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Remembering What God Has Forgotten · Rick Manis Ministries Podcast

• 0:02
  SPEAKER_00: And in the book of Luke, chapter 5, we see Peter and James and John, they're in the fishing business together, and uh and they're fishing.
• 0:14
  SPEAKER_00: Now, the background to the story, as it's told in Luke, is that um you know Jesus has been been around Galilee, Capernaum, and uh Nazareth, and he's he's done some things, and while he was up there, he uh for how somehow he he he found himself at uh Peter's house.
• 0:34
  SPEAKER_00: His name was Simon at the time.
• 0:37
  SPEAKER_00: And uh and uh I'm assuming that Peter brought him to his house, that he was in the crowd when Jesus was doing his teaching and his healings and and things.
• 0:46
  SPEAKER_00: So uh so it the assumption is that Peter brought him to his house because his mother-in-law was very, very sick.
• 0:54
  SPEAKER_00: So Jesus went in and and and healed her.
• 0:57
  SPEAKER_00: And so here in Luke chapter 5, um, we see that Peter and James and John are out fishing and they fished all night and they caught no fish.
• 1:06
  SPEAKER_00: And uh they see Jesus uh actually what happened first was Jesus was with them, and and they and he had Peter go out and push his boat out, and he taught him from that boat.
• 1:20
  SPEAKER_00: And then when they came back in, they went out and fished, and they caught nothing all night long.
• 1:24
  SPEAKER_00: So Jesus told them, you know, this story where he said, Throw your nets out, get ready for a big catch, and and they threw their nets out, and the nets were so full that they almost lost their boat.
• 1:33
  SPEAKER_00: And verse 5 says, When they had done this, they caught a great number of fish, and their net was breaking.
• 1:38
  SPEAKER_00: So they signaled to their partners in the other boat to come and help them.
• 1:41
  SPEAKER_00: And they came and they filled both the boats, and so when they and so so that the boats began to sink.
• 1:47
  SPEAKER_00: And when Simon Peter saw it, he fell down at Jesus' knees, saying, Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord.
• 1:55
  SPEAKER_00: Now, if you back up and look at this, when Jesus told them to cast their nets out, he called him master.
• 1:59
  SPEAKER_00: He called him master, which was uh basically, you know, teacher.
• 2:04
  SPEAKER_00: And uh and so he's already in awe of him.
• 2:08
  SPEAKER_00: Jesus has already healed his mother-in-law.
• 2:10
  SPEAKER_00: He's already following him because of his teachings and what he sees him do.
• 2:15
  SPEAKER_00: And uh, but at this particular instance, he's he realizes that he's in the presence of somebody more than what he thought.
• 2:23
  SPEAKER_00: And he doesn't call him rabbi, teacher, master, or anything like that.
• 2:27
  SPEAKER_00: He says, Oh Lord.
• 2:29
  SPEAKER_00: He looks at him, and for the first time, it's like it hit him.
• 2:31
  SPEAKER_00: He goes, Oh Lord, depart from me, because I am a sinful man.
• 2:38
  SPEAKER_00: Oh Lord.
• 2:39
  SPEAKER_00: For he and all who were with him were astonished at the catch of fish that they had taken, and so also were James and John, the son and sons of Zebedee, who were partners with Simon.
• 2:49
  SPEAKER_00: And Jesse said to Simon, Don't be afraid, excuse me, Jesus said to Simon, Don't be afraid.
• 2:54
  SPEAKER_00: From now on you will catch men.
• 2:56
  SPEAKER_00: He sees the fear and he says, It's okay, you have nothing to fear.
• 2:58
  SPEAKER_00: Now, the point I want to make here, so they brought their boats to Lab, they forsook everything that followed him.
• 3:02
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, one point I want to make right here is this is that when when uh that Peter was Simon was not so much in awe before he realized that this guy was something more than a teacher or a prophet.
• 3:24
  SPEAKER_00: He was willing to follow him, he was willing to cast it.
• 3:27
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, he was willing to argue with them a little bit.
• 3:29
  SPEAKER_00: You know, when he said, cast your nets out, he says, he says, Master, we fished all night.
• 3:32
  SPEAKER_00: You know, I just as soon not do that.
• 3:33
  SPEAKER_00: But he said, I'll go ahead and do it, you know, if you insist.
• 3:36
  SPEAKER_00: And uh and now he looks at me and says, Oh Lord, depart from me, I'm a sinful man.
• 3:42
  SPEAKER_00: It's interesting, and this is very common, that his first reaction was exactly the same as Adam's there in the beginning, um, when he looked at his condition, was ashamed of his condition, and he hid himself, pulled himself away from God, who had come to walk with him in the cool of the day.
• 4:07
  SPEAKER_00: And now here's this guy who's been happy to be with Jesus, and now he sees that he's more than who he thought he was, and he says, Oh Lord, depart from me.
• 4:17
  SPEAKER_00: I'm a sinful man.
• 4:18
  SPEAKER_00: Me and you could should not be together.
• 4:21
  SPEAKER_00: I am not worthy of being in your presence.
• 4:25
  SPEAKER_00: Please get away from me.
• 4:26
  SPEAKER_00: I don't feel comfortable right now.
• 4:30
  SPEAKER_00: Now, what we're looking at here is something that I've been talking about a whole lot.
• 4:35
  SPEAKER_00: Here is what causes the world to not want to draw near to God because they have some have some misunderstandings.
• 4:46
  SPEAKER_00: They have a sin consciousness that they're trying to deal with.
• 4:49
  SPEAKER_00: This is also what causes Christians who are not convinced of God, who don't really know God yet.
• 4:56
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, really know him, know his heart, know his character, know his his his his attitudes and just and and and know what he's really is about and know who he is, for God is love.
• 5:06
  SPEAKER_00: But they but they carry, because of religion and simply just just the old man's mindset that they still haven't forgotten, they they carry very often a sin consciousness and they carry some accusation and condemnation, and this is why they feel like I'm not quite good enough, I'm not quite there.
• 5:24
  SPEAKER_00: God must be disappointed in me.
