not adding to
30:31
their faith. They're not adding the word add.
30:34
There is epicurego in the Greek and what it means, what that
30:38
word add means, it means to furnish, like with an empty room
30:42
to furnish. It means to to fully supply.
30:45
It means to aid or to contribute.
30:48
Interesting. Peter say, hey, God is faithful.
30:51
He gives you all that you need, but then you bear a burden of
30:54
responsibility. You need to add to your faith.
30:57
You need to pursue these. You need to furnish your life,
31:00
your heart, your mind with these key areas.
31:04
And if you do this, your life will abound in grapefruit.
31:07
That's what Peter's talking about.
31:09
This is Peter laying out a map, a road map.
31:11
If you were kind of laying out instruction.
31:14
The way I like to look at it is Peter is kind of giving us a
31:17
recipe to grow in our spiritual pursuit.
31:21
Anybody here like have a famous or like a well known family
31:24
recipe on things Anybody have like anybody like to bake any
31:27
bakers in the house? Couple of two 3/4 Thank you some
31:31
people participate. Thank you.
31:32
You like to bake. You know, I'm not, I'm not
31:34
really a cook or chef, and I'm definitely not a Baker.
31:37
So about a month and a half ago, my wife and I were home alone.
31:42
Our two oldest sons are married. They're out of the house, and
31:44
our daughter was out with some friends.
31:46
And so we're on the couch, we're hanging out, and I look at my
31:49
wife. I'm like, hey babe, let's make
31:50
some cookies together. That'd be kind of neat.
31:52
And she kind of rolled her eyes. So I'm like, hey, what's up?
31:54
Why, Why the eye roll? And she goes, well, anytime you
31:57
say let's let's us make cookies, what you mean is is I want you
32:01
to make cookies for me. That's what she said.
32:03
I'm like, no, no, no, babe, no. It's different today.
32:05
It's different date night. You and me, We're going to make
32:08
some cookies together. We're alone.
32:10
I'm getting a little flour. Put it on your nose.
32:12
It's going to be like, like a date night, like when we were
32:14
dating, you know, we're going to hang out and she's like, OK, but
32:17
we can do that. So get all the ingredients.
32:19
We got all the greens. We put them on the counter.
32:21
And then she began to read the recipe to me and tell me
32:25
precisely what to do. And I'm like, you got it, babes.
32:28
I'm like, I'm working. I roll up my sleeves and we're
32:30
we're putting everything together.
32:32
We're putting it in the bowl. We're mixing up.
32:34
And I'm doing it by hand. No machines here, man.
32:36
I'm like, I lift them up like, babe, look, look at the look.
32:39
I'm, I'm like, and you know, she's like, oh, wow.
32:42
Yeah. And so I'm doing this date night
32:45
cookies, her and me. It's, it's going to be an
32:47
awesome night, right? Well, after we do everything,
32:51
we, the cookies were kind of like the, the, the batter,
32:53
whatever you call it was that kind of kind of moist little
32:55
they were sticking to my fingers, but I was like slapping
32:57
them on the tray and we put it on there and then we stick them
33:00
in the oven. I'm thinking, man, you and me
33:03
cookies tonight. It's awesome, right?
33:05
And the Lord's there. It's like good.
33:06
And so she puts it in there for the 8 to 10 minutes to cook, and
33:10
the bell rings and I'm thinking, all right, man, this is awesome.
33:14
She opens the oven. She pulls out the tray.
33:16
And all I hear is like, oh, no, why you laughing?
33:22
She said like, oh, no. And and I was like, what?
33:25
And I walk over there and it's kind of hard to describe.
33:28
So I'm just going to show you the picture.
33:29
This is what it looked like. Why are you laughing at me?
33:35
I'm a guest. Yeah.
33:40
I did not want to touch that with a 10 foot pole.
33:43
I did not want to touch that. It looked like something was
33:46
going to start crawling out of it and and I was like, what
33:50
happened to my cookie? What happened to date night?
33:53
And and she's like, well, so we started talking and she goes,
33:56
you know what? How much flour did you put?
