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One Way: Part 1 · Rick Manis Ministries Podcast

• 0:07
  SPEAKER_00: Morning, though.
• 0:08
  SPEAKER_00: I want to uh get into something, and I will be uh speaking next week, so I'm gonna do a two-part thing here.
• 0:15
  SPEAKER_00: And we're calling this thing um one way.
• 0:19
  SPEAKER_00: Uh because Jesus said in John chapter 14, verse 6, I am the way, the truth, and the life.
• 0:24
  SPEAKER_00: No man comes to the Father, no one comes to the Father except by me.
• 0:27
  SPEAKER_00: Um I've uh had a lot of people push me back on that a lot of times, saying, Why does there have to be one way?
• 0:34
  SPEAKER_00: Why does Jesus have to be the only way?
• 0:36
  SPEAKER_00: Um, you know, what's what's the deal with Jesus?
• 0:39
  SPEAKER_00: He, you know, is he he look at it this way.
• 0:44
  SPEAKER_00: We should be glad that there is a way.
• 0:47
  SPEAKER_00: Because not every way profits us.
• 0:50
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, uh Proverbs chapter 14, 12 says, there is a way that seems right to a man, but its end is the way of death.
• 0:56
  SPEAKER_00: So not all roads read lead all roads lead to life.
• 1:01
  SPEAKER_00: Uh not all roads lead to the Father.
• 1:03
  SPEAKER_00: This is what he's talking about here.
• 1:04
  SPEAKER_00: He says, I'm the way to the Father.
• 1:06
  SPEAKER_00: So so uh it means more, I believe, than just where do you go after you die?
• 1:12
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, it's amazing to me, and I guess kind of sad if you think about it, that we've taken this gospel of the kingdom that Jesus taught and he demonstrated, and he and we and we, as we look into the word and as we grow in this, we see how big and how vast this salvation is.
• 1:32
  SPEAKER_00: We see how wonderful and powerful and liberating and what it does and how it opens up our soul to heaven and brings us a whole new experience right here in this lifetime that we're in.
• 1:43
  SPEAKER_00: And and somehow over time, Christianity has condensed this whole big, beautiful thing into just heaven or hell, which one?
• 1:53
  SPEAKER_00: And everything comes down to that.
• 1:55
  SPEAKER_00: And there's not much, there's not much that it says about this life, the way they've condensed it, except for what do we have for this life?
• 2:04
  SPEAKER_00: Well, try not to sin, and that's about it, right?
• 2:08
  SPEAKER_00: And so while you're in this life, you try not to sin and hope that you make heaven instead of hell.
• 2:13
  SPEAKER_00: And everything has funneled down into basically that when this gospel of the kingdom is so much bigger.
• 2:18
  SPEAKER_00: And in fact, when Jesus said that, he says, no man comes to the father.
• 2:22
  SPEAKER_00: So look at it this way this morning.
• 2:24
  SPEAKER_00: Uh actually, when you read that chapter, everything is the father, the father, the father, the father, the father.
• 2:30
  SPEAKER_00: He's the way to the father.
• 2:31
  SPEAKER_00: Remember, John also said no man had seen the father or perceived the father.
• 2:36
  SPEAKER_00: We could say no man has known the father at any time, but the son who's in the bosom of the father, he has declared him, revealed him to us.
• 2:45
  SPEAKER_00: And uh and I think a lot about, I'm excited, in fact, I love um uh how uh you know Clark sometime back was talking about what's happening to us, what we're coming into more and more of, and this time in a way that we never have is knowing the Father, the revelation of the Father.
• 3:04
  SPEAKER_00: And this was something nobody had that Jesus had, that Jesus gave to us.
• 3:09
  SPEAKER_00: And this is there's a bigness of this that that we're we're we're experiencing and beginning to experience and coming to that's changing everything.
• 3:18
  SPEAKER_00: And there's only one way to know the father, and that's that is is through what Jesus did and revealed to us.
• 3:26
  SPEAKER_00: And he revealed a father, and nobody else ever did that.
• 3:29
  SPEAKER_00: Nobody talked about the father.
• 3:31
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, it was blasphemous to call him your father, right?
• 3:35
  SPEAKER_00: God was a God that was separated from he was a far-off God.
• 3:38
  SPEAKER_00: They didn't even call him by his name, they wouldn't even write it completely out on paper.
• 3:42
  SPEAKER_00: He was too far separated, too holy.
• 3:45
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I didn't talk about that this morning.
• 3:47
  SPEAKER_00: And then Jesus comes along calling him daddy.
• 3:50
  SPEAKER_00: And he says, Your daddy loves you, your daddy will do this for you, your daddy wants this for you, your daddy, your daddy.
• 3:59
  SPEAKER_00: Well, how do we pray?
• 4:00
  SPEAKER_00: Call him your father.
• 4:02
  SPEAKER_00: And so he's he gives us this revelation.
• 4:05
  SPEAKER_00: So let's look at this and have have fun with this.
• 4:07
  SPEAKER_00: So uh what and when we say talk about this one way, there's there are many ways.
• 4:14
  SPEAKER_00: Proverbs speaks about a way that leads to death.
