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But I Want To Do Better · Rick Manis Ministries Podcast

• 0:08
  SPEAKER_00: I've got what I think is a delicious word this morning.
• 0:15
  SPEAKER_00: A lot of times people will ask me after I've spoken, they'll say, Well, how did it go?
• 0:18
  SPEAKER_00: And and you know, I don't what what does that really mean?
• 0:20
  SPEAKER_00: All I can say is, well, I liked it.
• 0:22
  SPEAKER_00: You know, that's that's the reason I'm bringing it.
• 0:24
  SPEAKER_00: That's the reason I've prepared this.
• 0:26
  SPEAKER_00: I like it.
• 0:28
  SPEAKER_00: It's uh been a blessing to me.
• 0:30
  SPEAKER_00: Uh and so I just want to share some good, good bread that I've tasted.
• 0:35
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and what I want to get into this morning, um, I've called this I want to do better.
• 0:45
  SPEAKER_00: Um, because something I run into in conversations with people a lot is when we're talking about grace, people can be real happy with it and and even thrilled with it and be turned on to it.
• 1:02
  SPEAKER_00: Um but they they say it's great that I have relief.
• 1:12
  SPEAKER_00: Sin's not imputed to me.
• 1:13
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, it's all on Jesus.
• 1:16
  SPEAKER_00: Um but I still want to change.
• 1:18
  SPEAKER_00: I still want to like, I'd still like to not sin, you know.
• 1:23
  SPEAKER_00: Um and so many times people will ask, ask, so Rick, I I love this grace, got no argument with it, but but how do I stop sinning completely?
• 1:37
  SPEAKER_00: And uh that's a problem because they're asking me, for one thing, like, I don't know.
• 1:43
  SPEAKER_00: I haven't figured that one out.
• 1:46
  SPEAKER_00: Well, you're not laughing, it's true.
• 1:48
  SPEAKER_00: It's it's true.
• 1:49
  SPEAKER_00: Uh you know, you're at you usually we're asking somebody that that still sins, and by that definition I mean transgression of the the law, you know, the 613 rules uh from the Old Testament.
• 2:02
  SPEAKER_00: And and and and people still do, or or or still have flaws or shortcomings, or or mess up in some way.
• 2:09
  SPEAKER_00: We uh I've never met anybody that doesn't.
• 2:12
  SPEAKER_00: We preach about only one in history, really.
• 2:15
  SPEAKER_00: So maybe we should ask him.
• 2:17
  SPEAKER_00: And that's kind of what I want to direct us to um today.
• 2:22
  SPEAKER_00: But as we as we look at this, so that's one problem that we have.
• 2:27
  SPEAKER_00: We have a problem is that people say, I want to to do better, and we'll we'll deal with that.
• 2:31
  SPEAKER_00: And this is sort of a two-part thing this morning because I want to I have to establish, or I feel like I have to establish one truth first, so we can go on to an actual answer of how does this really make us better?
• 2:45
  SPEAKER_00: How do we get better, act better, talk better, do better, um, be more Christ-like in our in our in our responses and in our actions.
• 2:56
  SPEAKER_00: Um but the problem we have with this whole sin thing that we that we that we're looking at is number one, we're asking people that still sin how to not sin.
• 3:06
  SPEAKER_00: Number two is that we we have a wrong paradigm.
• 3:10
  SPEAKER_00: We have a whole wrong basis uh and a way of thinking that makes that such a big problem.
• 3:17
  SPEAKER_00: And I got a I want to uh give you a quote from Albert Einstein.
• 3:22
  SPEAKER_00: I heard heard he was pretty smart, and uh and uh he says, he said one time, you cannot solve a problem on the same level that it was created.
• 3:35
  SPEAKER_00: You have to rise above it to the next level.
• 3:38
  SPEAKER_00: You cannot solve a problem on the same level that it was created.
• 3:42
  SPEAKER_00: So so where's this whole sin problem?
• 3:45
  SPEAKER_00: Where was it created?
• 3:46
  SPEAKER_00: Well, we go back to Adam and that whole thing, that that whole thing there.
• 3:50
  SPEAKER_00: And and I've talked about it a lot, but but the gist of it that I um that I that that I get there is that Adam has uh uh an ignorance problem, uh to say the least, doesn't really understand the Father.
• 4:07
  SPEAKER_00: They they they they go about trying to establish their own righteousness there.
• 4:12
  SPEAKER_00: They make a choice that says, that puts it all upon them to get better and to change.
• 4:17
  SPEAKER_00: We will be like gods if we if we we receive this knowledge of good and evil.
• 4:24
  SPEAKER_00: This is how we will be godlike.
• 4:27
  SPEAKER_00: Now, that in itself is not a not a bad uh ambition.
• 4:32
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, most of us would like to be like him, Christ-like, we'd like to love like him, think like him, act like him, be like him, and do good like him.
• 4:44
  SPEAKER_00: But they went, they they chose a way to do that.
• 4:48
  SPEAKER_00: And we also know that there was that that shame and fear came upon them, and Adam separated himself.
• 4:55
  SPEAKER_00: He pulled away.
• 4:56
  SPEAKER_00: We don't see God pulling away from Adam, we see the man pulling away from God.
• 5:00
  SPEAKER_00: And and that comes from ignorance.
• 5:03
  SPEAKER_00: And I hate to just repeat it all the time, but my mind goes to the prodigal son.
• 5:07
  SPEAKER_00: To me, it's just a beautiful, clear picture about a son that doesn't understand his father.
