Oh, he's shy. Okay, Ephesians chapter one. But pray for everybody that we feel, we all gotta be feeling better by next week. We gotta, we gotta go preach in front of Planned Parenthood. To both sides of Planned Parenthood, the Catholic, Roman Catholic, ecumenical, a week from Friday, what they call Good Friday. No, a week from this Friday. No, take off next Friday. Take off both of them, why? You got plenty of days. Be like Ryan, he took off a year. Ryan hasn't went back yet, he's... Do they remember you at all? Are you back there right now for the end of the year, or end of the month stuff? No, sorry, what's that? And then you're off again? For how many days? We're happy for you. I was asking Lee if I could figure out a way to get paternity leave, and he said, you ain't getting nothing. He said, you're gonna work double. I'm not jealous. I'm happy for him. He got a track done, so we put him to work. That's good benefits right there, man. You didn't tell them that you were having the baby, right? Because I thought maybe they might make an exception for the whole transgender thing going on. They might have thought maybe you told them you were having a baby. Like, whoa, OK, hey. Sounds like you need some time off. That sounds like crazy, but it's really not with what's going on in this world right now. He did. Oh, no, no. You mean Ohio or whatever it is? Buttigieg or whatever his name is? Colorado. Oh, is he from Colorado? Oh, I don't care. I don't care where he's from. He's a pervert. That's gross. That's disgusting. Somebody said, why don't you preach in front of the Capitol? It's like, well, we don't have any problem with that. We'd love to. I'd like to. But we're going to go to Planned Parenthood for our next stop. So they're all going to love us. Like I was telling Paul earlier, is we're gonna go contend for the children that they're trying to murder their own children. We're gonna beg them not to kill their own children. Right? Isn't that something? Like, we care more about their children than they do. We're gonna go beg them, please don't kill your children. Isn't that an odd thing? Isn't that a strange thing? But we're gonna be the crazy ones. Oh, you guys are crazy. Yeah, I know, we don't want you to kill your babies. We are really crazy. Right? That's reality. Those people need to hear it. So we're going to give them Rialt. We're going to give them what all the psychotherapists, Planned Parenthood, the weird religious people on the other side that walk around with that opium thing that they swing around. And what's the other thing they have? They chant all the way while they're walking with their prayer beads in there. We'll give them the gospel, too, because they don't have it either. Right? What's that? They're worse, yeah. Yeah. All the people, they're leading to hell, right? That's why I got so mad today about somebody that was trying to make animals the same as humans. I got upset. I got angry about that. I was like, Jesus didn't die for animals. He died for men. He died for men. That's some messed up theology some of these people have out there. They need to know the truth of that. Hey, I think they should get rid of the assault weapons, too. You know which ones? The ones that are killing babies. Those are the assault weapons. Doctors, they ought to make them stop murdering babies. That's the assault weapon. You want to know, what do we have the number, what was it, Andrew, that number? 74 million in the world? 73 million a year? Yeah, that's 200,000 people, 200,000 babies worldwide a day. 200,000 babies a day. Those are reported. Reported numbers. No. No, it does not. It's performed abortions. Yeah, the number's way higher than that even. That's just what a woman goes into a clinic and has the baby murdered. That's what that number is. Doesn't count the morning after pills and the 10 days later and what's that other, are you for? Yeah, chemical, doesn't include that, I don't believe. It's the actual, because they want to make sure that you understand that this is the safe way that they do it. That's what that number is, that 70, that's on World-O-Meter. And then I cross-referenced that World-O-Meter with the CDC, oh no, the World Health Organization, which they're not ashamed, they'll tell you that they. No. That's their numbers, and that's their verified, that's just, there's more than that even, right? But just think about that. 200,000 babies on record a day that this world is murdering. 200,000. Yes, every day. Every day. So is there not a cause, right? Ephesians chapter one, verse number 18. Well, we're gonna try to think of something more pleasant here. As we switch gears here, we'll be in the place of dealing with that in a week from Friday here. And obviously we do it all the time. But I want you to think about something here that the Lord has showed us. It's about being heavenly minded and our eyes on our inheritance. And that's really what we're going to focus on. We're not actually going to focus on the actual inheritance and list everything that that is. We're going to do that next week, Lord willing. But what we're going to do this week is the importance of being heavenly minded. That we have our eyes on our inheritance. That we have our eyes on eternity. We have the right thinking in our hearts. Ephesians chapter 1 verse number 18, the eyes of your understanding being enlightened. That you may know what is the hope of his calling. That was last week we covered what is the hope of his calling. Now he has another phrase that he gives, and what the riches of the glory of his inheritance in the saints. and what the riches of the glory of his inheritance in the saints. And what is the exceed the next one will be in what is the exceeding greatness of his power to us were to believe according to the working of his mighty power. Amen. Let's pray. Father, please help us now as we go through the scriptures and help us to become more heavenly minded. In Jesus' name we pray, amen. That's impossible. You couldn't, the more heavenly minded you are, the more earthly good you will be to others. Absolutely 100%. God's people need to have their conversation in heaven. You've heard that there was a poet that said that, I'll get you who said that before, a philosopher and a poet, but way off, right? Their understanding is way off. There's no such thing as being so heavenly minded, you're no earthly good. It's the opposite. Many times we're too earthly minded We're no heavenly good when we're earthly minded, right? We're here to do God's will, then to go home. Did you know that? Boy, that's the simplicity of life, isn't it? That you and I, we are here to do God's will and go home. That's what we're here for. We're