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Yes, I don't know. I think that's
the first time I've ever sung that song, but I enjoyed it.
That was good. Good song. I like that. I want to try and remember it,
but the problem is my memory is so poor. Well, we are in 1 John. I want to give you some good
news that we'll just share with you. And I hope Bob and Carol
don't mind. I'm sure they're watching. But
I text them to ask if they mind if I shared the good news. But
on the prayer sheet, we had Carol asking requests for opportunity
to witness to her aunt Katie, Kitty, and we had the privilege
of driving up, she's in a facility up in York, and she's not, she's
on the beginning stages of dementia, so she has good days and bad
days, and sometimes struggling a little bit there, and she's
in early hospice care, so don't know how much longer she's gonna
be with us, Carol was not 100% sure about her salvation. And
so Bob and Carol and I drove up there and were able to spend
some time with her. I think it was yesterday morning,
this week's been pretty full, but I think it was yesterday
morning that we went up and she was very alert. She had a very
good morning, she was already out of her room and up and around
and doing well and she was very alert and we got to sit and have
a conversation and you know, Carol watered many times. Carol had shared the truth of
the gospel with her, she had given her many tracts over the
years, she had printed out and handed her the plan of salvation,
all typed out, and just kind of as a letter from Carol, had
witnessed through her on numerous occasions. But Katie had never
made a response or made a decision for Christ, and yesterday, Carol
said, you know, I've talked to you about this many times, but
I was wondering if you would allow my pastor to sit and talk
with you for just a minute. And anyway, she graciously said
yes. And, you know, for the next few
minutes, we gave her God's simple plan of salvation and went through
that together. and she bowed her head and trusted
Christ yesterday morning. So we praise God for the decision
that she made and just a real victory and answer to prayer
in so many ways that Katie was having a good day and she was
there and alert and was following along, was definitely conscious
of what decision she was making. I have no question about that,
no doubt about it. On the way home in the car, I
told Bob and Carol, I said, you know, I know you couldn't see
it, but Katie was, Katie, I keep calling her Katie, Katie was
crying when I was talking to her about the fact that her sins
could be forgiven and she could be assured of a home in heaven
because of what Jesus did for her. And Bob says, you know,
I thought I could hear that in her voice. He said, I thought
I could hear that like how she was talking, but I wasn't sure.
And then Carol said, I've never seen a heart response from her. And all the times that I've talked
to her about it, there's never been a heart response. And I
said, well, she definitely had one today. And we praise God
that, you know, she understood and trusted Christ before it
was eternally too late. I know she's grateful for those
that were praying and that's a tremendous victory. And again,
I had the privilege of bringing increase, but really I want to
be sure you understand it's because of. Carol's ongoing testimony
with her and her ongoing planting that seed and planting that seed
and her desire to see her aunt come to the saving knowledge
of Christ is what brought that to fruition. So we are in 1 John
chapter three tonight. Hopefully you can get in the
word of God and turn to those pages. We've been studying 1
John just by simple way of review. I literally had no idea how this
was gonna transpire and I'm still not sure that we're going to
be able to continue this. I just don't know as I dig into
a passage of scripture. And as I began studying, just
right away, you know, it came to me the very first lesson,
you know, that he wrote this, that your joy may be full. And
I thought, well, this is a joyful life that God wants the Christians
to have. And so I titled our first lesson in this series in
1 John, The Joyful Life. No idea what the next. We studied
the joyful life, that's chapter 1, verses 1 through 4, and then
we looked at the honest life in chapters 1, verses 5 through
10, the satisfied life in chapters 2, 1 and 2, the consistent life
in chapters 2, 3 through 6, the shared life in chapter 2, verses
7 through 11, the sanctified life, verses 12 through 14, the
rejected life, verses 15 through 17, and the troubled life, 18
through 29. And, you know, this just, it's
neat to see how the Lord has put this together. And this evening,
we're gonna look at the first three verses, really focusing
on the first two, but I'm tying that third verse in, you'll see
at the conclusion for why I'm tying that in. But the third
verse is also gonna be included in next week's lesson. But want
to be sure that you see tonight, we're looking at the privileged
life. the privileged life. He says
here in chapter 3, verses 1 and 2, verses 1 and 2, the privileged
life. And we see, 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. Beloved, now are we the sons
of God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be, but we know
that when he shall appear, we shall be like him, for we shall
see him as he is. And every man that hath this
hope in him purifies himself even as he is pure. Werner Wiersbe
says about this passage of scripture that as we move into the second
half of the letter written by John, he is now dealing with
sonship. Emphasizing the fact that we
are born of God. Tying this passage together with
John chapter three and emphasizing the theme that God is love. He
gives us here five motivations for obedience. and I thought
I would hand these to you. Again, these are from Warren
Wiersbe, but in this chapter, we see five motivations for obedience.