• 5:13
  SPEAKER_00: Therefore, he acts in in ways that are that are not right in that relationship, while the father's loving him the whole time, and not until the son finds out how good his father is, can his son enjoy being who he was always born to be.
• 5:30
  SPEAKER_00: And so we have a problem that we're trying to deal with things in the church world, in religion, and in the whole, in the world itself.
• 5:37
  SPEAKER_00: We're trying to deal with this issue of making ourselves better, improving ourselves.
• 5:42
  SPEAKER_00: Whether it's religiously, that improvement usually is spoken of in terms of stop sinning.
• 5:48
  SPEAKER_00: Uh uh in the world, it's just it's always like you're not good enough yet, you don't look good enough yet, you don't, you don't have enough money yet, you don't have, you know, it's it's it's it's it's it's get better, get better, get better, uh, improve.
• 6:00
  SPEAKER_00: And and there's this this this innate drive in people to try to attain to become something because they feel like they're not there, they're not complete, they're not perfect, and and they want to get better.
• 6:17
  SPEAKER_00: Um I'm so glad the Bible says things like, we are complete in him.
• 6:23
  SPEAKER_00: And hopefully I can say some words this morning that make that more than just pretty words.
• 6:28
  SPEAKER_00: That we really, you know, I want people to feel, to feel like they're complete.
• 6:35
  SPEAKER_00: I want people to have a consciousness in life of being complete.
• 6:41
  SPEAKER_00: What do we do with this?
• 6:43
  SPEAKER_00: Um we have to get past in this Christianity where we're seeing the good news, where we're seeing that Jesus is the cornerstone, that it's all about him, that it's that it's grace upon grace.
• 7:03
  SPEAKER_00: That message shows us that sin is really not an issue.
• 7:13
  SPEAKER_00: Now, I know somebody says, but I still want to act better.
• 7:15
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, I'll I'll get to that to that part, but I want to establish something first.
• 7:19
  SPEAKER_00: We want, we, the the the gospel shows us, wants to tell us, wants to wants to give us a conviction that sin is not our issue, that our flaws and our faults are not what's getting in our way.
• 7:41
  SPEAKER_00: Um we must get past this whole issue of sin, sin, sin.
• 7:48
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and we must become perfect in our imperfections.
• 7:57
  SPEAKER_00: And what I I say that because the Bible talks about some things, and we have to become comfortable with Jesus being the cornerstone of everything.
• 8:08
  SPEAKER_00: We have to become comfortable with our life being based on nothing less than him.
• 8:15
  SPEAKER_00: And his goodness, his love, his perfection, and his righteousness.
• 8:20
  SPEAKER_00: And that's why this beautiful gospel, everything points to him and his goodness.
• 8:24
  SPEAKER_00: Even Jesus, walking in his earth walk that we read in Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, people would come to him and say, Call him good master, and he stopped him and he he corrects something.
• 8:37
  SPEAKER_00: You go, wait, why are you calling me good?
• 8:41
  SPEAKER_00: Now we know Jesus was good, but he's intending to correct something here because this person is assuming that it's because of how Jesus is, of how he acts.
• 8:53
  SPEAKER_00: It's because he's good, because he, you know, lives a life of perfection or imperfection or something or obedience and all that, and they and and they're assuming that it's because of that, is why he can do the things that he does.
• 9:07
  SPEAKER_00: So he's correcting, he says, wait a minute, why are you calling me good?
• 9:11
  SPEAKER_00: There is none good but my father in heaven.
• 9:14
  SPEAKER_00: Now we all know Jesus is good, but he doesn't attribute the goodness and the blessing and the power upon him in his life.
• 9:22
  SPEAKER_00: He doesn't attribute that to his own goodness.
• 9:24
  SPEAKER_00: He he says it comes from the Father.
• 9:26
  SPEAKER_00: In other places, he said things like, I can of my own self do nothing.
• 9:31
  SPEAKER_00: It's of the Father.
• 9:32
  SPEAKER_00: So there again, he was basing everything, not upon his the goodness of this uh as a he wasn't basing it upon him being a very good human upon this earth.
• 9:42
  SPEAKER_00: He wasn't basing it just upon him being a good, perfect human.
• 9:50
  SPEAKER_00: He was basing it upon the good and perfect goodness and the love of the Father.
• 9:55
  SPEAKER_00: The Bible says in 1 Corinthians chapter 1, verse 27, says, but God has chosen the foolish things of the world to put to shame the wise.
• 10:08
  SPEAKER_00: Isn't it good to know that you were chosen to put to shame the wise?
• 10:12
  SPEAKER_00: Or does anybody qualify?
• 10:13
  SPEAKER_00: The foolish things of the world.
• 10:15
  SPEAKER_00: The foolish things.
• 10:16
  SPEAKER_00: I'm talking about the the ones that just, you're, you, you just can't get this perfection thing down.
• 10:21
  SPEAKER_00: You can't, you can't, you, you, you, you keep seeing these, these, these flaws.
• 10:25
  SPEAKER_00: You keep, you're, you're, you're not not the smartest thing, you're not the most perfect thing, you're not whatever.
• 10:31
  SPEAKER_00: He's chosen the foolish things to put to shame the wise or to confound the wise.
• 10:36
  SPEAKER_00: Because in the world, it's all about, it's, it's about, it's about becoming something that's just so perfect, getting rid of all of your flaws.
• 10:45
  SPEAKER_00: And it and he says, but he's chosen something completely different.
• 10:48
  SPEAKER_00: See, this grace really blows all that out of the water.