here to do our Father's will and then go home. Now, what is in the Father's will is vast, right? But that's what we're here for. Each one of us have a place and a part and multiple things that God has us to do before we go home. But that's why we're here. That's the only reason God spared us and saved us and washed us in his own blood, is for us to fulfill the will of God. That's why. What a blessing. He didn't save us just to say, well, I'll see you when you get to heaven, but here's my will, here's my book, follow it. Amen. So we continue with Paul's prayer for the Ephesian saints, and Paul wanted the eyes of their understanding to be enlightened, for them to know some things. We talked about that wisdom, inspiration, right? We talked about that revelation, knowledge, and understanding. That's all inspiration. to But there's some good things in that. We'll finish that up on on Sunday, that chapter. But what a what a good teaching that was. But it's consistent with the scriptures, because when you look, it's kind of interesting how God was showing me that, because before I read that book or the portions of that book on that, or maybe it was after it. I was studying Ephesians chapter one here and God was showing me that his spirit working with our spirit was showing me those things already. And then I'm going around the scriptures and all of a sudden I'm matching it up with that and I'm reading that again and that's God bearing witness of that, right? And teaching us and showing us. You know, if you'll believe God's word, he'll teach you from this book and he'll make everyone else that denies this book look like a bunch of fools. But he'll give you everything you need from this book right here. The one in my hands, this King James Bible right here. Make sure you understand that. Amen. That's important. But we look at Paul's prayer. Paul knew that if they knew some things from the spirit of God, and they were given that spirit of knowledge, revelation, understanding, that it would go a long way in helping them live in this world. They would grow in the Lord. God would bless them. One man said it this way, If we perceived more clearly the riches of the glory of the inheritance to which we are called, we would be well content with food and raiment, and a covering over our heads while here. We would have more of the spirit of those who took joyfully the spoiling of their goods, knowing that they had in heaven a better and an enduring substance. We wouldn't cling so tight, would we? In that sense, we would cling tight to God and less to the things of this life. So number one, Paul's prayer was for them to be heavenly minded. He wanted them to think about heaven. You and I don't think about heaven enough in this life. We really don't. We're heaven bound, right? With a hammer down, like my friend Shay says. But a sincere question, how often do you think about heaven? How often do you think about being with the Lord and spending eternity with Jesus? How often do you think about the inheritance that awaits you? Not very often. We're so busy with life running to and fro and getting here that we don't really think too much about what we have in store for us, our inheritance, that God has for us. How often do you meditate on heaven? How often do you meditate on the promised inheritance that is yours? I think it's a good question. I think we get so fixated on our trials here that rarely we are heavenly minded. Right? We've heard that phrase before, that a person is so heavenly minded, they're no earthly good. That's impossible. What sort of wretch would make up a comment like that? Well, one named Oliver Wendell Holmes, a poet. He made that up. He thought that it was a great idea, you know, that people would, you know, that people were too heavenly minded to be any earthly good. Well, that's antichrist. And then Johnny Cash used it in a song. He quoted it, right? like it's the gospel. But really it's an anti-Christ teaching of the core. It's impossible to be so heavenly minded as to be no earthly good. It speaks against the scriptures, it tells a different story altogether. Paul's prayer is that the eyes of our understanding would be enlightened to know what is the hope of his calling and what is the riches of the glory of his inheritance in the saints. We're going to get to that phrase of his inheritance, speaking of God, that we are God's inheritance. We are part of that. God said that. That's what that means there as well. There's a couple of different applications. But that's a wonderfully loaded statement there that Paul makes and that he prays for the Ephesians here. There are two main applications for it, and neither one of them are wrong. They're both right. One is saying that it is talking about His inheritance to the saints. That's us. We are God's inheritance, which is no problem. Then there is us being heavenly minded to understand our inheritance that awaits us. I think you could apply both to that. Because later on, he's going to talk about the riches of his glory. He's going to talk about the inheritance all over the scriptures. If you study that word inheritance, you will find it's all over the New Testament. And it's Paul that is really explaining the inheritance that we have awaiting us. Paul is given the revelation of the mystery, right? To tell us what happens. What's the rest of the story, right? Paul got to see it. That's right. He got to go up there and see it. You see, we must get to that understanding of what God wants us to have. Not just an intellectual understanding, but a spiritual one. That spiritually we would have eyes to read God's Word and let God's Spirit feed us through His Word and teach us what it is that our inheritance is. The problem is we have broken and fallen minds. and our thinkers don't work right. You would think that you would automatically meditate and think about your inheritance, but that's not true. What your mind is prone to automatically do, what our minds are prone to do, is think about depravity. Because they're depraved and we have to walk in the spirit so we don't fulfill the lust of the flesh, amen? Turn to Romans chapter 12. But Jesus said to us, or the Apostle Paul said to us, he said, let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus. In Romans chapter 12, remember, Paul is correcting our thinking. He's saying, it's not that you're not separated or that the first thing I want you to understand about all these doctrines that I just taught you. Remember, we reviewed this, I don't know, a couple months ago, maybe or so, maybe three or four. But we talked about all the doctrines of Romans chapter one, all the way through Romans chapter 11. And then he gets to 12 and he's