Participants: Ty Gibson
Series Code: OTR
Program Code: OTR000980
|
01:01 Hello and welcome back to 3ABN's spring camp meeting
01:04 2010 and our very first pillars of our faith event, 01:10 has this been an incredible weekend so far or what. Amen. 01:14 We have been praying so hard that God would pour out the 01:17 Holy Spirit not only on the speakers for their anointing, 01:21 but on all who are here and all of you who are joining us 01:26 by television from around the world that you would. 01:30 God would really do a work in our hearts 01:33 that he would give us ears to hear what the Holy Spirit 01:35 has to say and I believe that we have, 01:39 we have certainly not being disappointed thus far 01:42 and I think God is in midst to doing something incredible. 01:45 Well, it is my great privilege today to just once again 01:50 come out and see all your pretty faces, 01:52 you know this is, this is a beautiful church 01:55 not the building you're the church you go in 02:00 and out of the building. The church goes in 02:01 and out of this building, but it's a wonderful 02:02 beautiful church and right now in the next hour 02:05 we are going to have a wonderful sermon away just 02:08 a moment to introduce the speaker, but first we have 02:11 Pastor John Lomacang, who is my pastor. 02:15 Pastor come on out and I have to tell you that 02:19 I tell John all the time that, where are you John 02:24 are you back there. I hope they are not gonna 02:26 make me sing. Oh! There you are. 02:33 Okay, they didn't tell me that, but anyway 02:36 I tell John is a wonderful teacher of the word, 02:40 but to me one of the greatest anointing 02:43 for ministry of music, really rests on this man 02:47 and he is going to sing a beautiful song right now. 02:50 Turn your eyes upon Jesus. 03:14 O soul, are you weary and troubled? 03:23 No light in the darkness you see? 03:32 There's light for a look at the Savior, 03:41 And life more abundant and free! 03:51 Turn your eyes upon Jesus, 03:58 Look full in His wonderful face, 04:06 And the things of earth will grow strangely dim, 04:16 In the light of His glory and grace. 04:39 His Word shall not fail you, He promised; 04:48 Believe Him, and all will be well: 04:55 Then go to a world that is dying, 05:02 With His perfect salvation to tell! 05:13 Turn your eyes upon Jesus, 05:20 Look full in His wonderful face, 05:29 And the things of earth will grow strangely dim, 05:40 In the light of His glory and grace. 05:51 In the light of His glory and grace. And grace. 06:29 Glory to God thank you so much John. 06:32 It is my honor today to introduce the next speaker 06:35 and you've heard him already a couple of times, 06:39 but this man I truly appreciate the ministry 06:44 that he has because he is so focuses 06:47 on the love and grace of God and I know that 06:50 this has been a growing experience to my experience 06:53 has been the more I study about the love of God 06:55 and you just can't study it from the word, 06:58 but the more I experience the love of God in study 07:01 from his word, the more I realize how little 07:04 I understand the love of God. We never will to 07:07 we were actually there right, but the pastor Ty Gibson 07:11 is the co-director and speaker for Light Bearers Ministry 07:15 for 25 years they have had this ministry 07:18 and did you know they have a ship to get this over 07:21 500 hundred million pieces of Literature. 07:26 Five Hundred, half a billion, glory to God they are 07:29 shipping it everywhere around the world 07:31 and last year along they shipped out 53 million pieces 07:36 of Christian literature. So, we are very, very honored 07:41 to have him here and he is going to bring to you 07:44 today a wonderful message called Matchless Attraction. 07:51 Thank you Shelly, thank you, good morning everybody. 07:53 How are you today? Great. Ah! Are you happy to be here? 07:58 Yeah. Ready to dive in the God's word. Yeah. 08:01 John, wherever you are in the hearing of my voice 08:04 thank you I have, I don't remember ever hearing 08:08 turn your eyes upon Jesus that beautifully rendered 08:11 wasn't that just incredible. Amen. I would pay 08:15 monthly payments to have a voice like that 08:18 and to be able to sing. I would, I would go into debt 08:22 on my credit card in exchange for that voice 08:26 for that ministry. I wanna speak with you 08:29 this morning about what we are going to refer 08:32 to as the power equation of the gospel. 08:38 What is that we are going to be looking for in God's word? 08:40 We are going to be looking for what the power equation 08:45 of the gospel. We are going to discover the God's love 08:49 is a non-coercive love that actually gets down deep 08:56 into our hearts and draws forth a voluntary unforced 09:03 response to the Lord. God is in the business of saving 09:08 you and me to the uttermost depths of our soul 09:12 while keeping our free will intact. And it's going to be 09:18 an incredible journey as we draw close to the Lord 09:23 day by day realizing with deeper and deeper 09:28 understanding, how truly great his love for us is? 09:32 Now the power of equation of the gospel 09:34 in the simplest terms that I can place it before you 09:37 is simply this. To the degree that I comprehend God's 09:44 love for me will precisely be the responding degree 09:53 to which I will be made able to love God in return. 