Bill Kauble 0:09
To influencers Orange County, and we believe with all of our heart, what a joy it is to have intimacy with Jesus Christ. And where our whole mission here is to create an environment where the Holy Spirit can come and help himself to each man’s heart and influence that heart to influence his family, his neighborhood and his community. What we believe with all of our heart, is we are faith based, Christ driven. What else? Grace driven, right, Christ center, we believe in five things. Number one, Jesus is not only our Savior, but he’s Lord of our lives. Number two, the Bible is the final authority. Number three, we are men a prayer, number four, we link with like minded men. And number five, we give it away. And the thing that embodies that more than anything else is the forum. I wanted Frank Daniels and Ron to come here for a second. Somebody helped crank up could take a while. Guy drives a Corvette, I don’t know. Yellow Corvette. One of the things that we’re grateful for, is everything that I just described is embodied in forum. And Frank has been Ron’s lovely assistant, and come up with a template, we our goal is that every single man in here would be involved in the forum group, Ron,
Ron Tovar 1:46
you can have access to this template, if you go on the website and and click on for M. And it’ll take you to a form that you can fill out if you want to join for Ammar refer someone to joining for M. But we have that those forms today. And if at the end of the meeting, you can see Frank it’s two pages, how many pages, two pages. And and so if you fill those out, yeah, too simple. It’s going to take like three minutes. And so if you fill those out, then we can plug you into a meeting if you’re looking for a meeting at the time that you can get into it. And I just want to thank you all that are involved in the shepherds that were in the meeting last Saturday. And it was a great meeting. It’s really good to see men of god together like that. Winning man by man, winning territory, man by man touching our families.
Bill Kauble 2:47
Say hi.
Unknown Speaker 2:49
Good morning.
Bill Kauble 2:51
Thank you for
Alright guys, thank
you very much. You made me sit down. Thank you. We’re trying to get it together. It just takes a little bit. Hey, Dennis rebooted. We have a focus here on men. Marriages, and what else?
Dennis Ruvilo 3:16
Yeah, we we’ve got a meeting tomorrow and outreach for the missions that network through influencers here. And everyone that has a full time ministry here that networks through here is invited if you didn’t get it invite because we sent out the agenda in the invites. And if we overlooked you, you’re welcome here tomorrow morning at 930 up in the upper room.
Bill Kauble 3:41
And I want to I want to pray for this Lord, not only for the forum, but I want to pray for missionaries father there on the front line, we are going to all be missionaries because we’re headed for persecution. And that’s not something that I feel it’s something that is spelled on Matthew 24, in the Book of Revelations. So Father, we just ask you to continue the anointing on our dear brother, Dennis, and for all those that are going to gather tomorrow morning, Father, bless that time together. But bless the forum. It’s a time for men to come together and stand up and be men. Thank you In Jesus name, amen. I’m going to do the offering now and again. We are grateful God has been has blessed us tremendously and has allowed us to keep the doors open and to keep Pete away from being a greeter at Walmart. And so Lord, we’re we’re very grateful for that, because I’d have to hold his I’d have to hold his bag. So as we pray over this offering, we ask you to multiply it the name and the power the blood of Jesus Christ, amen.
Pete McKenzie 5:01
Hey man, keep me out of Walmart.
Well, you know, appreciate you guys wearing your mask. These people, the leadership at voyagers has been more than going overboard and being generous and kind with us and let us use their facility and not just for this Friday morning, but for so many of the things that we do. And we want to honor them in what they want us to wear these masks and we all have different ideas about whether mask or good work or not, whether they’re good or not, or they’re going to keep you from getting COVID or not, but that doesn’t matter. They’ve asked us to do it. So we appreciate you wearing them. Thank you.