saying, well, now it's time to apply what you've learned. Now it's time to apply these doctrines. But what you have to do in order to take a doctrine and apply it, is not this. The first thing you should do is not, again, think, how do I feel about this? No, it's what do I believe about this? Because that's what it's about. It's not about what you feel, it's about what you believe about it. It's about the truth of the scriptures. Romans 12.1, 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, and be not conformed to this world. But be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God. And that is the same will. That is describing the will of God. That's not, well, there's a good will of God. There's an acceptable will of God. There's a perfect will of God. No, that's all the same thing. It's describing, if it's good, it's perfect, right? If it's acceptable, it's the will of God. Amen. And that's, that's, that's the understanding that we ought to have about that. But what Paul is doing, he's praying for us to be heavenly minded. One of the ways to be more like Christ is to meditate on heaven. Paul's prayer was that we would have spiritual eyes to see, to get a glimpse of what awaits us in glory. We should look at reasons here why we should meditate on heaven in our inheritance. I think we could find some very interesting ones. Reason number one is that it brings us great comfort. God wants us to meditate on heaven and on our eternal inheritance that is coming because it gives us great comfort. Turn to Romans chapter 8, please. Romans chapter 8. God has designed this to give us comfort and for us to meditate on that. Paul said this in verse 18, For I reckon that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us. For the earnest expectation of the creature waiteth for the manifestation of the sons of God. We are waiting for what's ahead of us. We are waiting for that perfection. We have the earnest expectation Paul is explaining to us that the sufferings that you and I go through in this life, they are not worthy to be compared with what God has for us in the future, what our inheritance is. One of Paul's chief arguments in dealing biblically with the sufferings of this life is to think about and meditate on our inheritance. That's what God uses to sustain his people through there, is for you and I to meditate upon the glories of heaven and the inheritance that we have. We will suffer many things in this life. We will suffer many different trials and tribulations in this life, but you are to remember that God has something for you that is far more spectacular and an eternal weight of glory awaiting. What a help it is in times of distress for us to have forward thinking. to be thinking about the promises of God. We tend to get tunnel vision on our trials. And if we do that, it will sink us for sure. And when we feel as if we have no hope, God has provided a way in trials for us to have a continued hope. And that is to meditate on heaven and our inheritance, to fill our hearts and our minds up with heaven and the glories of the inheritance that await us. You know, Paul didn't feed them some kind of pipe dream that they weren't going through anything or they weren't having trials. Paul admitted to the Romans that things were bad. Man, it's rough out there. He wasn't preaching puppy dogs and rainbows to them. He's telling them, yeah, I know it's bad out there, but just remember that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us. You need to remember your future inheritance. You need to remember that you're going somewhere. That if your body, if you die, your soul goes to be with the Lord and you get your eternal inheritance. Paul wanted them to remember that, that no matter what, they suffered. Paul was a realist. Christians are realists. We're not, we don't live some positive power of thinking or power of positive thinking, one of the ways, I'll get in a second. I don't believe in it, as you can tell, but anyway, we don't live that. We don't live the Norman Vincent Peale life, right? We don't live that life. We're realists. We understand it's bad out there. that there's suffering, that there's trials and tribulations and heartaches and pain and death and murder and all kinds of evil things that befall us along the way until we get home. We're not fools, but we're realist. If things are bad and we're being persecuted, we can deal with it. We don't have to ignore it. We're not false psychologists that run around singing happy, happy, joy, joy all the time. and act like we're not in severe trials. Romans 8.20, verse 22, Paul continues this thought, he says, For the creature was made subject to vanity, not willingly, but by reason of him who hath subjected the same in hope. Because the creature itself also shall be delivered from the bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of the children of God. For we know that the whole creation groaneth and travaileth in pain together until now. And not only they, but ourselves also, which have the firstfruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting for the adoption, to wit, the redemption of our body. You know every morning you get up and you got some you have some back pain and man you got to get up or just remember one day you're not going to have any pain. Right? Just remember, one day you're not gonna have any sickness. You're not gonna have any sorrow. You need to remember that. You need to meditate on your future. You need to meditate on what God has promised you in eternity. Your inheritance, when you think, oh man, that back, it hurts. You need to say, praise the Lord, there's gonna be one day when this old body will be made new and I won't have any pain at all. I'll be in glory for all of eternity. Amen? I won't need a doctor because the great physician made it all things new. Right? When you wake up in the morning or wake up in the middle of the night and you suffer from anxiety or PTSD or depression or any of those other things and you have these terrible thoughts and everything else, you need to automatically take your mind to the scriptures and meditate and thank God that one day your mind will be perfect. It'll never be broken again. You'll never desire sin again. You'll never be tempted to evil again. But your mind will be new. You need to think about that, because that's the answer, friend, it is. One day, one time when this old body drops and my soul goes to be with the Lord, pain, sickness, sorrow, it's all over. The fight is over. We're done fighting. Jesus will do all the fighting there on out, right? We'll just stand with him and be made new. But he'll destroy evil with the word of his power. He'll take care of it all. It'll