• 4:17
  SPEAKER_00: So, so let's do this, and I can't help it.
• 4:21
  SPEAKER_00: I do it all the time because it's simple to me that everything went south in the Garden of Eden, went bad, and Jesus came and set it right again.
• 4:31
  SPEAKER_00: So what we missed in the Garden of Eden, Jesus brought us back to that, brought us to that and gave us that.
• 4:38
  SPEAKER_00: He said, I didn't come to condemn the world, I came to give you life.
• 4:42
  SPEAKER_00: And more abundantly.
• 4:44
  SPEAKER_00: Well, there were two trees that we that we read about in the garden.
• 4:47
  SPEAKER_00: One was a tree of what?
• 4:48
  SPEAKER_00: Life.
• 4:50
  SPEAKER_00: Jesus said, I came to give you life.
• 4:52
  SPEAKER_00: And the other tree was a tree of knowledge of good and evil, and it brought death.
• 4:56
  SPEAKER_00: So there were two things.
• 4:58
  SPEAKER_00: Deuteronomy, God said it this way.
• 4:59
  SPEAKER_00: Look, I've set before you life and blessing, and death and cursing.
• 5:04
  SPEAKER_00: Choose life that you can live.
• 5:07
  SPEAKER_00: And I am that life.
• 5:09
  SPEAKER_00: It's me, the person of God who created you and loves you.
• 5:14
  SPEAKER_00: I am that life.
• 5:15
  SPEAKER_00: I'm your source of life, I'm your I'm your everything if you can see it, and all these other things that will distract and pull you away.
• 5:23
  SPEAKER_00: Because there are ways that seem right, and it all falls under that tree of knowledge of good and evil.
• 5:27
  SPEAKER_00: So we want to look at a specific aspect of that this morning.
• 5:31
  SPEAKER_00: Because something happened when we chose that knowledge of good and evil.
• 5:39
  SPEAKER_00: Many things happened, but one of them is that we gain, we not that we gained it as much as we we chose to be led by it.
• 5:53
  SPEAKER_00: And by choosing to be led by the knowing of good and evil, we became judges.
• 6:02
  SPEAKER_00: We see it very simply in the garden.
• 6:05
  SPEAKER_00: The first thing Adam and Eve do is they start judging.
• 6:08
  SPEAKER_00: Who do they judge?
• 6:09
  SPEAKER_00: First themselves.
• 6:10
  SPEAKER_00: They noticed they were naked, they judged themselves in a negative way, were ashamed of their condition.
• 6:19
  SPEAKER_00: When God approaches, when they hear God nearby, what do they do?
• 6:23
  SPEAKER_00: They run from him because of their shame and their fear, because they don't feel worthy to be close to God.
• 6:33
  SPEAKER_00: That was their judgment that told them that.
• 6:36
  SPEAKER_00: That wasn't God's judgment, right?
• 6:38
  SPEAKER_00: Like I said, they've been naked the whole time.
• 6:40
  SPEAKER_00: God didn't say anything.
• 6:41
  SPEAKER_00: He didn't care, he didn't condemn them, he doesn't do that.
• 6:43
  SPEAKER_00: That's why he said, Who told you you were naked?
• 6:46
  SPEAKER_00: You've been naked the whole time.
• 6:48
  SPEAKER_00: I never told you that.
• 6:49
  SPEAKER_00: Did you eat of that tree?
• 6:51
  SPEAKER_00: Why did he say that?
• 6:52
  SPEAKER_00: Because the only thing that could have told you that was that knowledge of good and evil.
• 6:58
  SPEAKER_00: Now, another thing about it is the tree of knowledge, the knowledge of good and evil actually is not necessarily a bad thing.
• 7:06
  SPEAKER_00: It's the being led by it.
• 7:09
  SPEAKER_00: See, because God himself knows good and evil, right?
• 7:12
  SPEAKER_00: After we chose that way, God said, look, the man has become like one of us to know good and evil.
• 7:17
  SPEAKER_00: So God knows good and evil.
• 7:18
  SPEAKER_00: He's got the knowledge of good and evil.
• 7:22
  SPEAKER_00: But the difference is he can handle it.
• 7:24
  SPEAKER_00: He's God, he's love.
• 7:25
  SPEAKER_00: He's not led by that.
• 7:26
  SPEAKER_00: He's love.
• 7:27
  SPEAKER_00: He doesn't judge by that.
• 7:29
  SPEAKER_00: He judges righteous, he judges righteous judgment.
• 7:32
  SPEAKER_00: He loves, gives mercy, gives life.
• 7:35
  SPEAKER_00: He's generous.
• 7:36
  SPEAKER_00: He's just, he's, he, he doesn't judge and condemn because he doesn't lead by the knowledge of good and evil.
• 7:42
  SPEAKER_00: So we go to Matthew chapter 7.
• 7:43
  SPEAKER_00: And I want to get into this, uh, some verses in this chapter.
• 7:47
  SPEAKER_00: And in verse 1, Jesus is teaching, and he says, judge not that you be not judged.
• 7:53
  SPEAKER_00: For with what judgment you judge, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured back to you.
• 7:59
  SPEAKER_00: So uh pause right there.
