Speaker 1: God, we are starting our series called the good life, the good life.
Speaker 1: And everybody's looking for the good life.
Speaker 1: I've never in my life.
Speaker 1: Had anyone say, you know, I'm just looking for the bad life.
Speaker 1: I just, I really hope that my life is filled with all kinds of trauma and drama and turmoil.
Speaker 1: And I, I hope that I have lots of trials and tribulations along the way.
Speaker 1: And that's really what I'm hoping for in life.
Speaker 1: Everybody's looking for the good life.
Speaker 1: And when you talk about the good life, people define it differently.
Speaker 1: For some people it's sitting on a beach with something, with an umbrella in it, under an umbrella, don't lie in church.
Speaker 2: [inaudible]
Speaker 1: Listening to the waves and feeling the wind.
Speaker 1: And, and if you were there, you probably would never, ever want to leave.
Speaker 1: For instance, if you lived in Hawaii or something, I've questioned myself for time or two, or maybe in, it's not the beach and the sun for you, maybe it's the mountains.
Speaker 1: And it's a cabin somewhere in the mountains where there's really not a lot of people around and you're, you can hear the wind and the trees and you just, you see the vistas.
Speaker 1: And, and when you think about the good life, that's what you're dreaming about.
Speaker 1: It's for other people, it's a big city.
Speaker 1: It's the idea of being in the hustle and bustle of it all.
Speaker 1: And you know, sitting at a cafe and in New York or Paris or Rome or Venice or someplace where you're, you're hearing the sounds and feeling the movement of the city around you and there's big buildings or whatever it may be.
Speaker 1: What the good life looks different for different people, but for pretty much all of us, when we think about the good life, we're thinking about ourselves being happy, you're happy in the good life.
Speaker 1: You're satisfied in the good life.
Speaker 1: You, you have enough in the good life.
Speaker 1: You have, you have resources in the good life and you're at peace.
Speaker 1: You're respected whenever you're living the good life.
Speaker 1: When we think about the good life, we don't think about being stressed.
Speaker 1: We don't think about being super busy all the time.
Speaker 1: We certainly don't think about lacking resources.
Speaker 1: If you're thinking about living in New York city, as the good life, you're not thinking about living in a basement apartment someplace, paying$4,000 a month for a one room apartment.
Speaker 1: That really isn't even an apartment.
Speaker 1: It used to be a closet, but now it's an apartment and, and you're working 24 seven to try to afford that.
Speaker 1: That's not what any of us are dreaming of when we say the good life.
Speaker 1: Now the good life can be simple.
Speaker 2: It can be complicated,
Speaker 1: But no matter what you think of, when you think of the good life it's satisfying and it's enough, it's enough.
Speaker 1: And this, this key to the good life is always this idea of enough, having enough being enough, enough to handle whatever the situation will be.
Speaker 1: And even more than what is required.
Speaker 1: We liked the idea of more relationship enough in resource enough, in respect enough in peace, we always want enough.
Speaker 1: And so the world challenges our state of enough.
Speaker 1: If you will, it keeps pushing enough.
Speaker 1: It says, well, are you really smart enough?
Speaker 1: Are you driven enough?
Speaker 1: Are you able enough to acquire enough, to get to live the good life?
Speaker 1: And then if you do, and you are, are you enough to keep it?
Speaker 1: If you feel like you're lacking in some particular way, consumerism will help you with that.
Speaker 1: It'll say that if you drive this particular automobile, then you will gain respect enough.
Speaker 1: If you wear this line of clothes, you'll be seen as enough by other people.
Speaker 1: If you achieve this level, then you will then be enough to be wanted by other people desired by other people.
Speaker 1: And so you'll have enough relationship and it really doesn't matter what the object is that they're trying to sell.
Speaker 1: It always means it's enough for you.
Speaker 1: It's a, you know, a$10,000 car sitting in front of a$20 million mansion saying that this car is enough to belong here.
Speaker 1: And if you drive this car, you could be seen in these kinds of places.
Speaker 1: It really is just playing on enough.
Speaker 1: So what we do is in our life, much of our pursuits are in the, the pursuit of enough.
Speaker 1: We, we spend a lot of time trying to become enough, but here's the problem.
Speaker 1: Enough is a fleeting thing.
Speaker 1: It's a, it's a relative thing.
Speaker 1: It's a relative thing.