• 10:52
  SPEAKER_00: And that's what scares people is because they're afraid that a message of grace will leave you comfortable with your sins, or let's say flaws, will leave you comfortable with that, and then you won't have any motivation to get any better.
• 11:09
  SPEAKER_00: Now, I will get to that in just a little while here.
• 11:13
  SPEAKER_00: But they're but but but they're afraid of that.
• 11:16
  SPEAKER_00: But God is doing something different here with this whole thing, and he says, he's taking the weak and the foolish, or this is how he does things.
• 11:23
  SPEAKER_00: This is in God's plan to have weak and foolish things.
• 11:28
  SPEAKER_00: God has chosen the weak things of the world to put to shame the things that are mighty.
• 11:35
  SPEAKER_00: Verse 29 says, so that no flesh would glory in his presence.
• 11:39
  SPEAKER_00: And verse 31 says that as it is written, he who glories, let him glory in the Lord.
• 11:46
  SPEAKER_00: Can any of you see that a big part of the whole plan and purpose and intent of God from the beginning of creating man, these flesh creatures in this physical earthly body that is, that has weakness.
• 12:08
  SPEAKER_00: It has weakness, it has weakness.
• 12:14
  SPEAKER_00: And God, in all this, this whole picture here, creating you and me with weakness.
• 12:21
  SPEAKER_00: Now we're we're complete in Him.
• 12:22
  SPEAKER_00: We are God's children, we are spiritual beings, we live forever, we as he is, so are we, and here we are in this world, but we're having an experience in weak flesh.
• 12:37
  SPEAKER_00: Right?
• 12:37
  SPEAKER_00: And that's where the conflict is.
• 12:41
  SPEAKER_00: You're having an experience in weak flesh.
• 12:44
  SPEAKER_00: But yet the word says that you're perfect and entire, lacking nothing.
• 12:48
  SPEAKER_00: The word says that you are complete in him.
• 12:50
  SPEAKER_00: The word says, as he is, so are you.
• 12:52
  SPEAKER_00: We have all of these scriptures that are absolutely true.
• 12:56
  SPEAKER_00: You have an anointing, the Spirit from God, and you know all things.
• 13:00
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, you have this perfection, but you have it in an earthen vessel.
• 13:06
  SPEAKER_00: You have it in weak flesh.
• 13:07
  SPEAKER_00: And you're having this experience right now.
• 13:10
  SPEAKER_00: And how do we deal with this experience?
• 13:13
  SPEAKER_00: Number one, recognize that and understand that in the intents of God, he made things this way, and he never made Adam to go out and seek to become perfect in his flesh.
• 13:28
  SPEAKER_00: Adam in this weak flesh was created to be dependent on something bigger than his weak flesh.
• 13:38
  SPEAKER_00: And God was not just, you know, here you are, Adam, now let me see if you can be perfect, because if you if you if you live a sinless life, then you get to go to heaven someday.
• 13:47
  SPEAKER_00: That wasn't mentioned at all there.
• 13:50
  SPEAKER_00: The whole plan was that God, who is love, made this man to be in union, communion with him.
• 13:57
  SPEAKER_00: And I say it a lot, but God is your source.
• 13:59
  SPEAKER_00: God would be your strength while you're in this weak flesh.
• 14:03
  SPEAKER_00: You wouldn't have to rely upon that, and you wouldn't have to be condemned by it, because God would supply all the love and all the grace and all the confidence and all the assurance and all the power of life because he would be your complete source.
• 14:19
  SPEAKER_00: In him we are strong.
• 14:21
  SPEAKER_00: In him, we are complete, while we're still having an experience in weak flesh that manifests its weakness.
• 14:33
  SPEAKER_00: We have to get it established that it is part of the plan of God and it and it actually amplifies his glory.
• 14:45
  SPEAKER_00: It amplifies his goodness in this plan.
• 14:49
  SPEAKER_00: That while you're in weak flesh, making mistakes, messing up, that it has that it that it that it serves to magnify and amplify how gracious and how loving God is.
• 15:06
  SPEAKER_00: For if we were all created perfect from the day of Adam all the way on to now, and all we did was act perfect.
• 15:13
  SPEAKER_00: There is, it I can't I can't imagine how we could fathom that love in our perfection.
• 15:19
  SPEAKER_00: God would tell you, I love you, and you would say, Of course you do, Father, look at me.
• 15:25
  SPEAKER_00: But he says he did it this way, so that no flesh would glory in his presence, that the excellency would go to God.
• 15:33
  SPEAKER_00: Because he's the source of the whole thing.
• 15:35
  SPEAKER_00: And it's and it magnifies and gives this beautiful picture of his love.
• 15:39
  SPEAKER_00: And that's why many of you know what I'm talking about, that when you started seeing the beauty of the graciousness of God through this beautiful gospel, you fell in love with him because you saw more than you ever could before, how beautiful he really is.
• 16:00
  SPEAKER_00: How loving he.
• 16:02
  SPEAKER_00: And then you got to where you thought you knew that God loved you.
• 16:05
  SPEAKER_00: Then it just opened up your thinking.
• 16:08
  SPEAKER_00: We're just like, my goodness, I don't know how much love he has, but it's more than I can fathom.
• 16:13
  SPEAKER_00: You got that by by realizing, by by believing in his grace and realizing that it was that it was his grace by Christ alone, and it had nothing to do with you, your goodness, your flesh, your perfection, your how how obedient you were, how sinless you were, how whatever you were.