I don't suspect I'm gonna be dealing with these specifically,
but I want you to see them. The first is God's love, that's
verse number one. God's return, he's coming again,
amen. God's return, verses two and
three. God's sacrifice, verses four through five. God's gift
of a new nature, verses nine through 18. and then God's gift
of a new spirit, verses 19 through 24. And he divides this chapter
up that way, looking at it as motivation for obedience to God. But what I want you to see this
evening as we look at this idea of a privileged life is that
we as God's people have access to and are blessed because of
the position that we have in Christ. because of the fact that
we are given a new family. We see here, first of all, that
we have a new family. He says, behold, what manner
of love the Father hath bestowed upon us that we should be called
the sons of God. that we should be called the
sons of God. First of all, I want to look
at that little phrase, what manner of love, and we could spend the
entirety of the lesson tonight. Some years ago, a couple years
ago, I preached a message specifically on the love of God. I preach
the entire message just dealing with the fact that we're loved
by God and and that God loves and cares for his own and seeing
the love of God as it's expressed in the word and as it is seen
in our own lives and and it's lived out. And ultimately, I
concluded that message. Well, what is the motivation
here? OK, we see this great love that we have from God. But what
do we get from that? And we're hopefully tonight going
to see that a little bit. But he says here, what manner
of love is this? Beloved, I wonder, could the
scope and the breadth of this love be described? And if so,
could we in our finite minds really be able to understand
it? Or maybe we are like John and just kind of saying, well,
what manner of love is this? I mean, the depth and the breadth
of this love that Christ has for us and how could we literally
describe it? Is there a list of things that
we could give? And I believe through the pages
of scripture, we could grab a hold of some things, but I mean, we
could not, you know, the songwriter said, hey, You couldn't, you
would exhaust the oceans dry. If every ocean was a quill, you
know, or a ink, it would all be gone, describing, talking
about the love of God. It is an indescribable and immeasurable
love. But beloved, the greater the
love, the greater the motivation for you and I. The greater the
motivation. And what a privilege it is to
be adopted into the family of God. What a privilege that has been
bestowed upon us that we should be called the sons of God. I
mean, from a practical standpoint, we look at in this world and
sometimes there are people of esteem or people of recognition
and, you know, they will adopt some, you know, this is not very, This is probably very poor typecasting,
and I certainly don't mean anything by it, but you know how in our
home, we have a lot of the young people, they hang around us,
and you know, the Anderson boys, and different people, you know,
the young people of the church, they hang out at our house, and
a lot of them end up calling, you know, us their adopted parents. We, Brad, Maramba, you know,
Mary is his American mom, because he has a Filipino mom, but he's
like, she's my American mom, you know. And, you know, there
is that, like, to be part of our family. And we're honored
that they would want to be part of our family. But sometimes
there is that idea that, man, what a blessing to be part of
this family or to be recognized by this person or to be accepted
by this group. I mean, that's a privilege. Not
everybody gets accepted in that group, but what a privilege is
it for us to be adopted by the King of Kings, the Lord of Lords,
to be in the family of God. Romans 8, verses 14 through 17. Talk about this idea. He said,
for as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons
of God. For ye have not received the
spirit of bondage again unto fear, but ye have received the
spirit of adoption, whereby we cry, Abba Father. He says, listen,
we don't have a spirit of fear before an almighty God. We know
that God is a just and a holy God, and he will judge wickedness,
but he said that's not the spirit, that's not our motivation, that's
not what stirs us. What's the spirit that's inside
of us is that we've been adopted into God's family, where we cry
Abba, Father, where he is our father, and we recognize that
position that we have in Jesus Christ, and he says what a privilege
that is. He says the spirit itself beareth
witness with our spirit that we are the children of God. And
if children, then heirs. Heirs of God and joint heirs
with Christ. What an amazing thing to be joint
heirs with Christ. I mean, I'm a finite being. I
am flesh and bones. I am, you know,
just, I mean, nothing special at all, but how is it that I
could be made a joint heir with Christ? That's an amazing gift that God
gives us to be adopted into the family. We're adopted through
Jesus Christ. Ephesians chapter one and verse
number five says, having predestined us unto the adoption of children
by Jesus Christ to himself. Adopted by Jesus Christ to himself. You know, he gives us power to
become the sons of God. Yesterday, as I was sharing the gospel with Kitty,
I explained to her that, you know, not everybody that's born
is a child of God. they have to become a child of
God. And God says, to as many as receive
him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God. It's
