Good morning, welcome to Teaching Others Also. We're going to do another building block of your faith. It'll be number five, and it's in Genesis chapter two, verse 15 to 17. And the Lord God took the man and put him into the garden of Eden to dress it and to keep it. And the Lord commanded the man saying, of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat. Every tree, okay? But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it, for in the day that thou eatest thereof, thou shalt surely die. If you would also look back at verse nine of this chapter, this is significant also, verse nine of this chapter. And we'll pick it up in verse eight. And the Lord God planted a garden eastward in Eden, and there he put the man whom he had formed. and out of the ground made the Lord God to grow every tree that is pleasant to the sight and good for food. The tree of life also in the midst of the garden and the tree of knowledge of good and evil." Would you mark that tree of life where it's at? It's in the midst of the garden. It wasn't hidden. It was in plain sight. It was where man, Adam, could get to it. Later on in chapter two of Genesis, we find that the Lord God brought the animals before man, and he had him name them, okay? And after he had him name the living creatures, then he made him help me, called Eve, and from that time forward, it's been man and woman. So what God did was he took man, put him in this perfect environment, And in this condition, we're going to say, we'll call man innocent. Okay? He's innocent. He does not know how to do evil. He only knows good. But, if he partakes of something called the tree of knowledge of good and evil, if he takes of that, then he's going to know how to use facts, numbers, words, both good and evil. Okay? Now, The entrance of that is going to bring death. That's what's going to happen the day they're eaten. It's not God who's going to kill Adam's spiritual life and physical life later. It's this knowledge is called sin. Okay. Romans five is a place to mark. We're going to turn there later, but we want to get through this expediently. And we're going to talk about the law of Lordship as a building block of your faith. And I need you to really focus to get what this law of lordship is built upon. For example, in chapter one, chapter two, at the beginning of it, he rested on the seventh day. God gave a day. Here, God gave one tree that they were not allowed to eat. They could eat up every other tree freely. Okay? Freely. It's important to understand that he said freely, verse 16 of chapter two of Genesis, thou mayest freely eat. No works, no promises, no anything, just eat of it. And one of them in the midst of it, verse nine, is the tree of life. So here's this incredible environment in which they did not have to dig anything or eat anything out of the ground. You cannot avoid God's plan now and God's laws after the fall, but they could. they could have eaten of that tree of life and lived eternally. So we're going to talk about the law of lordship and basically there is always one thing that makes for lordship. There's always one thing. Number one, one thing represents all things. He said you could freely eat even if it was a tree of life safely because of what they did not eat. You see, it's important for us to understand that when they gave God lordship over that tree of knowledge of good and evil, okay, they were actually giving him lordship over all the rest because the one tree that he forbade them to eat of was that tree. Now, why is that significant? Because God is Lord as long as he has lordship of the thing that he says, I want lordship over. So one thing represents all things. In Mark chapter 10, this man came and your Bible says that after he had talked with the Lord Jesus Christ, asked him what he could do to inherit eternal life. And if you'll study your Bible a little bit, you'll find that he was not talking about getting to heaven. He's talking about an inheritance in eternity. And child of God, that's what you should want. You should want what Jesus said, lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven. You should want to be blessed in heaven because it's a sign, an indication, it's a mark that you were obedient to God in this life and followed him by faith. That's the whole purpose of it. And so he said, then Jesus beholding him loved him. After what he said, you know, there's none good, but one that is God. And he said, thou knowest the commandments, do not commit adultery, do not kill, do not steal, do not bear false witness, defraud, not honor thy father and thy mother. He answered and said to him, master, all these have I observed from my youth. Jesus did not correct him. So he'd done all those things. Then Jesus beholding him, loved him. So he's about to tell somebody he loves something. Loved him and said unto him, ready? One thing thou lackest. Go thy way, sell whatsoever thou hast, give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in heaven. So you know he's talking about treasure and inheriting eternal life. And come take up the cross and follow me. And he was sad at that saying and went away grieved. Why? Because he only had 50 bucks? No, for he had great possessions. Now, why is that significant? It was one thing. One thing thou lackest. Now, this is a universal principle among life on Earth. Okay? His one thing was the thing. Let me give you an example. You may not have ever worked with livestock. We'll