• 5:26
  SPEAKER_00: Uh somebody said last night in a meeting that I never felt worthy of God's love all of my life.
• 5:37
  SPEAKER_00: He said, until I heard you speak that first time.
• 5:40
  SPEAKER_00: And my life was changed ever since.
• 5:42
  SPEAKER_00: She says, I've had a couple of moments since then where I had to remind myself.
• 5:49
  SPEAKER_00: But I always had that knowledge of him now and realized that I'm worthy of his love, not because I'm I do everything right, but because I realize that he's big enough to love me in spite of me anyway.
• 6:03
  SPEAKER_00: And so what we see with Adam when he first saw his condition, judged it unworthy of the presence of God, tried to fix that unworthiness because at that moment was where this thing called sin consciousness entered in.
• 6:20
  SPEAKER_00: Remember, we did not have it before the knowledge of good and evil, before we took it upon ourselves to try to make ourselves like Him.
• 6:31
  SPEAKER_00: Now, remember, I know I say this every time, but this has got to be, this has got to be known.
• 6:38
  SPEAKER_00: We were created in His likeness and in His image in the beginning.
• 6:43
  SPEAKER_00: The temptation that caused us to pull away and try to do this on our own was a temptation that said, if we will do this, if we will use the knowledge of good and evil to make ourselves better, to arise and become like gods, uh, that this would do that, and this is how we would be God like.
• 7:04
  SPEAKER_00: The Bible says in Isaiah 9, My people, God said, My people are destroyed for a lack of knowledge.
• 7:10
  SPEAKER_00: It happens every day in life in this world, and it happened to man in the very beginning.
• 7:16
  SPEAKER_00: I've often I wonder every time I read that, why didn't Adam and Eve say we are already in his likeness?
• 7:22
  SPEAKER_00: We're already in his image.
• 7:24
  SPEAKER_00: He made us like him.
• 7:26
  SPEAKER_00: He made us like him, he made us like him.
• 7:30
  SPEAKER_00: Why do I have to go and try to become something that I already am?
• 7:36
  SPEAKER_00: But why did we perish?
• 7:37
  SPEAKER_00: For a lack of knowledge, for an ignorance.
• 7:39
  SPEAKER_00: We weren't aware, just like so many in the church.
• 7:41
  SPEAKER_00: And so what happened was the Bible says that he was in the garden with God until iniquity was found in him.
• 7:52
  SPEAKER_00: Who found that iniquity?
• 7:55
  SPEAKER_00: We did.
• 7:57
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, when we told God about our iniquity, God said, Who told you that?
• 8:03
  SPEAKER_00: Well, we were afraid.
• 8:04
  SPEAKER_00: We were ashamed because we were naked and we hid ourselves from you.
• 8:06
  SPEAKER_00: We pulled away.
• 8:10
  SPEAKER_00: We couldn't, we didn't want to be with you.
• 8:11
  SPEAKER_00: We didn't feel like we could be with you anymore.
• 8:13
  SPEAKER_00: We blew it.
• 8:14
  SPEAKER_00: We were so conscious of our sin that we hid ourselves from you.
• 8:18
  SPEAKER_00: We pulled away, we we were afraid, we were we were ashamed because we were naked.
• 8:22
  SPEAKER_00: And and and God says, watch this.
• 8:24
  SPEAKER_00: God says, Who told you that you were naked?
• 8:26
  SPEAKER_00: That shows us that God never said a thing about it, right?
• 8:30
  SPEAKER_00: Now, what's the opposite of sin consciousness?
• 8:35
  SPEAKER_00: Righteousness consciousness.
• 8:37
  SPEAKER_00: That's what Jesus gives us.
• 8:38
  SPEAKER_00: And if I've got time, if I don't ramble too much, we'll get right to that this morning.
• 8:43
  SPEAKER_00: So God.
• 8:46
  SPEAKER_00: Now, let me let me say this.
• 8:48
  SPEAKER_00: Now pay attention because this, you know, we got a good smart group here.
• 8:51
  SPEAKER_00: We can really do some teaching here.
• 8:53
  SPEAKER_00: Remember when they when we ate of the knowledge of good and evil?
• 9:01
  SPEAKER_00: God said, Man has become like one of us having the knowledge of good and evil.
• 9:07
  SPEAKER_00: So that shows that God knows.
• 9:10
  SPEAKER_00: God does have that knowledge, but he doesn't operate in its dominion because God is love.
• 9:21
  SPEAKER_00: God knows what's black and white, God knows what's good and what's not good, good and evil, but because he knows everything, but because he said he did.
• 9:30
  SPEAKER_00: He said they like us knowing good and evil.
• 9:32
  SPEAKER_00: They have become like they now they know what we know, but man couldn't handle it.
• 9:37
  SPEAKER_00: Because man did not know or believe in that love of God.
• 9:40
  SPEAKER_00: That's why he pulled away.
• 9:42
  SPEAKER_00: And in this redemption, that's why God Jesus reveals to us God is love.
• 9:46
  SPEAKER_00: The Father loves you.
• 9:47
  SPEAKER_00: He would say, He loves you, he loves you, he loves you.
• 9:49
  SPEAKER_00: God tried to reveal it to us in old times, when he would say in the Old Testament, I love you with an everlasting love, yet you have not known me.
• 9:57
  SPEAKER_00: And so what so God, God said, Who told you that?
• 10:00
  SPEAKER_00: He even though he knew he was naked, it was not an issue because God loved him and God was his life.
• 10:08
  SPEAKER_00: God is not a sin conscious God.
• 10:13
  SPEAKER_00: He does not operate in sin consciousness.
• 10:18
  SPEAKER_00: If he were, he would have done the condemning before Adam did.
• 10:23
  SPEAKER_00: Huh?
• 10:28
  SPEAKER_00: So Jesus comes along, and we have this word that we hear over and over all through the New Testament, and we see it prophesied in the old.
• 10:36
  SPEAKER_00: This word called righteousness.
• 10:38
  SPEAKER_00: That in righteousness we'd be established, that we had, he made us the righteousness of God in Christ, that he had established us in righteousness and holiness and righteous, righteous, righteousness.
