Acts Part 12

Acts Part 12

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:01

This is number twelve. Tim and I are in agreement. This is number twelve in our family series on X. We had a great weekend. Boys won or tied three hockey games. Smith Boys had a great weekend swimming. Laura gets to dance on Tuesday. Enjoyed watching Janie practice softball last night. And if I've missed anybody, please forgive me. I can't keep it all straight without taking too much time. So we're still in chapter 20 of Acts, and we're in the middle of you don't speak for God unless. So you don't speak for God unless you pay careful attention to yourself. You have to ask yourself, is it your intent to serve people? Remember Christ said, let him who wants to be greatest in the kingdom of heaven be a servant to those in the kingdom of heaven? Or do you want to be served? What's your intent? To serve or to be served? Then you have to ask yourself, would you risk everything to protect Christ's own? Everything to protect them. I protected my children. I would have given anything to protect my children. I would have done anything to protect my children. And here's the thing. All mothers want to gobble their kids up. They want them for their own selfish purposes. They want their children to comfort them and to protect them and to live for them. No, no. A man has to protect his children from the mother. Now you can take this too far, of course. But I would, this is just something that's just ingrained in me. Don't you know where I picked it up? But I would live without a woman's love for the sake of my children. I would have done anything to protect my children, to make sure that they were not hobbled for life. Then you have to examine yourself. Do you cry out for help? Solomon, the wisest man who ever lived, God blessed him because of Solomon's humble attitude. When Solomon prayed to the Lord, he told the Lord, basically, I'm like a little wet behind the ear kid. I don't know how to lead these people. You want me to lead these people? I don't know how. And because of that prayer and that humility, God gave Solomon wisdom and great riches. Then you have to make sure that you keep your heart aglow for the word. And this is not an easy task. Your heart is like a wood-burning stove. And the fuel for that stove is the Word of God. The Word of God is like planks, wood, solid oak wood that you put into the stove to burn. I love walking into Brian Ledesma's home and seeing that fire blazing. It's really pretty to look at. But that's where that's the source of the heat. And the source of your spiritual heat is the Word of God. And you have to keep, you have to keep throwing those logs on the fire. Jeremiah had an interesting experience. God called him from birth to do a certain work. And Jeremiah thought, I don't think he felt it was going to be easy, but he didn't think it was going to be as hard as it actually was, and he felt deceived. He felt like God had tricked him. You guys too, me too, we've been kind of tricked by God. I had no idea, you know, it was going to be this hard. In fact, I thought it was going to be easy. There was a time in my life, you know, back when I first, you know, started thinking about these things. I thought, you know, I'd write a book and, you know, the throngs would just come and read it and be converted. But that's not the way it has gone. But Jeremiah says, but his word was in my heart as a burning fire shut up in my bones. He tried to, he was, he was resentful. He was angry. Like I said, he felt tricked. And he said, I'm not going to speak for the Lord. But he realized the fire was burning in his bones. And he was worn out by trying to keep his mouth shut. But he couldn't keep his mouth shut. He could not stop speaking in God's name. And that's what you should want. If you're a Christian, you have a fire in your bones. You may not realize it, but it's there. You may not realize it until the last moment. I don't know when you realize it, but it's there. And then do you pray, search me and see if there be any wicked way in me? You know, God knows you. God knows you. The question is, do you want this knowledge that God has for you? Or are you satisfied with yourself? David says, try me and know my thoughts. Examine me. Put me on the witness stand and examine me. This takes a lot of courage to want to know who you really are. Then you have to pay careful attention to all of God's flock. Paul uses the term, the word all. It just really kind of intrigued me. He told the people at Ephesus, pay attention to all God's flock. There are no write-offs. This is the one thing I saw in the false churches I went to. They write people off. If you're not in agreement with them, you're written off. But there can be no write-offs. No write-offs. You have to examine yourself and make sure that you look at the people who are under your ministry and examine them in the light of God's word and your wisdom. You have to know their state. Who are they? How are they doing? Because you will give an account. Fathers, you will give an account for how you raise your children. You are the spiritual leader of the family. You can't say, well, my wife took them to church or my wife, my wife. No, uh-uh. No. You will give an account. You want to make sure you're not too harsh or too lenient. If you're either one, you will pay dearly for their sins and your mistakes. You want to be appropriately loving and appropriately firm. You want to make sure that you deliver them from sin. Or are you going to take the easy way out? Just, you know, pat them on the behind. Oh, that's okay. No, that's not what a spiritual person does. A spiritual person resists sin in himself and in others. You can't keep your children from sinning, but you can do what you can to