take horses. I did. I grew up with them and throughout my life have spent time with horses. It's not where the horse will obey you that is the issue. It's where he won't. And the reason is he's so big and strong. See, God gave you a will, and much of this hyper-Calvinism is wrong. It doesn't mean that your will's stronger than God's. It does mean, though, that it's very strong and powerful in this life, and you can break your full neck. And God is not behind those who break their full neck. He may very well allow it, and we know He does. But God is not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance. And they have to tamper with the Bible to teach what they teach. See, we're not over here with ultra man's will, but we're also not over here where God predestines man's will. So with that creature, let's take the horse. It's not where he will obey me that makes him a good horse. It's where he won't obey me that makes him a bad horse. If he will go but not stop, well, yikes, man. Help, I've seen it. Been on them, okay? Runway horses with a rider on them is a bad thing. If he will stop but not go, then when that steer comes out of the chute, you're gonna miss your throw and you're gonna miss everything. Years ago, I was with a fella and he loaned me a horse. He was wanting me to learn to do team roping with him, and he was a good cowboy already. And the horse he put me on was older, and he was a good horse. He was a good horse. He was a smart horse, but he lacked motivation out of the box. And so you'd get everything ready, and you'd have your rope ready and yourself ready, and when you're learning, that's about all you need to be thinking about, but then sometimes he didn't want to move. And so by the time you got him to move or by the time you exercise the energy to get him to move, then you're discombobulated and the show is over. And I've thought before about how many times has the Lord said to somebody to do this? Today's, it's 2017, it's March and I believe it's March 28th, 2017. And today's chambers is about that, obeying God instantly. You take Cain and Abel, what was the problem? Lordship was one thing, one thing. Bring a lamb, an innocent lamb, bring a lamb. You see, God has to deal with us on individual, isolated things. And this is where many stop short, or they bolt, as we say, as a horse does, gives them, or they quit, or they cut out, or they buck God. Why? It's one thing. With training, with teaching, with coaching, it is the one thing. You take somebody who's passive-aggressive, and someone doesn't see them as being resistant, oh yeah, all you gotta do is mention or instruct them in that one thing and watch them. For example, we had a young kid, and my boss's thing, we had guys working for us building, and you had these long four-by-twos, two-by-fours, and you could run with two or walk with four. and he would always walk with two. Needless to say, he didn't last very long. Why? Because when you told him, hurry up and bring those nails or bring that nail gun over, he'd slow down. He just hated authority. But it didn't look like it outwardly because he was passive aggressive. Now, why is it so important for us to understand this idea of one thing represents all things? Because this is how God works also. It's how salvation works. See, Romans 5 describes this fall, and he said, if by one man's offense, death reigned by one, and it did. And we won't expound this, but the point of it is, is by one man, sin entered the world, and death by sin, And so death passed upon all men, for that all sinned. For as by one man's disobedience many were made sinners, so by the obedience of one shall many be made righteous." Many is a qualitative number there. It's not an exclusionary conversation. What is the point of that? The point is that Adam's sin was about one thing. The one thing, God said, do not touch it. Do not touch it. Don't. Do not eat it, is what God said, okay? I'm saying do not touch it, as in, leave it alone. Not adding to the word there. We know Eve did that, but I'm just saying, leave it alone. Like, do not eat it. Secondly, one thing can cost you all things with God, and with people. Sometimes a Christian, has a fault or maybe a quirk and it costs them nothing with God. But there's other times a Christian has one thing with God and it costs them everything with Him. I think immediately of King Saul. King Saul was humble when he was called. He was hesitant when he was called. He honored those around him when he was called, okay? But then he got to believing what people were saying about him and doing things in the energy of the flesh. I tell you, it is not insignificant that Paul said, not a novice, let's be lifted up. I can think of three young men today, right now. They're still young. They're in late 20s, two of them, one of them's in their 30s. They've been lifted up and they don't realize it. Their preaching is full of themselves. The average Christian church promotes it because the average Christian church is full of themselves and they need a hero right now. They want to believe. They're desperate to believe that as old timers pass on these young ones. You know what's amazing to me? that they're missing what God always did. You know what God always did? Let's say a fellow's 65 or 70, which is about that time that things start wearing down the body and everything. Do you know what God has always done in the past that he witnessed to? He'd take somebody around 