You know, when I was going to elementary school back in the day, and that was a different day than our day. If you lost some money on the playground, someone would come along and might find the money on the playground. And this happened on one particular day. And they would go around to the different classrooms and say I found a quarter on the playground and anybody lose a quarter. Can you imagine that? I thought easy money. I think I was waiting to third grade. And so I raised my hand and I got the quarter now with a quarter you could do a lot in those days. You could go and get a chocolate melt with ice cream down on the corner drugstore and then take your dime that you had left and get in the movie theater. And so on the way home, I stopped by a little convenience store and I got some paper and some candy and some stuff with my quarter. And I got home and my mom said, where’d you get that candy? Got it the convenience store in the paper too. And I said yes, ma’am. She says, where’d you get the money to get it? And now human heart and family she squeezed the truth out on me. Well, I was tempted to do something that was wrong. And I did it. And now she was not going to tempt me. But tell me I had to do something that was right. She said you’re going back to school tomorrow and get out in front of the whole class and tell him what you did. It sound like father knows best what bud got in trouble all the time. And his dad would make him go make it right. Mom did the same thing. I had to go back to the class the next day and tell everybody that I said that was mine. But it wasn’t mine. I lied. Now started learning in that experience about temptation. I want to talk to you today about being tempted about temptation and the trouble it is in your life in mind. But the absolutely necessary thing it is in your life in mind. You know, I remember someone saying I don’t remember who but I wrote it down and send the front of my Bible is write a lot of quotes down in there. I can resist anything but temptation. You ever heard down? Yeah, I say it all the time. Because it’s true. Tim Taylor temptation it means to entice to do wrong by a promise of sordid gain or sinful pleasure to risk the danger of being tried and tested to be baited or beguiled. Led by deception, conned bamboozled, duped, hoodwinked misled, I got a thing the other day on my text messages, said you just spent $2,642 on a 48 inch television on Amazon. If this is not you, and you didn’t get that call this number, you ever gotten one of those? I got a guy. I get all kinds of things like that there are scammers out there. And I’ve been taken in a couple of times. But no more. I’ll probably miss some good things because I’m, I don’t know if it’s a scammer or not. So I just take the Safe Road. So I didn’t call the number. And I’m not gonna call the number. And I’m not tempted to call the number. But there’s temptations like that, coming at us every day in every way. to entice to do wrong, you know in the Garden of Eden He was enticed to do wrong. God had said, this is a way walk down in it don’t eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, because if you do, you surely die. The devil comes along and says, I think I can back that up. So he comes along, and he starts tempting Eve. And he says, you know why God doesn’t want you to have that fruit from that tree. He knows that you’ll be just like him, you won’t need him anymore. You can be your own God. Now, that’s been the devil’s temptation since the beginning of time. He’s always tempted us, we can be our own God, we can do our own thing, we can go our own way we know better. And so God is always saying, this is the way walked out in it. And if you walk in this way, you’ll be blessed. But if you walk in the other way, if you could take that other route, you’re going to be judged, you’re going to have consequences, it’s going to be painful, you’re going to be separated from me.
And so that’s been invoke, for the beginning of time, as well. So she got bamboozled, she started looking at the tree. And that was one of her problems. She started looking at the fruit on the tree. And so he was saying, you know, that’s good for look at the fruit. Look on tasty, it looks nice. And if you ate that fruit, you’d really be satisfied. It meets all your needs. And so she looked at it, and it did look good to eat. In so she took it in. And you know the consequences of that we’re sitting here today with sin nature’s because the first Adam and Eve disobeyed God, they were tempted by the devil, oh, my God never attempts us. We’re gonna see a verse in that in a minute. But James one has a lot, it has several verses in there, two through four and 12 through 15, I’m going to share with you that address this issue considered all joy brother, and when you encounter various trials, now Life is full of trials. Don’t you agree? trial means trouble. It means to put to the test, with the purpose of discovering that person’s nature or quality. So there’s one way to look at temptation. And when we’re tempted to do something that’s wrong, or watch something that’s wrong, or say something that’s wrong, or do something that’s wrong, and all the different ways we can mess up.