09:58 My love for God is created by encounter 10:04 with his love for me. I love him because 10:08 he first loved me, his love is original, 10:13 my love for him is, it is residual, 10:17 it is responsive to his for me. Now the best way 10:20 I know to take you into an understanding of this vital 10:24 topic is to take you way back from me 10:28 to the absolute worst summer of my life. 10:34 And it was a surprise to me that it turned out 10:37 to be the best summer of my life. 10:39 It was the worst summer of my life because I grew up 10:42 in Los Angeles, California and my mother 10:45 rather abruptly and without notice informed me 10:49 and my younger brothers and sister that we were going 10:53 to be moving out of Los Angeles up north to the 10:57 small town of Sacramento. Now, a teenager 11:04 doesn't like the idea of moving can you relate? 11:06 Los Angeles is all I ever knew, all my friends were there. 11:12 It was familiar, I wanted to stay there, 11:16 I told my mother you can go ahead move, I'm not going. 11:21 I said Mom, I have friends. 11:24 They will give me a place to live, 11:25 I couldn't find one friend, who would let me move in. 11:31 My Mom said we are moving to Sacramento 11:33 and you are going. And so, we moved to Sacramento, 11:39 my whole world was turned upside down. 11:43 I didn't know a solitary person in Sacramento. 11:47 We moved there in the summer. School was not in, 11:53 I took my skateboard and I went outside 11:55 in the new neighborhood and I began to just ride 11:57 around the neighborhood by myself. And I finally saw one 12:02 guy, who was also riding the skateboard and I felt woh! 12:06 There is somebody I can potentially skate with 12:08 maybe he knows, where their some empty swimming pools 12:11 or some half pipes or something. 12:14 So, we struck up a conversation and we began to ride 12:17 together and as the summer moved on 12:19 and came to the conclusion of the month of August, 12:24 right before the new school year was to began, 12:27 he said hey there is an end of the summer party 12:30 at a friend of mine house and why don't you just come 12:33 to this party with me it's going to be great, 12:35 all my friends would be, I said I don't want to. 12:36 I don't know anybody you are the only person 12:38 I know. He said no it will be fine just, just come. 12:42 So, finally I yielded and I very nervously walked 12:46 into this house and they were I don't know probably 50, 12:51 60, 75 teenagers swarming around 12:55 in and out of this house. Teenagers are intimidating. 13:02 I was so nervous I didn't know what to do, 13:04 I walked in through the front door and I just very quickly 13:08 moved across the room and sat down on the sofa. 13:13 My one and only friend, my new friend came 13:15 and sat beside me. He said don't you want to mingle 13:17 with it come on, come on, come on, let's do, 13:19 let's just, I will introduce you to some people. 13:21 I said now I just want to seat right here. 13:22 I love going into a busy house and positioning 13:28 myself strategically, where I can watch the people 13:34 come and go and do whatever people do 13:37 when they don't know they are being watched. 13:43 This is my absolute favorite way by the way 13:45 to wake up my wife. I always wakeup before her 13:49 and sometimes I just lean and close and I just look at her 13:56 and somehow without even touching her she knows that 14:00 I am staring at her. And she just opens her eyes 14:06 and she is awake finally, I love waking her up, 14:10 I hate the fact that she doesn't wake up before me. 14:14 I love watching people and I'm sitting there 14:17 on the sofa watching the door open, 14:20 watching the door close. Some teenagers coming, 14:23 some leaving, it's all mundane nothing of interest. 14:31 I'm feeling little tired, my friend is seating next to me 14:35 and all the sudden the door opened and this time 14:39 when the door opened, it opened me because 14:44 in through that door what? The most beautiful creature 14:48 I have ever seen in my life. I said to my new friend 14:55 do you know who she is? And he said everybody 14:59 knows who she is and then he said to me, 15:02 but dude she is way out of your league 15:05 don't get any ideas. I said that is for her to decide. 15:16 I said you know her, he said yeah I know her. 15:17 I said will you make the introduction? Will you just, 15:20 just take me to her? Tell her my name, tell me her name. 15:27 I said by the way what is she? 15:29 He said what do you mean? What is she? She is human. 15:35 I said no precisely what is the genetic mix? 15:39 I mean what is this? He said I don't know her dad 15:43 is like a tall white guy and her mom 15:45 is like a short Mexican lady. 15:48 I said wow! That is, that's the DNA I've been looking for, 15:52 right there. I already loved her. 16:00 He said alright, he said it's your punishment man. 16:04 We walked up he said my name, he said her name, 16:08 our eyes oh! it couldn't have been more than just, 16:12 just nanosecond she looked and she looked away. 16:15 And so I did what any self-respecting 16:21 young man would do, I made myself omnipresent. 