40, 45, maybe even 50, and put them behind that man, following up. He doesn't go all the way to the other end of the spectrum and bring somebody in that's gonna get lifted up. And here's why. Because one thing can cost you all things. You see, oftentimes, King Saul, you know what cost him? Was little disobediences that nobody else knew about but him and God and Samuel, the prophet. And it cost him everything. You think about King David. David did some crazy things. He did. The thing about David was, David was a good repenter. David was a man after God's own heart. So was it David's sin? Listen, he committed those two sins, adultery and murder, okay? and it hurt him and marked him and all that. But the difference is God never ever turned his back on David as such. You know why? Because when it came down to it, even that David was willing to give to God. David wanted God to have everything. King Saul was not willing to obey in the small things. You know, when King Saul got some good advice, King Saul was not willing to listen to those who gave him good advice. When King Saul obviously had enough proof to know David was not gonna turn on King Saul and take King Saul's life, that David was gonna leave it to God, he still didn't listen. That's why one thing can cost you all things. If someone's listening and you're in a church, in a marriage, if you're in a place of leadership, I promise you, if you're not careful, That thing that you keep neglecting because no one else is going to call you to task on it, and the others around you don't care if you give it to God, He's going to deal with you about it. And it could cost you all things with God. Oh, it's not going to cost you your ministry. Listen, Ananias and Sapphira, if God hadn't chosen to make a point out of them, no one else would have known. You say, well, what did they do? People were selling their land and giving the money to be distributed amongst the needs of people who were losing their jobs, poor, et cetera, outcasts because of receiving Christ. Ananias and Sapphira decided, we want to be in that group, but we don't have the faith or whatever. So they sold it, skimmed back apart, took it to the disciples, and instead of saying, look, we kept back some, but here's what we want to give, and just being honest, they lied about it. It was the lie, it was the deceit, it was the lack of faith behind closed doors that got him. One thing can cost you all things with God, and other people may not know it. Do you know, it wasn't until the end of King Saul's ministry that people could visibly know, but the people closest to him knew. People observing him knew and David knew. Yeah, I would adjure you, if you happen to be listening in ministry, I would heavily adjure you. You need to be careful of doing stuff in the power of your flesh. If you gauge it by people's responses, you could live in your flesh the rest of your life, after your flesh, the rest of your life in ministry, and no one know it till you get to the end. But it may cost you all things with God. And then one thing can give all the other things. You say, how? It's like this. Much of the abundant life for a New Testament believer is settling the one thing. In Acts 15, they named four specific things and said, start here. It's always a good start. Acts 15 is a good start for a Gentile believer, okay? And they said, abstain from these. That's giving God the one thing. Probably most Gentiles don't have all four things, but the similarities are there. You see, it opens up all other things. First Timothy six, verse 17, he gives a warning and he gives warnings about ambition. He gives warnings about they that will be rich. It's, you know, there's something that happens to us when we decide to listen to the modern line and many, many a professing Christian has this line in their life about, how God wants you to be wealthy and abundant and all that, and that's your business. But at the same time, at the same time, there is a great danger, and that danger is willing to be, desiring, doing what we do, okay? And the reason that's different, it says, he that will be rich, okay? They that will be rich fall into temptation and snare into many foolish and hurtful lusts, which drown men in destruction and perdition. For the love of money is the root of all evil." Some said, well, nothing wrong with money, that's true. But a lot of people are saying it, do love it. They still love it. They could not possibly part with it just like the rich young ruler. But here's my point, verse 18 of first Timothy six. That they do good, that they be rich in good works, ready to distribute, willing to communicate. Verse 19, laying up in store for themselves a good foundation against the time to come that they may lay hold on eternal life. What is the context? Okay, those are 18, 19, but it's verse 17 I want you to understand. Charge them that are rich in this world, that they be not high-minded nor trust in uncertain riches, ready? but in the living God, which giveth us richly all things to enjoy." And we all agree on that, he does. He gives us all things richly to enjoy, okay? Now, here's the key. One thing can give all the other things. If I can give the one thing, the issue of my life to God, even if it's just a normal thing, if it's a thing that other people partake of. First Timothy six, verse 12. I'm sorry. First Corinthians six and verse 12. Okay. All things are lawful for me. Okay. But all things are not expedient. All things are lawful for me, but I will not be brought into the power of any. And it's very important to understand that God knows what those things are and he gives them to us. You want to write a reference down, it's 1 Corinthians 10, 23, same book. All things are lawful for me, but all things are not expedient. All things are lawful for me, but all things edify not. They don't build the believer. Now the abundant life gets slowed down, it gets choked, like a garden water hose when you pinch it, when we cling to or take back the one thing, okay? So in 2 Corinthians 5, he talks about that. He said, we thus judge, okay? The love of Christ constraineth us because we thus judge that if one died for all, then we're all dead. See the one, the all, and that he died for all, that they which live should not henceforth live unto themselves, but on him which died for them and rose again. Romans 12, one and two, I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, wholly acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service. So this law of lordship that starts in the very beginning of mankind on earth, it shows us that one thing represents all things, and one thing can cost you all things, and one thing can give all the other things. When you give the thing to God that you need to give to him, control over it, power over it, it may be lawful, 1 Corinthians 6 and 10. It may not be openly, actively sinful. You just say, Lord, it's yours. then what he does is he has lordship over us. It's where the horse refuses to obey me, that's the issue. It's where the horse is out of control. Years ago, in Australia, we're down in the snowy mountain country, and we were gonna use horses to move some sheep and stuff, and there was somebody else's horses. So they brought them out, And the young girl that was in charge of them got them ready. And we started loading up, saddling up. And this one horse would not do. I mean, if you touch the reins, it would go the opposite direction. And it wasn't the rider's fault. And finally, the girl in charge asked the rider to get off in no uncertain terms and snatch the bridle and snatch the saddle off and slap that horse on the rear end and send it out to the pasture. She said. That horse does this every time, she said in more colorful language, of course. And I grew up with these animals, horses. And I said, maybe it's because you do that every time. You know, that horse knew it was going to get its way. Now let me say this, getting your way is not a sign God's in it. I'm going to close with this this morning. There was a well-blessed, well-used pastor over in the United Kingdom. This is many years ago, many years ago. And he pastored a church, and it happened to be located geographically between two very well-attended, esteemed pastors. And there was times he struggled with his lot in life. God had really blessed him and stuff, but he, you know, he was in between these two places that were very well attended. One evening, he was sitting in front of the fireplace of his little hut, his little house, and in those days the only source of heat was the fireplace, and so he had his Bible in his lap and he dozed off. And he started dreaming a little bit, and a visitor let himself in and sat down in the chair across from him, and he said, I looked at him, he said, I just knew in my heart it was the Lord, or at least his messenger. And he said to me, where are the keys to your life? And he handed him a set of keys, it was in his dream, The Lord said, is this all of them? Are these all the keys? He said, yes. He said, are you sure this is your last chance? He said, no, there is one room. And so he took the key out of his pocket and handed it over. And that room for him was where he desired to not be stuck in the middle of these two pastors, as in geographically. And that night he gave it to God. And the Lord just gave him the abundant joy and peace that comes with surrendering that one thing that's there. And in a short period of time, the overflow from those other two churches filled his church also. And here's what I will say to you, by the way, that man that had to give that thing to God, I've read many of his sermons from the old days. I've not read one of the sermons of the fellows that were on either side of him. In other words, he being dead yet speaketh. Not only did God use him now, he used him later. Isn't it amazing that we cannot figure out God? So I would say to you, the law of Lordship, this is a thing where you have to frequently and routinely and faithfully say, Lord, is there one thing in the way here? As the longer you walk with God, the more it is just one thing that's in the way, your whole life's not out of whack. But I can tell you this, and I can tell you this recently. I know men who are doing the work of God, supposedly. And God is not bearing witness, but no one's going to tell them. But they've got something in the way, and most of it's usually some form of pride or stubbornness. You know what sometimes it is? Dear believer, in closing, sometimes you're afraid to trust God because it's gonna change your identity to yourself, and it's gonna open you up to have to grow in Christ, which usually means death to self. A seed cannot grow except it gets buried and drowned. And so I trust that you'll put this building block, the law of lordship, into your life, and that you'll maintain this law of lordship, this building block. And Lord bless you.