not just because you went to church or because you carried
a Bible or because you've always known about God that you're a
child of God. And I said, I have my wedding
ring on here. You know, I asked her, I said,
am I married just because I put this ring on? Is that what makes
me married? And she says, no. And I said,
no, I could wear a ring as a teenager. That doesn't make me married,
does it? I mean, there's a lot of men that aren't married, right? She's like, yeah. And I said,
but there was a day, there was a time where I made the decision
to become married. And by my decision, I accepted
what God put together and recognized that and publicly before people,
I acknowledged it and I became a married man. And now this ring
is just a testimony of that fact that I did that, but there was
a day that it happened. And the same is true with our
decision for Christ. There has to be a day, there
has to be a time when you put your faith and trust in Christ,
when you became a child of God. Do you understand that? And she
said, yeah, that makes sense. You have to become a child of
God. But what we're dealing with tonight is the fact that we have
the privilege of being adopted into the family. What a privilege
to have that relationship. It's a privilege that shouldn't
be forgotten or taken for granted. You have a family, Christian,
a Christian family, the family that's there with you and for
you. We know that by nature we are
created by God, but it's only through his grace that we become
a child of God. We've passed from death unto
life. We've passed from a child of
wrath to a child of obedience because of Christ, because of
us making that decision. 2 and 3 through 5, he says, among
whom also we all had our conversation in times past in the lust of
our flesh, fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind,
and whereby nature, the child of wrath. He says there was a
time when You did the things, the lust of your flesh, the things
that you wanted to do, and you were by nature, that is, by the
bloodline from Adam until now, you were by nature a child of
wrath. He says, even as others, but
God, who is rich in mercy, for his great love, wherewith he
loved us, even when we were dead in sin, he quickened us together
with Christ, By grace are you saved. By grace are you saved. That's what Christ did for us.
We see that we have this new family. Are you thankful for
the new family? I'm so glad I'm a part of, amen? The family of
God. Amen. Well, not only do we have
a new family, but we see that we have a new fellowship. He
tells us here, he says, behold, what manner of love the Father
hath bestowed upon us that we should be called the sons of
God And here's the transition of our fellowship. He says, therefore,
the world knoweth us not because it knew him not. I looked at this and pondered
this for a little bit and I thought, you know what? It's pretty nice. I mean, I think we're in pretty
good company. I mean, if somebody looked at
me and wanted to insult me and they looked at me and said, you're
just like your father. Be like, amen, thank you. I'm okay with
that. That sounds good. So when we
were kids, you know, I've told you this before, but we had some
neighborhood gangs and they would come by the house and give us
a hard time because we were Christians and they used to ride their bikes
by the house and they would say, Jesus freaks. And they would
yell that out at us, you know. And I remember my brother David
looking back and going, thank you. I mean, to be called a Christian,
Man, you're Christ-like. Oh, okay, thank you. That's all
right. I mean, that puts us in pretty
good company. What he's saying is you used
to have a fellowship with the world. You used to go after the
lust of the flesh. You used to desire those things.
There was nothing inside of you that motivated you to pursue
after God, but now you have a new fellowship. Now you're partnered
with Christ, and now you would rather be with him than out in
the world. Boy, they didn't know him, and
they don't know you. That's pretty good fellowship,
pretty good person to be with. The fact of the matter is, as
Christians, we should be like a fish out of water when we get
out into the world. There ought to be places that
in your heart and mind you just say, whoa, wait, I don't belong
here. I accidentally wandered into
this place and this is not where I'm supposed to be. You know,
sometimes we've had, I know Brother Hunt's familiar with this, but
pretty aggressive candy sales. where my dad had a Christian
school grow, you know, I went to my dad's Christian school
my whole life and we had candy sale. We do it in the spring
and in the fall to help cover the cost of the school. You know,
the Christian school, they don't charge hardly anything and you
got to pay your teachers and all that. So we had these candy
sales. And, you know, you're kind of, you're walking down
the strip mall and you're just going into one, you know, you're
going into Hobby Lobby and then you go to the next store and
you walk into the pet store or something like that and you sell
what you can, selling chocolate, and you go down a little further
and you walk in one and you find out it's a bar. You know, like,
whoop, I didn't realize. I mean, you're not looking at
the names, you're just opening the doors and walking in. You walk in and
like, oh, and I've walked into a couple of places that I'm like,
oh my goodness, this is not where children are supposed to be.