• 8:01
  SPEAKER_00: First of all, we see this, we know this verse.
• 8:04
  SPEAKER_00: Don't judge that you be judged.
• 8:05
  SPEAKER_00: And what he's saying is, because that judgment that we use, that same thing can come back on you.
• 8:13
  SPEAKER_00: We know that the way we judge other people, they can always say things about us too, because we got stuff.
• 8:19
  SPEAKER_00: And then we got a whole world of people judging each other, and everybody's evil, and everybody's bad, and everybody's wrong, and everybody's mad at each other, and and oh, you're friends for a little while, but then you get mad because they did something and you judge them bad, and they're judging you bad, and all all that's going on.
• 8:34
  SPEAKER_00: It's interesting in the Garden of Eden, not only do they judge themselves as unworthy, but then you know, then they start blaming each other.
• 8:42
  SPEAKER_00: The woman did it.
• 8:44
  SPEAKER_00: Woman says, the devil made me do it.
• 8:49
  SPEAKER_00: And so so he says, Don't judge that you be that that he's that you be not judged, because that same measure will come back to you.
• 8:57
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, he goes, he says, and why do you look at the speck in your brother's eye and don't consider the plank that's in your own eye?
• 9:03
  SPEAKER_00: Or how can you say to your brother, let me remove the speck from your eye and look, a plank is in your own eye.
• 9:08
  SPEAKER_00: What he's simply showing us here, he says, that whole thing, that way that we live, that way that mankind has gone, that that whole path that we have taken by following and living under and living by and making rules according to the knowledge of good and evil.
• 9:27
  SPEAKER_00: He says, Don't, he says, this is a way.
• 9:30
  SPEAKER_00: He's saying, this is a way that leads to death.
• 9:32
  SPEAKER_00: Everybody loses here.
• 9:35
  SPEAKER_00: I remember hearing a pastor talking one time, and he was talking about the subject of homosexuality, and he was being very sensitive toward it, being um very gracious on the subject.
• 9:54
  SPEAKER_00: And he says, now I know what a lot of you are thinking.
• 9:57
  SPEAKER_00: He says, You're thinking, well, the Bible says it's an abomination.
• 9:59
  SPEAKER_00: You gotta he says, well, if you want to go to Leviticus, we all lose.
• 10:04
  SPEAKER_00: Every one of us loses when we do that.
• 10:07
  SPEAKER_00: Everybody loses.
• 10:08
  SPEAKER_00: That's basically what Jesus is saying here.
• 10:10
  SPEAKER_00: He says, you all lose.
• 10:12
  SPEAKER_00: He says, You got us, you got something in your eye, everybody's got something in their eye.
• 10:16
  SPEAKER_00: So why do we want to start start using that knowledge of good and evil to deal with what's wrong with somebody else when we got our own stuff?
• 10:23
  SPEAKER_00: And Jesus is telling us, is getting ready to tell us here, there's a whole other way.
• 10:28
  SPEAKER_00: There is a way that brings life and leads to life.
• 10:33
  SPEAKER_00: So he says, hypocrite, don't first remove the plank from your own eye, and then you'll see clearly to remove the speck from your brother's eye.
• 10:39
  SPEAKER_00: And here then the next verse comes up.
• 10:41
  SPEAKER_00: And this is what's interesting.
• 10:42
  SPEAKER_00: Do not give what is holy to the dogs, or cast your pearls before swine, lest they trample them under their feet and they turn and tear you to pieces.
• 10:53
  SPEAKER_00: Now, I'm going to tell you first of all that Jesus did not do a 180 and change the subject.
• 10:59
  SPEAKER_00: He's still on the same subject.
• 11:00
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, if you if we if you went down to uh verse 12, he would say, Therefore, whatever you want men to do to you, do also to them, for this is a law and the prophet.
• 11:08
  SPEAKER_00: So he's still talking about all this judgment thing.
• 11:13
  SPEAKER_00: So he says, Don't give what's holy to the dogs.
• 11:17
  SPEAKER_00: Why does he say that?
• 11:19
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 11:19
  SPEAKER_00: Now, know who you know who Jesus is talking to the to these Hebrew Jewish people that he's got following him around.
• 11:27
  SPEAKER_00: And if you can look at the time there, they've got a different understanding for of that word holy than how somehow Christians have perverted, Christianity has perverted it over time.
• 11:43
  SPEAKER_00: I got so confused, I just said I don't have I don't even know what it is.
• 11:48
  SPEAKER_00: The main idea was that it was your your behavior.
• 11:51
  SPEAKER_00: So, you know, so then the job is to keep fighting for perfect behavior because if you can attain perfect behavior, then you will be holy.
• 12:01
  SPEAKER_00: And that missed it by a mile.
• 12:06
  SPEAKER_00: The word holy has a specific connotation, a specific meaning.
• 12:10
  SPEAKER_00: They know what he's talking about when he says, don't give the holy thing to the dogs.
• 12:15
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, uh, to give you a good example of a good picture of it, we go to Joshua chapter 6 and we see a good, good picture of what in their minds holy really is.
• 12:30
  SPEAKER_00: He says in verse 6, chapter or chapter 6, verse 18.
• 12:34
  SPEAKER_00: Now, God's, the people are about to go and take take Jericho.