all be over then. Like that song says, it'll all be over someday, right? I like that song, Someday. Chris Stanzel sings that, it's a good song. Someday it'll all be over, right? You think about that next time when your mind, you know, I talked about this on my broadcast, but your mind has the effects of the fall, it's broken. Your body has the effects of the fall, it's broken. Right? Our hearts are affected by the fall. But one day, all that will be over. One day in God's time, you'll spend eternity to be with Him. And He'll make all things new. That's what you and I, that's comfort in this life. Now if you're not meditating on that, well you're not going to receive the comfort that God has for you. He has that comfort for you. He wants you to meditate on his word and meditate on his goodness. And not only they, but ourselves also, which have the first fruits of the spirit, even we ourselves grown within ourselves, waiting for the adoption to with the redemption of our body. Paul, he's talking about the resurrection, right? He's talking about the magnificence when God makes your body new, right? Second Corinthians four. Verse number 17 through 18, Paul picks up on the same theme. This is for comfort that he wants you to meditate on the future, he wants you to meditate on what God has for you, in severe trials for you to meditate on heaven and think about it. He says this, "...for our light affliction, which is but for a moment, worketh for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory." While we look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen. For the things which are seen are temporal, but the things which are not seen are eternal. When you and I look at these temporal things around us, everything's broken and fallen. We live in a fallen world. The only thing perfect is this book you have right here. Everything else is fallen. Everything else is broken, right? And the Spirit of God inside of you is perfect, but everything else is tainted. So He gave you, when He saved your soul, He gave you the Holy Ghost of God to seal you, and He gave you His perfect Word. And He said, now you live in it until you come home. Amen. But you meditate on those things for our light affliction. It's but for a moment. You're to look to the things ahead of you. Not with these eyes. But with the eyes of your mind, the eyes of your understanding being enlightened, what God gave you when he gave you the Holy Ghost, when he saved your soul and he gave you understanding, and you're to meditate on those things, you're to think about those things. Paul shows us that meditating on our future rewards goes a long way in strengthening us. In trials, you won't do that automatically. You will focus on the present distresses of this life, and you'll forget to focus on our heavenly inheritance. It's on our thinking, not our circumstances that need to change. It's our thinking. Your circumstances may always be bad. They will always be tainted in this life, but it's your thinking that must change. We must be renewed in our minds daily. It's because your circumstances are always going to be against the child of God in this life, for the most part. They're always going to be adverse. You're always going to go through trials. You're always going to have things that are not going to be the way that you would like them to be, that you're comfortable with. You will always have that. Expect that. It will be that way. But you and I are supposed to focus on the things that we cannot see. We're to think about the future. We're to think about what God has for us. We're to meditate on that. Paul said that in 1 Corinthians 15. He said, If after the manner of men I have fought with beasts at Ephesus, what advantageth it me, if the dead rise not? Let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we die. Paul says he was strengthened by thinking about the future. If I fight with beasts at Ephesus, if that's where I end up, if that's what I end up doing, so be it. My body is going to rise one day. So he wasn't too concerned about that in that sense. See, we are strengthened, or we will be strengthened, by remembering that we are to be heavenly minded. We're to be focusing on that. That's the first reason. If you want comfort in this life, if you want God to comfort your heart, if you want that, then you need to go to the scriptures. You need to do it God's way. You need to meditate on things of heaven. You need to. It will help you. Number two. Being heavenly minded helps us to be pure. Helps us to walk in purity. When I think about what God has for me, it helps me to be pure. 1 John 3, turn there please. Verse number one. It helps us to be pure. 1 John 3, verse number one. Behold what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us, that we should be called the sons of God. Therefore the world knoweth us not because it knew him not." Boy, there's a lot that we could stop right there and talk about, right? You wonder why nobody understands you. How come these people don't understand anything I'm saying to them? Well, that's why. They didn't know him. You think they're going to know you? They don't understand your words. We're going to stand outside that abortion clinic and we're going to preach the word of God to those people. And we're going to warn them to flee from the wrath to come. And we're going to warn them that they need to stop killing their babies because God's judgment will be upon them. We're gonna warn them of that, and you know what? They're not gonna understand what we're saying. They'll know they're guilty. They won't want to admit it. That's why we have to pray for them to be saved. But he goes on to say here, beloved, now are we the sons of God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be. But we know, but we know that when he shall appear, we shall be like him for we shall see him as he is and every man look at this that's that's an all-inclusive statement right there that he's about to make as to every born-again believer every man that hath this hope and every man that hath this hope in him purifies himself even as he is pure Every if you are a blood bought Saint of God, if you have repented and put your faith and trust in Christ, if you have been born again, if you have turned and trusted Jesus and you've and you've been led by the Holy Ghost of God to call upon the name of the Lord to be saved. Then you have this hope in you. And this hope purifies a man. You know, this is it's it's an amazing text, really, because when you think about it, I know what I was before I was saved. And I wondered why it was so easy for me to do the things I did when I was a lost man. Like, how could I, I didn't realize I was lost