33:58
I'm like, I put all the flour that was in the cup and, and she
34:01
was like, well, it needed like another cup and 1/2 a flour.
34:05
I read the ingredients. I'm like, I don't know, right?
34:08
So, so thankfully we only put a 1 little batch in.
34:12
It was kind of our test run. So we got the rest of the flour.
34:15
We mixed it up. I this time I rolled up both
34:18
sleeves. I was like, I'm going to do
34:19
this. We put it on the tray and then
34:22
we put them in the oven. It rang and they came out and
34:24
they looked like this. Yeah, you laughed at me.
34:31
You brought me down. You got to clap.
34:33
You got to lift me up. You know what I'm saying?
34:35
We had date night. Praise the Lord, right?
34:38
Awesome. They came out right?
34:39
Why? Because we followed the recipe.
34:42
We. I followed the instructions.
34:43
Finally, here's the point. It's not about cookies.
34:46
OK, Here is the point, though. Often times your spiritual
34:52
growth and your development in the Lord will plateau.
34:59
It'll stall. There's times in which you feel
35:03
like you're even regressing. You're not hearing from the
35:06
Lord. You're uncertain if God's with
35:09
you. You begin to doubt His promises
35:11
or His Word, and you begin to struggle and you begin to
35:13
rustle. Often times in those seasons and
35:17
moments in life, in your walk with the Lord, The reason why
35:20
that is, is because there's something missing in your life.
35:24
There's something lacking. The Lord might might be speaking
35:28
to you, but you're not listening, or God is asking
35:30
something from you but you're disobeying, or you're not being
35:33
faithful with the spiritual disciplines of our life.
35:36
And therefore we find ourselves weak or unable to stand against
35:40
temptation or sin. And then we begin to to crumble.
35:43
We begin to trip up. And Peter knows this.
35:46
Peter tripped up many times and he's trying to encourage the
35:50
believers to say walk, apply these things, add these things
35:53
into your life, pursue these areas.
35:55
And so what's he do? He gives us 7 specific
35:58
characteristics, 7 principles, 7 truths, whatever you want to
36:03
call them. I, I call them 7 distinctives.
36:05
These become the key ingredients if you really want to begin to
36:08
grow. Now, this is not an exhaustive
36:11
list. It's not meant to be an absolute
36:12
list. It's meant to be a list of
36:14
intentionality for these believers, for them to continue
36:17
to pursue spiritual things. And so what's the list?
36:20
Well, he puts it together. Look at verse 5 again as we
36:24
begin to read through this. In verse 5, he says for this for
36:29
a reason, giving all diligence, add to your faith, virtue, add
36:35
to your faith. So he's telling us to add these
36:37
things to our life. Now, here's a spoiler.
36:38
OK, I need to give you a quick spoiler is Peter tells us what
36:43
to do. Peter doesn't tell us how to do
36:46
it. Jesus does that sometimes.
36:51
Remember with the feeding of the 5000 Philip, go give them
36:54
something to eat. He's like he didn't tell him
36:58
how. He just said go do it as if it
37:00
was possible for it to be done. I believe the Lord does this on
37:04
purpose in your life, in my life.
37:06
And one of the reasons why is because it requires a dependence
37:10
on the Lord. It requires faith in the Lord as
37:13
we do this journey of life when God says go and do this and we
37:18
don't know how and we journey in faith, looking to the Lord to
37:23
provide guidance and instruction through His word, right?
37:27
So let me give you an example. Today you came to worship,
37:29
right? I hope you did.
37:32
Is worship only your singing? What's the answer?
37:36
No. So when God says I want you to
37:38
be a worshiper and I want you to worship me, what's that mean?
37:41
How is that done? How has that lived out in my
37:44
life? How is that supposed to be
37:46
expressed? And again, you rightly answered,
37:47
no, it's not just a matter of you singing, because our worship
37:51
for the Lord can take many different positions in our life.