• 16:32
  SPEAKER_00: You realize it had absolutely zero to do with that, and all the glory was on him.
• 16:41
  SPEAKER_00: In this plan of on purpose using weak and foolish flesh, God would show his goodness and his love.
• 16:56
  SPEAKER_00: And I know what I'm talking about because it's amazing me more and more and more.
• 17:03
  SPEAKER_00: And this grace has been powerful and it has brought changes, and I will talk about that in a moment.
• 17:08
  SPEAKER_00: But I've not found found the magic bullet to make me flawless, to make me not have moments of sin, what we would define as sin.
• 17:25
  SPEAKER_00: But you know, Paul had an experience that he talked about in 2 Corinthians 12, where there was something about him, something going on in his life, whatever it was, and people will debate it, but whatever it was, and and and it certainly can apply to what we're talking about here, something going on in his life that he didn't like.
• 17:49
  SPEAKER_00: And he kept asking God, take it away.
• 17:51
  SPEAKER_00: You ever had had a had a flaw, a sin, an imperfection, and you kept asking God to take it away?
• 17:57
  SPEAKER_00: And you were very sincere, and you found yourself still doing it, and you wondered, how come?
• 18:09
  SPEAKER_00: I've had lots of that.
• 18:12
  SPEAKER_00: I'd be in the church, I'd be in the churches where you know you you'd come up and they'd punch you in the stomach, or they'd squeeze your head, or they'd push you on the floor.
• 18:20
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, there'd be all lots of things that you would, you're just wanting to get rid of this thing.
• 18:26
  SPEAKER_00: And Paul has something, he says, I besought the Lord again and again, three times, take it from me.
• 18:32
  SPEAKER_00: And the answer was always what?
• 18:35
  SPEAKER_00: The answer was, My grace is sufficient for you.
• 18:40
  SPEAKER_00: My grace is sufficient for you.
• 18:42
  SPEAKER_00: And we know the story.
• 18:43
  SPEAKER_00: Eventually, Paul sees something and he goes, Ah, now I get it.
• 18:48
  SPEAKER_00: I get it.
• 18:50
  SPEAKER_00: So in my weakness, in my weakness, your strength is perfected, is shown to be to be perfect and more than necessary and more than sufficient for me.
• 19:04
  SPEAKER_00: It's not about me getting rid of all my flaws, it's about you being good and loving me in my flaws.
• 19:11
  SPEAKER_00: I've said this a lot.
• 19:12
  SPEAKER_00: Perfection is not the absence of flaws.
• 19:15
  SPEAKER_00: Perfection is perfect love in the midst of your flaws.
• 19:18
  SPEAKER_00: That is the more beautiful thing, that's the more perfect thing.
• 19:21
  SPEAKER_00: And that's why Paul goes on, he says, Oh, now, he says, I will actually, I will boast, I will boast uh in my infirmities, but I will boast in that, and and and and and it gives glory to God.
• 19:37
  SPEAKER_00: I can speak with such conviction, knowing that I am far from anybody's definition of perfection, and have absolute, or at least a whole lot of how to say it.
• 19:59
  SPEAKER_00: Usually I feel like I have zero condemnation.
• 20:04
  SPEAKER_00: Judy tells people like that, you can't condemn him.
• 20:07
  SPEAKER_00: I've tried.
• 20:14
  SPEAKER_00: Not because I had a flaw, but because she did.
• 20:17
  SPEAKER_00: I'm kidding.
• 20:17
  SPEAKER_00: I'm kidding.
• 20:22
  SPEAKER_00: But we had an argument and one of the kind that Judy felt like, I just gotta get in the car and go think.
• 20:31
  SPEAKER_00: And she's talking to God, which is smart.
• 20:34
  SPEAKER_00: And she says, Lord, I know there's no condemnation in you, but I really think he could use just a little bit of condemnation.
• 20:45
  SPEAKER_00: Because something about him could change, and then my life would be better.
• 20:50
  SPEAKER_00: And it's not that you don't want to, you you you get you do.
• 20:53
  SPEAKER_00: That's the thing about this, is that want to is really there.
• 20:56
  SPEAKER_00: So that brings a conflict, and you want to.
• 20:59
  SPEAKER_00: You know, the way I used to deal with it is I would, many of you do this, I would vow.
• 21:04
  SPEAKER_00: I mean vow to God, promise God, I'm gonna do better.
• 21:08
  SPEAKER_00: Any of y'all never do that?
• 21:10
  SPEAKER_00: I promise God, what do you do?
• 21:11
  SPEAKER_00: You're putting it on you.
• 21:12
  SPEAKER_00: Like God is sitting there and he's waiting for you to make a promise and then keep it.
• 21:16
  SPEAKER_00: Come on.
• 21:19
  SPEAKER_00: And if that were true, then what God would be saying is that it's on you, not me.
• 21:27
  SPEAKER_00: And I've thought for many, many years that God was waiting on me, looking, looking for me, expecting me to make a promise, to do something or stop doing something.
• 21:41
  SPEAKER_00: And this time, Rick, really keep it.
• 21:44
  SPEAKER_00: So I would say things like God, I don't like that.
• 21:50
  SPEAKER_00: I promise I'm not gonna do that anymore.
• 21:53
  SPEAKER_00: Now I I know I promised you before, but this time I really mean it, God.
• 21:57
  SPEAKER_00: You know, because you're sincere, you want to.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_00: Be better.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_00: You don't like this.
• 22:01
  SPEAKER_00: Paul was saying, I don't want it.