Speaker 1: John D Rockefeller, who most of us are probably somewhat familiar with his name at least was at one point the richest man in the world by far.
Speaker 1: And he was asked by a reporter one day, how much money is enough?
Speaker 1: And his response was just a little more,
Speaker 2: Just a little more.
Speaker 1: So listening to a man, speak one time who has been incredibly successful in life and financially speaking and in other ways as well.
Speaker 1: But he said, when I made my first million dollars, I really felt like I had achieved something great.
Speaker 1: And I was, I was a millionaire and man, that, that meant something to me.
Speaker 1: And so as I began to develop my sphere of influence and so on, I started being invited into different rooms than I had been invited into before with different people than I had been able to associate with before.
Speaker 1: And so he said, I remember the moment I stood in a room and I looked around after getting to know some people.
Speaker 1: Then I realized after earning a million dollars, I was the poorest person in the room.
Speaker 2: It's relative
Speaker 1: Enough is always relative.
Speaker 1: And in the good life series, we're going to see what the scripture has to say about
Speaker 2: Enough.
Speaker 2: Now, there is
Speaker 1: A young man in the scripture that seems to have enough.
Speaker 1: W the Bible describes him.
Speaker 1: We call him the rich young ruler, but, but the Bible doesn't call him that specifically.
Speaker 1: It just uses those descriptors to, to talk about who he is.
Speaker 1: And so he he's, he's rich.
Speaker 1: So he has financial wealth enough.
Speaker 2: He's he's
Speaker 1: Got money and resource at his disposal.
Speaker 1: Then it says that he's young.
Speaker 2: So he has chronological wealth.
Speaker 2: He has the,
Speaker 1: The ability to gain more.
Speaker 1: He's got time in front of him to gain more and to see more and to achieve more.
Speaker 1: And how many of us today, you wish that you had the financial resource and the wisdom that you possess today.
Speaker 1: You just wish you had it 20 years ago.
Speaker 2: Yeah, me too.
Speaker 1: All, all of us are at a different place today.
Speaker 1: And we wish that yes, that if we could have just had this yesterday, well, what he did, he had it yesterday.
Speaker 1: And then it says that he was
Speaker 2: Ruler.
Speaker 2: He had a wealth of power.
Speaker 2: He had enough
Speaker 1: Power.
Speaker 1: And so he has financial wealth.
Speaker 1: He has chronological wealth and he has the wealth of power.
Speaker 1: And by human standards that looks like he's got the world in the Palm of his hands.
Speaker 1: I mean, he can do anything he wants to at this particular point.
Speaker 1: But at, at some point he runs to Jesus.
Speaker 1: The scripture says he falls down before him.
Speaker 1: He bows before him.
Speaker 1: And he asks a question.
Speaker 1: In fact, the biggest question that humanity can ask, he says, good teacher, what should I do to inherit eternal life?
Speaker 1: What I do to inherit eternal life.
Speaker 1: Now, his verbiage kind of tells us a little bit about him.
Speaker 1: He's a rich young ruler, a time in a day and a time, and in a culture where youth would not have been given power and why, where wealth was a difficult thing to achieve.
Speaker 1: And he asked the question, how do I inherit eternal life versus how do I earn eternal life?
Speaker 1: So many scholars believe that he has inherited wealth.
Speaker 1: He has inherited power.
Speaker 1: And so he is saying, how do I inherit this thing called eternal life?
Speaker 1: Now it's an interesting question because you and I know that Jesus had come here for the purpose of making humanity, the sons and daughters of God, thereby allowing us the privilege of inheriting eternal life.
Speaker 1: But this young man is, is asking this question before that is widely.
Speaker 2: And it's because
Speaker 1: Of his own understanding his own experience that he comes to ask this particular question, but he, he understands enough to say that what I have on this earth is not enough to guarantee me eternal life.
Speaker 2: And so how do I get there?
Speaker 1: His question becomes our question today, how good is good enough to go to heaven?
Speaker 2: [inaudible]
Speaker 1: In survey of Americans say that 50% or over 50% of the United States or people in the United States, wonder if they will go to heaven when they die.
Speaker 1: This includes believers.
Speaker 2: Now, before
Speaker 1: We are saved before, when a relationship with Christ, we asked the question, do I deserve salvation?
Speaker 2: After we were
Speaker 1: In a relationship with Christ, we don't typically ask that question unless we're going through a difficult time, a bad time where we're feeling bad about ourselves.
Speaker 1: And one thing I find just from observation is that it's not really a matter of whether we are doing things that are wrong in the sight of God, whether we are actively in sin or not.
Speaker 1: It's whether or not we feel bad about where we're at
Speaker 2: Or not.
Speaker 2: And so it's really
Speaker 1: An emotional question that we, as believers can ask saying, am I good enough to go to heaven when I die?
Speaker 1: But the short answer to both questions, whether I'm deserved to be saved or whether I'm good enough to go to heaven.
Speaker 1: When I die before being a believer or after being a believer, the short answer to both questions is perfection is the standard for salvation.
Speaker 2: Perfection
Speaker 1: Is the standard for salvation.
Speaker 1: So you're welcome.
Speaker 1: This service is dismissed.
Speaker 1: You have the answer and you can go home and do likewise, praise the Lord.
Speaker 1: It'd be saying, well, wait a minute.
Speaker 1: Where does Jesus say that?
Speaker 1: I'm really thankful that you asked in Matthew chapter five.
Speaker 1: He says, but you are to be perfect.
Speaker 1: Even as your father in heaven is perfect.
Speaker 1: He's teaching this right after he teaches the beatitudes, right?
Speaker 1: As he is speaking the giving the sermon on the mountain, he says, you are to be perfect.
Speaker 1: Even as I, as your father in heaven is perfect.
Speaker 1: And here here's the, here's the reality.
Speaker 1: That's an issue.
Speaker 1: That's an issue for me because I cannot say that I am perfect.
Speaker 1: In fact, speaking of the reality of sin, Romans three 23 says for everyone has sinned and fall.
Speaker 1: We all fall short of God's glory
Speaker 2: Standard.
Speaker 2: So there's
Speaker 1: Anybody on planet earth that has sinned, that he is speaking to we all, but then even it goes a little bit further than that.
Speaker 1: Ecclesiastes chapter seven, it says not a single person on earth is always good and never sends not a single one.
Speaker 1: Even your great grandmother.
Speaker 1: I dunno.
Speaker 1: There's something I can understand my grandfather sending for some reason, that just makes sense to me.
Speaker 1: But when nano and mom, all my grandmothers, when somebody was thinking about them, sending, they don't send grandmothers, don't send, if you're a grandmother in here today, you don't, we know you don't send.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 1: I know some of your grandmothers and yeah, you do.
Speaker 1: Every single one of us have sinned.
Speaker 1: At some point
Speaker 2: We all fall short.
Speaker 2: So
Speaker 1: Perfection is the standard given to us by Jesus
Speaker 2: And by a father.
Speaker 2: And
Speaker 1: If we all have sinned, then what is the ramification of that?
Speaker 1: What is the penalty for that?
Speaker 1: Romans six says for the wages of sin, the penalty of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ.
Speaker 1: Our Lord will hold up a minute.
Speaker 1: One might say, wait a minute.
Speaker 1: I thought Jesus was about love and grace and forgiveness.
Speaker 1: This is the new Testament.
Speaker 1: This is the same writer.
Speaker 1: Paul who said, is it by grace that you're saved through faith?
Speaker 1: It's the, it's the same writer who's telling us about the salvation that we can have through Jesus Christ.
Speaker 1: So this is an old Testament, God that we're talking about old Testament, covenant or old covenant that he's talking about.
Speaker 1: This is, this is new covenant.
Speaker 1: This is where you and I are living.
Speaker 1: And he says that the penalty for sin is death, but he does not stop there.
Speaker 1: He says, but the free gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ.
Speaker 1: Our Lord, he gives us hope.
Speaker 1: He gives us a way to escape the punishment for sin.
Speaker 1: And I have a helper today in Christian.
Speaker 1: Christian is coming to help us give an illustration of what he's talking about and how he is talking about it.
Speaker 1: I needed a billboard this morning.
Speaker 1: So I've got the biggest one I could find.
Speaker 2: Thank you, sir.
Speaker 2: And he represents all of us.
Speaker 2: Every single one of us has this stuff going on, where we have lying.
Speaker 2: And we have co
Speaker 1: Dissension and idolatry and bitterness.
Speaker 1: And, and even in places that we can't see all the time, we have unforgiveness and gutting and envy and stealing and talking back and gossip and disrespect.
Speaker 1: And we're covered in this stuff called sin.
Speaker 1: This stuff that God doesn't like, that causes us to fall short of his perfection.
Speaker 2: And so we,
Speaker 1: We try, we try to stop doing this stuff.
Speaker 1: And so we go, okay, well causing decision.
Speaker 1: I'm going to do my very best to get rid of that in my life.
Speaker 1: And then, and then I'm going to try, I mean, witchcraft, I mean, no sacrifices lately.
Speaker 1: So I'm going to go ahead and take that one off.
Speaker 1: And I'm going to, I'm going to say that I've got that one licked over here, but bitterness in my heart.
Speaker 1: Well, okay.
Speaker 1: That's a little bit harder to get off than I thought it was gonna be, but, you know, and, and then how many of us know that as soon as we get it off, sometimes that sucker just seems to come right back on there and here we are trying to get rid of it, but it just keeps, it keeps popping up.
Speaker 1: So murder.
Speaker 1: Okay.
Speaker 1: I think I defeated that.
Speaker 1: Um, you know, now in my heart and my mind that I commit murder, but I'm not, but I'm not in prison today.
Speaker 1: So, you know, maybe.
Speaker 1: Okay.
Speaker 1: And, and so I feel like I've done all right, but, but, but then, you know, other things keep popping up and, and even the stuff that we feel like we've defeated at some point,
Speaker 2: At some point they can come back and they become,
Speaker 1: Become a reality in our life again.
Speaker 1: And so we try different things.
Speaker 2: We try different things
Speaker 1: To mitigate our sin.
Speaker 1: We first, we act like it doesn't exist.
Speaker 2: We say, Oh no, that's just
Speaker 1: How I am.
Speaker 1: It's just kind of how I created it.
Speaker 1: Doesn't that, that doesn't really matter because I mean, I can't control, you know, pride.
Speaker 1: I've heard everybody, everybody's got it lying.
Speaker 1: Well, everyone.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 1: I mean, it's, everybody lies sometimes.
Speaker 1: So I'm just going to act like it doesn't exist.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna act like it doesn't matter.
Speaker 1: Or I'm just going to ignore God.
Speaker 1: I'm just going to say, well, you have no right to say, what is sexually and moral in my life or, or whether or not I'm living in fear and worry and whether or not that's a problem with you.
Speaker 1: Or maybe we try to change
Speaker 2: The definition of sin.
Speaker 2: We say, well, you know,
Speaker 1: No sexually MRR and morality will, that was sin.
Speaker 1: That was wrong back then.
Speaker 1: But today it's not a problem because things have changed.
Speaker 1: And yet we serve a God who does not change
Speaker 2: What most people do when it comes
Speaker 1: To sin is we adopt a good enough mentality.
Speaker 2: I'm good enough.
Speaker 1: So, so let's say, let's just say I was able to get rid of that bitterness.
Speaker 1: And I already got rid of murder in my life.
Speaker 1: So, you know, I'm better that guy over there and I'm better than that lady over there.
Speaker 1: And, and you know, they, so I don't deal with bitter ness all the time.
Speaker 1: I'm just, I got the bit out, but the, the ness, it remains, you know, I'm mostly over that one, not completely, but mostly.
Speaker 1: So at least I'm better than them.
Speaker 1: Well, look at them, Christian, you know, you're better than most of us.
Speaker 2: And so
Speaker 1: We have a good enough mentality.
Speaker 1: I'm good enough to go to heaven because I can find people who are worse than I am.
Speaker 2: The issue is
Speaker 1: There.
Speaker 1: Isn't a good enough list
Speaker 2: To work from
Speaker 1: The scripture.
Speaker 1: There's nowhere in scripture where it says, you know what, if you do these particular things and only those things, that's good enough.
Speaker 1: There's nothing that says these things, God hates, but you know what, he he'll, he'll let you get by with, with, with five out of the 12, or I'm just making numbers up here, but there isn't a good enough list.
Speaker 1: And if we go by culture, because we know cultures shifting and changing, then even that isn't good enough because, because it does shift and it does change.
Speaker 1: So what was considered San or wrong?
Speaker 1: 50 years ago, isn't center wrong today.
Speaker 1: But then 50 years from today, what we consider center wrong by popular demand and by cultural reality is, will be different even then.
Speaker 1: So how do you know if you've lived more than 25, 50 years?
Speaker 1: How do you, how do you know which list to live by the list that you grew up with or the list that exists today, but even, even if it's not culture and if it isn't scripture, even in our own lives, as individuals, that's difficult to come up with a good enough lift list because what's good enough to me today is different than what was good enough to me when I was 15 at 15, I, there were some things on my good enough list that today I'm like, no, no, no, no, no, that is not good.
Speaker 1: Enough things have shifted.
Speaker 1: Things have changed.
Speaker 1: And so if there isn't a good enough list and perfection is the goal, then, then how in the world can anyone possibly go to heaven?
Speaker 1: And here's the good news and our big idea today.
Speaker 1: Good people don't go to heaven.
Speaker 1: Forgiven people do good people.
Speaker 1: Don't go to heaven.
Speaker 1: Forgiven people do good enough is never good enough when perfection is the standard, but God made a way for you and I to become perfect like him.
Speaker 1: And I have two faults for us today.
Speaker 1: And thought, number one is this go to Jesus
Speaker 2: To be saved, go to Jesus, to be saved.
Speaker 2: See when we're covered with sin,
Speaker 1: We cannot get good enough.
Speaker 1: And we cannot stay good enough to deserve salvation.
Speaker 1: Even if you could have, even if you could not sin for a full 24 hours, the chances of you maintaining that for the rest of your life are zero.
Speaker 2: Okay?
Speaker 1: So we cannot become worthy of salvation.
Speaker 1: And Jesus says it this way.
Speaker 1: He says, I am the way the truth and the life, no one can come to the father except through me.
Speaker 1: So if you want to live where the father lives, if you want to be in the presence of the father, then you have to go through Jesus.
Speaker 1: We go to Jesus to be saved.
Speaker 1: We come to him and we, we repent of our sins.
Speaker 1: We recognize him as Lord and savior.
Speaker 1: We receive his saving grace in our life.
Speaker 1: We believe him and accept him and profess him as our savior.
Speaker 1: And then he forgives us.
Speaker 1: He covers our sin in forgiveness, and he adopts us as his own praise.
Speaker 1: God.
Speaker 1: In fact, the Bible says it in second Corinthians this way, he says for our sake, he made him who knew no sin.
Speaker 1: The one who had never sinned before he made him to be sin for us so that we in him might become that word become or might become.
Speaker 1: It means that we have the opportunity to transition to the righteousness of God.
Speaker 1: And so what happens is when we are saved, Jesus sees us in all of our sin and all of our issue.
Speaker 1: And he wraps us in his perfect righteousness.
Speaker 1: He, he covers us with his blood and with all that he is.
Speaker 1: And so when the father looks at us and would have the opportunity to judge us, he looks at us and he says, I don't see, I don't see any sin there.
Speaker 1: I don't see any issue there.
Speaker 1: No, look at that turn all the way around.
Speaker 1: He, I see him as he is.
Speaker 1: I see him and he's covered by the righteousness of Jesus.
Speaker 1: There is no sin and it as close to perfection as you and I can get on this earth, underneath the righteousness, the sin may still be there.
Speaker 1: We still dealing with issue.
Speaker 1: We're still dealing with stuff, but as it's, as, as God looks at us, there is a wholeness.
Speaker 1: And there is a righteousness that is there.
Speaker 1: And the forgiveness that we have, it's not something that we're striving for or working for.
Speaker 1: It's something that he has wrapped us in.
Speaker 1: He has offered it to us.
Speaker 1: He has blessed us with it.
Speaker 1: And so, and so he, it is ours to operate it.
Speaker 1: It's ours to walk in and Jesus covers it.
Speaker 1: In fact, would you say it with me?
Speaker 1: He covers it.
Speaker 1: Jesus covers it.
Speaker 1: Now it's our job to button it.
Speaker 2: He covers it.
Speaker 2: We button it.
Speaker 1: We have the choice to keep the
Speaker 2: On hallelujah thought.
Speaker 2: Number two, stay in Jesus to live saved.
Speaker 2: See Jesus covers us.
Speaker 1: And we choose to keep the covering of Christ over our lives.
Speaker 1: He covers our sin and we button up.
Speaker 1: We, we bundle up in his righteousness
Speaker 2: If you will.
Speaker 2: And living
Speaker 1: For Christ is a beautiful thing.
Speaker 1: It's a, it's an expanding thing.
Speaker 1: It's, uh, it's, uh, a peaceful thing as a joyful thing.
Speaker 1: Living in Christ as a, as a joyous thing.
Speaker 1: And the more we develop in him and the more we grow in him, and the more we develop in him, the more we understand, the more our understanding is opened, that the scripture would say it, it's building line upon line and precept upon precept.
Speaker 1: And here are a little, and they're a little, and we are, we are building up in him and our knowledge of him grows.
Speaker 1: And the result of us living in the righteousness of God is the same as it was in the life of Jesus.
Speaker 1: We ended up growing in peace and enjoy, and the fruit of the spirit and love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faith, meekness, gentleness, and self-control all these things become the realities of our life.
Speaker 1: Just like they were in the, in the life of Jesus, because we are becoming more and more like him.
Speaker 1: We've taken on his righteousness.
Speaker 1: And now we are becoming more and more like Christ and the greater regrow and maturity and the righteousness of Christ.
Speaker 1: The result is that we have less tolerance for our life in sin, as we become more and more like him.
Speaker 1: And so our, our tendency is to start hearing the voice of God sooner.
Speaker 1: And, and we start feeling his move faster and we become more and more responsive to him as we mature in Christ Jesus, to the point that scripture is very clear.
Speaker 1: It says in James four.
Speaker 1: So whoever knows the right thing to do, if you know the right thing to do, and then you don't do it for that person,
Speaker 2: It is sin.
Speaker 1: We, we now have sin in our life because we simply did not do what we knew was the right thing to do.
Speaker 1: And so, as a new Christian, somebody just coming to Christ, we know very little and we need easy things to digest.
Speaker 1: The scripture would call it the milk of the word, things that are easy to understand, easy to digest, they feel good.
Speaker 1: They fill you up nicely, but eventually as our diet matures, as we mature, then we, we begin to take in the meat of the word.
Speaker 1: These are things that are not easy to digest, but they help us stay stronger, longer.
Speaker 1: We can do more with it.
Speaker 1: It helps us develop even further.
Speaker 1: And so we began having the meat of the word in our life.
Speaker 1: And this is a progressive revelation in our life.
Speaker 1: It's not that sin is expanding.
Speaker 1: Sin is not expanding at all, but our understanding of righteousness is
Speaker 2: Suddenly
Speaker 1: Understand, well, what will I need to pull back from that weight?
Speaker 1: I need to handle that in a different way.
Speaker 1: Wait, I realize now that the way I've been doing that is off sin, hasn't changed, but our understanding of righteousness has we're not becoming worse.
Speaker 1: It's simply that we're understanding holiness better.
Speaker 1: And so we press into our new understanding of holiness, but we all have times when, even as mature believers, our cover of righteousness,
Speaker 2: It seems to slip.
Speaker 2: So the pressure gets to us and suddenly, Oh, pride pops out,
Speaker 1: Start saying things that we should or shouldn't say, and doing things that we ought not say the worst in us comes out or anger is revealed.
Speaker 1: And what do we have here?
Speaker 1: So now we're living in feeling worry or fear and worrying that ness starts popping out there on the corner.
Speaker 1: And, and maybe there's a little bit of idolatry that's being seen in our life.
Speaker 1: As, as, as, as, as the, the righteousness of God seems to start slipping from our line.
Speaker 2: Now, as we were mature, Jesus,
Speaker 1: It gets our con our attention.
Speaker 1: And he does it through this thing called conviction.
Speaker 1: Conviction says that you did wrong.
Speaker 1: Not that you are wrong.
Speaker 1: So it says, Hey, Christian, you did the wrong thing.
Speaker 1: And as a mature Christian, we hear that.
Speaker 1: And it pricks our conscience and we go, Oh, I did the wrong thing.
Speaker 1: And the mature believer responds
Speaker 2: Through repentance.
Speaker 2: What,
Speaker 1: What we realized is, wait a minute, I'm covered in the righteousness of God, but a little bit of self is popping out right
Speaker 2: Now.
Speaker 2: A little bit of me
Speaker 1: Is, is showing through the righteousness of God.
Speaker 1: I've got a little gap here.
Speaker 1: And so, and so I repent and it, it closes the gap.
Speaker 1: Once again, repentance, reestablishes, righteousness, and we turn from sin and we refocus
Speaker 2: On Christ.
Speaker 2: We say,
Speaker 1: I'm sorry.
Speaker 1: And that's a beautiful thing, but we changed direction.
Speaker 1: And I, and I'm sorry, without a change of direction is not repentance.
Speaker 1: I've used this illustration before, and it's never actually been true.
Speaker 1: So it's not true even right now.
Speaker 1: But if I said to Christie, if I, if I, if I reached out and I smacked Christie, my wife of almost 24 years, and then I looked at her and say, I'm really sorry about doing that.
Speaker 1: But two minutes later, we've got an, a popped her again.
Speaker 1: And I said, Oh, no, no, that's not really me.
Speaker 1: That's not really me.
Speaker 1: Um, I'm really sorry for that.
Speaker 1: And then 10 minutes later, I popped her again.
Speaker 1: And she's like, okay, hold up.
Speaker 1: At some point, I have to question whether or not the apology is real, because if you, if you're, if you apologize, you're probably, and you're really sorry.
Speaker 1: You're not gonna keep hitting me.
Speaker 1: It's also never been true because I'm still alive standing here right now.
Speaker 1: I have to sleep sometime.
Speaker 1: And I know what's good for me.
Speaker 2: Sorry.
Speaker 1: He has to be accompanied by a turn in direction or a change in direction.
Speaker 1: So here's Jesus allowing us the opportunity to reestablish righteousness.
Speaker 1: And you might be saying, well, wait a minute, you don't understand what I've done, though.
Speaker 1: I've done some really horrible things and I've done them for years, or maybe I've been involved in this habitual behavior.
Speaker 1: And it's just, it seems like I'm never, ever changing my ways.
Speaker 1: And so I try hard.
Speaker 1: I asked for repentance, and then I just do that thing again, whatever that is in your life, that, that struggle that you're having.
Speaker 1: And so I just don't know I've made a mess of it.
Speaker 1: And I don't know, I do not think I can be good enough to be saved.
Speaker 1: And here's the reality.
Speaker 1: You cannot be good enough to be saved, and I can not be good enough to be saved, but here's the good news for you and I today, it might be easier to be saved than, you know, and harder to be lost than you think, easier to be saved and you know, and harder to be lost than you think.
Speaker 1: And here's why I say that because you, you have a prophet in the Bible.
Speaker 1: His name is Jeremiah, but the Nick, his nickname is the weeping prophet because he is always giving bad news.
Speaker 1: He's crying over Israel.
Speaker 1: He is not the world's most joyous individual.
Speaker 1: And then most scholars believe he wrote the book of Lamentations.
Speaker 2: Hmm.
Speaker 1: Obviously a uplifting read full of encouragement.
Speaker 1: And so you have the weeping prophet writing Avella mense and in the middle of all of his lamenting and saying some really tough things.
Speaker 1: Jeremiah writes this, the faithful love of the Lord never ends.
Speaker 1: His mercies, never cease.
Speaker 3: Great is his faithfulness.
Speaker 3: His mercies began a fresh each morning.
Speaker 3: So maybe you send a thousand times yesterday.
Speaker 3: And a thousand times you asked God for forgiveness and you went to bed saying, I will never ever sin again.
Speaker 3: If you'll just forgive me for today's debacle, Lord, I will never sin again, starting tomorrow morning.
Speaker 3: And you wake up tomorrow morning.
Speaker 3: Here's what I want you to know.
Speaker 3: 100% of God's mercy and grace are available to you this morning.
Speaker 3: He never walks into a day deficient of mercy and grace.
Speaker 3: They're new every single morning.
Speaker 3: So I'll say it to you this way you will fail.
Speaker 3: Just don't quit.
Speaker 3: You will fail.
Speaker 3: Just don't quit.
Speaker 3: You will never be good enough to be saved or to stay saved, but your good enough doesn't save you.
Speaker 3: So if good enough, doesn't save me then.
Speaker 3: What does safety here?
Speaker 3: It is ready.
Speaker 3: God's grace offered through forgiveness accepted by you in faith saves you.
Speaker 3: You saying Lord, I can't explain how it all works, but in faith, I believe in trust you that you will forgive me right now.
Speaker 3: His grace is poured out on you.
Speaker 3: Forgiveness is released into your life.
Speaker 3: The righteousness of God remains constant in you.
Speaker 3: You said, well, what happens if, what happens?
Speaker 3: If that situation occurs where we're self pops out, I want you to understand something very clearly.
Speaker 3: You are not lost.
Speaker 3: You're not lost because a little bit of something's popping up, but it's your privilege to reestablish righteousness.
Speaker 3: What I'm saying is you're not saved this minute and lost that minute and save this minute, but lost that I'm saved today because I did everything right, but I thought that bad word.
Speaker 3: And so now I'm over here in the loss category, or maybe I did more than thinking.
Speaker 3: Maybe I said it, maybe I said it twice.
Speaker 3: Well, then that does that.
Speaker 3: Obviously what that means Christian is that we can just do whatever we want whenever we want.
Speaker 3: However we want because, well, God don't care.
Speaker 3: He's going to cover us in righteousness.
Speaker 3: No, the scripture teaches the same writer who says salvation by grace through faith says that's not at Liberty, a license to sin because if God unsaved us every time that you and I sin, we would have no hope of salvation, but he has sealed us with the Holy spirit.
Speaker 3: And he has allowed us the privilege of living in confidence and a humble heart says, Lord, when self pops out, I ask you to forgive me.
Speaker 3: When too much of me begins to shine through, forgive me.
Speaker 3: We're not enough, but God is he's good enough to forgive us.
Speaker 3: Jesus is good enough to pay the price and you and I, by faith accepting it.
Speaker 3: That's where our salvation lies.
Speaker 3: But I'm thankful that that's not the end of the story because the day will come and John writes about it.
Speaker 3: Jesus is going to return for his children.
Speaker 3: And on that day, it says, dear friends, we are already God's children, but he has not yet shown us what we will be like when Christ appears.
Speaker 3: But we do know that we will be like him for, we will see him as he really is.
Speaker 3: And for eternity, the righteousness of God wraps us for eternity.
Speaker 3: We become like our father.
Speaker 3: Oh, what a beautiful promise.
Speaker 3: That is.
Speaker 3: I don't know what your next step is today.
Speaker 3: I don't, I don't know where God is calling you to.
Speaker 3: I don't know where you are in your walk with Christ, but as you mature in him, thank you Christian, for helping me today.
Speaker 3: As you mature in him, he keeps calling you to new understanding and new revelation, and it becomes your responsibility in mind.
Speaker 3: It becomes your privilege and mind to step into that next level of understanding.
Speaker 3: What does that in your life today?
Speaker 3: I'm going to ask you to bow your heads with me right now is your, is your next step today accepting the forgiveness of God.
Speaker 3: Maybe you have messed up and you know, you've messed up and you've got itself showing maybe it's a little bit of self.
Speaker 3: Maybe that's a whole lot of self.
Speaker 3: And you know that you need to button up that righteousness.
Speaker 3: You're not lost today.
Speaker 3: I don't want to give you that impression at all, but there's a better way to live.
Speaker 3: A more liberating way to live.
Speaker 3: The freedom that we have in him is to come to Christ and say, I'm sorry for my sin.
Speaker 3: And he, he applies his righteous this once again, maybe your next step is asking him to be your Lord and savior for the first time, whatever it is today, he's calling you higher.
Speaker 3: How good is good enough to be saved perfection and God in his goodness has offered us away to be perfect.
Speaker 3: Even as he himself is perfect today, it is the application of the righteousness of God in our life.
Speaker 3: And then for eternity, we dwell in his righteousness.
Speaker 3: Lord, I thank you for your promises.
Speaker 3: I thank you for your word.
Speaker 3: I pray that your convicting spirit would cover your people right now in any area in which we seen that we have strayed in any area that we've walked away in any area that we've allowed self to show through.
Speaker 3: I pray right now, savior that you, you would reveal it to us and you would convict our heart.
Speaker 3: If we need your salvation, I pray that we would call out to you today.
Speaker 3: Whatever our next step may be.
Speaker 3: I pray that you give us the courage to take it and to fuel.
Speaker 3: You cover us once again, with grace, with love, with your overwhelming forgiveness in Jesus name.
Speaker 3: We pray that everybody say, man, let's stand to our feet and that's closest service and worship prayer partners come forward.
Speaker 3: If you need prayer for anything at all, I invite you to come forward and pray what these prayer partners, they are ready to pray for.
Speaker 3: You don't leave today without connecting with somebody in prayer.