at the time. I didn't understand that, but I couldn't figure out why I could live like that and like continue and just, and hide it and do all, and just the way that I did it, it was just grievous and wicked. It was just vile. And God showed me why, because I was never born again. That's why. But you know what, when He saved me, man, you might sin, but you sure ain't gonna enjoy it. You sure ain't gonna live. You sure ain't gonna love it. And I'll tell you something else. You know that you're gonna be reproved by the Holy Spirit of God. He's gonna convict your conscience of your wickedness. He's gonna show you that you're wrong. He's gonna chasten you when you're wrong. And every man that hath this hope in him purifieth himself, Even as He is pure, every man, the hope that one day we will be completely like Christ, one day we will battle sin no more. One day those sins of the mind and heart will be gone, washed away, wiped away completely, made new in Christ. And we shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is. We'll be like Christ. That is a guarantee for the blood-bought saint of God. We shall see him and we shall be like him. Every man that hath this hope in him purifies himself. It has a purifying effect. To meditate on heaven and the coming of Christ and to meditate on the things of the future like that, and to meditate on who Christ is and his perfection and everything else, it has a purifying effect. To meditate on what we will be like someday. One person asked the question, I thought it was a good one, Martin Lloyd-Jones asked this question, he said, Could our lack of holiness be because we do not meditate on the future glory and inheritance that we have awaiting us? And our thoughts are so consumed with other things that we don't consume them with Christ. We don't consume them with the holiness of the Lord. We don't consume them with our future glory that God has for us. So then our minds have a lot of things to think about except Jesus. Right? We have a lot of, we could start getting distracted by the things of this life, right? Tangled up by the things. And so we're not meditating on Christ. You wonder what's wrong with my thought process? Well, let's start there. Are we being heavenly minded? Are we thinking on heaven? Are our affections set on things above and not on things in the earth? Where is my heart? For where your heart is, there will your treasure be. Where your treasure is, there will your heart be also. Right? If it's your treasure in heaven, then your heart will be there. Your affections will be set there. You and I ought to be thinking about that future. By the way, I'll tell you what has a purifying effect. Thinking that I'm going to see Jesus someday. Yeah. That's a sobering thing, isn't it? We're going to see Jesus someday. You understand that, right? You're going to stand before God one day. You're going to stand at the judgment seat of Christ someday as a child of God. You're going to stand before God one day. You're going to see Him face to face. What a purifying effect that has. Not because I'm afraid He's going to throw me in hell. I don't want to disappoint Him. That should be on your heart. Not because I'm afraid God's going to put me in hell. I know I've been saved by the blood of Jesus Christ. The point is, He saved me. What am I doing with my life? How could I waste and squander it? We don't want to disappoint the Lord. That is a purifying effect, doesn't it? Man, I got to think about that. You ought to think about seeing Jesus someday. You ought to think about the judgment seat of Christ. You ought to be heavenly minded and think about heaven one day. All the fleeting things that you and I think are of vast importance here, it's all going to turn to dirt. It's all going to get buried. It's all going to burn. It's all gonna burn. All of it is. Right? Only what we do for Christ will last. Everything else is just gonna burn. Where we live, our possessions, the whole world. He's gonna melt it with fervent heat. All of it. Are we meditating on that? Are we thinking on that? Turn to Hebrews chapter 12, please. I like what Martin Lloyd-Jones says about this. He said that we tend to think too much of salvation as our present situation and not the future glory that awaits us when we receive our inheritance. We think about now the present day salvation or the time that we trusted Christ as our Lord and Savior. And we think about that, but are we thinking about the future glory? Are you thinking about that you're going to spend eternity with Christ? Are you thinking about the future of what God has for you in the future? We think of salvation in terms of just here, right now. And many times we're so short-sighted, we don't think about the future. That we're marching to Zion, right? We're going home someday. This is not our home. God will make sure you don't get too comfortable in it. Amen. You know why disappointments come? You know why God allows all those things to happen? Because we get too comfortable. We're too comfortable with this life. We're too comfortable with everything. God makes us uncomfortable to remind us, wait a minute, this ain't your home. Hebrews chapter 12, verse number one, Jesus, had the same argument as Paul when it comes to dealing with suffering and dealing with the things of this life and understanding them, right? And the purity that comes with that. Hebrews 12, wherefore seeing we also are compassed about was so great a cloud of witnesses. Let us lay aside every weight and the sin which does so easily beset us. Every weight, every sin. And let us run with patience the race that is set before us. Yeah. Forward thinking. It really is what God has commanded his children to have. Let me tell you something. I'm going to remind you of this. A gross waste of time. I want to remind you of a very gross waste of time. I think that it is one of the things that you and I will suffer so much loss for at the judgment seat of Christ if we don't get a handle on this now and really remember this. As you turn it around looking behind you and thinking about all the mistakes you made and looking behind you at the past and being concerned more with the past than the future where you're going. You're turning around looking at all the mistakes you made and everything else. Well, brother, the race is this way. Where are you going? You can't be running. You can't run. Turn around looking the other way. You're to be pressing toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus. If you failed yesterday, then keep pressing on. If you fail today, you keep pressing on. Our race is forward. Onward, Christian soldier, right? Onward. Onward and upward. Not behind you. The perfect, mature