You know, it's like a fish out of water. Christians don't belong
in those places. I mean, there's places like that.
I praise God, I've never been in my life, certainly not on
purpose. And we shouldn't be comfortable in places like that.
We don't have fellowship with those things anymore. We're not
gonna take time to look at it, but you remember in chapter two,
that rejected life, that's the life of the fellowship with the
world, we don't have that anymore. Because we've been given a new
fellowship with the Father and with the Son. The world doesn't
know what to do with the believer. They'll mock your faith and they'll
mock how you follow him. But beloved, they mocked him
first. You and I will never have to go through all that Christ
went through. But whatever we do go through, we can know that
Christ went through it first. He has already been through it. It is an understanding of this
new family, this new relationship that motivates us in this new
fellowship. You know, there are many men
that have fathered a child. You would say they are their
parent by nature. That is, that they could take
a paternity test and prove that that child is that man's son
or daughter. But sadly, it's even more and
more prevalent in society today that men are not assuming the
role of fatherhood. And what I'm saying is they have
not taken that position that they are indeed the parent of
the child, but they have not assumed that position that you
say father, that term means something altogether more. Not just the
parent, but the father, a father, my father, is somebody that loves
and cares and leads and protects all that a father is supposed
to do. And we have this new fellowship with our heavenly father who
does love and care and protect. What a privilege to be called
a child, a child of God. That's why Romans 12 one says,
I beseech you, therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye
present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable
unto God, which is your reasonable service because of what he has
done for us. Not only do we have a new family
and have a new fellowship, but I want you to see as we move
on to verse number two that we have a new future. He says, beloved,
Now are we the sons of God, now that you've made that decision,
now that you know that you've become the child of God and you've
been adopted into the family of God, he says, and it doth
not yet appear what we shall be, but we know that when he
shall appear, we shall be like him, or we shall see him as he
is, man. He starts verse number two here,
having established already the fact that we're loved by God,
and he calls them beloved. You guys know I like that term.
I use that term, beloved. It is an expression of care and
concern. John has a heart of compassion
when he teaches, even if he needs to rebuke You will see in John's
tone, it is given in love. It is a rebuke, it is an admonition
maybe, but it is presented with compassion. And you see that
all through John's writing and he wishes to encourage and exhort,
but at the same time, he does so in love. Beloved, he says,
and we would do well to follow his example. Beloved, the future
of the lost, The future of those that do not know Christ. He says
here, he says, now that we are the sons of God. So that by implication
tells us there are some that are not the sons of God, that
do not have this new future. And if you have been around church
very much or spent much time studying the book, you are understanding
the fact that the future for the lost is an eternity without
Christ. Not just eternally separated from Christ, but eternally separated
from Christ in a place called hell. What terrible news for the lost
world. For their future, I mean, you
know, the psalmist says, hey, don't worry about the prosperity
of the wicked. He says, sometimes you look at
them and you think, man, they're so bad, but why in the world
are they prospering and I'm struggling? The psalmist says, hey, all they
have is right now. The day's gonna come when they
die, the future that they have to look forward to is not what
anybody would want. Beloved, we have a new future. You know, you remember the story
of the rich man in Luke chapter 16? Let me read those verses
to you. I know you know it already, but
he says in Luke chapter 16, and it came to pass that the beggar
died and was carried by the angels into Abraham's bosom. The rich
man also died and was buried and in hell, he lifted up his
eyes being in torment. And seeth Abraham far off, and
Lazarus in his bosom, and he cried, and he said, Father Abraham,
have mercy on me, and said, Lazarus, that he may dip the tongue, the
tip of his finger in water, he may cool my tongue, for I am
tormented in this flame. But Abraham said, Son, remember
that thou in thy lifetime receivest thy good things, and likewise
Lazarus evil things, But now he is comforted and thou art
tormented. And besides all this between
us and you, there is a great goal fixed. So they which would
pass from hence to you cannot, neither can they pass to us that
would come from thence." I mean, you read that story and who would
you rather be? He says, Lazarus in his life
received evil things. I mean, he had a hard time. He
struggled. I mean, he wasn't living high on the hog. He was
eating the scraps. And the dogs come and lick his
wounds. And people in the world say,
boy, I would never want that. But when you get a glimpse of
the life after with what comes next, Would you rather be a rich
man who for 70, 80, maybe 90 years lived prosperous, but ended
up in a place called hell? No. But Christian, you have a
new future. You and I, we don't have to go
there because we are a child of God. We have a future where
we've been forgiven. And he says, it doth not yet
appear. You know, we don't know everything that there is to know
about heaven. We don't know everything exactly
how we're going to be and exactly what God's going to, you know,
doesn't yet appear. I mean, we are trying to be like
Christ. We hopefully are dealing with
some of our shortcomings and making some changes and growing
in the Lord. But he's still working on me.