37:55
It can be expressed in our words, in our singing, but not
37:57
always. It can be found in our prayer,
38:00
but not always. It can be found in our giving,
38:02
but not always. It can be found in many
38:04
different ways in which we express our worship.
38:07
And here's the thing. He says, worship me.
38:08
And then we learn as we navigate, while we're doing all
38:11
diligence and seeking the Lord, how to learn how to worship.
38:16
And then you're driving in your car and you're going to work and
38:18
it's Monday and you're like, I hate Mondays, but Lord, I want
38:21
to work for you. And then you begin to express an
38:24
attitude of worship to God and you begin to experience what it
38:28
means to be a real and true worshipper who worships in
38:32
spirit and in truth. So Peter tells us, add to your
38:36
faith. Add these things to your life.
38:38
Because that was kind of a little deviant.
38:39
I want you to, I want a deviation from our text.
38:41
I want you to think about this. He tells us what to do, but then
38:44
we learn how to go do it. So he says, add to your faith,
38:46
virtue. Now this idea of virtue, we're
38:48
going to go do these really quick.
38:50
OK, Virtue has two main expressions or ideas and
38:53
thoughts. Number one is moral excellence,
38:56
but the second is moral, moral courage.
38:59
It means making a stand for the Lord.
39:01
It's mean being faithful in times of great difficulty to
39:04
have courage and to have moral excellence.
39:07
You know, a great example would be like Joseph in the Old
39:09
Testament, who when no one was watching, he was faithful with
39:12
everything that Potiphar trusted with him.
39:14
And then Potter's Potter's wife was like checking him out, like
39:17
how you doing? And he's like stay away.
39:19
And he could have done great sin, but he knew I need to honor
39:23
God. Daniel in the Old Testament,
39:25
another great example of moral courage, who had a very young
39:28
age was was captive, was taken captive by the Babylonians,
39:31
taken to Babylon and was given all the temptation to to leave
39:36
behind the word. And he remained faithful to God.
39:38
Moral courage, moral excellence huge.
39:42
He says add to your faith virtue.
39:43
But then he says next add virtue knowledge again.
39:46
How many times has Peter said knowledge by this .4 times or
39:49
so, and he uses it 13 times in this epistle.
39:53
Epignosis. A precise knowledge and a
39:56
greater understanding, a greater depth of understanding.
39:59
We have to be those that become students of the word, to study
40:05
the word, to grow deeper in the word.
40:08
This is so important and it can be hard, but as you make every
40:13
effort you begin to grow. You Start learning about history
40:16
and timeline. You begin learning how things
40:19
relate to one another and how God worked in the Old Testament,
40:21
how that relates to the New Testament.
40:23
And again, the early church, the 1st century church, you know
40:26
what their scripture were. Everything in the Old Testament.
40:29
The Old Testament is so relevant.
40:31
We are a New Testament church, but the early church used the
40:33
Old Testament to bring revelation of Jesus.
40:37
So we give all diligence to study the Word.
40:39
And as you study the word, guess what happens?
40:40
You grow and greater understanding and you begin to
40:43
have solid doctrine and theology.
40:47
So when something funky comes your way, people come knocking
40:50
on your door. And we're the Church of Latter
40:53
Day Saints and we're Christians just like you're like, no, I
40:56
don't think so. You're Jesus, not my Jesus.
41:00
They come down from the Kingdom Hall and they begin, let me tell
41:02
you the gospel of Jesus. And you're like, no, you're
41:04
Jesus is not my you're Jesus is Michael the ark.
41:06
You begin to have a solid ground theologically and doctrinally.
41:09
So he says, add to your faith, virtue to virtue, knowledge to
41:13
knowledge, self-control. This is one of the fruits of the
41:17
Spirit. We need to add this in our
41:20
lives. This idea of self-control.
41:21
This idea of self-control is the ability to control one's
41:25
passions and emotions. You know, one of the things
41:30
that's very difficult in the life of a believer is to learn
41:33
to control emotion. Emotion is so powerful.
41:37
And by the way, emotion is given to us by the Lord.