• 12:38
  SPEAKER_00: God's saying, you guys are going to take that city, and when you do, he says, go in there, take everything.
• 12:42
  SPEAKER_00: He says, Except there's certain things I don't want you to take.
• 12:45
  SPEAKER_00: He says, and you, by all means, abstain from the accursed things, lest you become accursed when you take of the accursed things.
• 12:53
  SPEAKER_00: Now, this is a word, a word harem, which which which which means it's a it's a fenced in, it's an isolated thing.
• 13:00
  SPEAKER_00: Uh we we would use the word taboo.
• 13:02
  SPEAKER_00: This is something that's not for you.
• 13:04
  SPEAKER_00: He says, Abstain from it.
• 13:06
  SPEAKER_00: He says, lest you become accursed when you take of the accursed things, and make the camp of Israel accursed.
• 13:14
  SPEAKER_00: And trouble it.
• 13:15
  SPEAKER_00: But all the silver and gold, verse 19, but all the silver and gold and the vessels of bronze and iron are holy or consecrated, sanctified, consecrated to the Lord, they shall come into the treasury of the Lord.
• 13:27
  SPEAKER_00: That's the word kodesh, which which simply means dedicated or separated unto.
• 13:34
  SPEAKER_00: It's holy unto the Lord.
• 13:35
  SPEAKER_00: Remember in Malachi, what did he say?
• 13:37
  SPEAKER_00: The tithe is holy to the Lord.
• 13:40
  SPEAKER_00: What was it about that?
• 13:42
  SPEAKER_00: It was separated, it was dedicated to him.
• 13:44
  SPEAKER_00: It wasn't for the men to partake of, it wasn't for them to use, it was for God.
• 13:50
  SPEAKER_00: That it would come into the treasury of the Lord.
• 13:53
  SPEAKER_00: So so when when Jesus says, don't take what's holy and give it to the dogs, he's saying, don't take what belongs to God and put it in the paws of something that doesn't know what to do with it.
• 14:06
  SPEAKER_00: Are you following me on that?
• 14:07
  SPEAKER_00: You see that?
• 14:08
  SPEAKER_00: In other words, he's saying what he's really saying is don't take judgment that belongs to God and put it in your own hands.
• 14:16
  SPEAKER_00: Don't put it in the hands of men.
• 14:19
  SPEAKER_00: Because men are led by the knowledge of good and evil.
• 14:21
  SPEAKER_00: They can't judge righteously, they judge according to the flesh.
• 14:24
  SPEAKER_00: An eye for an eye is justice to them.
• 14:29
  SPEAKER_00: My Bible said in Isaiah that when Jesus comes, he would not judge according to the sight of his eyes, he would judge righteously.
• 14:37
  SPEAKER_00: He would judge differently.
• 14:40
  SPEAKER_00: You want to see examples of his judgment?
• 14:42
  SPEAKER_00: Well, we go to the woman caught in adultery.
• 14:45
  SPEAKER_00: There's two judgments going on there.
• 14:47
  SPEAKER_00: There's a judgment of knowledge of good and evil, which brought her there in the first place to be killed.
• 14:52
  SPEAKER_00: Judgment of knowledge of good and evil, it comes up with all these ideas.
• 14:55
  SPEAKER_00: Well, what kind of a message?
• 14:56
  SPEAKER_00: If we let her go, we've got to do something about it.
• 14:58
  SPEAKER_00: She's got we have to get rid of her.
• 15:00
  SPEAKER_00: She's a spot, she's a blemish, she's she's gonna she's gonna teach everybody else to commit adultery if we just let her go.
• 15:08
  SPEAKER_00: That's man's wisdom.
• 15:12
  SPEAKER_00: What a misnomer, right?
• 15:13
  SPEAKER_00: Man's wisdom.
• 15:15
  SPEAKER_00: And Jesus says, I don't condemn you.
• 15:18
  SPEAKER_00: Go and be free from sin.
• 15:20
  SPEAKER_00: Zacchaeus, my man, my little man Zacchaeus, up in that tree.
• 15:25
  SPEAKER_00: And out of all the people there, Jesus says, I want to go to your house.
• 15:29
  SPEAKER_00: Come on.
• 15:30
  SPEAKER_00: I want to party with you tonight.
• 15:31
  SPEAKER_00: I want to go to your house, and I want to eat.
• 15:33
  SPEAKER_00: I want to spend time with you.
• 15:35
  SPEAKER_00: That's his judgment.
• 15:36
  SPEAKER_00: Everybody else got a different judgment about him.
• 15:38
  SPEAKER_00: This thief, this traitor, and all that.
• 15:40
  SPEAKER_00: And he he wanted to see Jesus in the first place, and he calls him out of that tree.
• 15:43
  SPEAKER_00: Zacchaeus, like, yeah, come on, Jesus.
• 15:45
  SPEAKER_00: He's a little short guy.
• 15:46
  SPEAKER_00: Come on, Jesus, let's go to my house.
• 15:53
  SPEAKER_00: His judgment was completely different because God is love.
• 16:00
  SPEAKER_00: The revelation of the Father that the disciple John got.