• 10:48
  SPEAKER_00: We are God, it says all over there righteousness, righteousness, righteousness.
• 10:52
  SPEAKER_00: And when you see this, what happens is that we become righteous conscious, righteousness conscious, instead of just sin conscious.
• 10:59
  SPEAKER_00: Now, I told I told the church last night.
• 11:18
  SPEAKER_00: You ever heard that verse?
• 11:19
  SPEAKER_00: Or at least heard a teacher that goes along with that, that God cannot look upon sin.
• 11:27
  SPEAKER_00: So then the idea was what we would say in church was, and what we would feel within ourselves was, when we sinned, here we are walking, walking as a Christian, loving Jesus, but we sin.
• 11:39
  SPEAKER_00: And what we felt, what we many of us believed, was that when we sinned, God turned his face away because he couldn't look at us.
• 11:50
  SPEAKER_00: And we were not in fellowship, that's what we believed.
• 11:53
  SPEAKER_00: We were not in fellowship until we restored ourselves to fellowship by seriously and earnestly repenting of that sin.
• 12:02
  SPEAKER_00: And when God knew that we meant business, then he could look at us again.
• 12:07
  SPEAKER_00: Because we believed that it was that kind of a work that would get us clean again.
• 12:13
  SPEAKER_00: And I believed that.
• 12:15
  SPEAKER_00: I did.
• 12:16
  SPEAKER_00: But the problem with that was it was very subjective because then they would say, why is it that people can repent of a sin and then go and do it again?
• 12:26
  SPEAKER_00: And they would say, if you've done it again, then you didn't really repent.
• 12:31
  SPEAKER_00: And I thought, oh my goodness, I've been out of fellowship all this time.
• 12:34
  SPEAKER_00: I thought I repented, but obviously I must not have because they said I didn't.
• 12:39
  SPEAKER_00: I thought I did.
• 12:41
  SPEAKER_00: I tried my best, and I'd get all confused with the sin consciousness.
• 12:45
  SPEAKER_00: Because you know what?
• 12:46
  SPEAKER_00: Then I found another scripture.
• 12:48
  SPEAKER_00: I found a scripture about um Jacob and Esau, and Esau who gave up his birthright, and it says, oh my god, it's when I read this verse, it just messed me up.
• 12:58
  SPEAKER_00: It said, and Esau found no place of repentance, though he sought it carefully with tears.
• 13:03
  SPEAKER_00: And I thought, I've done that.
• 13:05
  SPEAKER_00: I have cried to God, wanting to repent, and maybe I'm like Esau, and I haven't been able to find that real repentance because I repeated that thing again.
• 13:15
  SPEAKER_00: And I sought it carefully with tears, and it scared me.
• 13:18
  SPEAKER_00: I'm like, my see, at least see how hard that makes it?
• 13:21
  SPEAKER_00: And this whole mess revolves around being conscious of sin.
• 13:28
  SPEAKER_00: So we see God wasn't conscious of.
• 13:30
  SPEAKER_00: So what does it mean when it says his eyes are too pure to look upon sin?
• 13:35
  SPEAKER_00: He doesn't operate in sin consciousness.
• 13:37
  SPEAKER_00: That's why he looks at you and you make mistakes all the time, and what he sees is righteousness, holy, pure, blameless.
• 13:43
  SPEAKER_00: It says so all in the Bible.
• 13:44
  SPEAKER_00: He looks at that.
• 13:47
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe he chooses to, but he does.
• 13:50
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, the Bible says in Jeremiah 31, verse 34, he says, No more will men say in that day, speaking of the new covenant, this day, the day of Jesus.
• 14:04
  SPEAKER_00: They will not say to everyone to his neighbor, Know the Lord, know the Lord, for they're going to know me.
• 14:08
  SPEAKER_00: They'll all know me from the greatest to the least, because I will be merciful to their transgressions and their sins and iniquities I will remember no more.
• 14:19
  SPEAKER_00: That shows God does not operate in sin consciousness.
• 14:31
  SPEAKER_00: Therefore, or not henceforth, which means from now on, henceforth, we know no man after the flesh.
• 14:43
  SPEAKER_00: So God says, I remember their sins no more.
• 14:47
  SPEAKER_00: God says, I do not have a sin consciousness about you.
• 14:53
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, Psalms 103, David, prophesying of this walk with God, said, He would not deal with us according to our sins, nor punish us according to our iniquities.
• 15:04
  SPEAKER_00: And we know that's all because of what Jesus did.
• 15:10
  SPEAKER_00: So he doesn't operate in a sin consciousness.
• 15:12
  SPEAKER_00: And then the new creation, 2 Corinthians 5.20, from now on we know no man after the flesh.
• 15:18
  SPEAKER_00: Though we once knew Jesus after the flesh, we don't know him like that anymore.
• 15:24
  SPEAKER_00: Peter knew Jesus after the flesh.
• 15:26
  SPEAKER_00: Depart from me, I'm a sinful man.
• 15:29
  SPEAKER_00: Go with me to John 21 and let's finish the story of Peter.
• 15:33
  SPEAKER_00: Peter knew, Peter and the disciple, they knew Jesus after the flesh, but then later on, Paul says, But we don't know him like that anymore.
• 15:43
  SPEAKER_00: Depart from me, Jesus, I'm a sinful man.
• 15:46
  SPEAKER_00: Peter denied Jesus and went into a depression because it could never be the same between him and Jesus.
• 15:55
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, even after he rose from the dead, it took a while for Peter to be restored within himself because he still carried that sin consciousness in this relationship.
• 16:06
  SPEAKER_00: I'll show that to you.
• 16:10
  SPEAKER_00: And so God, if God, when God gave us his spirit, his heart, his nature, the one whose sins I will remember no more, who says, I will not deal with them according to their sins nor punish them according to their iniquities, because Isaiah 53 says that the iniquity of us all was laid upon Jesus.
• 16:29
  SPEAKER_00: The chastisement for our peace was upon him.