• 22:05
  SPEAKER_00: I don't like being like that.
• 22:06
  SPEAKER_00: Don't like having that in my life.
• 22:10
  SPEAKER_00: And God's saying, My grace is sufficient for you, you weak and foolish vessel.
• 22:15
  SPEAKER_00: Rather than make you perfect to where you don't make any of those mistakes anymore, let my grace be enough for you.
• 22:22
  SPEAKER_00: Let yourself be loved while you're still like that.
• 22:27
  SPEAKER_00: And then tell me what you think about me.
• 22:30
  SPEAKER_00: And then tell other people what you know about me when you have seen that truth.
• 22:35
  SPEAKER_00: See, so we want to really establish that.
• 22:37
  SPEAKER_00: And I know we all know this on some level or another, but this, when this gets established, it changes the whole paradigm.
• 22:45
  SPEAKER_00: It changes the level that you think about the sin problem.
• 22:49
  SPEAKER_00: Because you can't fix the sin problem on the level of fixing the sin.
• 22:57
  SPEAKER_00: You have to go to a higher level.
• 22:59
  SPEAKER_00: What is it?
• 22:59
  SPEAKER_00: God's amazing grace.
• 23:02
  SPEAKER_00: How sweet the sound.
• 23:03
  SPEAKER_00: Are you hearing anything?
• 23:08
  SPEAKER_00: A focus on sin always puts focus on our flesh.
• 23:17
  SPEAKER_00: Righteousness or grace takes the focus off your flesh.
• 23:24
  SPEAKER_00: It takes the focus off of sin, and it puts it all on God's love.
• 23:28
  SPEAKER_00: We sing about it every week.
• 23:30
  SPEAKER_00: Every song we sing points to that, magnifies that.
• 23:40
  SPEAKER_00: We'll always put the focus on you.
• 23:43
  SPEAKER_00: You'll feel like it's on you to try to do better.
• 23:48
  SPEAKER_00: You might feel like promising to do better.
• 23:51
  SPEAKER_00: You'll feel like you'll be looking for that magic bullet somewhere.
• 23:56
  SPEAKER_00: And, you know, that was a part of my problem for the reason it took me like 20 years of Christianity to come home to grace, to the grace of God, and let him really be my cornerstone and accept the fact, accept my own flesh ruin that I am a weak and a foolish vessel, but God is beautiful and good to this person who is in a weak and foolish vessel.
• 24:18
  SPEAKER_00: This not just a person, I'm his child.
• 24:20
  SPEAKER_00: His beloved child in his very image, having an experience in weak and sinful flesh.
• 24:29
  SPEAKER_00: And it's magnifying the goodness of God.
• 24:31
  SPEAKER_00: But I would deal with that, and for 20 years, I dealt with that and I kept looking for that silver bullet.
• 24:37
  SPEAKER_00: What's going to make me better?
• 24:40
  SPEAKER_00: What's going to make me stop having these sins and these flaws?
• 24:46
  SPEAKER_00: So you seek and you search.
• 24:47
  SPEAKER_00: And there's a lot of good preachers out there, if you haven't noticed.
• 24:52
  SPEAKER_00: And we're all coming up with the next heavy revelation and a new secret.
• 24:56
  SPEAKER_00: And I would, I mean, I'd open the Christian magazines and oh, I've got to get this book, because this is the secret of uh, you know, this the priestly prayer.
• 25:05
  SPEAKER_00: Here's the secret of so-and-so's uh prayer, here's the secret of this, you know, and this is the key.
• 25:12
  SPEAKER_00: All these these these these videos and all these books and all the they they always prompt.
• 25:17
  SPEAKER_00: This is the key to unlock whatever, you know, and you're you're looking for that secret key, that silver bullet, that something that's going to finally put this this whole flawless, this whole flaw business, this whole sin business, this whole this whole weakness at an end.
• 25:37
  SPEAKER_00: And the whole plan was God saying the whole time, son, my grace is sufficient for you.
• 25:46
  SPEAKER_00: And when my eyes opened up to grace, that's when I feel like I finally started to understand what that really means.
• 25:57
  SPEAKER_00: So that he that glories, let him glory in the Lord.
• 26:01
  SPEAKER_00: Um I might have made it hard on the staff here, but didn't we have the graphic that I submitted real late in the game?
• 26:12
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know.
• 26:13
  SPEAKER_00: I said, Oh gosh, you guys are great.
• 26:17
  SPEAKER_00: Like at the last minute, I said, Oh, I got another idea.
• 26:19
  SPEAKER_00: Can you put that up there?
• 26:23
  SPEAKER_00: But we have this picture.
• 26:28
  SPEAKER_00: On the right is your true self, on the left is your false self, on the on both both of those ideas or both of those levels of thinking or paradigms or whatever, you have the same truth.
• 26:38
  SPEAKER_00: You have God.
• 26:39
  SPEAKER_00: The same truth is the same truth.
• 26:41
  SPEAKER_00: He is your source of life.
• 26:43
  SPEAKER_00: And he is, in him is the kingdom of heaven, in his presence, in him, in Christ.
• 26:51
  SPEAKER_00: All that.
• 26:53
  SPEAKER_00: And when you don't see this correctly, what you see is that the image on the left that you see yourself, and you have a sense of separation.
• 27:03
  SPEAKER_00: You have, and and and and you can tell that you're having a sense of separation because you feel like the responsibility is on you, as opposed to the graphic on the right where there's a connection.