Christian is the one that is thus-minded. He is minded by that. He is thinking of eternity. He is thinking that he is running a race. And it's forward. It's not backwards. And when God's people run back, try to run forwards, They're in trouble when they're looking backwards. Paul warned us of this. He says the same thing in Philippians. In verse number 10, he says that I may know him and the power of his resurrection in Philippians 3.10, and the fellowship of his sufferings being made conformable unto his death, if by any means I might attain unto the resurrection of the dead, not as though I had already attained, either were already perfect, but I follow after, if that I may apprehend, that for which also I am apprehended of Christ Jesus. Brethren, I count not myself to have apprehended, but this one thing I do. Now that always stuck out to me. I think I've preached on that 10 times in my ministry, because that has always stuck out to me. When Paul said, this one thing I do, man, I better pay attention to that. Cause if there's, cause Paul's the apostle to the Gentiles. And if there's one thing, That Paul does. It's pretty serious. I better pay attention to what it is, don't you think? Now here's a man that had a very troubled past. You might have done some really nasty things in your life, and I've done some really nasty things in my life that I'd be ashamed. Paul's are written in here. I'm glad mine aren't. Well, they are somewhere, but you know what I mean. Not with my name attached to them, praise God, right? Jesus forgave him, but you know something? I don't want anybody to know the nasty things I've done in my life when I was a lost man. When I ran in the world, when I did all the things that I did, and even things I've done as a saved man, I wouldn't want people to know. That's why I told Jesus, amen, and confess those sins to the Lord. But I wouldn't want anybody to know those things. But you know what? Paul murdered people. He had to live with that. I think it's one of the reasons he wanted to go home to be with the Lord. He's like, oh, you're gonna kill me? Okay, good. I'm gonna get out of here. Not because he wasn't forgiven, he knew he was forgiven, that's why he wanted to go home. He's like, I'm gonna go home. Because his mind, it was troubling to him. It was troubling to him. Look what he says here. He says, brethren, I count not myself to have apprehended, but this one thing I do. Forgetting those things which are behind. You gotta let them go. And reaching forth under those things which are before. See, it's not enough that you're not, that you just forget those things that are behind. You gotta be reaching for something. You've got to be reaching. You've got to be moving forward. You've got to be thinking about heaven. You've got to be thinking about your inheritance. You've got to be thinking about why God saved you in the first place, to bring honor and glory to his name, to make your life a trophy of his grace. That's why he saved you. See, God's going to make something out of our lives, not for our sake, for his. You understand that? It isn't so we can pin something on our chest. It's because God gets the glory what He does with our lives. That's why He's not going to fail us. Because He doesn't fail. He's going to make sure that your life brings Him glory. And if that means He's going to take you home earlier, then He'll take you home earlier. Amen! So he goes on to say, but this one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind and reaching forth under those things which are before, I press. That's not, he's not, you know, like skipping. Right? He's not meandering. He's talking about, he's talking about a race, right? He's talking about a fight. He's talking about moving forward. He's talking about a runner running and pressing towards, he's pressing in. That's what he's doing. And reaching forth out of those things which are behind. I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus. And notice what he says about that. Let us therefore, that's us, the children of God, as many as be perfect be thus minded. If in anything, you be otherwise minded, God shall reveal even this unto you. If you're not walking, what a neat, by the way, he's not talking about walking sinless. He says perfect minded. Complete, mature. The mature Christian does not get tangled up by the past and continue there. The mature Christian presses on and realizes, not that we overlook things that we've done or we don't make things right. I'm not talking about that. I'm saying after all those things are done, what do we do? We press on. We move on. You press on. You can't do anything about what you did before, but you can do something about what you do now. And living in a place with your mind into someplace that you can't do anything about is a waste of time. It's not logical either. And it will lead to death. That's where it leads. You gotta press on. You gotta press forward. That's what Paul is saying. And that's what he's saying in Hebrews chapter 12 here. But he's saying here, where are your eyes at? Wherefore seeing we also, in Hebrews 12, wherefore seeing also, we are seeing we also are encompassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses. Let us lay aside every weight. Can't run with a lot of weights. Holding you down. And the sin which does so easily beset us. Whatever that is, it's different for every man. That's why it's not listed. It's the one that takes us easily, that we easily fall for. And let us run with patience the race that is set before us. Looking, here it is. Here it is. Here's what he's telling you. You ought to be heavenly minded, looking unto Jesus, the author and the finisher of our faith. And he shows us that this is exactly what Jesus did as well. Paul's not just instructing us to do this because it's a great idea. He's instructing under the inspiration of the Holy Ghost for us to do this because Jesus did this. who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross. See, Jesus looked past the suffering or through it to the joy that was set before him. That's what he looked for. That's what he looked at. That's what he remembered. That's what he was going for. Who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame. and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God. For consider him that endured such contradiction of sinners against himself, lest ye be wearied and faint in your minds. You know what? For consider him that endured such contradiction of sinners. You're going to go out there in a week and we're going to go preach out there and we're going to endure what? Such contradiction of sinners. That's what you're going to endure. You need to endure