Thank you very much. Get my hand. They’re recording these things. I guess that’s what we need to improve on here. Thank you, Terry. Or there we go. We’re in trial. discovering a person’s nature or quality, something that breaks the pattern of peace, comfort, joy, happiness in someone’s life. You go into a trial, and have you had your joy stolen? Have you gotten upset and go like that? Okay. Look at the guy next to you and say, Hey, listen up, he’s talking to you. Guys, you have been, because that’s what life is full of life is full of trials and difficulties in test. And it tests our tests our character. It shows us what we’re really like. I could put up with a lot for my dog. And I’m very patient with my dog until she had diarrhea. I won’t have to finish the rest of that story. But I found out that I have a limit to my patience. And God wants to stretch my patience. God wants me to grow in patience. And he didn’t want me to be angry. He didn’t want me to be upset. And he gives me trials and challenges and difficulties to show me what I’m really like. Sometimes it shows me what you’re really like. It means a reputation. We have a reputation. And you want to have a good reputation. You want people to think well of you and speak well of you. But sometimes we don’t do things that allow them to do that. Because we lose our patients we fail the trial. And every trial is a test of faith that you’re going to trust God or not, is God in this and not is God allowed this or not. Is God put this into my life or taken it out of my life. Is he still on his throne? Is he sovereign? Is he good? Is he in control and every time we face it trial and we get in trouble. That’s what we’re dealing with. We’re dealing with what our view of God is, what our character is. Now, you’ll never grow in character until you’re tested. So it’s not the most terrible thing in the world to fail at something you think’s important. The greatest danger is to exceed it, things that don’t really matter, amen. And so, just think of what the trials that you are in today are held trials, financial trials, marriage trials, children, child’s political trials, COVID trials, fear, you’re, we’re being tested to be half fearful, we’ll be well, we operate on faith or fear, we trust God or not. And you know, when all else fails, we usually trust guy, when the government lets us down and becomes corrupt when you can’t even have an election anymore. That’s fair. When inflation starts to hit, when the value of the dollar goes down, when the stock market crashes, when all the things that we put our hopes and our dreams and build our life on fail, what do we have left? does God allow that? Now we talked in Jeremiah 29, who he said, we looked at, I know the plans I have for you says the Lord their plans for good and not for evil, that you will have a future and a hope. We looked at that. And we saw where God judges us. When we wander away. God judges us when we start worshipping and depending on other things other than Him, and we have other gods, we have idol worship in our life and the children of Israel. I don’t care what prophets you read in the Bible, it seems like they all deal with the same thing that children of Israel wandered away from God. They started worshipping idols, they started doing terrible things, prostitution, adultery, you name it, if they had drugs back then it’d be drugs, alcohol, and all the things that we get into that were in our lives. And so they go wandering off in that direction. And God says, whoa, timeout. I’ve had enough of this. So he brings to judgment and in that case, he brought Nebuchadnezzar from Babylon. they conquered Judah and Israel, they took a bunch of exiles back to Babylon,
and left to the false prophets and the false teachers and the people that had been worshipping idols who left them back in Judah. And God looked at Jeremiah and he said, What do you see? We gave him a vision. He says, I see a coke two baskets, and they’re full of figs. The basket on over here is full of rotten figs. It could need them. The basket on the right is a juicy ripe figs. And they’re good to eat. And God says, well, the bad figs are the people I’m leaving in Judah. The good figs are the ones I’m taking in exile to Babylon. Sometimes God has to x hours to get us right. He says they’re going to be in Babylon. And Jeremiah told him this was going to happen. He warned him before it ever happened before never can has ever showed up on their border. God warned him what was going to happen and by God’s faithful to do that, he tells us what’s going on if we’re listening. Unfortunately, the people never listened. He sent on prophet after prophet and they just killed him. He sent messengers, he sent messengers by nature he sent in he said, for us, there’ll be birth pains. I’m gonna let you know it’s coming and I’m coming. And you need to listen up. And the birth pangs