• 16:36
  SPEAKER_00: It also says in 2 Corinthians 5, henceforth, from now on, we don't know anybody after the flesh either.
• 16:44
  SPEAKER_00: So therefore, if any man's in Christ, he's a new creation.
• 16:52
  SPEAKER_00: If any man's in Christ, all things are passed away.
• 16:56
  SPEAKER_00: If any man's in Christ, look, everything is new.
• 17:00
  SPEAKER_00: So we look at each other and we don't have a sin consciousness.
• 17:05
  SPEAKER_00: Certainly not about God, certainly not about us because of Jesus.
• 17:11
  SPEAKER_00: And if not about us, then not about you.
• 17:13
  SPEAKER_00: About them.
• 17:16
  SPEAKER_00: What this does is it does because it has taken all the condemnation from you, it also takes your condemnation from them.
• 17:29
  SPEAKER_00: Somebody else.
• 17:32
  SPEAKER_00: See, I've said this many times.
• 17:38
  SPEAKER_00: When I see someone who's very critical, a Christian, very, very critical, very judgmental, very condemning.
• 17:46
  SPEAKER_00: Most people just get mad at them.
• 17:47
  SPEAKER_00: They just say, I don't like that kind of person.
• 17:49
  SPEAKER_00: But I I feel sorry for them because I know what's going on.
• 17:51
  SPEAKER_00: They're still carrying a sin consciousness.
• 17:55
  SPEAKER_00: They think that God still deals that way.
• 17:58
  SPEAKER_00: And they they they they carry within themselves that they're also a sinful person, or they they have a condemnation.
• 18:07
  SPEAKER_00: And and even though they'll say, I'm forgiven, I know I'm forgiven of sins, still their thought life says things like, I'm not there, I'm still trying to get there.
• 18:15
  SPEAKER_00: Just like Adam and Eve were still trying to get somewhere that they already were.
• 18:22
  SPEAKER_00: And so because they carry this sin consciousness within themselves, they project it onto others, and that's why, and that's why in Christianity it's very, very common, though we know that we all sin.
• 18:40
  SPEAKER_00: It's very easy for us to make other people's sins worse than ours.
• 18:46
  SPEAKER_00: Right?
• 18:47
  SPEAKER_00: Um I remember I I I sat under a man's ministry for a number of years that was a very powerful man of God, and he made this statement at least on one occasion.
• 19:10
  SPEAKER_00: He said, Nobody, anybody that's a homosexual and claims to be a Christian is lying because a homosexual cannot be a Christian.
• 19:32
  SPEAKER_00: He would preach against he got to a I noticed when I would listen to him that that that particular thing would come up a lot.
• 19:42
  SPEAKER_00: Homosexuality.
• 19:44
  SPEAKER_00: It wasn't long before it was revealed that all this time he had been involved in a homosexual affair.
• 19:53
  SPEAKER_00: I don't believe he was a hypocrite, I think he was very sincere.
• 19:58
  SPEAKER_00: And I think he hated that.
• 20:00
  SPEAKER_00: And he was trying to fight it.
• 20:03
  SPEAKER_00: So he'd preach about it.
• 20:04
  SPEAKER_00: He would condemn it.
• 20:11
  SPEAKER_00: But you can't make yourself stop by a sin consciousness.
• 20:15
  SPEAKER_00: This man did not know the grace of God.
• 20:18
  SPEAKER_00: Not in the way that we talk about.
• 20:21
  SPEAKER_00: I'm convinced that if he had, he wouldn't have had this big fall.
• 20:27
  SPEAKER_00: Because sin consciousness, just like that tree of knowledge of good and evil, it promises to make us better.
• 20:33
  SPEAKER_00: It promises to fix the nakedness, it promises to fix what's wrong.
• 20:39
  SPEAKER_00: But sin consciousness by its very nature, Paul said it in Romans and 1 Corinthians, by its very nature, all it can do is foster more growth of that thing.
• 20:51
  SPEAKER_00: The only antidote is what the Father did when the Lord came and died and took up on sin.
• 20:58
  SPEAKER_00: And Romans 8:1 says, He condemned that sin in the flesh, he took care of it.
• 21:03
  SPEAKER_00: That's the only thing that works.
• 21:04
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, right before that in chapter 7, I'm throwing a lot of scripture out there.
• 21:08
  SPEAKER_00: Are you following me?
• 21:09
  SPEAKER_00: In chapter 7, he says, I delight after the law of God in my heart.
• 21:18
  SPEAKER_00: I want to do right, but I see this other law that worked in my members.
• 21:24
  SPEAKER_00: And in chapter 7, that's what he's talking about.
• 21:26
  SPEAKER_00: You know, that's the chapter where he says, the thing I want to do, I don't do, and the thing I don't want to do, I do.
• 21:31
  SPEAKER_00: And Christians have told me so many times, I'm just like Paul.
• 21:34
  SPEAKER_00: That's just how I am.
• 21:35
  SPEAKER_00: No, no, Paul's talking about before he met Jesus.
• 21:38
  SPEAKER_00: Before he got a revelation, he says, he says, I saw, he says, I saw that I delighted after God in my heart.
• 21:46
  SPEAKER_00: After the way of God, the law of God.
• 21:47
  SPEAKER_00: He said, but I saw this other law, this other law, this other law, not the law of God, he was talking about.
• 21:53
  SPEAKER_00: He said, I delight after the law of God, but I saw this other law, the law of sin and this.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_00: It was working in my members and it brought me into captivity and it killed me.
• 22:07
  SPEAKER_00: Huh?
• 22:08
  SPEAKER_00: And he said, and because of that, what I wanted to do, I could not do.
• 22:14
  SPEAKER_00: I wanted to fix my nakedness, but I couldn't because this other law was in there.
• 22:20
  SPEAKER_00: The sin consciousness, the law of sin and death was there, and it would not allow me to do what I wanted to do, and it empowered me to do the thing I didn't want to do.
• 22:31
  SPEAKER_00: Oh Lord, who's gonna deliver me from that thing?
• 22:37
  SPEAKER_00: And he says, I thank God through Jesus Christ my Lord, there is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus.