16:27 And this is before I was converted 16:28 I didn't even about omnipresence. I paid attention 16:31 I knew where she was in the house and I just kept going 16:35 wherever she was positioning myself 16:39 where she would be at times. Hello, I'm Ty, 16:42 remember Ty I just met you at the door when you came in. 16:46 What you weird, she went on. Thirteen-year-old girls 16:51 are like that, you're weird they say. 16:54 Well, she didn't even give me the time of day 16:57 not even a passing notice, but I tell you what 17:00 my motivation level was so high. I was a kid, 17:06 who was a natural born introvert and I was cured. 17:14 The school year began and as providence would have it 17:19 and again this is before my conversion I knew 17:21 nothing about providence and yet God was leading 17:25 I guess you not. She providentially 17:29 was in math class. The teacher on the first day 17:35 of school announced that this young lady 17:38 would get an automatic A and B the one who would tutor 17:43 the other students in need of mathematical tutoring. 17:49 What do you think I needed? I needed some very serious 17:54 mathematical tutoring. I raised my hand 17:58 immediately me, pick me, pick me, I need help, 18:02 I don't even know two plus two anymore. 18:08 And so she began tutoring me in math and I continued 18:13 fanning ignorance about math. Until finally I said 18:19 I think that you probably need to come 18:21 to my house after school for some intensive tutoring. 18:26 I don't get it? I don't understand this? 18:29 I wanted you to meet my mom. My mom, my mom 18:34 was to that point in my life the most incredible 18:40 wonderful person I had ever known. 18:42 I mean I loved this lady like words can't describe. 18:46 She raised me and two younger brothers 18:49 and younger sister alone pretty much just moving 18:54 from one potential man after another hoping 18:59 longing for love. I mean my mom 19:02 if I have ever known anyone, who was hungry for love 19:05 it was my mom. Almost suicidal, 19:09 she didn't live past 42 and the memory of my mother 19:13 in my mind is a beautiful memory and one of the 19:16 most beautiful things about my mom is that the moment 19:21 I brought this young lady home they became 19:24 immediate friends. My mom began to teach her 19:28 how to cook and I was just like yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, 19:32 yes, yes, yes this is it I know it's it. 19:35 I know she is the one, but now back to the sofa. 19:46 There I was strategically positioned in the room 19:50 and beauty itself walked through the door. 19:55 My friends I want to introduce to you in the word of God 20:03 what we're going to call the power of attraction 20:08 that's what I was experiencing kind of on a micro level 20:11 just on the human plane. I was experiencing the power 20:15 of attraction, I was forgetting about myself, 20:19 I was encountering a beauty of personhood 20:24 that I would go on to have the privilege 20:26 of discovering for year after year, after year, 20:29 after year to this very day. I was encountering 20:34 a beauty of personality in character in personhood 20:38 that was just looking me out of self concern. 20:42 Now, this is on the micro level. I want to talk 20:46 to you about the power of attraction on the macro level, 20:50 on the divine human level. God has actually structured 20:55 the inner workings of the human mind 20:57 and the human heart in such way that we are wired 21:01 to fall in love. We are literally made 21:07 as we learned in our session yesterday afternoon, 21:10 we are literally made engineered tailor 21:14 made for love. And God just happens 21:18 to be the most beautiful person in all the universe 21:21 and I'm convinced that if we can just get a glimpse 21:25 of who he really is we will find the attraction 21:32 to the Lord overwhelming. Turn with me in your Bible 21:37 to the Old Testament Book of Hosea. 21:40 When is the last time you read the Hosea? 21:43 Listen, all the other prophets of the Bible, 21:47 they received visions and dreams and prophecies 21:52 and then they wrote down those visions and prophecies 21:56 and dreams. Hosea stands apart and distinct 21:59 from all the other prophets in the sense. 22:02 Hosea didn't just receive a vision from the Lord. 22:06 He didn't just receive a prophecy from the Lord. 22:09 God made him a living prophecy. He said Hosea 22:15 I want you to fall in love with a woman, 22:22 who will be unfaithful to you. I want you to fall in love 22:25 with a woman, who is pursuing other lovers. 22:28 Look at verse 1 of chapter 3, verse 1 of chapter 3, 22:33 than the Lord said to me imagine that 22:36 the Lord said to me, to Hosea, this is what 22:40 I want you to do go again and love a woman 22:44 who is loved by a lover and is committing adultery, 22:50 now notice very carefully what are the next two words 22:54 after the comma. Just like, just like, so, so, 22:59 God is building a bridge of understanding 23:03 in Hosea's heart and mind, so that he could be a living 23:08 testimony a living prophecy to build a bridge 23:11 of understanding in our minds. What's the bridge? Hosea, 23:15 I want you to fall in love with a woman, 23:17 who is pursuing other lovers and Hosea 23:21 this experience that you are about to have will be 23:25 just like the love of the Lord for the children of Israel. 