in Matthew 2047 will be in nature. You’re going to see floods and tornadoes and hurricanes, volcanoes, earthquakes, you’re going to see fires, you’re going to see things like you’ve never Well, I’m no okay. You’ve had all that before people say that. But they’ve never had a tornado that stayed mouth wide and stayed on the ground for 20 minutes, and never had an earthquake in 2001. On the floor of the Pacific Ocean that measured on every seismograph on the planet, they never had one like that before. The tornadoes or hurricanes or floods the ice and snowstorms in places that never have them. We’ve had this winter. Those sayings are warning signs, the gods saying their birth pains, and they’re going to get worse. And that’s what birth pains do. They get worse and they get hurt. How much does it hurt? It’s about a five how much it hurt. Now it’s about an eight. Would that baby’s coming? And that’s what lets them know the baby’s coming. We’re seeing all the birds Banks now we see them in politics, finances, nature, families, health, media. Everywhere you look there, they’re just signs that he’s coming in, the people never listened, they shot the messengers. And God is faithful. They say, I’m going to bring judgment. And I’m going to take you captive for 70 years into Babylon. So it took them into Babylon. And they were there for 70 years. And it took 70 years for those people to be delivered from idol worship, to see God and obey Him and follow His commandments in his ways. And that’s what God was after. It’s what he’s after in your life, and mine will be tempted to do wrong, and then we’ll be tempted to do right. And we blow both of them tempted to do wrong, and I do, I’m tempted to do right and I don’t, I’m tempted to do the right thing. temptation, enticed to do the wrong thing, or the right thing. And then these, he gave us these temptations to test our character to test our faith. characters, features and traits that make up the end distinguish who you are, which could be good or bad. A man could have a firm moral excellence or poor moral excellence. But either way, it’s your character, whatever it is, God gives us trials and difficulties and tenses. And that allows us to be tempted to test us to see what we’re like not to destroy us. He does do that. But that’s not why he does it with his children. He does it like a father, he does it to show us what we’re like. And they show us the way and show us what right behavior and keeping our behavior excellent among the Gentiles, if you will. What he said in First Peter to keep your behavior excellent among the dem towns, your chosen people, your holy nation, your royal priesthood, your people for mound possession. Now, I’m going to hone you and test you and try you.
To make you better, to grow you up to make him a tour to strengthen your faith in your character, to build the fruit of the Spirit in your life. You love and joy and hope and goodness and peace and patience and gentleness and kindness and self control all that. You’re never going to get it without the trials and the temptations that come your way. How do you respond when you’re tempted and fail? What do you do? Do you beat yourself up? He it feel a guilt and shame. Go like that. We all do. That’s what we do. We’re men of God, we’re not supposed to do that kind of stuff. We’re not supposed to fall into temptation. We’re supposed to stand tall and temptation. When you don’t know how my wife treats me. If you knew how she treated me, you would just fall into that temptation to treat her in an unbecoming way to my wife. Susan has an I just read it yesterday, still up on my cabinet in the kitchen. Never lead how people treat you alter how you treat them. That’s a good one. I think of it all the time. That matter how they treat you It matters how you respond. Had a guy the other day and said Pete, you and Susan had such a great marriage and I’ve got such a terrible marriage. Do you think God just gave you something he didn’t give it to me? You think you have it not have you have an I don’t have it. I said it’s not about having and not having. We can’t control that God works in those ways. And I don’t understand all his ways in that regard. But I do understand the US whether you have it or don’t have it, what God is concerned about is how you respond to having it or not having it. So how you react to it is how you deal with it. It’s how you understand it, how you respond. That’s what God’s concerned about. It he gives someone talent, some two or three, some five, some 10. We have different talents, different gifts, different opportunities, different experiences. And it’s not whether you have it and they don’t you don’t compare yourself to others that will always get you in trouble. in either direction. You compare and look better than them and comparing look worse than them and neither one is wrong. So don’t start comparing.
He wants us to learn to persevere to persist in spite of counter influences. In other words, and I tell guys in marriage all the time. You’re never going to stand before God and answer How your wife is a good wife or not. You’re going to stand in answer for whether you’re a good husband or not, no matter what kind of wife she was, you’re never going to be able to stand before God like Adam tried and said, it’s this woman you gave me. serverfault. Matter of fact, God, it’s not her fault. It’s your fault you gave her to me. God says, Yeah, but then you say, this is now bone of my bone and flesh of my flesh. And she’ll be called a woman because she’s taken out a man. Then you say you up, you’ve been counting and naming all these animals, and then all of a sudden she showed up. And finally, you are attracted to what something? Hopefully one attracted any of the animals. That happens. Here’s one that if you’re going to talk about temptation, we need to talk about first Corinthians 1013. no temptation has overtaken you with such as common demand. And God is faithful, who will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you’re able. But with the temptation, we will provide the way of escape also, why? That you may be able to endure it. No temptation has overtaken you, but such as common demand, don’t start thinking that you are tempted in ways other guys aren’t that your temptation is harder than the next guys. It’s all common demand, we all face temptation. It’s part of living, it’s part of life. It’s part of what we go through. We just have to prepare ourselves for it when it comes. God always prepares a way out. When and when he said, Jeremiah to judge the nation. And he says, God’s judgment is coming on you. You got to stop this out of worship, this adultery, this prostitution, these false teachers, these false property, they had to stop. And they wouldn’t listen. But God said, Okay, I’m going to bring judgment. But with that judgment, they will follow, I’ll bring you back into the land. And I’ve shared this a couple of weeks ago, Jeremiah 24, seven, I will give you a heart to know me, that I am your Lord. And you will be my people. And I’ll be your God, and you will return to me with a whole heart. So God said, Look, I’m going to take into exile in Babylon. You’ll be there 70 years, but I’m going to purify you, I’m going to grow you up. I’m going to make you healthy. And I’m going to bring you back. So God always gives us a promise. God says you’re going to die, but you will live again. Data yourself, you’ll live. When you die physically, you’re going to live again. It’s just a second blink of an eye and you’ll be in eternity. You’ll be in our presence. You’ll be in heaven, you’ll be in paradise forever. That doesn’t sound good, but life in him that that sounds pretty good. That’s why we don’t die like other people. We don’t die like people that don’t have Christ. Susan was so looking forward to it. It offended me. You You’re not going to miss me. You’ll be fine. I’m out of here. I’m going where I was born to go. I’m going where I’ve been longing to be. She was never comfortable in this world. Are you comfortable in this world. She was never comfortable in this world, the sin of the world. She just ignored it. I was amazed at her and I’ve been reflecting on her ever since she died and amazed more amazed every time I think about the kind of person she was. Now she just ignored sin ignored temptation. I’m not saying she never sin. She’s not perfect. But compared to me, I knew she was pretty good.
But I admired the way that she just ignored it. She looked the other way she wouldn’t be moved by. She guarded Her eyes are hard and she would help me guard mine. She made me a better man. As well chamber says Timpson temptation is not sin. It’s a thing we’re bound to meet if we’re human temptation and not something we can escape. It’s essential to a full orb life of man. We were thinking that you’re tempted, is no one else is tempted. What you go through is a common inheritance of the human race. Many of us suffer from temptations from which we have no business to suffer because we have refused to let God lift us to a higher Playing where we would face temptations of a different order. In other words, or wherever you are, spiritually, that’s going to be a different line of temptation for you. But you may have willingly decided I’m not going to deeper water with Christ, I’m not going to go to a higher plane. I don’t want him lifting me up. And because I know it always means trial and difficulty, because that’s the only way you go to a higher plane and deeper water. You have to be thrown in. I’ve been in the ocean here three times in twice I was thrown in. Because it’s too cold. I’m used to warm Gulf water in the beach. And that disappointed me when I came out here. A man’s disposition on the inside determines what he is tempted by on the outside. The temptation fits the nature the one tempted and reveals the possibilities of the nature. The temptation will come along the line of your ruling disposition. You know, our hearts are full of lust. Now lust in itself dislike trials, it’s not a bad thing, dislike temptation, it’s not necessarily sin. He Jesus used the same word when he said, If you lust after a woman, and you desire to have her, you have to have her that’s passion and lust. So what it means I needed that I needed and I want it now. And if you lust after a woman that sin, but they use the same word when he says, look at the harvest feel they’re ripe for harvest. And he used the same word about lusting after the harvest feel. So it’s what you lust after that is whether it’s sin or not. You may desire a character, you may desire holiness, you may desire godliness, you may say I want to be like Christ, that’s a good last. That’s a good passion. But then there’s that last little passion of sin where you hit the button and you look at the pornography. You don’t turn away or change this channel when you know you should. You look the other way. When you see these gals dress the way they sound dress these days and have for ever you discipline yourself for the purpose of godliness, you prepare yourself for temptation. In Philippians, four, eight. Finally, Brethren, whatever is true, whatever is honorable or noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure Sam used to sing this song, remember, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right. Whatever is pure, sing out next week, guys. Whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable. If there is any excellence in anything worthy of praise, think about these things. You got to prepare yourself for temptation. It’s coming. You don’t say if it comes, maybe it’ll come. It’s coming. You’ll be tempted. You’re always being tempted. I am to God wants to use that. But you have to prepare. And we hate failing. We hate failing and fall into temptation. We hate being angry like we do. I’m out on the golf course are Rocky and we are in our mid 30s they put us with two old guys like I am now. So we’re playing around and I’m trying to break in a new wedge. And and I was trying our skull and at all we’re hitting bad shots. Finally, we got on the back nine is a par three with a pond over on the left. And I scold another shot and I walked over to the pond broke that thing over my knee and through both pieces in the pond. This gentleman we were playing with him and I heard a guy’s doing that but I never seen it before.
We’re up there putting on the green and one of those guys is putting and rocky comes over and goes Listen, tell him what we do. Okay. Well, it was my fault. That was the way to spot some was wrong with that which couldn’t have been me. Whatever is true, whatever is in accordance with what’s actual. Whatever is existing in fact or reality, you better get rooted in this right now. Because if you’re not rooted in fact, in reality, if you’re not rooted in the truth, if you’re not rooted in what’s noble, you’re going to be blown off your axis. Because we live in a day we’re good as evil and evil is good. They turned everything upside down. We used to wear put fish on our car, but now you’re going to be persecuted if you do. You can lose your job for worshipping Christ. It used to be an honor people saw official in your car and they say well, I can trust that guy. He’s a Christian. He’ll treat you honestly, he won’t cheat you. He’ll be reliable and dependable. That’s not true anymore. They’ve turned that upside down. They’ve taken the power and the influence and the impact of the church and they’ve taken it away. So we don’t have the influence we used to have. We’re not respected like we used to be. We’ve made peace treaties with the devil. We started making true church comfortable for goats. Instead of for sheep. Try to make goats comfortable. Jesus never tried to make a goat comfortable. If you don’t turn the other cheek and go the second mile and bless those who persecute you, you can’t be My disciple. If you don’t sell everything you got and give it to poor people, you can’t be My disciple. If you don’t eat my flesh and drink my blood, you can’t be My disciple. The doors with swing it on the hinges, guys are leaving right and left. Because he never would lower the standard. He kept raising the standard for the cost of what it meant to follow him. He’s purging the church right now. He’s judged our nation. We’ve run him out of the schools, we’ve run him out of our every area of our life. The fastest growing religion in America today is the nones. No religion, atheism. And so God will say to us, like he said to Israel, that’s enough. I’ve had enough of this. I’ve had enough of Christians not standing up, not living the life. That’s what to me standing up is. When the crisis comes, encourages require God expects his man to have such confidence in him, they’ll be the reliable ones. So I think personally, this is my personal opinion. I think we’re being judged as a nation. I think God’s allowing everything that’s happening to happen. Everything in nature, everything in finances and health, everything in our families, everything in corruption in politics, in every other area, you want to look at totally corrupt. Pandora’s Box been open, the toothpaste is out of the tube, and I don’t think we’re going to get back in there, the bullies are running amok. And God’s going to use them all I can use Nebuchadnezzar, this pagan king Nebuchadnezzar, my servant, he said, and he used never can, as a pagan king to judge Israel, judges own people. But in doing that, he brought them back to repentance. He brought them back to himself. They got rid of idol worship, they were purged and cleansed. They were tried. In like, King Eleazar. He was this. He was tried and found wanting and this hand wrote on the wall, when he was being judged. You’ve been tried in the on the balance and found wanting. And so you know, that’s not what you want on your gravestone. He was trying to balance and found wanting. He didn’t stand when he should have stood. He didn’t sacrifice for the good of others who didn’t bear up under suffering. He was tempted in fail. And when he failed, that’s not the greatest sin of great sin is you don’t repent. The great sin is if you say I never heard afterwards, john, one night when I was growing up, I knew I was a sinner. I heard all about sin every Sunday and church went down and rededicated my life because I didn’t know what else to do with my sin. And I did it a lot. Because God had put it in my heart to know Him
is God put it in your heart to know him? Because if he has and you won’t work to be righteous, you want to be good. You want the fruit of the Spirit in your life, you want to be have courage in a crisis, you want to stand up and bear up under suffering and sacrifice for the good of others. He’s put it in your heart to do that, to know that to know him. I can’t pat myself on the back and say, Boy, I know God, I received Christ. I’m special. I am special to him. But I didn’t decide that he put it in my heart to do that. And I don’t understand how I know about that.
All I know is that I need him and apart from him, I can do nothing. I know you need him and apart from him, you can do nothing I need I need to focus on things that are honorable, noble, deserving respect and high regard. I need things that are right. In focus on that think on these things, things that are righteous and upright and according to what is Just conforming to the facts that truth. Need purity, unmixed with any other matter, free from dirt or taint? Don’t we long for that in a culture that’s going down the tubes who are circling the bowl? Don’t we long for these things for those things that are unmixed with any other matter free from Tanner dirt spotless, free from what? weaknesses weakens or pollutes, free from moral fault and guilt. Containing nothing that does not properly belong. That’s what God is saying. Whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is right in pure, whatever is lovely and delightful of beauty harmony, attractive, because inside, they are bearing the fruit of the Spirit, eliciting love by moral or ideal worth. Whatever things are admirable that you admire, deserving high esteem, exciting wonder, applaudable and commendable. He wants us to be these kind of people. He wants to be these kind of men but don’t happen. You don’t stumble into godliness, you discipline yourself or godliness. Are you the kind of guy that if you’re going to be in a Bible study, you need to be told there’s no homework. You don’t have to memorize any verses. You don’t have to spend any time in the word. You just come. That’s what we say to them today. Just come because we’re afraid if we raise the standard, and we ask them to discipline themselves for their own good. We’re afraid they’ll leave. We’re afraid they won’t stay. Raise the standard and lop off the bottom 10%. Raise the standard in just because you can’t go to war and win the battle with those guys at one discipline themselves. It won’t pay a price or cost, do something to winnow them out. Put them in the trial and test them. Yeah, we got a Bible study and we’re going to be memorizing verses we’re going to be doing filling in the blanks, we’re going to be going through the Bible. And if that’s too much for you, and you’re not ready for that, and the first time it was offered to me or challenged me, I didn’t do it. I got in and I had to memorize verses is the first navigator study as ever in do Bible study. And I wasn’t ready for it, I dropped out. But God bless him, the navigator, staff guy that he recruited us to come to California, he gave me grace. A year later, I was ready. And he welcomed me and he gave me a big hug and say, Come on in. I learned a lot about that. He believed in me, he saw something in me I couldn’t see in myself. You got somebody that you can see something in them that they can’t see in themselves and you can pan their flame and encourage them and lift them up. So what mentoring and coaching in friendships all about things that are excellent, eminently good, superior, higher rank. Things that are worthy of praise, having worth the value, meritorious of great renown, brilliantly outstanding because of dignity. See, that’s what God does. When God gets a hold of a guy’s life. He makes them this kind of person. He makes you a man of God, it makes you a man who emanates these kinds of character traits. Not that you don’t ever follow a temptation we do. I will before the day is over, maybe many times, but I know what to do when I do I know what to do and I grow in discipline myself. And you know why I grow because I hate failing I hate having to go back and say I’m sorry I did I was wrong. Will you forgive me? First john one nine promises if you’ll confess your sin and I’ll be faithful and righteous to forgive your sin. So I need to repent. And God calls us to repentance. God calls us to confess our sin agree with him. Be merciful to me, oh God according to your loving kindness according to the greatness of your compassion, blot out my transgressions.
And we need to do that on a regular basis that needs to be your your normal everyday, immediate response to sin. Sin you do send you think your anger your bitterness, your resentment, your resentment bank, empty that thing and confess his sin causes all kinds of emotions in me that’s not godly and holy and right and pure and honorable. Keep a clear conscience with God. The devil will come and say Yeah, you did so and so as as you’re dead and I confess it and God forgave me You got a problem. Go see him. He’s taken it on himself. He’s not an attorney. He’s my advocate. And he’s forgiven me. And that’s something more than we can usually do for each other, forgive each other. Let them out from under the yoke. Give them grace, unmerited favor. that’ll change your life more than anything makes you want to obey makes you want to, when God gives you grace and forgives you, it makes you want to be obedient next time. It helps you grow. But we’re too slow to confess our sin and, and we’re gonna look at Second Chronicles 714 next week, that you’re very familiar with. If my people call by my name will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven forgive their sin, and I’ll heal their land. We don’t even know what our wicked ways are, if we’re not in the word. If you don’t, if you’re not in the Word of God, you don’t even know you don’t have a mirror that shows you what when you’re not holy and righteous and good and pure. And so you let see and loose in your life and you become loose in your living. And then you start paying the consequences forward and you blame others. This woman, it’s his job, it’s his, those politicians. And all because we weren’t men of the word in Jesus, one Lord of our life, and we don’t man a prayer, hanging together with men who love Christ, more than we do, and given that away. So when you go out there, and you’re tempted today, when you fail, just confess it. And don’t just repent with no feeling. Repent and mean it and hate it. In it’ll help you resist next time and you’ll resist in your resist in your resist, and then you fall again. confess it. And once you confess, and once you repent, and once you get his forgiveness and grace, walk in newness of life. Don’t keep letting yourself be beat up. Don’t let the enemy come and accuse you. You’ve already confessed that Jesus took that sin on the cross, He died guard, he’s forgiving you. He strengthened you. He loves you walk in that don’t walk in the guilt and the shame once it’s been confessed and repented. Let it go. make peace with reality. That’s all you can do left to yourself is saying I’m not surprised when I said I’m surprised when I don’t. That’s what do that’s how we get past the accusations of the devil. He tempts you to sin and then shames you when you do. And then he tries to shame you and keep guilt and shame on you even after you’ve repented. And he wants to keep you feeling low and unworthy. Man of God, oh, I’m unworthy. I’m no man of God. Then you’ve never really repented. You’ve never really asked forgiveness. You’ve never really received forgiveness and grace. And you wouldn’t say that God gets the glory. Jesus gets the glory for Don on the cross for my sin. He forgave me He gave me grace. He restores me. He lifts me up. And for me to say I’m unworthy is a slap in his face. He died on the cross that makes for the unworthy. Yes, in a way. But once he died and I received my new life and forgiveness, I’m not unworthy anymore. I’m worthy and he saw worthiness in me he put it in me to know him.
So my Jesus Lord of your life, be quick to confess your sin. Look at the things that are right and pure discipline your eyes through the purse make a covenant with your eyes that you might not sin against him is what the proverb says My God made a covenant my eyes how then can I look on a virgin? I made a cover of new eyes. How could I watch this stuff on TV. That’s what I deal with all the time. Change the channel, get rid of it. Don’t look at don’t get gaze at that. It’ll stir things up in you that you don’t want and you don’t need and it’s going to take you in a place you don’t want to go it’ll stay longer and you ever wanted to stay it’ll cost more than you ever wanted to pay. It’s what sin is. And God wants us to be men who don’t have to battle that out and will always battle it until we die. But God wants to set he wants to be men of God for such a time as this a man you enter out I know you are we needed to hear this today diddly. We needed to be reminded of this. We needed to know that we’re gonna have trials but go there’s an answer. There’s hope. There’s forgiveness. There’s grace. God’s given us the victory. stand out. Bless give him the honor. Lord, we’re giving you the honor We stand now in your presence. We’re a bunch of guys that love you and you put it in our heart to know you. And so Lord and knowing you, we want to obey you. We want to be men that are counted on right now that are that are dependable and a crisis. So when we face the amputation, Lord, we’ll just recognize it for what it is. And Lord, when we fall, thank you that you’ll forgive us. Because apart from you, we can do nothing. We want to honor you. We have a great God and a wonderful Savior in Christ. We thank you for giving us the hope of victory in him in Jesus name And all God’s men said amen, give’m heaven guys.
Transcribed by https://otter.ai