I'm not what I ought to be, but I
thank the Lord I'm not what I used to be. And we're still taking
steps. God gives us a glimpse and he
says, we shall be like him. You know, initially in Genesis
1 26, God said, let us make man in our image after our likeness. And of course, sin entered into
the world and men fell. So death by sin passed upon all
men for all have sinned and we are not all that God created
us to be because of sin. One day that sin's gonna be removed
and we should be like him. Not like him in the fact that
he is God. And as some people would teach
that we are gonna be gods. Yeah, the Bible says we're gonna
be like him and he's God, right? So we're gonna be maybe little
gods. You know that was really the
problem with Eve and what happened with Eve and why she ended up
falling. Satan says, hey, you could be
like him. You could know what he knows.
God has kept this knowledge from you. So I don't believe that
we will be like him as in God, but we'll be all that God wants
us to be. in every way that he originally
planned for us to be. So you say, well, what does it
mean that we're gonna be like him? I can't tell you exactly, but I can tell
you that it will be satisfying, because I have scripture on that.
You may wanna write in the margin of your Bible, Psalm 17, verse
15, next to that verse there. He says, as for me, I will behold
thy face in righteousness, I shall be satisfied when I awake with
thy likeness. He said, I shall be satisfied
when I wake with thy likeness. So one day we're gonna wake up
and we're gonna truly be like him. Right now we're just trying,
amen? We're just working hard to be
like Christ. You know, the whole, what would Jesus do? Sometimes
you're like, yeah, but that's not really what I wanna do right
now. I wanna give this guy a piece of my mind, that's what I wanna
do. So we struggle with that battle between what Jesus would
do and what we wanna do and we strive to be like Christ and
hopefully people see Jesus in us. But one day, the psalmist
says, hey, we're gonna be satisfied when we awake and we're in his
likeness. We have a new future. And so,
beloved, we are blessed with these truths, this privileged
life, a privileged life that we have a new family, that we
have a new fellowship with the Father, and we have a new future
that's promised to us. These are all great and magnificent
truths, but what does that mean for us? What do we do with that
truth? Outside of just rejoicing it,
outside of it makes us feel good, outside of we celebrate the fact
that we're loved by God, amen, but there should be some result. And so I want you to see in verse
number three that we have a new focus. We have a new focus. He says in verse number three,
and every man that hath this hope in him, Every man that knows
God, every man that has that hope of, that confident expectation
that they are a child of God, that God will one day either
rapture them out of here or they're gonna, to be absent from the
body, to be present with the Lord, we know that we're gonna
be there and that one day we will be like Him. We have that
expectation. He says, every man that hath
that purifies himself even as he is pure. I'm not gonna spend
long here because this is really the foundation of next week's
lesson as we talk about the purified life. And there's a number of
verses that kind of tie together. This is just the introductory
verse. As you look at this idea of a purified life that we are
supposed to be pursuing. But just as a matter of connecting
with these verses of privilege, we have this great privilege,
so it motivates us to have a different pursuit, the pursuit of purification. As one who has full enjoyment
of this great privilege, there comes a great responsibility.
It is amazing to ponder and think about the position we have in
Christ and to dwell upon the love that he has given us and
all that we've received because we are children of God. Just
the fact that we can be made a child of God is amazing. But
that is not an end in and of itself. It is the love of Christ that
constraineth me, that motivates me, Often, I deal with young people,
and I'll tell them, I know your parents aren't perfect. And as
a young teenager, but still in those
youthful years, you like to grab a hold of and pick mom and dad
apart for their shortcomings. They failed you here, and they
didn't follow through there, and they said they were going
to do this, and they didn't do it. But what you need to remember is
all that they have done. They loved you. They changed
you. They cared for you when you were
sick. They babied you when you needed a shoulder to cry on.
They fed you every day of your life. They clothed you and they
put a roof over your head. No, they weren't perfect, but
they showed their love in so many ways and in their limited
ability, but they expressed that. And you should have some compassion
or some level of concern and respect for mom and dad because
of what they did do for you. And beloved, we have a heavenly
father that is perfect, who does show his love consistently and
faithfully to us and never fall short. Is that not motivation
enough for us to have a new pursuit? To say, man, we need to be all
that God would have us be for all that he's done for us. What
is the primary motivation for your obedience to God? It's not supposed to be fear.
Although fear is a motivator. And I think that we're to fear
God. He is a holy and just God and he says he'll chase in those
whom he loves. You can't run from God and him
not come after you. There ought to be a holy fear
for God but that beloved is not to be our main motivation. Our main motivation is to be
love. You know love is a far greater motivator It really is. You know, there's people, I think
about somebody, and I'm not gonna give any names, but there'll
be some in here who know what I'm talking about. There's somebody
that as a church we've tried to minister to for a long time
and really could not do much. But they met a girl. And all of a sudden, change started
to take place. There was some motivation there.
Oh, yeah, I need to go to church. Oh, yeah, I need to make some
changes in my behavior. I need to make some changes in
my dress. I need to make some changes in
my life. You know, I could have preached until I was blue in
the face, and that would have made no change. but he's got love. Love is a
very strong motivator. Love will cause a guy to do things
that he would never do if he was in his right mind. Love, that's a great motivator. And that's the thing is what
Christ has done for us should motivate us. to have a new focus
in our life and to pursue those things that would bring honor
and glory to God most of all. You know, this is probably not
a very good illustration, but maybe we're a little bit like
my dog, Odie. He loves his freedom. And, you
know, we had one of those little shock collars you put on dogs
that, you know, give them boundaries around the house. And he had
150 feet around the house that he could go all around the house.
He could go to the pool, he could go to the backyard, he could
go to the front yard, he could go to the road, he could chase the
mailman to the edge of this road. I mean, he had a lot of freedom.
He could do all this stuff. But he decided that, you know
what, I know it causes me a little bit of pain. What I'm saying
is there's some fear there. But fear wasn't a strong enough
motivation for him to stay inside the boundaries. He decided that
a little bit of a shock was worth getting to run all over the neighborhood.
And he would run through that shocker, right? You get a certain
distance past the shocker and it doesn't shock anymore. So
he just decided, well, I can take it. And he would just, he
would take off. We would come home or the neighbors
would call and they would say, hey, your dog's out here in our
yard, you know, or he's in the neighbor's trash or your dog's
doing this and, you know, and we would be out a couple times
at like midnight or one in the morning. My kids are walking
through the neighborhood, oh, you know, and calling him, trying
to get him to come home, looking through the woods. He loved chasing
deer. I mean, he'll chase deer through
the woods and he's gone. What I'm saying is that fear
of that little shock wasn't enough to keep him in line. I'm not sure how to articulate
any love because we didn't give him that option, we just chained
him up. Now he lost all of his freedom. What I'm saying is Christians
sometimes, I think maybe our fear of God is not enough to
keep us from doing wrong. We decide, hey, a little bit
of judgment or a little bit of pain or this thing is worth to
do this, this whatever we want to do. But love will stop you before it happens.
You guys know that my daughter Alicia is very tenderhearted
to me as a father. And she always has been. To this
day, if I just look at her like I'm disappointed in her, she'll
start to cry. It doesn't take much discipline.
I don't have to do much discipline because her heart wants to please
her father so much that if any way she feels like dad's disappointed,
she'll start crying. And she'll call mom. She'll say,
dad's not happy with me. Dad's disappointed in me. But why don't we have that for
our heavenly father? that the fact that we might disappoint
Him would move us so much to say, I can't do this. I can't
pursue that. I can't take that step. I must
do this because I want to please my Heavenly Father. We've got
a new focus because of all of what Christ has done for us. That's the privilege life that
we have. Would you stand to your feet
with your heads bowed and your eyes closed? I want to give you a moment to
ponder and think about these things and we'll have a pianist
come and play a moment of invitation. Actually, we don't have a pianist,
not our pianist is gone. So we just have a short time
of quietness here and you talk to the Lord. Acknowledge and
recognize the privileged life that we have in Christ. He's
so good to us.
The Privileged Life
Series The Epistles of John
| Sermon ID | 562321232258 |
| Duration | 37:35 |
| Date | |
| Category | Midweek Service |
| Bible Text | 1 John 3:1-2 |
| Language | English |
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