23:31 Hosea when you fall in love with this woman 23:36 and you feel in your heart the terrible feelings 23:42 of a jilted lover, when you feel what it feels like 23:47 to love somebody with every fiber 23:49 of being only to be rejected by them. 23:55 Hosea when you feel those feelings 23:58 of rejected love tell my people that that's 24:02 what is like to be God. This is an Old Testament 24:09 insight to the sin problem and how it impacts 24:15 the heart of God. I mean we come to the 24:18 New Testament and we see this powerful statement 24:22 so full of meaning, the sin is transgression 24:26 of the law and if we are not careful we will, 24:29 we will so sanitize the idea of sin that 24:33 we will imagine it to be merely breaking rules 24:38 recorded on tables of stone, but we need to remember 24:42 that when the Bible speaks of the law, 24:45 sin is transgression of the law, we need to also put 24:48 in their Romans 13:10 love is the fulfilling 24:52 of the law, we need to remember what the inspired pin 24:56 has told us that the law is actually a transcript of God's 25:01 character. So break the law is not merely to break 25:07 an external code of ethics on tables of stone. 25:12 It is to break the living, beating, 25:16 sensitive heart of God. The law is an expression 25:22 of the content of the heart of the almighty. 25:25 So, he says to Hosea. Hosea I want you, 25:29 I want you to fall in love with a woman, 25:33 who won't love you in return and then tell my people 25:39 that that's would it feels like to be God. 25:44 To love you and me my friends with every fiber 25:50 of his divine being only to not be loved by him 25:56 in return, so the question becomes what will God do then? 26:01 How will he respond to the sin problem, 26:05 to our unfaithfulness, what will he do? 26:09 Well, go back to chapter 2 of Hosea 26:12 and I want you to notice that God has a very specific 26:16 plan of action. Notice verse 14, this is in the context 26:23 of the sin problem in the larger scope of things 26:27 and more immediately in the historical context 26:30 the unfaithfulness of Israel and so God says 26:34 the way I'm going to respond to the sin problem, 26:38 the way I'm going to respond to human unfaithfulness 26:44 is verse 14 therefore, behold I will what's that word 26:50 in your Bible. I will allure her to me, 26:54 I will bring her into a quite place in the wilderness 27:00 one version says and I will speak comfort to her 27:04 another version says I will speak to her words of love. 27:07 Notice that you and I, God's people, 27:11 human beings are personified as a she, 27:14 as a woman in this text. God says you're unfaithful to me, 27:20 so what I'm going to do is I'm going to allure you 27:24 to myself what would be some synonyms 27:27 for the word allure. What do you think 27:29 of when you think of the word allure? 27:31 Is that a positive word or a negative word 27:33 in your thinking? Positive. It can be positive, 27:36 it can be negative right. But what would be the some 27:38 of the positive synonyms to be allured is to be what? 27:43 To be invited someone said. Drawn, attracted, 27:51 captivated someone said oh! I like that. Would. 27:56 Do you like the word would? Yes. How about this? 27:59 How about this? This is in the context 28:01 of a love relationship, so how about this 28:05 to be coded. Right. To be coded. 28:09 God says I'm going to code your affections for me. 28:14 I am going to reestablish a heart to heart connection 28:19 with you and the way I am going to do it 28:21 is not by forcing you, not by coercing you, 28:26 not by manipulating you, but the way I am going to save 28:31 you from sin is I'm going to allure you away from it to me. 28:37 Literally God says I am going, I am going to love you 28:41 out of the sin problem. I am going to cultivate 28:46 in your heart a responsive love for me. 28:50 Now listen, the only person in the universe, 28:55 who actually could force us in the subjection 29:01 to his will and get away with it and be answerable 29:04 to nobody up or beyond himself. No one would say, 29:09 excuse me that's not allowed. Would they? 29:14 No. The only person in the universe, who could force us 29:19 in the subjection to his will simply chooses not to. Amen. 29:24 God is working on the principle of attraction, 29:28 the principle of alluring us to himself. 29:32 Now, watch where this goes because here in Hosea 29:36 we have a prophecy unfolded to us, 29:40 of what we can expect to take place in our individual 29:43 Christian experience as we progress and develop and grow 29:46 in grace and what we can expect to take place 29:50 eschatologically for the corporate body of God's people. 29:55 Here is the prophecy of what's coming go down to verse 18. 