41:40
It's part of the attribute of God, of God's joy and blessing,
41:43
love. It comes from the Lord.
41:45
So emotions aren't necessarily bad, but the problem with
41:47
emotion is we're called you and I are called to live by faith
41:50
and emotion has the time, the tendency often times to lead us
41:54
in the direction too far on one side or the other.
41:58
So you think about anger. You can have righteous anger,
42:01
but where does anger typically take us?
42:03
I'm going to punch you in the nose, right?
42:06
It takes you too far. Passion is great.
42:09
God gives us passion right there you are dating that that cute
42:12
Christian gal and you're like, I'm passionate for you.
42:15
Hold on, chill out. You know, let's just pull that
42:18
back a little bit, right? Because passion will take you in
42:21
the direction that you should not go.
42:22
So how do we balance that self-control, fruit of the Holy
42:26
Spirit, add to your faith, virtue, virtue, knowledge,
42:29
knowledge, self-control. And then he says the 4th
42:32
character is add to your faith, perseverance.
42:34
And I love this one. Perseverance has the when you
42:37
read it, it talks about steadfastness.
42:39
It talks about patience. And one of the synonyms that I
42:43
like for perseverance is the word endurance.
42:46
You have to endure. Endurance is not something you
42:50
get overnight. Anybody go to the gym?
42:52
You're like one of those healthy eaters.
42:54
And you don't do the cookies on date night, right?
42:55
You're one of those. And if you like going to the
42:58
gym, you know, starting to exercise or lifting weights.
43:02
Any guys lift weights in the room?
43:03
Yeah, you can always tell the guys that lift weights.
43:06
You know why? Because when they raise their
43:07
hand, they do it like this, right?
43:10
So you go to the gym and you're working out.
43:12
It takes your body 4 to 8 weeks to adjust to a regimen and those
43:18
first couple of number of weeks, man, you're lifting or you're
43:21
running, you're doing cardio and it hurts your body.
43:23
Like you don't just feel discomfort, you feel pain.
43:26
Why? Your muscles and your body has
43:28
not endured or built endurance. It's the same way in your
43:32
Christian faith. Well, what do you have to endure
43:35
through? You have to learn to endure sin
43:37
and temptation. You have to learn to endure the
43:40
philosophy of the world. You have to learn to endure
43:43
suffering and pain and difficulty.
43:45
You learn to endure as you persevere.
43:48
And so he tells us to add to our faith, virtue, virtue,
43:51
knowledge, knowledge, self-control, self-control,
43:53
perseverance. And then he says from
43:55
perseverance to godliness. I love this one.
43:57
Godliness, godliness there. What it means is God to be God
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like, to be God like, you know, children, children always
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reflect their parents. You know, you look like your
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parents. So my parents, my mom and dad,
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we grew up surfing our whole life.
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And so my parents moved to Colorado and they were part of
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our church for a number of years, helping with worship and
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other things. And so they they went to Maui.
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They moved to Maui. They lived in Maui for 10 years.
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My dad surfed and paddle board for for all that time.
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And so we went out there to visit and we went out there.
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I think it was the first time that we went out there and we
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walked into some shop to buy something.
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And he's like, hey, you're Louis's son.
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I'm like Louis junior, OK, you're Louis's son.
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I go, how do you know that? I go, you look just like him.
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Why? Why I'm his son.
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I reflect him. So my dad's Dominican and my
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mom's Cuban and there's times I'll do something and my mom, my
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wife is like, you're just like, that's what your mom does.
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We went out to dinner a few weeks ago with another Christian
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couple, a pastor. Actually, he did some mission
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work in Cuba and, and we're having dinner together and he
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asked me a question and I and I, I do a gesture like this.
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He goes, Cubans do that in Cuba and it's true.
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You know what, what the things are happening in, in whatever
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the queue and they'll be like tranquilo, you know, you know,
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and they use their hands. He goes, that's where do I get
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that from my mom and my dad. Thank you, mom.
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Thank you, dad. Here's the point.