it anyway, patiently, right? We need to be patient and endure it and not be wearied and faint in our minds. You know what? You'll get weary if you forget that you're supposed to have your eyes on heaven. You're to have your eyes on Jesus. You're to remember what Jesus, you'll get weary. We'll be like, man, I don't want to do this. Right? This is, this is vexing. Yeah, it is. But we ought to, we have to, you know what, they're going to try to shame us and you know what we need to do? Despise the shame. Think very little of it. Insignificant of it. That's what Jesus did. He hung naked on the cross for me and he despised the shame. With blood. You think about that. Jesus looked past the terrible present afflictions that he was facing. He looked forward to the joy that was set before him. Heaven, going back to his father. You and I, we have a race to run, and we are encompassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses, and we are to run the race that is set before us. We are headed to glory, and our eyes need to be on heaven. We need to be focused on glory. We need to be focused on our inheritance, and we will come to someday. John 17 5. Jesus said it here, and now, O Father, glorify thou me with thine own self, with the glory which I had with thee before the world was. That's what, that's the glory. That's the joy that Jesus was thinking about. Then he would return to that glory, right? Then he'd go home to be with his father and he'd be done with this world. Amen. That's what you need to remember as you, not that we overlook what we have to do or our responsibilities. No, it's with our responsibilities. We do it with the right spirit and attitude and meditating upon Jesus, upon heaven, upon our eternal inheritance that awaits us. We don't lose sight of that, why we're doing what we're doing, and where we're headed. John 17, 24, Father, I will that they also, whom thou hast given me, be with me where I am, that they may behold my glory, which thou hast given me. For thou lovest me before the foundation of the world. Colossians 3, turn there please, verses 1 through 7. Again, Paul is speaking again of being heavenly minded, thinking about heaven, thinking about our eternity with Jesus. Colossians 3.1, If ye then be risen with Christ, seek those things which are above, where Christ sitteth on the right hand of God. Set your affection on things above. Now remember, the heart is the seat of all emotions and affections. So when he says, set your affection, it's your heart. That's what he's telling us to fix our heart, to fix our mind, to fix our hearts on heaven. Set your affection on things above, not on things in the earth, for you're dead. And your life is hid with Christ in God. When Christ, who is our life, shall appear, then shall ye also appear with him in glory. Remember, so when Christ appears, remember, think about that. One day you're going to be with Christ. One day you're going to be just like him. When he shall appear, then shall ye also appear with him in glory. said he goes on to give us instructions because of that mortify therefore your members which are upon the earth fornication uncleanness in order and affection evil concupiscence and covetousness which is idolatry for which things sake the wrath of God cometh on the children of disobedience in the which he also walked sometime when he lived in them So then we are to look forward, we are to have our hearts and minds set on glory. One man said it this way, it's like the needle on your compass set to heaven. Paul wanted the eyes of our understanding being open that we may know what is the hope of his calling and what is the riches of the glory of his inheritance. The riches of the glory of his inheritance Says one, besides the heavenly inheritance prepared for the saints, there is a present inheritance in the saints. For grace is glory begun and holiness is happiness in the bud. There is a glory in this inheritance, riches of glory, rendering the Christian more excellent and more truly honorable than all about him. And it is desirable to know this experimentally and to be acquainted with the principles, pleasures, and powers of the spiritual and divine life. We must remember that we are God's inheritance. We belong to the Lord Christ. We belong to the Lord. We're not our own. One man said it this way, and what the riches of the glory of his inheritance in the saints, the saints themselves are the Lord's portion and the lot of his inheritance. That's us in whom he is and we will be abundantly glorified. But here it rather seems to design the heavenly inheritance before spoken of. of which the spirit is the earnest. Remember he said the earnest. He's giving us the spirit. He's sealing us. We have that part of that inheritance in us. That's the Holy Ghost of God. He is our down payment for our inheritance. God says, you're my son. Here's my spirit. So you never forget that. Amen. Here's the down payment. Here's the earnest on your future inheritance. The spirit is the promise. Do you understand that? God's spirit is the promise. He is called the Holy Spirit of promise. He is your promise from God. That's why he gave you his spirit, the earnest, right? That God will fulfill that which he begun in you, that good work, which he begun in you. He will perform until the day of Christ. That's his promise. That's the inheritance that God says, here's my spirit. God has an inheritance in the saints and they have an inheritance in and from God. For if they are his children, then they are also heirs, heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ. Romans 8 17. The term God's inheritance in the saints is used to show the greatness and grandeur of it. It is His inheritance, because He is the divisor and He is the author of it. And let it not be overlooked that His inheritance, as the Father of glory, emphasizes the surpassing excellence of it. It is God's inheritance, yet the saints are the heirs of it, that it is designated, and inheritance announces that it is a free gift, which we can do nothing to earn or merit. It is an inheritance of God's own planning, preparing, and bestowing. A.W. Pink said, The eyes of our understanding are not truly enlightened unless we discover what is the hope of the internal inheritance to which we are called. One understood it as the inheritance appointed for those who are renewed by the Spirit of God, that they might more clearly see and fully believe those good things which they shall enjoy hereafter. It is the abundance and greatness of that inheritance of which God is the author. Whether we regard it as God's inheritance or the Christians, it comes to the same thing, in effect, for it is displayed in the saints. It's