29:59 And in that day context what day? 30:03 The day when I allure you to me in that day says 30:09 the Lord you shall no longer, you shall call me my husband 30:15 and no longer call me my master. Is that fascinating? 30:21 I mean what is being said here? What that, Let's just, 30:25 let's just flesh this out a little bit? Okay. 30:29 What is the nature of a master servant or master 30:33 slave relationship. What are the, what are the kind of 30:37 emotions that are involved? What are the kind of 30:39 motivations involved in a slave master relationship. 30:44 Subjection okay, was like the driving motivation? 30:47 Fear exactly. What's the basic nature of the relationship 30:54 between a slave and a master? You do what I say or else. 30:59 And if you ask why, why do you want me to do? 31:02 That's in such, what is answer of the master, 31:04 because I said so. How dare you ask, right. 31:10 Basically fears the driving motive. 31:13 God says I don't want ultimately a relationship 31:17 with you that is like a slave servant kind of thing. 31:23 I don't want that kind of dynamic between you and me. 31:26 Now in the early stages of our born again experience 31:30 just like raising children there is a place for God 31:34 to say you know do it I say because I said so because 31:37 you are beyond the capacity for understanding 31:44 the rationale process here. It is in your best interest 31:47 to do it I say before you can understand 31:49 what I'm telling you because I have your best interest 31:52 at heart. So, do what I'm telling you. 31:56 But as we grow in grace, does God want us 32:00 to actually grow up into a self-motivated relationship 32:08 with him in which we do what he says because 32:12 we actually love him? Yes. Not merely to get to heaven 32:17 or escape hell, but because a new motivation 32:21 has taken hold of our heart to be at Desire of Ages, 32:24 page 480, it is not the fear of punishment nor the hope 32:29 of everlasting reward that leads the followers of Christ 32:35 to seek him. But they behold his matchless 32:39 love revealed at Calvary and I love this last line 32:43 and the site of him attracts. Isn't that something, 32:48 is not the fear of punishment that is the ultimate 32:52 motivation for serving God. It's not the hope 32:54 of everlasting reward, but the love of God 32:57 is an attraction worthy of all the energies 33:02 of our lives. God says in that day, 33:07 in the day of allurement, in the day when you come to know 33:11 me as I am and you began to love me in return. 33:17 You will no longer call me my master, 33:20 but rather you will call me my husband. Wow! 33:27 What are the emotions and motivations in a good husband 33:31 and wife relationship? Love is the motivational 33:36 factor isn't it? It's like the language of Jesus 33:40 regarding his father. Jesus said I do always those things 33:45 that do you know? Do you know? Please God 33:49 when you are in love you do what you do for the other 33:52 because you actually want them to be please. 33:55 You want to make them happy, you want to minister 34:00 to them in such a way that you raise the quality 34:02 of their heart and mind in relationship to you. 34:08 God says I am going to allure you to me and my question 34:16 this morning is a very simple one. Have you experienced 34:23 the alluring attractive beauty of Gods love for you? 34:31 I mean seriously, I know it's a simple question, 34:33 but have you actually found yourself spontaneously 34:41 not in a public gathering to be seen by anybody, 34:44 but just in the privacy of your own heart and mind, 34:48 in the privacy of some room. Just, just completely 34:52 no show for anybody just you and God have you ever, 34:56 have you ever actually spontaneously dropped 35:00 to your knees and sensed God's love for you personally? 35:08 As if you were the only person in all the Universe to love? 35:14 And have you in the sense of his love for you, 35:16 have you given your heart voluntarily back to him. 35:22 That's listen, that attitude, that spirit of voluntary 35:27 attrition in worship and in service to God 35:30 out of the heart of unforced, uncursed, pure love 35:37 that is the spirit of eternity future. 35:41 Everyone, who inhabits that future kingdom 35:44 will be there not because they were constrained to be, 35:48 they are forced to be there, manipulated to be there, 35:51 scared not to be there for fear of punishment 35:54 or hope of reward. There won't be any mercenary 35:58 motives in that kingdom. Do you find yourself 36:02 growing up in your spirituality to the point 36:07 where the courtship of the Lord has given way 36:14 to a marriage between your heart and his. 36:17 It's a personal question I know. 36:20 Flip all the way back to Ezekiel chapter 16, 36:24 this is a bovine one of my top five favorite chapters 36:31 in all the Bible. A story is told here, 36:36 a parable is told here and God is telling the story 36:38 and he projects himself into the story, 36:42 so that we can know what life is like in this great 36:47 controversy between good and evil from God's perspective. 