• 22:47
  SPEAKER_00: For the law of life in the Spirit has made me free from that law of sin and death, the sin consciousness.
• 22:56
  SPEAKER_00: God doesn't operate in it.
• 22:59
  SPEAKER_00: Jimmy Swaggard, when he fell, the sexual sin also.
• 23:05
  SPEAKER_00: When that happened, I I read his book after that whole thing.
• 23:10
  SPEAKER_00: And it was called The Cup My Father Has Given Me.
• 23:12
  SPEAKER_00: And I vividly remember one part in that book where he declared, he said, if I had known, if I had trusted, if I had trusted in the finished work of Christ, this never would have happened.
• 23:24
  SPEAKER_00: He said, But I saw the sin in my life and I thought that I could will myself to stop.
• 23:32
  SPEAKER_00: I thought I could make myself more godly.
• 23:35
  SPEAKER_00: I begged God.
• 23:36
  SPEAKER_00: I cried out.
• 23:38
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know how many times over the years, I could not tell you how many times I have been approached by people that love the Lord God with their heart.
• 23:47
  SPEAKER_00: And they struggle, and usually it's like with a sexual sin, because most of them people will admit, they'll they'll be willing to admit in public in church, but that one they keep secret because it's so shameful.
• 23:58
  SPEAKER_00: And honestly, I honestly believe in my experience that probably about 90% of Christian men struggle with it to some great degree or another.
• 24:07
  SPEAKER_00: And and and and and it and and and they and they and they they would come to me and they would because they're they're hurting so much because they love Jesus.
• 24:16
  SPEAKER_00: And they hate this thing.
• 24:18
  SPEAKER_00: They say, I'm trying, I don't know what to do.
• 24:20
  SPEAKER_00: I have fasted, I've prayed, I've been prayed for, I've done all I know to do.
• 24:26
  SPEAKER_00: And they start feeling like they're un, there's there's no help for them because they've done everything.
• 24:32
  SPEAKER_00: They delight after God with their heart, but they can't find the power to do what they want to do.
• 24:40
  SPEAKER_00: Why?
• 24:40
  SPEAKER_00: It's not because they're not strong like the other man or woman of God is, it's because they got a sin consciousness.
• 24:51
  SPEAKER_00: 2 Peter chapter 1 tells us, it says, in verse 9, it says, add to your faith virtue and brotherly kindness and patience and all these things.
• 25:01
  SPEAKER_00: Basically, it's the fruit of the Spirit.
• 25:04
  SPEAKER_00: And he says, and he that's that that's not abounding, it's not lacking in these things.
• 25:09
  SPEAKER_00: Excuse me, but he that's lacking in these things, it says, it's because he has forgotten, he's blinded, he's not seeing right, he can't see, and he has forgotten that he has been purged from his sins.
• 25:23
  SPEAKER_00: He's not righteous conscious, he is sin conscious, and that's what has taken his faith.
• 25:29
  SPEAKER_00: That's what's taken his brotherly kindness away.
• 25:31
  SPEAKER_00: He's being judged, so he's judging other people.
• 25:35
  SPEAKER_00: Hmm?
• 25:38
  SPEAKER_00: This powerful man of God felt like he was being judged because he carried a sin consciousness, so he was judging all those who were doing the same thing.
• 25:47
  SPEAKER_00: Are y'all hearing me?
• 25:54
  SPEAKER_00: God knew what he was doing when he made a covenant, when he gave his life and condemned that whole sin and took care of that whole thing and took care of the sin issue once and for all.
• 26:05
  SPEAKER_00: Honestly, if if the if the church world would ever get this right, it should never ever be brought up again in me, you, or anybody else.
• 26:13
  SPEAKER_00: Sin conscious, because God doesn't remember it.
• 26:15
  SPEAKER_00: You talk about somebody's sin, he says, What are you talking about?
• 26:20
  SPEAKER_00: What are you talking about?
• 26:22
  SPEAKER_00: He says, There's sins I remember no more.
• 26:25
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, 2 Corinthians 5, where we're quoting there, he says, From now on, we know no man after the flesh, though we knew Jesus after the flesh, we don't know him that way anymore.
• 26:36
  SPEAKER_00: Therefore, if any man be in Christ, he's a new creation, old things are passed away, behold, all things are become new, and all things are of God who has reconciled us unto himself, and has given to us the word of reconciliation to wit that God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto himself, not imputing their sins unto them.
• 26:59
  SPEAKER_00: Do you realize every one of them have been forgiven?
• 27:02
  SPEAKER_00: They haven't all received that in their heart, they don't all believe it, they're not walking in it, they're not benefiting from it.
• 27:09
  SPEAKER_00: That's what faith does.
• 27:11
  SPEAKER_00: Faith receives, faith gets it, faith changes you, believing in it.
• 27:15
  SPEAKER_00: That's all he said you got to do.
• 27:17
  SPEAKER_00: Your part is only just believe.
• 27:18
  SPEAKER_00: But they're all been, he does not holding anybody's sins against them.
• 27:22
  SPEAKER_00: He doesn't remember.
• 27:25
  SPEAKER_00: That's how powerful the blood of Jesus is.
• 27:27
  SPEAKER_00: Are you all hearing me?
• 27:29
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, let's finish up with Peter here.
• 27:33
  SPEAKER_00: John chapter 21.
• 27:35
  SPEAKER_00: Now, Jesus had risen from the dead.
• 27:38
  SPEAKER_00: He appeared to them in the house after the grave was found empty.
• 27:44
  SPEAKER_00: The doors were clocked were locked, and Jesus appeared in the room.
• 27:48
  SPEAKER_00: Thomas wasn't there, but the rest were.
• 27:50
  SPEAKER_00: Eight days later, he appeared again in the house when the doors were still shut up.
• 27:54
  SPEAKER_00: Thomas was there this time, and that's where we have the encounter where he said, Okay, Thomas, touch me.
• 28:01
  SPEAKER_00: And then some time had passed, I don't know how much, but later on, the the guys, they've left Jerusalem.