• 16:07
  SPEAKER_00: That it's love.
• 16:08
  SPEAKER_00: I think it was D.L.
• 16:09
  SPEAKER_00: Moody that said something like if you could get that revelation of the Apostle John that God is love, he says, I would take that one verse and go up and down across the whole world and preach that one verse.
• 16:25
  SPEAKER_00: That God is love, the revelation of our Father.
• 16:32
  SPEAKER_00: That's why I talk about the vision.
• 16:34
  SPEAKER_00: I've caught the vision.
• 16:37
  SPEAKER_00: I see the revelation of the Father spreading.
• 16:40
  SPEAKER_00: What's happening is we're we're we're we're we're we're enjoying more and more this new and living way of the fruit of the Spirit, love, joy, and peace, and gentleness and goodness and kindness and the power of all that that operates in.
• 16:56
  SPEAKER_00: And we're trusting less and less in the arm of the flesh and all the judgment and fighting that goes on.
• 17:04
  SPEAKER_00: It seems so normal to us.
• 17:05
  SPEAKER_00: I know.
• 17:05
  SPEAKER_00: Minds go crazy when you start talking like this because examples come up.
• 17:09
  SPEAKER_00: Well, what about this and what about that, and what about the other?
• 17:11
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know, but I know there's two ways.
• 17:15
  SPEAKER_00: One brings life and peace, another brings confusion and every evil work.
• 17:23
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know about you, but I I really got tired of being the judge.
• 17:30
  SPEAKER_00: There is such a peace and a rest from not carrying my robe of judgment on everything and everybody.
• 17:39
  SPEAKER_00: And you know how how how it's the way of man.
• 17:42
  SPEAKER_00: It's so it's it's so normal to us.
• 17:44
  SPEAKER_00: We don't even have to think about it.
• 17:45
  SPEAKER_00: We judge everything, we judge everybody.
• 17:47
  SPEAKER_00: Not always in a bad way, we just judge.
• 17:50
  SPEAKER_00: People are judging your hair, your clothes, your shoes this morning, color of your skin.
• 17:54
  SPEAKER_00: People are the people just doing it.
• 17:56
  SPEAKER_00: Not necessarily condemning and saying it's bad, but they're making judgments.
• 18:00
  SPEAKER_00: We do it.
• 18:00
  SPEAKER_00: It's just a part of part of part of part of being human.
• 18:03
  SPEAKER_00: The thing about it is, is that we don't have to be led by that knowledge of good and evil.
• 18:10
  SPEAKER_00: We're led by something so much bigger and so that supersedes all that.
• 18:14
  SPEAKER_00: We're led by the Spirit of God, the heart, the very nature of God, our creator, who who created all things by his very character, which is love, and we're learning this this this revelation of the Father, and we're coming into it.
• 18:27
  SPEAKER_00: Something is happening to me, guys.
• 18:30
  SPEAKER_00: There is a sweetness that's happening, there is a rest that's that that's happening to me, and it's just and and it's dropping so much of this stuff, of this judgment, this fear, this what if, and and and and the burden of me carrying whatever it is that God wants to do.
• 18:48
  SPEAKER_00: We're finding out the whole thing about God is that he's our life.
• 18:53
  SPEAKER_00: He from the very beginning, what he offered us and what he gave us through Jesus and what he offers to us now is that we may know him.
• 19:04
  SPEAKER_00: Because knowing him is the fullness of life.
• 19:09
  SPEAKER_00: I pray, Paul said, that you would know the height, the breadth, the depth, the width of the love of God so you can be filled with all the fullness of God.
• 19:22
  SPEAKER_00: You see, that tree in the garden, it was it was taboo.
• 19:30
  SPEAKER_00: It was just like we read there in in in in in uh Joshua.
• 19:36
  SPEAKER_00: It was taboo.
• 19:37
  SPEAKER_00: It was it was for God to know good and evil.
• 19:43
  SPEAKER_00: And he could know it because of how his heart is.
• 19:48
  SPEAKER_00: He knew the woman.
• 19:49
  SPEAKER_00: He didn't say he didn't think adultery was awesome.
• 19:52
  SPEAKER_00: But because he was love, he knew her.
• 19:56
  SPEAKER_00: Because he was love, he could be bigger.
• 20:02
  SPEAKER_00: He would have righteous judgment.
• 20:05
  SPEAKER_00: Many years ago, I was I was in a meeting, attending a meeting, and there was uh a lady speaking.
• 20:19
  SPEAKER_00: And while she was speaking, all I did when I sat there, I couldn't help it.
• 20:23
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, I hated it, but I couldn't stop.
• 20:25
  SPEAKER_00: I was judging her the whole time, and not in good ways.
• 20:30
  SPEAKER_00: I I felt that my prophetic insight was showing me all these bad things about her.
• 20:38
  SPEAKER_00: I realized a lot of what I thought was prophetic insight was just a carnal mind and one good eye that could see the outward actions of people.
• 20:45
  SPEAKER_00: But but but I was see, I I saw motivation, I thought she was all about herself.
• 20:51
  SPEAKER_00: She was, I felt like she was a show-off up there.
• 20:54
  SPEAKER_00: I felt like there was a, I felt like everything about her was I, I, I, I.
• 20:57
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, all these things that I'm thinking, and I and I couldn't enjoy the thing because I'm just thinking, I don't why am I listening to this woman?
• 21:04
  SPEAKER_00: And it wasn't that she wasn't saying some great things, she really was, but I've had these feelings, I just thought, ugh.
• 21:11
  SPEAKER_00: And then she had her book table in the back there, and everybody and I I I walked by there to look at, and she was standing there and trying to talk to me and trying to start conversation.
• 21:18
  SPEAKER_00: I could, I could hardly even talk to her.
• 21:20
  SPEAKER_00: I just I felt so separated from her.
• 21:22
  SPEAKER_00: I just felt like we had nothing in common.
• 21:26
  SPEAKER_00: I went back to my hotel room and I cried and I said, Father, I don't like feeling like this.
• 21:32
  SPEAKER_00: I said, if if if if if if if if this is a gift, if this is a gift of the Spirit of prophetic insight to see these things and feel said, I don't want it.
• 21:44
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm not saying it was, but that's how I was talking.
• 21:46
  SPEAKER_00: And I and and I just I said, I just don't want to know anything about anybody.
• 21:51
  SPEAKER_00: I don't want to see anything about anybody ever again.
• 21:54
  SPEAKER_00: I don't like this.
• 21:56
  SPEAKER_00: And I really heard the voice of the Father.
• 21:58
  SPEAKER_00: It was a it was a Momentous word that he spoke to me then as I stood there in that hotel room, and he said, Son, you are going to grow where you can see every flaw in people, and it will not affect your soul in a negative way.
• 22:15
  SPEAKER_00: That's knowing good and evil, but having love that's so much bigger that it just doesn't matter to you anymore.
• 22:22
  SPEAKER_00: Because when you don't have that, then what they do matters everything to you.
• 22:29
  SPEAKER_00: Am I making any sense to you?
• 22:35
  SPEAKER_00: So we go back to Matthew chapter 7 and pick up verse 15.
• 22:46
  SPEAKER_00: So in this discourse, he's saying, beware of false prophets.
• 22:50
  SPEAKER_00: This is that's a harsh statement.
• 22:52
  SPEAKER_00: They come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly they're they're ravenous wolves.
• 22:57
  SPEAKER_00: You'll know them by their fruits.
• 22:59
  SPEAKER_00: Now, false prophet is such a harsh term, I know.
• 23:03
  SPEAKER_00: But I can honestly say that in this context, um, that I myself have been uh a false prophet.
• 23:10
  SPEAKER_00: And by that I mean I preached the knowledge of good and evil rather than the heart of the father, the life of the father.
• 23:20
  SPEAKER_00: I preached that tree for a time in my life rather than the other tree that leads to life.
• 23:28
  SPEAKER_00: I preached a tree that seemed right, excuse me, it seemed right to me, and it seemed right to the hearers, and it did the work that it was that that the Bible says that it does.
• 23:42
  SPEAKER_00: It's a ministry of condemnation, and it made people feel like they should be doing better, like they should try harder, like they should, you know, made them feel like that.
• 23:53
  SPEAKER_00: It seemed right, it makes perfect sense.
• 23:58
  SPEAKER_00: And the reason it makes perfect sense is because it's the way of man.
• 24:02
  SPEAKER_00: There is another way, and there's only one way.
• 24:05
  SPEAKER_00: It's the heart, it's to the heart of the Father.
• 24:07
  SPEAKER_00: It's a whole different world.
• 24:08
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, Galatians says it this way, and this will be good for us to always realize.
• 24:13
  SPEAKER_00: Galatians says the spirit wars against the flesh and the flesh against the spirit, and they're contrary to each other.
• 24:25
  SPEAKER_00: In other words, God doesn't use a little flesh to help us in the spirit.
• 24:33
  SPEAKER_00: Judy likes to laugh and tell about a time when me and her had a disagreement, the kind of disagreement where she had to get in the car and go down the road, you know, and talk to God.
• 24:45
  SPEAKER_00: And she says, Father, I know.
• 24:48
  SPEAKER_00: I said, You I don't know how you remember, but it's like, you just, nope, he just does not accept condemnation.
• 24:56
  SPEAKER_00: But she says, Father, I really think he could use just a little bit of condemnation, honestly.
• 25:04
  SPEAKER_00: And you know, and what we're saying is, you know, they need to feel bad about what they're doing.
• 25:10
  SPEAKER_00: But see, that's that little bit we see, but they're but but that's like trying to bring a little bit of the tree of uh of uh uh that that produces death to produce life, and it won't do it.
• 25:21
  SPEAKER_00: Because Jesus is talking about here, so they're two totally different things, they produce totally different things.
• 25:26
  SPEAKER_00: See, and so there's that kind of mixture.
• 25:28
  SPEAKER_00: We talk about mixture of law and grace, but if you look deeper into it and push back some of the layers, we really get down to those two trees.
• 25:36
  SPEAKER_00: There's a way, and it's a way that saves mankind, it's a way that changes the world.
• 25:42
  SPEAKER_00: And I know it changes the world because it changed the world right here.
• 25:46
  SPEAKER_00: It changed everything.
• 25:49
  SPEAKER_00: Everything.
• 25:51
  SPEAKER_00: And it's changing me more and more.
• 25:53
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, I find myself, I feel like I'm being changed more and more now than I ever have in all my 40-something years.
• 26:02
  SPEAKER_00: I was I was a Christian a little bit before I started ministry.
• 26:10
  SPEAKER_00: But in this context, the false prophets are would be would be law teachers.
• 26:16
  SPEAKER_00: Take it a little deeper.
• 26:18
  SPEAKER_00: It's it's it's knowledge of good and evil teachers.
• 26:22
  SPEAKER_00: It's that thing that gets exposed when we when we we're we're you know we're we're all about God's love and his goodness and grace, but come on, we can only take it so far.
• 26:31
  SPEAKER_00: What that does is it shows that we're still playing too close to that other tree while there's a whole other way going on here.
• 26:43
  SPEAKER_00: And remember, he's Proverbs said that other way seems right.
• 26:47
  SPEAKER_00: Eve says, it looks it looks good.
• 26:50
  SPEAKER_00: I think this will do it.
• 26:54
  SPEAKER_00: It'll make us wise.
• 26:57
  SPEAKER_00: Come on, Rick.
• 26:58
  SPEAKER_00: I know you're all about this love, love, love, love, but come on, we gotta use wisdom.
• 27:02
  SPEAKER_00: And and and that would be great if they were talking about what Solomon's talking about, that kind of wisdom.
• 27:07
  SPEAKER_00: He says, there is that kind of wisdom.
• 27:09
  SPEAKER_00: It's life to you.
• 27:13
  SPEAKER_00: It'll bring you goodness and fill your heart and your mouth with good things.
• 27:17
  SPEAKER_00: But then he says, but there is also that loose woman.
• 27:23
  SPEAKER_00: You ever read that in chapter 5?
• 27:24
  SPEAKER_00: He says, she dresses up in many different disguises, she has many different ways.
• 27:32
  SPEAKER_00: She'll come as law, she'll come as she'll come in somehow to somehow pull our attention to the world, knowledge of good and evil, and takes us out of the father's heart.
• 27:51
  SPEAKER_00: She can dress like anything.
• 27:53
  SPEAKER_00: Religion, of course.
• 27:56
  SPEAKER_00: Politics, she'll dress like that.
• 27:59
  SPEAKER_00: Looks good.
• 28:01
  SPEAKER_00: She'll dress up in other things that distract fame and riches, you know, so on.
• 28:14
  SPEAKER_00: It looks good.
• 28:16
  SPEAKER_00: There is a way.
• 28:17
  SPEAKER_00: This is the good news I have this morning.
• 28:19
  SPEAKER_00: There is a way.
• 28:20
  SPEAKER_00: And that way is what Jesus brought us and what he revealed.
• 28:23
  SPEAKER_00: He says, You'll know them by their fruits.
• 28:25
  SPEAKER_00: He says you don't get grapes or thorn bushes from figs and thistles.
• 28:28
  SPEAKER_00: So every good tree, or that word is the whole good tree.
• 28:32
  SPEAKER_00: So that way you're not thinking of a picture of lots of trees, like, is he talking about me and you?
• 28:36
  SPEAKER_00: Is he talking about other look?
• 28:38
  SPEAKER_00: He says, the whole tree, actually what that word, every is, the whole tree.
• 28:41
  SPEAKER_00: Look at the tree of life and the tree of knowledge of good and evil, so that that whole tree, in other words, that whole tree bears good fruits.
• 28:48
  SPEAKER_00: In other words, it doesn't have some branches bearing bad fruit.
• 28:51
  SPEAKER_00: And that tree of knowledge of good and evil doesn't have a few branches bearing good fruit.
• 28:56
  SPEAKER_00: That idea is what brings what allows mixture.
• 28:59
  SPEAKER_00: Even so, every good tree bears good, but a bad tree bears bad, a good tree can't bear bad fruit, and the bad tree can't bear good fruit.
• 29:07
  SPEAKER_00: There is a way, people.
• 29:09
  SPEAKER_00: There is a way, and every tree that doesn't, or the whole tree that doesn't bear good fruit is cut down and is thrown into the fire.
• 29:16
  SPEAKER_00: Therefore, by their fruits, you will know them.
• 29:19
  SPEAKER_00: Love, joy, the fruit of the Spirit.
• 29:22
  SPEAKER_00: Love, joy, peace, gentleness, goodness, kindness.
• 29:26
  SPEAKER_00: Don't you know this is heaven?
• 29:28
  SPEAKER_00: In our heart, and it comes from one way, the revelation of Jesus Christ to the heart of the Father, who fulfills everything in us and in mankind.
• 29:39
  SPEAKER_00: And as the church is getting fulfilled in this fullness that only comes by our knowing the Father.
• 29:48
  SPEAKER_00: And by the way, I have found the only way to know the Father is to know him through his love and his goodness, his grace.
• 30:01
  SPEAKER_00: And if we know him any other way, we don't really know him.
• 30:06
  SPEAKER_00: We know about him.
• 30:08
  SPEAKER_00: Those are the ones he's talked about in this chapter.
• 30:10
  SPEAKER_00: But have we not said, Lord, Lord, we've done many mighty works in your name.
• 30:15
  SPEAKER_00: I never knew yet.
• 30:22
  SPEAKER_00: I didn't realize there were so many little negative statements in here.
• 30:26
  SPEAKER_00: But it's really, remember what he's really telling them.
• 30:28
  SPEAKER_00: He's not giving them a bunch of fire and brimstone here.
• 30:31
  SPEAKER_00: He's really telling them, I am the way.
• 30:34
  SPEAKER_00: There is a way.
• 30:35
  SPEAKER_00: You didn't have a way before.
• 30:36
  SPEAKER_00: There was no way revealed.
• 30:38
  SPEAKER_00: You had to stay in it.
• 30:39
  SPEAKER_00: That was the only way you could go.
• 30:41
  SPEAKER_00: Now there's a way.
• 30:44
  SPEAKER_00: Now there's a way.
• 30:46
  SPEAKER_00: And he said that tree will be cut down and thrown into the fire.
• 30:49
  SPEAKER_00: Remember what John the Baptist announced, you know, when he was announcing the coming of Jesus.
• 30:55
  SPEAKER_00: He says, the axe is laid to the root of the tree.
• 30:58
  SPEAKER_00: There was a tree, a fig tree, that did not produce fruit, but it acted like it would because it gave leaves, even though the time of figs was not yet.
• 31:06
  SPEAKER_00: And Jesus said, No man will eat fruit of you anymore after this.
• 31:09
  SPEAKER_00: In the book of Revelation, when we see this whole thing culminated, when we see this whole thing wrapped up, there is no knowledge of good and evil in that city.
• 31:17
  SPEAKER_00: There's only a tree of life.
• 31:21
  SPEAKER_00: There's only a tree of life.
• 31:24
  SPEAKER_00: And that's the way that we embrace.
• 31:27
  SPEAKER_00: We hug onto it.
• 31:28
  SPEAKER_00: We cleave to it.
• 31:29
  SPEAKER_00: We know that way.
• 31:30
  SPEAKER_00: We trust that way because that's the way of the Father.
• 31:33
  SPEAKER_00: It's a new and a living way.
• 31:35
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, it's it's it's we we stumble with this a lot.
• 31:39
  SPEAKER_00: Our brains have been cluttered with so much stuff.
• 31:42
  SPEAKER_00: Just by being alive, just by being alive.
• 31:46
  SPEAKER_00: Finally, Hebrews 4.11 says, So let us therefore be diligent to enter into that rest.
• 31:54
  SPEAKER_00: How y'all doing?
• 31:55
  SPEAKER_00: Would y'all stand up with me?
• 31:56
  SPEAKER_00: I want to pray real quickly.
• 31:58
  SPEAKER_00: Y'all doing all right?
• 32:01
  SPEAKER_00: You love the way?
• 32:03
  SPEAKER_00: You love Jesus?
• 32:06
  SPEAKER_00: That didn't make anybody mad.
• 32:09
  SPEAKER_00: Did I make anybody glad?
• 32:12
  SPEAKER_00: Father, um, what have you done for us?
• 32:17
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you for opening things up.
• 32:25
  SPEAKER_00: So those of us who were so lost and buried under all the stuff of this world, you opened it up so people like us could actually know you.
• 32:43
  SPEAKER_00: Know you in a way that you would be so good that you'd be hard to describe.
• 32:56
  SPEAKER_00: Father, we thank you for the tree of life that we joyfully have chosen in you and partake of.
• 33:07
  SPEAKER_00: It is so sweet.
• 33:10
  SPEAKER_00: The others look so good, but we've tasted the way.
• 33:20
  SPEAKER_00: And we've become addicted.
• 33:23
  SPEAKER_00: And the world in our little realm of influence will be better because of this fruit.
• 33:32
  SPEAKER_00: We will live and move and breathe in you.
• 33:36
  SPEAKER_00: And that fragrance of this mystery, this life that has been hidden and veiled from the ages is now being unveiled to us and through us, and we we marvel.
• 33:51
  SPEAKER_00: We marvel.
• 33:54
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you for your great, great love.
• 33:59
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you for caring for me.
• 34:05
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you for caring and getting us through all that you've brought us through.
• 34:12
  SPEAKER_00: And thank you for showing us more and more and more of you.
• 34:18
  SPEAKER_00: And let us have a sense of adventure and excitement that the best knowledge of you, the best unveiling of you has not even been seen by our own eyes yet.
• 34:30
  SPEAKER_00: But we shall know you.
• 34:32
  SPEAKER_00: And we shall know you just like you know us for that which is perfect, that which is perfect, you have come to us.
• 34:46
  SPEAKER_00: And the dark glass is becoming clear.
• 34:53
  SPEAKER_00: And we can honestly stand on the mountaintop and say, Behold your God, planet Earth.
• 35:00
  SPEAKER_00: God is the love and the power of life that you've been waiting for.
• 35:06
  SPEAKER_00: We give you praise in Jesus' name.
• 35:08
  SPEAKER_00: Amen.
• 35:09
  SPEAKER_00: God bless you.