36:51 I mean don't you, don't you want to know 36:53 what's going on in God's heart and mind. 36:55 I mean we think so often of you know what's play in us 36:59 and we are suffering and going through and calling up 37:02 the Lord that he would sympathize with us. 37:04 I would like to ask you, I would like to ask myself 37:07 this morning that we would somehow by the grace of God 37:10 that we would reach out and understand the heart 37:12 of God, and by his grace sympathize with him. 37:19 God tells us a story here and he is the central 37:22 figure in the story. He says I was walking along 37:27 as it were a dusty path on earth and as I was walking 37:32 along what did God see? Has anybody already read 37:35 verses 12-8 what did I see? I'm walking along 37:38 and God says I saw an abandoned baby 37:41 in an open field. So, get that picture clear 37:45 in your mind, God says I am walking along 37:46 and I look of to the side of the road and what do I see, 37:49 but an abandoned baby squirming in its own blood. 37:55 That's the story. The baby is lying there, 37:59 there is no mother, there is no father, 38:01 the baby is just there in the process of dying, 38:05 the blood of birth still on it's flesh. 38:07 The scripture says that the umbilical cord 38:09 was not even trimmed properly. 38:12 What are all the physical indications? 38:17 This baby was as it were yanked from the womb 38:21 and abandoned in this field with no care whatsoever. 38:27 No one he says, no one washed your body with water, 38:31 nobody covered you with cloth to keep you warm, 38:35 nobody cut your umbilical cord, you, you just, 38:39 you just cast from the womb into an open field 38:43 and I want you to notice the language that God 38:47 uses to describe the condition, 38:50 the situation that this baby is in. 38:54 Notice the words when I saw you there thrown 38:58 into the open field, there was no one who took pity 39:03 on you to do any of these things for you. 39:07 No pity, you know what another version says? 39:11 The Today's English version says no one loved you, 39:17 just that simple. Now, there is a definition 39:20 of our predicament? You see now somebody, 39:22 my mom she loves me. Well, my loved me, 39:25 she loved me with a defective damaged fall in human love 39:30 the best she could. I have friends who love me 39:37 with a fallen, defective, damaged human love. 39:43 There is a sense listen, I know somebody loves you. 39:48 There are those who love me, we all have relationships, 39:50 but listen to what God is saying here. 39:54 There is a sense in which nobody can love you like 40:00 God loves you. Amen. Nobody can receive you 40:04 and give the affirmation and the acceptance 40:07 and the forgiveness and the sense of cleanliness 40:12 before him. Nobody can love you like God. 40:15 He says nobody loved you; that is your condition 40:18 as a fallen human being. But notice as the story goes on. 40:22 God says nobody loved you, your cast into an open field 40:25 you are abandoned. Look at this verse 6, 40:29 and when I passed you by I saw you struggling in 40:32 your own blood and I said to you in your blood 40:37 I said live. Yes, I said to you in your blood live, 40:42 what is God's mandate? What is his, what is his aspiration 40:46 for you and me? Live, he wants us to live 40:49 but he doesn't just want us to live, he wants us to thrive 40:53 this is in Old Testament rendering of the idea 40:57 of the gift of eternal life. This is God saying 41:00 I want you to have life and I want you to have it 41:03 more abundantly. I want you to enter into a whole 41:07 different dimension of existence in which you 41:11 in relationship with me are completely restored 41:15 to what I made you for in the beginning. 41:18 I want you to live he says in verse 6. So, verse 7 41:24 he says I made you to what? What's the word? 41:26 To thrive, I made you thrive like a plant in the field 41:31 and you grew and you are matured. And you became 41:36 very well, what does God say? You became very beautiful. 41:43 God is in the process listen of beautifying you and me. 41:51 He is in the process of cultivating in our hearts 41:55 and lives and characters the beauty of his own character 42:00 in a way that each of us in our own personality 42:04 and character can reflect back to him like nobody else. 42:08 God is in the process of cultivating beauty 42:14 in you and me. He says I made you thrive, you matured, 42:18 you began to grow up spiritually, 42:21 you began to develop, you began to feel what I feel 42:26 and to think like I think and you began to love like I love. 42:33 That's what it means to grow up spiritually. 42:36 Now, watch this you matured, you became very beautiful, 42:39 please excuse this part it's in the Bible. 42:43 I blessed to say your breasts were well formed. 42:46 Question is this a boy or girl now? 42:50 So far it's a just abandoned baby in a field right. 42:54 There is no gender indicated all the sudden you come 42:56 to this verse she grows up, she passed through puberty 42:59 right and God says you became very beautiful. 