• 27:16
  SPEAKER_00: And and I show it just kind of, you know, just a little bit of a connection there, but you can you there are times, uh speak for myself, there are times when I have had moments, I've had times when I felt like I was smack dab in the middle of that source, like I was in oneness with all that it is.
• 27:37
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 27:39
  SPEAKER_00: Sometimes I'm just aware of the connection, and I'm in that a lot.
• 27:43
  SPEAKER_00: I feel like this thing gets better, this thing gets better, and you increase in the awareness of it, and and you, and I'm and I'm getting, you know, to where I first my first thoughts in the morning are in this type of connection.
• 27:57
  SPEAKER_00: Like, whoo, I'm in you, you're in me.
• 27:59
  SPEAKER_00: And you know that you're connected to life.
• 28:02
  SPEAKER_00: You know that you're connected to the source, and you don't feel alone.
• 28:07
  SPEAKER_00: You don't feel like it's on you, you don't feel like you have to have to make promises to God, you don't feel like you have to get better.
• 28:15
  SPEAKER_00: What you do is you enjoy the source and you're drinking from that living water, and you have an awareness that you are in the kingdom of heaven, which also is the kingdom of heaven that's in you, because all that you are in is also in you, and that's why the Bible uses that language.
• 28:32
  SPEAKER_00: I'm in you and you in me.
• 28:34
  SPEAKER_00: And you're like, which one is it?
• 28:35
  SPEAKER_00: It is both.
• 28:36
  SPEAKER_00: It's like that.
• 28:37
  SPEAKER_00: Because the two of you are one, and you don't feel the disconnect because God in him alone is the source.
• 28:45
  SPEAKER_00: He is the cornerstone of your life.
• 28:48
  SPEAKER_00: Every single stone of your life, everything you built, it's all upon that cornerstone of Christ and Christ alone.
• 28:58
  SPEAKER_00: No flesh will glory in his presence.
• 29:00
  SPEAKER_00: He that glories, let him glory in the source of life.
• 29:04
  SPEAKER_00: Let him glory in the Lord.
• 29:05
  SPEAKER_00: You weak and foolish vessel, hallelujah, you've got a source.
• 29:10
  SPEAKER_00: You imperfect and flawed flesh person, you thank God you've got a source in the kingdoms within you, and all this and that, and you you you you partake of that source of life, and what does it do?
• 29:22
  SPEAKER_00: It produces fruit in you.
• 29:26
  SPEAKER_00: Love, joy, peace, etc.
• 29:29
  SPEAKER_00: Now, the image on the right is closer to who you are.
• 29:33
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, if I were to do it correctly, you'd be like I smack dab in the middle of it, not on the edge of it.
• 29:40
  SPEAKER_00: The one on the left is not who you are.
• 29:43
  SPEAKER_00: But we know we can think that's who we are, right?
• 29:46
  SPEAKER_00: And that was me.
• 29:48
  SPEAKER_00: I was connected to him.
• 29:51
  SPEAKER_00: I was in him.
• 29:52
  SPEAKER_00: He was in me.
• 29:54
  SPEAKER_00: I didn't know that in my head.
• 29:58
  SPEAKER_00: I felt like it was on me, and I felt like that first image there is like God is looking at me, saying, son, when are you going to get these things right?
• 30:07
  SPEAKER_00: When are you going to stop doing that?
• 30:10
  SPEAKER_00: When are you going to start doing this other thing?
• 30:13
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm I'm promising God I'm going to do better.
• 30:17
  SPEAKER_00: And when you're promising God and promising that you're going to do better, but it seems like your promises don't really make you that much better.
• 30:28
  SPEAKER_00: Are you going to feel the fruit of the Spirit, love, joy, and peace?
• 30:31
  SPEAKER_00: I know I didn't.
• 30:31
  SPEAKER_00: I felt another fruit.
• 30:33
  SPEAKER_00: And you know a tree by its fruit.
• 30:36
  SPEAKER_00: The fruit I felt was guilt.
• 30:39
  SPEAKER_00: The fruit I felt was condemnation, and that manifested in my thinking as just always coming up a little short.
• 30:47
  SPEAKER_00: Always coming up a little short.
• 30:50
  SPEAKER_00: Jesus, knowing the connection, what did he say a lot?
• 30:54
  SPEAKER_00: I and my father are one.
• 30:57
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not outside the Father.
• 30:58
  SPEAKER_00: I and my Father are one.
• 31:02
  SPEAKER_00: He's always in that source.
• 31:05
  SPEAKER_00: They're like looking at him like he's probably one of the, like he's in the first image there, and like uh like uh good master.
• 31:13
  SPEAKER_00: And he's like, wait a minute.
• 31:15
  SPEAKER_00: Not because I'm good, the father is good.
• 31:19
  SPEAKER_00: And me and him are one.
• 31:21
  SPEAKER_00: That's where this camp comes from.
• 31:24
  SPEAKER_00: So with what we've said so far, how do we actually get better?
• 31:29
  SPEAKER_00: The Bible says, I mean, uh the book of uh Titus, chapter two, talks about it says grace teaches us to live righteously and soberly in this life.
• 31:38
  SPEAKER_00: One thing we need to learn to live righteously, and what I'm talking about right now is part of that.
• 31:43
  SPEAKER_00: But how do we get better?
• 31:44
  SPEAKER_00: Do we get better?
• 31:45
  SPEAKER_00: Yes.
• 31:47
  SPEAKER_00: I have, but what does it mean?