keep them from sinning foolishly. If they're going to be stubborn and persist in doing things that hurt themselves and dishonor God, you can't stop all that. But if you don't try to stop it, guess what? The foolish things they do, God takes their sins and puts them on your account and you will answer for that. You will answer for that. You need to keep that in mind. So when it comes to the church of God, we have to care. We have to care about every person in the body of Christ. Every person. No write-offs. I know I don't remember what class in school does this, but you know, sometimes a class will have the kids carry an egg. So I guess it's preparing them to carry a baby. But they carry this egg. And that's how you should treat every person in the body of Christ. The egg represents the weakest, most irritating person you can think of. Remember one church we went to, the Presbyterian church, they call them EGRs, extra grace required. That just so irritates me. Like they think they're above needing extra grace. They think they're so perfect. They don't need extra grace. But people with who they have to deal with, oh, those people, they need extra grace. Well, not me. I'm okay. I'm up here, you're down there. But if you have this egg, quote unquote, that you're carrying through life, this weak Christian, this person who may irritate you, if you drop them and break this person, God will break you. God will break you. So you be careful. Like the Bible says, be careful lest you entertain angels without knowing it. Be careful. The blood of Christ bought that person. And you have to ask yourself, have you ever paid so much for anything? The blood of Christ bought that weak Christian that you tend maybe to look down on and to be irritated by. The blood of Christ bought that person. Christ died for that person. Then you have to have an eye for fierce wolves. You can't be a Pollyanna. You cannot do that. Satan wants to destroy everything that Christ builds. Everything. Everything. There are wolves who just want to kill and destroy. And you have an obligation to protect them. They are God's own. You need to protect them as if they're your own newborn baby. Protect them. Don't think that people, don't think that Satan isn't out there and the world isn't out there to destroy them. You have to protect Christ's own. Just like David protected his flock. These stories weren't written for the sake of goats and sheep and cows. No way. David killed a bear with his bare hands. David killed a lion with his bare hands. That's how devoted he was to protecting his flock. You have to have an eye, too, for those who agree with you almost 100%. You have to keep in mind that there are people who want to pretend they agree with you, but they're not really in agreement with you. You may think they're 90% in agreement with you, 99%. It's that 1% that's the kicker. Because that 1%, they twist everything to steal what you have worked to heal. They want to steal it. They want to be the preacher. They want to be number one. You have to be touched by God's faithful servants who have endured to foster God's flock. Paul used himself as an example that he warned people with tears night and day. He worked hard. He provided his own income. He wasn't a burden on anyone financially. He worked hard. He put himself out there. He wore himself out trying to win people to Christ and keeping them one to Christ. And you need to consider my life. You need to consider what I've done these last thirty years. In the history of mankind, come on. I'm not exalting myself, I'm just stating the fact. In the history of mankind, do you think anybody has ever read a three or four hundred page book for twenty grandchildren and many of the adults? Has that ever happened? And to read it with them in mind, making notes, trying to encourage them and to prepare them for life and to excite their heart for God. I can't believe it's ever happened. You have to have the wisdom and the confidence to commend those who follow you and rely on you to God. You must commend them. The battle isn't yours, it's the Lord's. You are just an underling. You're an under-shepherd. Don't act as if it all falls on you because it doesn't. Yes, you need to work hard. You need to take it seriously. But Christ is the shepherd. You have to have the confidence not to take a cop out, not to take an easy way out, but from your heart to commend those who follow you to Christ, entrusting them to Christ. You must know that ultimately Christ is the chief shepherd. And you have to be able to commit those under your care to the care of Christ. Then you have to tear greed from your heart. Greed, what a terrible thing. Luther was so right about the enemies of the church, heretics, tyrants, and greed. And greed is by far the worst. Greed. This is an age of greed. We have perfected greed. We have perfected greed so much that people truly believe that the greedier they are, the more godly they are. The more they have, the more they feel that God has blessed them and they are God's darlings because they have so much money. But Paul said covetousness, which is idolatry. If you're greedy, you are an idolater. And the greedier you are, the more of a pagan idolater you are. And we're living in an age. And this is I saw this in the Lutheran church. It actually shocked me. They care far more, the Lutheran pastors care far more about their retirement funds and their paychecks than they do about caring for God's flock. And you have to work hard to help the weak, not to enrich yourself. So if you think you speak for God, you have to tear greed from your heart and realize that greed and working hard to help the weak rather than enriching yourself are mutually exclusive. You cannot be greedy and want to be served and think you speak for God.