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You are a child of God and you are to reflect your Father in
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heaven. You are to reflect who he is and
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who God is becomes a part of your life and you begin to
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reflect it. And so when he says, I want you
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to be godly, don't think there it's this impossibility of a
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thing because he's given you his divine nature.
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It's to reflect the heart and the mind of God in your life.
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I love this. So he gives us these
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characteristics, virtue to knowledge, self-control,
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perseverance, godliness. And then he says brotherly
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kindness. This is an important one.
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Brotherly kindness. It's the Greek word
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Philadelphia. It's where we get the word
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Philadelphia. Brotherly love from.
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The idea is a friendship, love, The NIV says a mutual affection.
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The NLT says brotherly affection.
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The idea it's, it's a relationship that we build with
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other believers together. This is huge.
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The danger of being part of a larger church with multiple
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services is that it's easy for you to come in the back and sit
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in the back and then leave and without anybody really knowing
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who you are or you getting to know other people.
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There's a danger to that. And there might be some today
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that you've been coming to this church for a while, but you've
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never built any relationships with people.
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Let me tell you, that's not from the Lord.
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God wants you to build relationships and connections
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with other believers here where you open your life and allow
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them to minister to you, and then you open up your life and
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you minister to them. And everything that we have
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going on in the church here, everything that's going on,
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whether it's a paintball day or whether it's a men's hike,
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whether it's a ladies study, the intent behind it is to build
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connection and relationship. The opportunity is there.
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You just have to give all diligence to go do it.
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And I understand there's a mixture of of people where some
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are extroverts and some are introverts.
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I understand it might be hard for you, but you have to give
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all diligence and that is where you build relationships and
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community in the church. This idea of brotherly love, the
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last characteristic that Peter gives us and we're going to wrap
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up is love itself. But it's not brotherly love.
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It's God's agape love. That's what that word love in
47:38
the Greek gives God's agape. And what is that?
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What kind of love is that? It is to love others without
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expecting anything in return. It is the opposite of what
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everybody in the world knows. You see, the world experiences
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love, but the kind of love that the people in the world
47:56
experience is, that's love where it's needs to be reciprocated.
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I do for you, therefore you must do for me.
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But when we learn God's love, we learn to give and to love and to
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serve others without any expectation for that to be
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reciprocated or for that to be returned back to me.
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Let me tell you today the 2 greatest things that you can do
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as a Christian today. The two, the the 2 rules, the
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two commandments that rule them all is number one for you to
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love God with all your heart, mind and soul.
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And the second is just like that, for you to love your
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neighbor as you love yourself, your vertical relationship with
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God directly affects your horizontal relationship with
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others. And God wants you to walk in His
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agape love. Is that possible?
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It's possible, but it requires all diligence because it's
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extremely difficult for us to do.
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OK, let's wrap up. I'm going a little bit over.
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Let's wrap up. What are we to do with all this?
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You are to respond. What are we to do with
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everything that was said this morning?
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You are to take it and you are to do business with it between
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you and the Lord. You need to respond.
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Every time the Word of God is opened up, it opens up.
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It requires us a response to the Lord and do His Word into the
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Holy Spirit. So look what he says in verse 8.
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He says, if these things are yours and they abound, you will
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neither be unbearing nor unfruitful in the knowledge of
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our Lord Jesus Christ. If these are yours and abound.
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Peter wants this, these things to abound in our life.
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It requires a response in US and through us for it to abound in
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our life today. And so Peter writes this
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epistle. Why?
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Because He's encouraging believers like you and like me
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to pursue the Lord spiritually, to have a passion and a desire
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in this, in this life with the Lord, this pursuit of spiritual
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growth. And when you begin to do that
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with intentionality, you're going to see your life radically
49:54
change. But let me just say, it starts
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right now with you giving your life to Christ.
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It starts with you trusting in Jesus for the forgiveness of
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your sin. And if you do that, I promise
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He'll radically change and transform your life.
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Do you know how someone is truly saved?
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People will come up to me all the time and ask pastor, how do
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I know if I'm truly saved? The way that someone knows if
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they're truly a born again Christian is that your life will
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be marked by transformation. And if your life has never been
50:22
changed from before to after, then that's a problem.