• 31:50
  SPEAKER_00: Um Isaiah 61, verse 3, and this was part of the chapter that Jesus read part of this in Luke 4 when he read in the synagogue and announced who he was.
• 32:05
  SPEAKER_00: Um He didn't read all of it, but part of that passage in Isaiah 61, verse 3 especially says that he came to console those who mourn in Zion.
• 32:15
  SPEAKER_00: He came to give us beauty for ashes, the oil of joy for mourning, the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness, that we would be called trees of righteousness, the planting of the Lord so that he would be glorified, that we would be trees of righteousness, so he would be glorified, trees of righteousness that God Himself planted, that He would be glorified.
• 32:43
  SPEAKER_00: So, how does this message of grace that it puts all upon him and not upon you, which people are afraid, what that might do is it just leaves you not getting any better or changing because all you're gonna do is just have a relief, ooh, so I'm not responsible for my sins anymore, I don't have to do uh you know deal with anything.
• 33:03
  SPEAKER_00: Um how does it actually, how does believing in God's grace in such a strong way, how do we glorify God with our lives after that?
• 33:17
  SPEAKER_00: Well, he said we're we become we are trees of righteousness.
• 33:22
  SPEAKER_00: And you know a tree by its fruit.
• 33:26
  SPEAKER_00: And I don't know how I missed this for so long.
• 33:30
  SPEAKER_00: But when I talked about bearing fruit, see, well, I actually do know how I missed it.
• 33:36
  SPEAKER_00: Because I was thinking on the paradigm of the problem.
• 33:40
  SPEAKER_00: When I would talk about bearing fruit, I always, for many years, thought about it in terms of sin, what we do wrong.
• 33:50
  SPEAKER_00: And I would say, if you're really saved, you'll bear fruit.
• 33:54
  SPEAKER_00: And what did I mean?
• 33:55
  SPEAKER_00: You'll stop sinning, you'll get rid of these flaws.
• 34:01
  SPEAKER_00: Any of y'all ever think like that?
• 34:06
  SPEAKER_00: Well, isn't that true?
• 34:07
  SPEAKER_00: Well, let's see how it how it works.
• 34:11
  SPEAKER_00: We bear fruit.
• 34:14
  SPEAKER_00: How many believe God loves you?
• 34:18
  SPEAKER_00: He cares about you.
• 34:20
  SPEAKER_00: Before he even gave the Son, he loved the world.
• 34:24
  SPEAKER_00: You and me.
• 34:26
  SPEAKER_00: He loved me.
• 34:29
  SPEAKER_00: I was miserable in a lot of ways.
• 34:34
  SPEAKER_00: I was fruitless in so many ways when it came to the things of God.
• 34:41
  SPEAKER_00: Fruitless in love.
• 34:46
  SPEAKER_00: Wasn't sure there actually was such a thing.
• 34:48
  SPEAKER_00: And if there was, I happened to be unlovable.
• 34:52
  SPEAKER_00: So I'm fruitless.
• 34:55
  SPEAKER_00: Peace had none.
• 34:59
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm not playing.
• 35:00
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, just now thinking about it, I'm just like, it almost I shudder when I think about my condition, and I think, how did I even survive mentally that long when I with that lack of peace, joy with a mixture of legalism and grace.
• 35:31
  SPEAKER_00: I have to say it was better than just being totally devoid of God and any knowledge of God or whatever.
• 35:37
  SPEAKER_00: But because it was mixture, it still left a lot of unrest and a sense of incomplet.
• 35:45
  SPEAKER_00: And it still, I still struggled a lot.
• 35:52
  SPEAKER_00: As a man that was very devoted to God, still struggled with condemnation.
• 35:57
  SPEAKER_00: No rest.
• 35:59
  SPEAKER_00: No real rest in my soul.
• 36:01
  SPEAKER_00: What rest I would find it would be a temporary thing.
• 36:04
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe I'd have a prayer meeting and I'd feel good for a while, or something.
• 36:07
  SPEAKER_00: I'd have some spiritual experience and I'd feel good for a little while, but overall did not have that fruit.
• 36:17
  SPEAKER_00: See, I was like that third plant in the ground in Mark 4, where the seed falls by the wayside and some on stony ground and some on among thorns.
• 36:28
  SPEAKER_00: And I was like among thorns because I was distracted by other things.
• 36:33
  SPEAKER_00: One of them was the flaws and the sins.
• 36:37
  SPEAKER_00: Couldn't see what's so plain to me now that his grace is sufficient for me.
• 36:44
  SPEAKER_00: Because I still made it about me getting better.
• 36:51
  SPEAKER_00: And I said that, and then I would think, and I thought, to show the fruit to bear fruit, means to get rid of the flaws.
• 37:00
  SPEAKER_00: But God loved me and God loved you, and what he wanted for me, who was having this experience in weak flesh, and it was getting the best of me.
• 37:13
  SPEAKER_00: What he wanted for me was to put heaven in my heart for me to experience heaven.
• 37:18
  SPEAKER_00: You know what's interesting when Jesus came to the Jews, what did they want him to do?
• 37:23
  SPEAKER_00: They wanted him to fix their external situation.
• 37:26
  SPEAKER_00: Overthrow the Romans for us, please.
• 37:32
  SPEAKER_00: He didn't do that, he came to give them something better, he came to give them heaven.
• 37:40
  SPEAKER_00: And what he he loved me so much, what he wanted from me that whole time, he wasn't wanting me to get rid of my flaws.
• 37:47
  SPEAKER_00: He was wanting me to have love, joy, peace.