ours. He put it there. We are His inheritance. According as God has glory in the saints, they must be glorious, just as the glory of a king is exhibited in the glory of his attendants. God regards the glory which the saints shall have. as meaning that God himself is the inheritance of the saints. This will constitute the ineffable bliss and blessedness of heaven. That God himself will be our all-absorbing and eternally satisfying portion and heritage. What did God say to Abraham? I am thy shield and thy exceeding great reward. That's what he's saying to us, right? The same thing. He is our shield and our exceeding great reward. What a marvelous and inconceivable prospect that the saints will possess God Himself, that the Redeemer will yet say to His people, Enter thou into the joy of thy Lord. Amen. For a man enters into his inheritance when he actually takes possession of the same. Each saint will exclaim, The Lord is the portion of mine inheritance, in thy presence is fullness of joy. That's what we have. We're waiting for that, right? We're waiting. One day, we will be home with Him. One day, we will see Him face to face. One day, we will have our inheritance for all of eternity. Amen. If we were more occupied With those pleasures forevermore, which are at God's right hand, we would run with patience the race set before us, and be less cast down by the petty sufferings and sorrows of the way. If heaven were more real to us, we would be more earnest in seeking to walk as those journeying to it, and we would long more ardently for Christ to come and take us there. Amen. That's God's promise. That's the inheritance. That's the glory. Now, we didn't even talk about the inheritance. We're talking about being heavenly minded. We'll actually talk about the inheritance next week. But what we need to talk about is remember to have the right mindset. It is the mind that God wants. It's our thinking that God wants us to always be renewed in our minds, in our hearts. He wants us to always have the proper thinking. Right? That's what preaching does. It helps us to get, you know, it helps us to go back to proper thinking, right? To focus our mind and heart on proper thinking. That's what, that's just the word of God. That's what it does, right? So when you read your Bible and you meditate on God's word and you read your Bible and you pray, you are getting your thinking to be spiritually minded. You're thinking heavenly minded. So you can't, you know what? That's why you need to take this book out and you need to pray. You need to be heavenly minded so you can be some earthly good. Right? Every day you go out is a war. It's a battle. And the world is raging against us and our minds and our hearts and the fallen nature that we still possess in us that we have that doesn't possess us, but it is in us, right? We have it. It is with us. But that fallen nature, the flesh is going to war against the spirit and the spirit against the flesh, as Paul told us in Galatians. You know, Paul told us that so we wouldn't get confused, because Paul is dealing with the Galatians being bewitched by a bunch of legalizers and a bunch of Judaizers that want to bring them back into the law and put them under bondage. What Paul reminds him is, oh, don't forget, there's a battle between the flesh and the spirit until you go home. So he reminds them of that, to comfort them so they don't think, oh my goodness, if I'm not sinless, I must not be God's child. Oh no, you're going to have a battle. You're going to have a war. It's not an excuse to sin. It's a reason to do right. But he explains to us, he shows us that the war is on, the fight is on. But he also explains this when these sorrows and these things come, our thinking needs to be right. You know, when you, the battle is won or lost in the mind. I'm gonna say that again to you. The battle of whatever trial you're in is won or lost in the mind. Before your hands do anything, before you sin against God with your flesh or your body or anything else like that, the battle starts in the mind. It's a war in the mind. And if you don't have your armor on and you don't have the right thinking, if your mind is not being renewed daily with the scriptures and not in Romans chapter 12, if your thinking is not fixed to think like Jesus, to think like Christ, then guess what? You're going to approach a situation worldly. You're going to look at this situation, your solutions will be worldly. And you're going to be, then you're being conformed to this world. instead of being transformed by the renewing of your mind. So being heavenly minded and meditating on heaven, what it does is it helps us to remember where we're going and whose son we are, whose daughter you are as a child of God, whose you belong to. When I think about the future and I'm going home to my father's house, in my father's house are many mansions. I'm going home to my father's house. I must never forget whose son I am. Who's I belong to? I'm not my own. I'm bought and paid for with a price. I walk through this world as a stranger and a pilgrim like Jesus did. And then I go home. But I have to remember that my thinking has to be right. I can't think like they do. I can't be conformed to them, but I need to be transformed by the renewing of my mind. That means I've got to think like Christ always. I approach every situation, everything that I approach, I want to approach it biblically. I want to be thinking biblically, meditating biblically on things like that. Is this a Christian's answer? Is this God's answer for this situation? Or am I thinking like the world? And the only way I can do that continually, to be in that mindset, is let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus. And that means that I'm following the scriptures, and I'm meditating on heaven in the future. You're not going to have a good spirit and a good attitude if you're meditating on the evil of this world, if that's where your heart is all the time, if that's what you're focused on. Yes, the world's going to impact you. It's going to impact all of us. It has that effect. But our thinking has to be scriptural. Our thinking, we need to be heavenly minded so we can be some earthly good. Amen? All right. Father in heaven, Lord, Thank you for the book and thank you for its teaching and your teaching. Thank you for the Holy Spirit, the down payment so we never forget whose we belong to. And Father, please save the lost in this room, online, wherever they may be, Lord. Bring them to repentance and faith in Christ and strengthen your children. Help us to be heavenly minded so we can do some earthly good for your glory and honor. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen.