Worship:
Message:
Transcript:
Morning, everyone. Let’s pray. Father, we come before you in Jesus name. And we thank you for this opportunity to worship you to look into your word, and to be in fellowship and communion with you the living God. I thank you so much father for the salvation that we share together. And I pray, Lord, that you administer to us through your word in a way that enables us to learn, to be encouraged, and to grow. And so now Father, I pray and ask your blessing upon these your people. And on me, Lord, that you would give me wisdom of what to share. I pray in Jesus name, Amen. And Amen. Excuse me. You know, the one thing we have to remember is that you and I are the temple of the Holy Spirit. Scripture makes that very clear. And Jesus and His Holy Spirit will not dwell in an unclean place. And so consequently, it’s important for us to be clean, then we can’t make ourselves clean. I’m going to do this on Going to do that. We have to allow the Lord to do it. And because we are in the flesh, we have to be cleansed over and over again. For instance, how many of you wished you only had to clean your house once in your life? But it has to be something that you continually do because even though you clean it all up, then you know the world dust and so forth comes in. So the same thing is true, we always have to be before the Lord saying, Lord, here I am, cleanse me of vessel, I’m yours, Lord, use me. And so as we look into this portion of Scripture, we’re going to be looking at lepers and, and losing sores and so forth, that people have to be taken out of the out of the camp in order to protect the rest of the body. And we have to realize that so much of what we read in the Old Testament is an illustration of what would come through faith in Jesus Christ. In other words, we have physical examples of a spirit reality. And that’s what we’re seeing here. So when you read these portions of Scripture, these kinds of verses, where it seems like Well, what’s going on? That doesn’t seem right, that doesn’t seem fair. Remember, the Lord is teaching us a lesson through it. And so our faith is all about having the presence of God in our heart, and in our life. You know, we have to understand the spiritual realm was real. When I was working on the message, it made me go back many years. And when I was much younger man when I first got saved, and we lived in Elmira, New York, and I was part of the gold tree, Gold Key ministry, and what we would do is we would go into prisons and do Bible studies with with inmates, and a Mayra prison is maximum security prison. And it’s usually for younger men. And the fellow that I was assigned to was a young young man, very Large man who was in prison for murder, he actually beat someone to death. And I can remember in fact, it was very interesting because we went right back into prison. And we were one on one in private rooms together. And I remember talking to him, and he was sharing with me, he said, I don’t know what it is. He said, usually I’m pretty good nature, nature, he said, something would come over me. And I would just get so angry and just lose my temper. And that’s what happened in this this particular incident. And so I had a chance to share with him that there is a spiritual reality. And so we have to understand that even though we have physical bodies, just like we’re influenced by our environment, there are spiritual influences that we deal with as well. And I shared with him that you need to have Jesus Christ in your life, and he’s the only one that can give you freedom over this that comes upon you. And just to make a long story short, you know, he got saved and and he accepted Bryson, I had a chance to do a Bible study with him for quite some time. And then we moved off to Syracuse and I kind of lost touch with him. This is, I mean, we’re talking like 30 years ago. But it’s just a point that I’m trying to make that there’s a spiritual reality that we have to understand that it’s not just physical, I wish it was, I wish you could just take a pill for everything. You know what I’m saying? But we can’t. There has to be changes to take place in our heart, in our in our life. So we’re in Numbers, chapter five. And we’re looking at verses one through four, first Numbers, chapter five. And the Lord spoke to Moses saying, command the children of Israel that they put out of the camp, every leper, everyone who has a discharge, and whoever becomes defiled by a corpse. You shall put both male and female you shall put out both male and female, you shall put them outside the camp, that they may not be. They may, I’m sorry, they may not defile their camps in the midst of which I dwell. And the children of Israel did so and put them outside the camp as the Lord spoke to Moses, so the children of Israel did. So we have to understand that like with sin, you know, there are many different kinds of leprosy. Leprosy is actually a common term for a number of diseases. But the kind of leprosy that was talked about in the Old Testament we find was, was brutal. I mean, because great disfigurement eventually death, and it was very contagious. So the idea was, if you had someone with leprosy, you put them outside the camp so that they wouldn’t contaminate others. That was the purpose and reason for it. And so we have to realize to us, it’s an analogous of sin and also the discharge from others. The content being in contact with a corpse could also cause disease to be transmitted. And that was the whole concept behind this, that the Lord was relating it to sin, and the reality that when you had some kind of a contagious disease, it needs to be removed, so that the people might be free. We do that today. You know, if we have some kind of an outbreak anywhere in the world, we try to contain it in that one spot. So that won’t transmit through the rest of the world. And that’s, of course, the example of this being used here. And, and to me, it’s so obviously this relates to sin. And you and I, you know, we have times that we’ve been infected with sin, and sometimes we’re around others that are infected with sin. And so often they can carry this discharge or the overflow of the results of sin and also spread to others and those who become so dedicated sins like a corpse, that they don’t even realize that they’re doing wrong. And they can also transmit that to others as well. And so even though it seems cruel, in a sense, to send these people outside the camp, we have to realize it was for the protection of the whole body. And one of the things we want to remember as well, is that there was cleansing, there was healing, from leprosy, and from these different diseases that cause people to be taken outside the camp, in other words to be quarantined. And so, God was doing it out of love for the rest of the body. And, you know, because those that are caught up in sin, whether they desire to or not, in some ways they can encourage others to participate in their sin. You know why? Sometimes people who are caught up in sin, kind of encourage others to do the same thing. It makes them feel better about their sin. You know, if I’m standing and I hate feeling guilty about it, if I can convince other people if they do the same thing, then I don’t feel quite as bad. And, of course, that’s a very wrong attitude to take, you know, be kind of like saying, Well, you know, I have the flu, you might as well have it too. In fact, it was funny. I was at in Wegmans in line to get a prescription at the pharmacy. And this young woman, you know, probably in her later 20s was behind me and she was just kind of, you know, leaning against one of the, you know, the racks there and and I been me being an old guy in the past, right. I just had trusted you okay, honey. She said, No, she said, I’m not she says, I’ve been dealing with the flu. I’ve got it raging fever. I’m here to pick up antibiotics and I’m thinking to myself, Wow, good. I’m glad you’re here to get antibiotics. But why are you standing by me? But anyway, the point I’m getting at, you understand the point I’m getting at is, is that people who have some kind of an infectious disease can transmit it. And we do we can to avoid it right? If you’re around someone who is sick, you try to say stay a little bit away from them. And sometimes you’re in a situation where you have people that are coughing and sneezing and so forth, and you kind of back away from them. Well, that’s what we need to understand what sin sin is infectious, and we need to take time and be willing to back away from it. And if we are caught up in sin, we need to be looking for healing, not looking to justify our sin and convince others that it’s okay to do the same thing. We need to be looking for healing. You know, when you’re sick, sometimes if you’re just a little sick, you know, you just go and get your own remedies. But when you’re really sick, you go to the doctor. Why? Because you want to be healed? And isn’t it interesting that Jesus has called the great physician. And when we find ourselves sick with sin, we need to go to Jesus, the great physician, so that we can find forgiveness and healing from our sin. You know, it’s better to deal with sin in the midst of the camp than deal with an epidemic, right? And that’s what this is talking about here is using leprosy as an example of sin. And so we have to make sure that we’re willing to deal with it, whether it’s in our own life or it’s in our family. You know, if you have a family member who is caught up in any kind of sin, this destructive or you know, is not beneficial to them. You want to help them overcome that, that sin that they’re dealing with that area of their life that is pulling them down. Why is it because you hate them is because you want to be mean to them. It’s because you love them. When you love someone you want them to be well. And that’s what the Lord is doing here. He’s making the point I want my people to be well. And so in casting those that are sick outside the camp kind of corn, quarantining them, it allows the rest of the body to remain healthy while he treats them because as I mentioned, many of these people were healed and allowed to be brought into the camp. In fact, as we go on, we’re going to find there are certain regulations of where the priests would inspect the person. By the way, the priests of that day, were also the physicians of that day. But they would have certain examinations that they would do have a person who was for instance, here they have leprosy, and if they determined that they were, then they were brought back into the camp. So that’s God’s desire, protect to healthy and heal the sick to follow what I’m saying that they might be brought back into the campus Well, now in Now you have to understand that when I’m talking about dealing and removing sin from our life, it’s a love that God is is actually pouring out on us to teach us this application in Matthew chapter five, verse 19. It says, Whoever therefore breaks one of the least of these commandments, and teaches men so in other words to do the same, shall be called least in the kingdom of heaven. So Jesus is making it clear that when we have a problem, we need to deal with it, not make excuses for it and encourage others to do the same. You know, people who have a drinking problem, they want other people to drink. People who are dealing with drug abuse, they want other people to do drugs. Well, why makes them feel better about themselves, see how selfish it is. But that’s the reason and that’s why this portion of Matthew was telling us here if someone has some city That they have fallen to, and they teach others to do the same. They’ll be called least in the kingdom of heaven. But that portion goes on and tells us that if we correct those, then we’re going to be called great in the kingdom of heaven. In other words, if we bring the cure the Holy Spirit in the power of God, to heal people of these kinds of problems, and casting the unclean out of the camp, we have to understand was never done by God and anger. Like get them out of here. It was take them and separate them out, that the body might be healed and well, you know, a few years ago, and some of you know this, I had a mild form of skin cancer and squamous cell carcinoma. And I had a choice of having kind of a hunk of my arm cut out or let it spread to the rest of my healthy tissue, my body. I chose to have a cut out and I’m glad I did because I’m well You know, I don’t have any problems, it’s gone. And we have to realize it’s the same with sin in our heart. There’s only one who can remove sin from our hartness God because sin is, is something that is spiritual. It’s not something physical and tangible that you can touch. And so only God is able to work in our heart, our cardio our inner man in that area and that way. Now we have to keep in mind that the Lord’s greatest desire is to have fellowship with us. And even when we’re caught in unrighteousness, the Lord still wants to have fellowship with us. Because he can take our own righteousness and cleanse it because unrighteousness sin and and and you know, the holiness of God cannot combine together just like oil and water. Now in Second Corinthians, if you want to turn to that quickly, keep your finger here in number Second Corinthians chapter six and go to verse 14. Matthew, Mark, Luke, john Romans Corinthians First Corinthians Second Corinthians, Second Corinthians chapter six, go to verse 14. And it’s talking about it starts off by saying Do not be unequally yoked together with unbelievers. Now, understand that, at that time, you had oxen that were hooked to a double yolk either for plowing field sometimes for pulling cards and so forth. And when it talks about being unequally yoked if you had one ox and it didn’t want to do anything, and the other ox didn’t want to really pull the cart, it really caused a lot of problems. You know, maybe one oxen one to go this way and the other one to go the way he was supposed to it cause all kinds of problems. So when it’s talking about us, not being unequally yoked with unbelievers, it’s not talking about being friends is talking about coming into that kind of intimate relationship where you’re literally yoked together. Now, let’s continue. Do not be unequally yoked together with unbelievers Listen to this, for what fellowship has righteousness with lawlessness? And what communion has light. with darkness. You can’t mix light and darkness, you understand darkness is the absence of light. And if your light is better to light a candle than curse the darkness Scripture tells us utilize a little candle darkness flees. First 15 what a core has Christ was with CLL is talking about Satan, or what part has a believer was an unbeliever. And what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God is God has said, I will dwell in them and walk among them, I will be their God and they shall be my people. Therefore, come out from among them and be separate, says the Lord. Do not touch what is unclean, and I will receive you. So in other words, the Lord is telling us if we find ourselves in a situation where we’re around uncleanness We’re around sin, we need to remove ourselves from it. Now understand, it’s not talking about removing ourselves from the opportunity to minister to others. I don’t have a problem being around someone who’s caught up in sin, if my purpose of being here is to bring the salvation of Jesus Christ, to bring victory to bring healing,
that’s okay.
But I don’t want to be around people that are caught up in all kinds of uncleanness to be part of it with them, or to be drawn into it. I don’t know about you, but if you ever been in a situation, where things are going on, that you feel very uncomfortable with but you don’t say anything. Well, that’s not what we should do. If the Lord has put us in a situation where we’re around people or group and things that are going on that that are just making us feel uncomfortable, we should either say something about it, or leave sometimes are leaving can say something about It because we can’t allow people to think that we’re in agreement with that which is unrighteous, so important for us to understand them. And his cleansing power is not only instant, but it is free. And we have to realize that under the dispensation of grace, there is no need for anyone to remain unclean. The Gospel of john, Chapter 15, verse three, it says, You are already clean because of the word which I have spoken to you. So, as believers as Christians, there’s never any need for us to remain stained with sin. The blood of Jesus Christ is not only able to save us from sin and death at our initial salvation, but is able to continually cleanse us. And so we need to be willing to always go before the Lord and say, God, forgive me a sinner. One of the things that’s interesting is God always forgive, doesn’t say, well, maybe this time. But next time I don’t know, God always forget how many of us have fallen to the same sin over and over and over again. I always think of an example is when I, it’s interesting. I went off to the army never smoked. And I started college, and I started smoking. But that was back in the day as a long time ago. And the reality is, I really, you know, got into smoking. And not for a long time, maybe for about six years I smoked. And in fact, it’s funny when I first started teaching had her since high school. And you went in the faculty room, when you open doors like blue was smoke, you wouldn’t have that today what it was like all the guys and I say guys, because believe it or not back then the faculty room for segregated you had mentioned Faculty rooms and women’s faculty rooms. The idea why would you be in the faculty room with women? Or why would women want to be in a factory room with men, too. But anyway, he walked in and he had this blue smoke. Now, the thing is that’s interesting is that as a science teacher, and then we used to have a whole chapter on, you know, the harm of tobacco. I knew all the harmless tobacco, I knew exactly how you know, the tar can affect the VLANs legally, legally, and all that kind of stuff. And and it’s very dangerous. I knew how bad it was. But I still smoked. It wasn’t till I came to the Lord and got saved, that I realized, I shouldn’t be smoking, because it’s harming my body. And I need to keep my body as healthy as it possibly can be in order to serve the Lord. It’s just like when I was in the army, they want you to be healthy so you can serve. Well, we’re in the army of God, I want it to be healthy. And I’m going around in this big circle to make this point. I used to take People when I finally decided to quit smoking, I used to tell people, it is so easy to quit smoking because I quit every Monday to get my point, in other words, I quit. And then I’d go a few days and I’d be back into it. I quit and go a few days night. And there was one time. And I still remember, there’s one time, I said, You know what, I’m done. And I never smoked again, never smoked again. I mean, it’s been 40 years, since I’ve smoked or more, never smoked again. And we have to realize that we are human. And we carry this great treasure that God has given us in earthen vessels, vessels of clay. In other words, vessels that are weak. And so there might be areas of your life that you’re dealing with. And you deal with it over and over and over. Don’t give up because One day, you’ll have the victory. And there are certain things that we probably deal with, and we’ll deal with the rest of our lives. How many? I’m not going to ask you to raise hands because either you’d be embarrassed or you’d be lying. So anyway, the point I’m getting it, how many of us can get attitudes towards people? I’m not, Don’t raise your hand. But we do, right. And we’ll probably going to deal with that the rest of our life. That’s just one little example. And we might have become sophisticated and polish enough that someone does something that makes us angry or upset and we’re just kind of like, Yes, yeah. Okay. And in our hearts, like, I’d like to choke you to death, you know. So we have to understand that there are things that we’re going to deal with the rest of our lives, but there are many things that we can have complete victory over. And it’s a blessing to see God work in our lives that way. And so we have to realize that we’re not going to have perfection in this life, but there has to be a desire Move away from sin. And we can’t profess to be walking with the Lord and living a life of conscious continuous sin. Okay, I’m talking about when you know what you’re doing and you just keep doing it, you don’t care. And we find this in Hebrews chapter 12, verses one and two, it says, Therefore we also, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight and this sin, which so easily entangles us and let us run with endurance the race to the step before us, Looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him, endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.
You know, sometimes I wonder if we really know who we serve. We really understand how understand how loving God is. God created us to be in fellowship with Him. If you go back to Genesis, and you read the beginning, you know, of Adam and Eve and they walked in the in the garden, the cool the day and had personal fellowship with God, and it was sitting to separate them. God’s desire is, has always been to have fellowship with us. The sin separates us from the love of God. And so consequently, God in His love, because he could not bear to keep this separation between he and his special creation. He sent His Son into the world, For God so loved the world that He sent His only begotten Son into the world. And Jesus Christ came into the world and was born of a woman was fully man, that his spirit was the Spirit of God, he was fully God. And so consequently, he was the only one who was ever able to live in his entire life, without ever committing one single Sin. Now, what’s the purpose of that? That he might be the perfect Lamb of God. Remember when john the baptist saw Jesus coming to be baptized, and john the baptist said, Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. He understood who he was. And we have to understand who we serve the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. God so loved us that He sent His Son to die on the cross to die. You know, it says curser those who die in a tree to die on a cross was a death of shame. And that’s what we’re reading about here. And Jesus did it out of love for you and I, that we might be forgiven all of our sin and transgressions. You know, in the Gospel, john, Chapter 14 and verse 15. Here’s what Jesus said, If you love me, and it’s a gobby, osis and unconditional love, if you love me, keep my commandments. You know, When two people are married, and I’ve done so many weddings, in fact, you’ve heard me share this so many times when I used to substitute and I haven’t substituted for almost a year and a half because my heart attack but I love substituting I love being in there with the kids. And one of the things I used to say to the kids, as far as they knew I was just a science teacher. You know, they had no idea that I was a pastor. And I used to go to the kids have got a riddle for you. And I said, I have been married, or I have married many women, but I only have one wife. And they’d be thinking, wow, of course the answer was I’ve done the marriage of many women and men, you know, I don’t know how many over well over 150 or so. And so we have to realize that we belong to God. We are his And so even though we are united in the flesh to someone in marriage, it doesn’t mean there aren’t any problems that we deal with. How many of you I’m not going to ask you to raise your hand, how many of you who have been married more than a day have never had a problem in your relationship, any problems at all this that if you raise your hand, like I said, You’re, you’re not being true. We deal with problems. And I know you guys look at buying it, you think? Well, they probably had never had any problems. We do. I mean, we’ve had times in our marriage that they’re like, these brick walls that come up. You guys don’t I mean, if you’ve been married for a while, and it’s not that we hate each other. It’s not that we don’t want to be married any longer. But these brick walls come up, you know, these differences of opinion, these problems, and you feel it’s horrible. Because you come home and you feel that separation, and you can’t wait to have that wall broken down. And then finally, both people, both parties humble themselves, and they’re able to sit down and talk about whatever the problem is. And as they’re talking, you can just see that wall brick by brick just collapsing, and they’re back into relationship with one another. Well, marriage is an example of Christ’s relationship with the church. It tells us that the scripture I’m not talking about marriage, but Christ relationship with his church, it says in Scripture. And so we have to realize, sometimes there is a wall that comes up between us, the only difference between that wall and the wall between a husband and wife is that Jesus is never wrong. It’s always on our part. We’re the ones who built the wall brick by brick ourselves. And all we have to do is go before the Lord and say, God, forgive me, a sinner, and the wall comes tumbling down, and we’re back in communion and relationship with Him. And one of the greatest hindrances hindrances we have, and being honest with the Lord and ourselves is pride and presumption. We’re prideful. people you know, we love to let people know how wonderful we are. And also we’re prideful in the sense of, it’s always your fault. And we’re presumptuous. You know, if you should be worried about me, you should be concerned about my feelings. What about being concerned about the other person’s feelings, you follow the point I’m making. Those are the causes of sin. And perfect example of either being led by the flesh or by the Spirit is the example of Jericho and AI. When the children of Israel were coming into the promised land. Remember, Moses was up the mountain a bow and he saw the promised land and he died. In the end. It literally says the angels took him and buried him. And I’d been on up on top of Mount niebo. You can see the whole Promised Land, but he wasn’t able to go in because we all know about the sin he fell into. So it was Joshua that led the children of Israel into the promised And, and when they first came in, they came against this great wall city called Jericho. And I’ve seen this, the remains of it and the wall the top, the the thickness of the wall was probably wider than this sanctuary here, you could have two chariots run together alongside of one another on that wall so thick that wall was an interesting thing is when you go and you can go online and see pictures of this, the Walden fall down, it was pushed down, was pushed right down. And that’s how the children of Israel defeated Jericho. Well, they came out of there with this great victory that the Lord had given them. And they said, Oh, I got this little puny town of AI over here. Let’s go and take care of them as well. And they went up against AI and and the army of AI, drove them out, chase them away and killed several thousands of their soldiers. And so Joshua went before the Lord Oh, what’s going on the bottom line in my own finance way of expressing it was this. When they went against Jericho, they were led by the Spirit. When they went against AI, they were led by the flesh. And if you try to do things by the flesh, you’re going to quite often be defeated. But if you walk according to the Spirit, you’re going to go, as Scripture says, from victory to victory. Now verses five through 10, we’re actually almost done, even though I’ve got these verses to cover. Then the Lord spoke to Moses saying, speak to the children of Israel. When a man or woman commits any sin that men commit and unfaithfulness against the Lord, and that person is guilty. Then he shall confess the sin, which his committed, he shall make restitution for his trespass in full, plus one sense of it. In other words, to add one says, what are the whatever it was, and give it to the one he has wrong, but as demand has no relatives to whom restitution may be made for the wrong the restitution for the Wrong must go to the Lord for the priests. And the rest of this is just talking about how if there’s no one to make restitution towards whatever, you’re sending my fee, then you give it to the Lord by giving it to the priests into the house of God. And we have a beautiful example of this in the Gospel of Luke and remember Zach espc sing that song little tech, he has crawled up into a tree. And that kiss was actually a tax collector. Here’s did you use a child Abraham, but he was a tax collector. And tax collectors, according to the to the Jews were considered traitors, because he actually was collecting taxes for the Roman Empire. And so they were robbing from their own people. And these tax collectors, what they would do is they keep the Luxor extra for themselves, and says that kiss was hated. But anyway, he heard that Jesus was coming by and he wanted to see Jesus and because he was a man of short stature, and don’t look at That way, but because he was a man of short stature, he had to climb up into a tree to seize the kiss. And when Jesus is coming by, he looked up at the kiss, and he saw him up there and he goes, so the key is to come down, I’m having dinner with you. They have to realize, Jews did not eat with sinners. And so for Jesus, the Lamb of God, the perfect man to go into a house of a center and have dinner was unheard of. But he went in to have dinner was that kiss? Why? Because he knows a kisses heart. And that’s the key is would repent. In fact, I want you to look at Luke chapter 19 and go to verse eight. Luke chapter 19, go to verse eight. You can always tell I was a teacher, because one of the things they taught us is that when you first give an assignment or your first say something to the students, They’re like, Huh. And the second time you say, after getting your pen and their, you know, their little pad out, and then the third time they get it. So I always repeat myself three times. Luke chapter 19 and verse eight. Then the key is stood and said to the Lord, this is after the Lord brought him down. He said, Look, Lord, I give half of my goods to the poor. And if I have taken anything from anyone by false Association, accusation, I restore it, I restore fourfold. And Jesus said to him, listen to this, today, salvation has come to this house, because he also is the son of Abraham. For the Son of Man has not come to seek and save for the Son of Man has come to seek and save that which was lost. So here you have that kiss. And why is God so gracious to him? Because he confessed because he admitted, so one of the hardest things we have a hard time you know, we’re like Well, you know, I was really wrong. You know, we have a hard time saying that. But it’s a wonderful thing to go to the Lord and say, I was wrong, Lord, I sin. Please forgive me, knowing the fact that the Lord would forgive him. Because we must realize that if we love the Lord, and we want to be in continuous fellowship with Him, we have to always be willing to admit our shortcomings. You know, one of the things you’ve heard me say so many times, and I truly believe it with all my heart is that we’re not only saved by grace, in other words, it’s God’s grace and mercy that we’re saved. It’s not because we’ve done anything to it to earn it. He just gives it to us. It’s a free gift. We’re saved by grace. We’re maintained by grace. And one day when we go to be with the Lord, either in death of the rapture, we’re going to be glorified by grace. It’s all the grace of God. You never come to a place where you deserve it.
You know, Have you ever heard people say, Well, I deserve something good? Well, you got it with God, you know, but you don’t deserve anything. You know, if you got what you deserve, guess what? Wouldn’t be, wouldn’t be very well, wouldn’t be very good. And so repentance then is much more than being sorry. Because we have to realize that we will never find peace in our relationship with God until we’re willing to admit our on our wrongdoing. You know, sometimes I think that we allow certain sins in our life, thinking what God understands. Because God does understand that your heart is wicked. The heart of man is exceedingly wicked beyond understanding who can know it. But we do that. Well, I think God kind of realizes this is the problem, or how many times we said, well, I do this because of this situation because they do that it makes me No, no Doesn’t make any difference what anyone else is doing. What are you doing and your relationship with the Lord? You see what I’m saying? It has to be a willingness to have peace in our own heart by confessing to the Lord. And many people think repentance is just shedding a few tears. The true repentance changes our heart. Because we have to understand there has to be a change in our desire, either for the Lord or for sin. In Second Corinthians, chapter seven and verse 10, it says, For godly sorrow, godly sorrow, produces repentance leading to salvation. Not to be regretted, but the sorrow of the world produces death. In other words, how many people are sorry for the consequences of what they did. I’m so sorry. We should have never done that. Well, why? Because you’re tired for the consequences of your sin. But you don’t recognize your sin, you’re not willing to deal with your sin. It’s like the husband or wife who goes up to their spouse and says, I promise I’ll never do that again. I really promise. Why are they saying that? Because they’re really frightened with the problems that is causing and the separation The gap is putting between them. They’re not really sorry for what they’ve done wrong. They’re sorry for the consequences. We need to be able to approach for instance, a spouse, friends, but especially especially the Lord and say, I’m sorry, because I’m a sinner, because what I did was wrong, and I offended you. Please forgive me. With God’s help, I’m going to have victory. That’s true repentance, not just shedding a few tears, not being sorry for the consequences. You know, when I was in the prison ministry, we used to call it jailhouse conversion. And the reason was is that we would talk to men in the prison to Bible studies with them in a one except Christ, because they thought somehow it would put them in better favor when they went for parole in this net. But because they were sorry for the consequences of their sin, I’m in prison because of what I did. I’m sorry for that instead. But the ones who really had a change of life, and came out of prison, and there are a number of them, and serve the Lord faithfully, where those who weren’t just sorry for their consequences. They were sorry, because of their sin, there is sorry, because of their attitude and whatever else it was, that led to them, breaking the law. We’ve all broken the law of God, every one of us for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. But the free gift of God is eternal life through Christ Jesus. And so we have to understand, we have to get beyond being sorry for the consequences. How many people I don’t want to go to hell. Well, I don’t know too many people. Who do Oh yeah, I can’t wait to go to hell yes, not too many people want to go to hell. But the reality is, we should be saying, I’m so sorry I offended you. So sorry I’m out of relationship with you. I want to know you I want to be in relationship relationship with you. Forgive me a sinner. You know, what’s your pastors favorite first, first john one nine, if conditional conjunction if we confess our sin, He is faithful and just to forgive us, and purify us from all unrighteousness. It doesn’t say if we confess our, you know, heartache, the consequences of our sin. It says if we confess our sin, so we have to understand portions of Scripture like this are so important to us. Maybe we have leprosy. Maybe we have some kind of a discharge maybe we’re carrying around the deadness of our of our past lives, whatever it might be. We need to run to Jesus. Say Lord take care of me. I can’t do it but I know you can forgive me and he will. You don’t want to walk around with unchecked leprosy. You want to make sure you take it to the great physician and have it cut out.
Let’s pray. Father, we come before you in Jesus name and how thankful we are for your love. how thankful we are for your grace and mercy and for the unconditional forgiveness that you have given us. Lord, we love you so much. And I pray that we would express that love by getting rid of a leprosy in our own camp, and also be willing to help others to do the same. Help us to be your servants I pray in Jesus name, Amen. And amen. God bless you my dear friends.
Transcribed by https://otter.ai