• 37:53
  SPEAKER_00: He was wanting me to live with gentleness, goodness, kindness, patience, faith, self-control, a fruit that comes from the truth that set you free.
• 38:12
  SPEAKER_00: And when I saw his graciousness, truth happened.
• 38:18
  SPEAKER_00: I say, truth came to sup with me that day, and he hasn't left since.
• 38:25
  SPEAKER_00: Now, whether I smoke something or not, I mean you can do it or not do it, that may not necessarily have anything to do with the fruit of the spirit.
• 38:38
  SPEAKER_00: Whether you have beer or drink a glass of wine, that may not have anything to do with the fruit of the spirit.
• 38:44
  SPEAKER_00: But see, I have my eyes are on things like that.
• 38:50
  SPEAKER_00: Well, if you're really saved, you quit drinking your beer.
• 38:53
  SPEAKER_00: That's the fruit.
• 38:54
  SPEAKER_00: See, I made that up.
• 38:56
  SPEAKER_00: Has nothing to do with God's fruit, which is love, joy, peace, gentleness, goodness, kindness.
• 39:04
  SPEAKER_00: And these things are abounding.
• 39:06
  SPEAKER_00: You know the tree.
• 39:07
  SPEAKER_00: You know when you're when you're barking up the right tree, you know when you're eating from the correct tree, you're partaking of the correct of God because of the fruit it produces.
• 39:24
  SPEAKER_00: And this is the change, the primary change that happens.
• 39:29
  SPEAKER_00: Now, does it affect things?
• 39:30
  SPEAKER_00: Yes, it's affecting things all the time.
• 39:33
  SPEAKER_00: Do I have a quest for flawlessness anymore?
• 39:36
  SPEAKER_00: That's not even in my mind anymore.
• 39:37
  SPEAKER_00: I'm enjoying the fruit, and I am enjoying the changes that it's making.
• 39:42
  SPEAKER_00: For one thing, I love you a lot more than I ever could before.
• 39:48
  SPEAKER_00: Still very flawed.
• 39:52
  SPEAKER_00: Very flawed.
• 39:55
  SPEAKER_00: My wife can tell you stories without ever ending.
• 39:58
  SPEAKER_00: She very flawed.
• 40:01
  SPEAKER_00: It's not my issue anymore.
• 40:05
  SPEAKER_00: Sometimes I wonder, it'd be nice to not make any mistakes, but that's not my reality anymore.
• 40:13
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, you can boast and about God even more in these flaws, weaknesses.
• 40:20
  SPEAKER_00: He that glories, let him glory in the Lord.
• 40:23
  SPEAKER_00: I I have I have peace more than I ever did before.
• 40:29
  SPEAKER_00: Fruit is abounding.
• 40:32
  SPEAKER_00: It abounded when I let go and made it not about me getting any better, but letting God love me and my flaws.
• 40:40
  SPEAKER_00: And that was when changes started happening, first inside, which happened to affect things outside, which I'm enjoying.
• 40:53
  SPEAKER_00: Where does this all lead?
• 40:54
  SPEAKER_00: Well, seems to, I get all I can all I can say definitively is it leads to better and better, whatever that is.
• 41:02
  SPEAKER_00: And I think that we're going to be alive for a long, long time, so I'm happy with just enjoying the better the better.
• 41:12
  SPEAKER_00: And by that I mean enjoying more love.
• 41:14
  SPEAKER_00: Beholding more of His the majesty of His love, being more and more in awe of that love, being more and more in awe of the joy that seems to be increasing in our hearts.
• 41:32
  SPEAKER_00: The change that happens to you primarily is the fruit, not the flawlessness.
• 41:40
  SPEAKER_00: The fruit and nothing.
• 41:41
  SPEAKER_00: Go ahead and stand up.
• 41:43
  SPEAKER_00: If you will.
• 41:43
  SPEAKER_00: If you want to, you don't have to.
• 41:45
  SPEAKER_00: But you've been sitting a while and you might want to fluff your pillows a little bit.
• 41:51
  SPEAKER_00: Because it's time for me to stop.
• 41:54
  SPEAKER_00: Because an old wise preacher said, you've heard this, and that when the when the butt goes numb, the ear goes dumb, and it can't hear much anymore.
• 42:06
  SPEAKER_00: But nothing glorifies God more than you feeling his love, knowing he loves you.
• 42:16
  SPEAKER_00: Which results in more love flowing through you.
• 42:19
  SPEAKER_00: Nothing glorifies God more.
• 42:22
  SPEAKER_00: Who loves you and he wanted you to know love.
• 42:27
  SPEAKER_00: He wanted you to know joy.
• 42:30
  SPEAKER_00: He wanted you to know peace.
• 42:32
  SPEAKER_00: That shifts the paradigm.
• 42:34
  SPEAKER_00: That is where it comes from.
• 42:36
  SPEAKER_00: And those things don't come from just temporary good things.
• 42:42
  SPEAKER_00: They're eternal fruit that only come from the graciousness of a God who loves people in very flawed flesh.
• 42:55
  SPEAKER_00: And that's our story.
• 42:57
  SPEAKER_00: And we're sticking to it.
• 43:00
  SPEAKER_00: Y'all doing all right?
• 43:01
  SPEAKER_00: Don't you love him?
• 43:03
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 43:04
  SPEAKER_00: He that glories, let him glory in the Lord.
• 43:09
  SPEAKER_00: Father, you're beautiful, and we give you thanks in Jesus' name.
• 43:12
  SPEAKER_00: Amen.