43:02 Obviously, she is a woman. God is here portraying himself 43:08 as the ultimate lover, pursuing and coding 43:12 the affections of his bride, which is a metaphor 43:16 throughout scripture. But I want you to notice 43:19 something she is female, she has passed through 43:21 puberty and noticed what God says in verse 8 43:24 this is absolutely stunning. This is the Almighty creator 43:29 of the universe talking to you and me this is an even God 43:32 giving Ezekiel a vision and then Ezekiel writing it down. 43:39 There are places in scripture you will find 43:40 quote marks like the Ten Commandments, 43:43 where this is God dictating. This is, this is Ezekiel 43:46 writing down, this is what he said. Here is the God 43:52 the creator of the universe speaking to you and me. 43:54 Verse 8, when I passed you by again, 43:56 that is after you move through this developmental process, 43:59 after you matured and became beautiful 44:01 and I made you thrive, I passed you by again 44:06 and I looked upon you and behold, your time was the time 44:14 for love. So, I spread my wings over you 44:19 and I covered your nakedness. 44:22 Yes. I swore and oath to you and entered into a covenant 44:29 with you and notice these tender words. 44:32 And you became mine says the Lord God. 44:40 Again today's English version renders the text, 44:43 when I passed you by again I saw that it was time for you 44:47 to fall in love, so I married you. Isn't that incredible? 44:55 Amen. Dear friends the question this morning is this. 44:59 Have you come to the place, where it's time for you 45:04 to fall in love with the Lord. I mean seriously. 45:10 When I was a child Paul says I spoke as a child, 45:13 I thought as a child, but when I became a man, 45:17 when I grew up spiritually I put away childish 45:21 things, right. Listen, God is asking 45:27 you and me especially at this junction in human history 45:32 to stop doing religion and church as usual. Amen. 45:36 He is asking for us to put the pedal to the medal 45:39 to rev up our passion for God and to mature 45:45 to grow up in Christ. To grow up as Paul says 45:50 into the full stature of men and women in Christ. 45:55 We are like little brothers and sisters and Jesus 45:57 is our elder brother and Paul says we need to grow up 46:03 to become the full stature of men and women in Christ. 46:07 And growing up involves coming to the place psychologically 46:12 and emotionally. Listen, where you make the pyridine 46:17 shifts from the motive of fear to the motive of love, 46:26 where you make the transition, where you seize to think 46:32 of your salvation and to think of sin and to think 46:37 of your whole spiritual experience in terms of doing 46:42 what I got to do because I better do it because 46:44 if I don't I will be lost. That's a five, six, seven, 46:49 ten-year-old spirituality. The motivation of I do 46:56 what God tells me to because I had better or else. 47:00 Now there is a place for that and it preserves us 47:03 early on from getting into all kinds 47:04 of trouble doesn't it. But listen, listen, if, if, 47:10 if you have a child who is three, four, five years old 47:14 and when it's time for dinner the spaghetti 47:16 is over his ears and in his hair and it's all over his face, 47:19 it's funny, is there it? How cute. But if he is 21 47:26 and the spaghetti is still just all over the place 47:33 is it funny anymore. No. You are like ah! 47:39 could you get over it. Cutlery, the fork, the spoon, 47:45 the knife eat like a grown up, right. It's funny, 47:51 it's cute when a child is young, it's not cute anymore 47:56 anymore when you grow up. 47:59 There is a place for a very limited parameter 48:06 of understanding and say you know. 48:07 I just, I just want to make it, I hope I make it. 48:09 I just wanna get to heaven. I don't want to be lost and, 48:14 and, and when you navigate through life, 48:17 everything is in reference to yourself and your salvation. 48:21 What about this? What about this? What about making 48:24 the move in which a higher and more powerful 48:29 motivation grips us and we began to serve God 48:32 not so much because we have to, 48:34 but because we want to. Amen. 48:36 What about Ezekiel 16:8 what about God saying us 48:40 to us. I passed you, what this. Can you hear delight 48:43 in his voice. God says I passed you by again 48:46 and I saw that it was time for you to fall in love, 48:48 so I married you. God would be so happy 48:54 if we would accelerate our spiritual growth. 49:00 And come to the place, where we love him 49:04 because he first loved us. Now, flip quickly to the 49:08 New Testament and watch how Paul develops 49:11 this powerful idea first in Ephesians chapter 3, 49:16 Ephesians chapter 3, this is the just one of the high 49:21 points of scripture here, where the apostle Paul 49:23 is praying for you and me and all believers 49:27 after him. Notice this very carefully watch 49:30 the language and you have to put some, 49:32 some intellectual energy into this. Paul kind a wordy 49:36 at times; notice this verse 14, Ephesians 3:14, 49:42 for this reason I bow my knees to the father 49:46 of our Lord Jesus Christ. So, he is praying isn't he. 49:51 Verse 15, from whom the whole family in heaven 49:53 and earth his named. Notice this here is the prayer 49:58 that he would grant you according to the riches 50:03 of his glory to be what's that word strengthened 50:09 with there is another power word might through 50:12 his spirit where in the inner man in the interpret. 