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I grew up in a Christian home. I knew the Word, I had it
50:29
intellectually, but I never experienced.
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But the moment I gave my life to Christ, truly my life was
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changed. There was something different.
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The work of the Holy Spirit, me. And today God wants you to
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experience that in Him. Amen.
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Let's pray. Father, we come to you and we
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thank you for your faithfulness. Lord, we thank you for the move
50:51
of the Holy Spirit. And even right now, you want to
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move in our midst. And I know, Lord, there are
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people here today that were invited.
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There are people here today that just walked in.
50:59
There are people today that are listening on the radio down in
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the Agape Room or the cafe. There's people right now
51:05
watching online and you're speaking directly to them.
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And more than anything else, Lord, you desire them to enter
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into a true and real relationship with you through
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Jesus Christ. And today you can have the
51:18
forgiveness of sin. Today you can begin to
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experience the joy and the blessing and experience all that
51:24
God has for you. But you have to come to Jesus in
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faith, trusting him to forgive you, to change you, to save you.
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And if you need that, you need to, if you want that, you need
51:34
to respond. You need to say, Lord, save me.
51:37
Lord, forgive me. And he'll meet you right where
51:40
you're at, and he'll do a supernatural work in your life
51:42
right now. And if that's you and you need
51:47
to receive the Lord, the Bible says whoever calls on the name
51:49
of the Lord shall be saved. And if you want to call in the
51:52
name of the Lord right now, you can just stand to your feet.
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You stand up and say, Jesus, I need you.
51:59
You rise out of your seat and the Lord will lift you up higher
52:02
than you could ever go. But you must stand and respond.
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You must say, Lord, here's my life.
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I'm tired of carrying the weight of my sin on my shoulders.
52:12
I'm tired of my depression. I'm tired of just always feeling
52:15
hopeless. And the Lord today will give you
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what you need in him. His love for you.
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God bless you. Anybody else you would say,
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here's my life Lord, and you need to respond to this.
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And today He'll make your life brand new.
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God bless you in the back. Erratic is a decision that I've
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never regretted in my life of him working and moving.
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God bless you, you guys in the back.
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Lord, we just pray right now for these that are standing and they
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thank you Jesus for them. And it's not coincidence and
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it's not chance. It's not accident that they're
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here today that they're listening, whether they're on
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the radio and they're responding or on the Internet and they're
52:59
responding or they're right here in this this this sanctuary and
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they're responding. I pray for these that are
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standing right now that you would radically change their
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life and today would mark a new beginning of salvation,
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forgiveness and transformation in your grace.
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And if you're standing and you're receiving Christ right
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now, just call out to God you can pray something like this.
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Lord, save me. God, I need you.
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God forgive me of my sin and, and save me and help me.
53:31
And I want to follow after you. I want to be changed and I trust
53:35
you with everything that I am. For the rest of us, maybe you're
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a believer. You need to respond as well.
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And that response might be repentance and confession.
53:50
It might be areas of your life that you haven't surrendered.
53:52
And today the Lord is saying I'm going to do a new work, but but
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you have to choose to give it to me, and He wants you to respond.
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Today we're going to close in a song of worship and praise and
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I'm going to stand up here along with the pastors and staff.
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And before you leave, we want to talk with you, especially for
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those who stood up to receive the Lord today.
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We want you to come forward. We want to pray with you and
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encourage you and give you some resources and tools in your life
54:16
to, to just strengthen your walk with Lord to begin this journey.
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But we'll pray with you. We'll pray with every single
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person here before you leave. We pray that you've been
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encouraged by this Bible study delivered live from the
54:28
sanctuary of Calvary Church for prayer.
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Call us at 87730 grace that's 877-304-7223.
54:40
To listen to this message in its integrity or to join us for our
54:43
live stream services, visit us online at Calvary Co dot Church
54:49
or download our free Calvary Church app.
54:52
Be blessed as you worship Jesus this week.