• 28:07
  SPEAKER_00: And Peter and James and John and Nathaniel and some other some other disciples, they've gone up north to back back to Galilee, and uh they're sitting there together wondering what to do.
• 28:18
  SPEAKER_00: And so Peter says, I'm going fishing.
• 28:20
  SPEAKER_00: James and John says, We're going too.
• 28:22
  SPEAKER_00: So the others, they they they they follow.
• 28:24
  SPEAKER_00: They fished all night and caught nothing, just like they did when they first met Jesus.
• 28:29
  SPEAKER_00: They'd fished all night and they caught nothing.
• 28:31
  SPEAKER_00: They're coming back to shore and they look and they see this man standing on the beach.
• 28:33
  SPEAKER_00: They don't they don't they can't tell who it is.
• 28:36
  SPEAKER_00: God says, Hey, you guys got any food?
• 28:39
  SPEAKER_00: And uh, no, we didn't catch anything.
• 28:44
  SPEAKER_00: He says, Well, throw your net on the right side.
• 28:45
  SPEAKER_00: You'll catch some.
• 28:46
  SPEAKER_00: So they did, and they the same thing happened.
• 28:48
  SPEAKER_00: They got this whole net load of fish.
• 28:51
  SPEAKER_00: And then when that happened, when they pulled in this whole net load of fish, John looks at Peter and goes, You know who this is.
• 28:58
  SPEAKER_00: I remember this.
• 29:00
  SPEAKER_00: They knew it was Jesus.
• 29:02
  SPEAKER_00: And as soon as they knew that, Peter, who was, you know, they were just fishing with no clothes on, these men out there, it's hot out there, he grabs his garment and wraps himself up and he dives in the water.
• 29:11
  SPEAKER_00: He starts swimming to the beach.
• 29:12
  SPEAKER_00: He's ready to go see Jesus in this time.
• 29:14
  SPEAKER_00: He's not saying depart from me.
• 29:16
  SPEAKER_00: He wants to see Jesus.
• 29:17
  SPEAKER_00: But the rest of them, they row on to the shore.
• 29:20
  SPEAKER_00: They're only about a hundred yards away.
• 29:21
  SPEAKER_00: And uh and so Jesus is sitting there and he's he's got breakfast cooking already.
• 29:26
  SPEAKER_00: He's got some bread and some fish on the fire.
• 29:29
  SPEAKER_00: And uh he says uh he says, uh, you know, bring what you got.
• 29:35
  SPEAKER_00: So Peter goes and he drags the net.
• 29:37
  SPEAKER_00: Verse 15.
• 29:38
  SPEAKER_00: So when they had eaten breakfast, Jesus said to Simon Peter, Simon, son of Jonah, son of John, do you love me more than these?
• 29:45
  SPEAKER_00: Now, there's a little bit of nobody's quite sure if he's talking about, do you love me more than these fish?
• 29:52
  SPEAKER_00: Do you love me more?
• 29:53
  SPEAKER_00: Most people, I I believe that he's talking about, do you love me more than these disciples here?
• 29:58
  SPEAKER_00: Because Peter still got an issue that he's carrying here.
• 30:02
  SPEAKER_00: Peter has still got an issue.
• 30:04
  SPEAKER_00: Peter denied the Lord three times.
• 30:09
  SPEAKER_00: And Jesus is about to help him get over that.
• 30:12
  SPEAKER_00: Peter said, before he denied the Lord, remember, he said, these other people might betray you, they might deny you, but I will never deny you.
• 30:21
  SPEAKER_00: I am willing to go with you to battle anywhere.
• 30:24
  SPEAKER_00: I will go all the way with you.
• 30:27
  SPEAKER_00: He was, he thought he was better than them.
• 30:30
  SPEAKER_00: He thought he was more committed to Jesus than anybody was.
• 30:34
  SPEAKER_00: He thought he loved Jesus more than any of them.
• 30:38
  SPEAKER_00: And if you look read your read your gospels, you'll see every once in a while, you can see that there was a rivalry among the disciples.
• 30:45
  SPEAKER_00: We see that at least on one occasion or more, they were arguing about among themselves, when Jesus would walk up to their conversation, they'd be arguing about which one was the best, which one was the greatest.
• 30:57
  SPEAKER_00: There's another time, it was so it was so it was such an important thing to them that uh James and John go get their mama to ask Jesus to let them be the greatest.
• 31:08
  SPEAKER_00: When uh one time Peter Peter uh gets something all wrong, he messes up, and all the others they start mumbling about him.
• 31:16
  SPEAKER_00: They're just there's this rivalry kind of that goes that's going on.
• 31:18
  SPEAKER_00: And he says, Peter, Peter, Simon, do you love me more than these do?
• 31:23
  SPEAKER_00: And he says, now when when he asked him this, have any of y'all ever studied this?
• 31:28
  SPEAKER_00: When Jesus asked him this, you know there's different words for love.
• 31:31
  SPEAKER_00: The two major words are agape and phileo.
• 31:34
  SPEAKER_00: Agape is the God kind of love.
• 31:35
  SPEAKER_00: Phileo is the affection that people can have, the feelings in the heart.
• 31:39
  SPEAKER_00: But agape is a commitment and everlasting and unconditional love that never diminishes.
• 31:44
  SPEAKER_00: And he says, Peter, do you agape me more than they do?
• 31:49
  SPEAKER_00: Do you have that committed, unconditional, full, supernatural, perfect love?
• 31:56
  SPEAKER_00: And Peter says, Well, yes, Lord, you know that I love you.
• 32:00
  SPEAKER_00: That word is phileo.
• 32:02
  SPEAKER_00: He says, Do you agape me?
• 32:04
  SPEAKER_00: And Peter says, Well, you know I phileo you.
• 32:07
  SPEAKER_00: You know that I have affection for you.
• 32:10
  SPEAKER_00: But he can't make himself to say to agree completely because he knows that if he did have that kind of love, he wouldn't have done what he did.
• 32:18
  SPEAKER_00: But he still has feelings for him, he still loves him.