50:16 Where does this strengthening need to occur 50:19 in the inner person at the motive level 50:23 of our hearts and lives. Verse 17, watch this that 50:29 Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith; 50:33 that you being rooted and grounded in love, 50:40 may be able to, watch this word, comprehend 50:44 what are the synonyms, what is it mean 50:45 to comprehend something it means to, 50:47 to grasp it, to someone said understand it, 50:51 to apprehend it, to get it, to see it 50:54 for what it is. Right. Paul says I pray that you 50:58 would comprehend the love of Christ, 51:04 which passes knowledge. The source beyond 51:08 mere intellectual understanding just like a relationship 51:15 with the friend or wife or husband it's not, 51:19 it's not pure intellectual experience is it? 51:25 I mean I think of your own relationships. 51:28 You don't contemplate brothers my brother you don't 51:31 contemplate your wife and your relationship 51:34 with her as a scientific equation do you? 51:39 No it's experiential, it's relational, 51:44 it's beyond knowledge, it's beyond mere intellectual 51:49 facts and figures. Paul says the love of Christ 51:53 is to be comprehended, but it's beyond mere knowledge. 51:59 It's relational, it's experiential, 52:01 you can only know the love of God like you know a person 52:06 not like you know math are you with me, 52:09 not like you know biology, but like you know your son 52:12 or your daughter or your grandmother. 52:15 It's a personal kind of knowing, it has an intellectual 52:18 component yes, but it's experiential. 52:24 Paul is praying here that you and I would comprehend 52:27 with all sins what is the width and length 52:31 and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ, 52:35 which passes knowledge watch this, so that you might be 52:39 filled with all the fullness of God. Incredible fill to the 52:48 brim with the very presence of God and what is the means 52:55 by which that in feeling occurs. 52:58 Paul very clearly says it is through the comprehension 53:02 of God's love for you for me. Comprehension is the 53:07 access point by which God gets into our hearts and lives. 53:13 To the degree that we comprehend the love of Christ 53:18 it will what Paul say produce strength 53:22 and might and power within us on a moral level. 53:26 Notice these words, it is just, just, just incredible 53:30 language here. From testimonies volume 2, 53:34 page 135, listen. "Love is power intellectual 53:44 and moral strength are involved in this principal 53:49 and cannot be separated from it. 53:53 Love cannot live without action and every act 53:59 increases strengthens and extends it. 54:03 Love will gain the victory." Love is power what kind 54:08 of power intellectual and moral power, 54:12 the love that is spoken of in scripture the love of God 54:17 is not a silly sentimental cotton candy sweet 54:20 Hollywood kind of love, it is a powerful love 54:28 that actually gets into the fiber of our characters 54:31 and molds and shapes and transforms us. 54:35 The Pen of Inspiration says love is power. 54:40 Intellectual and moral strength or how about 54:42 this line, just one sentence here from Desire of Ages, 54:45 page 493 listen. Nothing reaches so fully 54:52 down to the deepest motives of conduct 54:58 as a sense of the pardoning love of Christ nothing 55:05 and what is this love reaching down into. 55:07 Is this just to make us feel warm and fussy 55:10 and sentimental. What is this say? 55:12 It reaches down to the level of the motives 55:19 for our conduct. What drives you, what drives me? 55:23 You wake up in the morning what are the driving 55:28 motivations? While this statement says nothing, 55:31 nothing in all the universe reaches so fully 55:35 down to the motives of the conduct as a sense 55:38 of departing love of Christ. All this words 55:40 from page 478 of the same book Desire of Ages listen, 55:44 the contemplation of the love of God manifested in his son 55:49 will stir the heart and arouse the powers of the soul 55:57 like nothing else can. Right. To the degree that you 56:05 and I take into our minds and hearts in understanding 56:11 of God's love for us will be precisely the degree 56:17 to which we are then made able to love him in return. 56:22 We love God for only one reason my friends 56:25 and that is because he first loved us. 56:29 First John 419 and so we are called upon 56:33 through scripture to behold what manner 56:36 of love the father has restored upon us 56:38 that we should be called as sons and daughters of God. 56:44 That doesn't yet now appear what we shall be, 56:45 but we know this that when he appears 56:48 we will be like him for we shall see him as he is 56:55 and it is that beholding action that produces 57:00 the likeness to him in our hearts and lives. 57:05 It is as if you and I are strategically positioned on 57:10 a sofa in a room and the most beautiful person 57:14 in the whole universe is just walk through the door. |
Revised 2014-12-17