• 32:22
  SPEAKER_00: He delights after him in his heart, but he knows he hasn't, he didn't have the power to do what he wanted to do.
• 32:29
  SPEAKER_00: And the thing he didn't want to do, he found out he did it anyway.
• 32:35
  SPEAKER_00: So he says, Do you have agape for me?
• 32:37
  SPEAKER_00: And he says, Well, you know I have phileo.
• 32:42
  SPEAKER_00: Then he asks, he says, Well, feed my lambs.
• 32:44
  SPEAKER_00: And he said a second time, Simon, son of Jonah, do you uh love me?
• 32:47
  SPEAKER_00: Do you agape me?
• 32:49
  SPEAKER_00: And he says, Yes, Lord, you know I phileo you.
• 32:52
  SPEAKER_00: You know I have affection, you know I have feelings for you.
• 32:55
  SPEAKER_00: You know I really, really do, but that kind of love he would not admit to.
• 33:00
  SPEAKER_00: Because he's got a sin consciousness.
• 33:04
  SPEAKER_00: He realizes, I cannot tell you that I do because you know I'm a liar and I would know it.
• 33:09
  SPEAKER_00: I've already proven that I don't have that kind of love for you, but I really do have strong feelings for you.
• 33:19
  SPEAKER_00: He said, Tend my sheep.
• 33:20
  SPEAKER_00: Verse 17.
• 33:21
  SPEAKER_00: So he said to him the third time, watch this.
• 33:23
  SPEAKER_00: Simon, son of Jonah, do you love me?
• 33:27
  SPEAKER_00: This time Jesus doesn't ask about agape.
• 33:29
  SPEAKER_00: He says, Okay, Simon, son of Jonah, do you phileo me?
• 33:33
  SPEAKER_00: Do you just have affection for me?
• 33:35
  SPEAKER_00: He didn't ask him if he if he had that perfect kind of love this time.
• 33:40
  SPEAKER_00: He brought it down.
• 33:40
  SPEAKER_00: He says, Do you have phileo for me?
• 33:44
  SPEAKER_00: And Peter was grieved because the third time he said, Do you have phileo?
• 33:49
  SPEAKER_00: Do you have affection?
• 33:50
  SPEAKER_00: Do you have human love for me?
• 33:53
  SPEAKER_00: It made Peter sad because he realized now Jesus is bringing his standard down.
• 34:01
  SPEAKER_00: And he said, Lord, you know everything.
• 34:04
  SPEAKER_00: You know that I have feelings for you.
• 34:08
  SPEAKER_00: And Jesus said, Well, feed my sheep.
• 34:11
  SPEAKER_00: Most assuredly I say to you, when you were younger, you girded yourself and you walked where you wished, but when you're old, you're going to stretch out your hands, and another is going to gird you and carry it where you where you would not have gone, where you don't wish.
• 34:23
  SPEAKER_00: This he spoke, signifying by what death he would glorify God.
• 34:26
  SPEAKER_00: And when he spoke in this, he said to him, Follow me.
• 34:28
  SPEAKER_00: You know what we see here?
• 34:30
  SPEAKER_00: Jesus says, That's good enough for me.
• 34:35
  SPEAKER_00: You don't have to have it right.
• 34:37
  SPEAKER_00: I've got it right.
• 34:39
  SPEAKER_00: I'll take what you got right now.
• 34:42
  SPEAKER_00: Follow me now.
• 34:44
  SPEAKER_00: So you don't have perfect love.
• 34:45
  SPEAKER_00: So you did sin.
• 34:46
  SPEAKER_00: So you denied me.
• 34:48
  SPEAKER_00: So you fell short.
• 34:49
  SPEAKER_00: So you don't have what it takes.
• 34:50
  SPEAKER_00: And and it's proved you thought you did, but you know that you don't.
• 34:54
  SPEAKER_00: He said, That's okay.
• 34:55
  SPEAKER_00: I want you.
• 34:56
  SPEAKER_00: And when you read the progression, there's a lot of teaching in there in that.
• 34:58
  SPEAKER_00: But when you read that, the first time he says, Do you do you agree?
• 35:01
  SPEAKER_00: He said, You know, I phaleo you.
• 35:02
  SPEAKER_00: He says, he says, then um then feed my lambs.
• 35:05
  SPEAKER_00: It means take them to pasture.
• 35:07
  SPEAKER_00: The next time he says, tend my sheep, which means watch over them, be a shepherd over them.
• 35:13
  SPEAKER_00: And the third time he says, Do you have affection?
• 35:15
  SPEAKER_00: Do you have human affection?
• 35:16
  SPEAKER_00: Phileo for me.
• 35:17
  SPEAKER_00: He said, Yeah.
• 35:18
  SPEAKER_00: He says, Okay, then tend my sheep.
• 35:20
  SPEAKER_00: That's that's all I want from you.
• 35:22
  SPEAKER_00: I'll supply the rest.
• 35:26
  SPEAKER_00: That's good enough.
• 35:28
  SPEAKER_00: See, God is not demanding your perfect love for him, he's giving, he gave his perfect love for us.
• 35:38
  SPEAKER_00: And the apostle John realized how this whole thing works.
• 35:42
  SPEAKER_00: He says, This is how we agape him.
• 35:45
  SPEAKER_00: Here's how we get so committed to him, here's how we get so tied to him that we never deny him again.
• 35:51
  SPEAKER_00: Because he first loved us.
• 35:53
  SPEAKER_00: We received that kind of love.
• 35:57
  SPEAKER_00: See, I can remember always having strong affection for him, but being feeling just like Peter, knowing, knowing, saying, God, help me, help me to love you in the right way.
• 36:08
  SPEAKER_00: You know I love you, but help me to really love you.
• 36:14
  SPEAKER_00: But over time, you know what I found out is he's loved me.
• 36:19
  SPEAKER_00: I've been tested.
• 36:21
  SPEAKER_00: I've been tested in it.
• 36:25
  SPEAKER_00: I am so tied up in him.
• 36:27
  SPEAKER_00: I am so, you get so committed.
• 36:30
  SPEAKER_00: You get so that word agape, actually, the best definition for that word before it was used for Christian, for the God kind of love and Christianity, was a word that the Greeks used mostly for commitment.
• 36:45
  SPEAKER_00: That you're so tied with him, you're so committed to him simply because his love has been so perfect for you that you've got absolutely nowhere else to go, nothing else to trust in, there's nothing else like this.
• 36:59
  SPEAKER_00: And I say it all the time that when you, because you know his love, his commitment, his agape for you, that in this love he remembers your sins no more.
• 37:10
  SPEAKER_00: That is a big, big, big truth.
• 37:14
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I'll tell you what, if the church would start start looking at that, the body of Christ, I mean, would start looking at looking at that and quitting making sin the issue, like people do with me, you know.
• 37:23
  SPEAKER_00: They, well, what about, but what about sin?
• 37:26
  SPEAKER_00: You preach it's it's good that you preach love and grace, but but but we don't want to make light of sin, do we?
• 37:38
  SPEAKER_00: Let's make light of sin as much as God does with this new covenant who doesn't even remember it.
• 37:45
  SPEAKER_00: It's not that we're trying to make light of sin.
• 37:48
  SPEAKER_00: Any fool, any fool that's been around on planet earth for just a little while knows that sin is horrible.
• 37:54
  SPEAKER_00: It kills, it destroys, it hurts, it's ugly.
• 37:59
  SPEAKER_00: We all know that.
• 38:01
  SPEAKER_00: We don't have to make light of it.
• 38:04
  SPEAKER_00: It's not that we're making light of sin, we're making much of Jesus.
• 38:09
  SPEAKER_00: We're making much of righteousness.
• 38:11
  SPEAKER_00: When they say what about sin, I say, what about righteousness?
• 38:14
  SPEAKER_00: What about holiness in him?
• 38:16
  SPEAKER_00: What about him being our holiness?
• 38:17
  SPEAKER_00: What about him being our righteousness?
• 38:18
  SPEAKER_00: What about him being our sanctification?
• 38:20
  SPEAKER_00: What about being complete in him?
• 38:22
  SPEAKER_00: What about him finishing the word?
• 38:23
  SPEAKER_00: What about righteousness consciousness?
• 38:28
  SPEAKER_00: You see, the reason I always take us back to Adam and the fall is because that was where it went wrong.
• 38:35
  SPEAKER_00: And where it went wrong was what Jesus fixed.
• 38:39
  SPEAKER_00: The Bible says that when that we were once alienated from God, enemies of God in our minds because of wicked works.
• 38:50
  SPEAKER_00: Enemies of God in our minds because of wicked works.
• 38:54
  SPEAKER_00: God came to walk with man.
• 38:56
  SPEAKER_00: Man was himself an enemy of God in his mind because of his wicked work.
• 39:02
  SPEAKER_00: Peter, Jesus wanted to be with Peter.
• 39:06
  SPEAKER_00: Peter said, Depart from me, I'm a sinful man.
• 39:08
  SPEAKER_00: He was an enemy of God in his mind because of his wicked works.
• 39:14
  SPEAKER_00: And Jesus reveals to us, gives us the heart of God and says, Here's how it is, Peter.
• 39:20
  SPEAKER_00: Your sins and iniquities I'll remember no more.
• 39:24
  SPEAKER_00: Would y'all stand up?
• 39:26
  SPEAKER_00: And so Peter got it.
• 39:31
  SPEAKER_00: He would write these wonderful letters.
• 39:35
  SPEAKER_00: He said, Peter, tend my sheep, feed my lambs.
• 39:39
  SPEAKER_00: Peter's still feeding us today.
• 39:44
  SPEAKER_00: He said, when you've been converted, he said, Satan wants to sift you like wheat, but when you, I'm gonna pray.
• 39:49
  SPEAKER_00: When you've been changed, when you come out on the other side, I want you to strengthen your brothers.
• 39:53
  SPEAKER_00: He's still strengthening us today.
• 39:56
  SPEAKER_00: He wrote these other letters.
• 39:58
  SPEAKER_00: They're toward the back of your Bible.
• 40:00
  SPEAKER_00: He starts out by saying things like this Grace and peace be multiplied to you through knowing Jesus Christ our Lord.
• 40:12
  SPEAKER_00: The man who couldn't stand to be around Jesus because of his sin consciousness now writes to us and says, His grace and peace is multiplied to you when you know him.
• 40:29
  SPEAKER_00: Now that I know him, Peter says, I've got grace, I've got peace.
• 40:34
  SPEAKER_00: Now that I remember that Peter wrote this, Peter, this Peter that looks so dumb sometimes.
• 40:41
  SPEAKER_00: Peter wrote this, he says, We have faith, virtue, patience, brotherly kindness, self-control, all these things, he says, because we remember we've been purged from our sins.
• 41:02
  SPEAKER_00: Peter, after the day of Pentecost, when he received that heart of God, was not predominantly sin conscious anymore.
• 41:16
  SPEAKER_00: Father, I love you.
• 41:17
  SPEAKER_00: I thank you for your unspeakable gift, I thank you for so great a salvation.
• 41:24
  SPEAKER_00: Father, right now, I ask for the power of your Holy Spirit to do what we can't do.
• 41:29
  SPEAKER_00: By the blood of Jesus, which your word says purges our conscience from all sin.
• 41:40
  SPEAKER_00: Purges our conscience.
• 41:43
  SPEAKER_00: From now on, we know no man, not even ourselves, after the flesh.
• 41:52
  SPEAKER_00: For we are new creations, and so is any man in Christ.
• 41:58
  SPEAKER_00: We are clean today, we are holy, we are blameless today, and so is our brother, so is our sister, so are those who have wronged us.
• 42:08
  SPEAKER_00: They are holy, they're clean, they're unblemished by the blood of Jesus that we exalt, and we regard them that way.
• 42:19
  SPEAKER_00: And we thank you, Lord, for this great gift.
• 42:23
  SPEAKER_00: Jesus.
• 42:25
  SPEAKER_00: In Jesus' name, amen.