SPEAKER_00: All right, if you have your Bibles, would you turn to Mark chapter 10?
SPEAKER_00: Mark chapter 10.
SPEAKER_00: I'm calling this the question of the wholehearted disciple.
SPEAKER_00: Because in Mark chapter 10, Jesus is leaving Galilee.
SPEAKER_00: He will never return to Galilee in his first life.
SPEAKER_00: He will return to Galilee after he rises from the dead.
SPEAKER_00: But as we've been talking about the last couple weeks, Jesus is preparing his disciples for the cross.
SPEAKER_00: He's preparing his disciples for eternity.
SPEAKER_00: And now he's about to hit a couple thorny questions.
SPEAKER_00: I'm actually going to hit on a couple controversial issues tonight.
SPEAKER_00: And I'm calling it the question of the wholehearted disciple because guess what, gang?
SPEAKER_00: If you choose to be a disciple, you'll have a lot of questions as you grow.
SPEAKER_00: You won't just have one question about whether to receive Christ or not.
SPEAKER_00: You're going to have questions throughout your whole life about issues about marriage, sex, arguments with your parents, which I know none of you young people have had, because we all have perfect homes here.
SPEAKER_00: You're going to have issues with time management and being a disciple.
SPEAKER_00: And so Jesus hits on some of these in a pretty pointed way in our passage.
SPEAKER_00: Then he arose from there, verse 1, and he came to the region of Judea by the other side of the Jordan.
SPEAKER_00: Very interesting, it says the other side of the Jordan.
SPEAKER_00: And multitudes gathered to him again, and as he was accustomed, he taught them again.
SPEAKER_00: Now here's what Jesus is doing.
SPEAKER_00: He's going to the other side of the Jordan, you guys, because that was what Jews did to avoid Samaritan country.
SPEAKER_00: So between Galilee and Judea was Samaria.
SPEAKER_00: And if you took the literal west side of the road down through the Jordan River and alongside the Jordan River, which was the route they took, you went through Samaria.
SPEAKER_00: And in this case, Jesus is taking a more traditional route out of Galilee among those that are devout Jews, and he's going to the other side so that he can avoid Samaria.
SPEAKER_00: And it's important because of the question he's going to be asked.
SPEAKER_00: So he's going on the other side, he's leaving Galilee.
SPEAKER_00: He's never to return to Galilee until after he's resurrected.
SPEAKER_00: The Pharisees.
SPEAKER_00: Aren't you ever get sick of these guys?
SPEAKER_00: I mean, they follow him around.
SPEAKER_00: Do you guys have anybody like that in your life?
SPEAKER_00: You know, they like they never go away.
SPEAKER_00: Might be your family.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, I don't know.
SPEAKER_00: But anyway, they follow him around.
SPEAKER_00: And I think everybody's got this in your life.
SPEAKER_00: You got people in your life, they follow you around.
SPEAKER_00: And it's like everywhere you go, they're, I mean, not everywhere, but I mean, from time to time, they pop up.
SPEAKER_00: And they're like, they're like this burr in your saddle that God has placed there to sanctify you.
SPEAKER_00: It might even be your spouse.
SPEAKER_00: It probably is your spouse, but I'm talking about extra spousal people.
SPEAKER_00: The Pharisees came and asked him, is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife?
SPEAKER_00: Testing him.
SPEAKER_00: Now, divorce is not even an issue anymore.
SPEAKER_00: It's not, it's a non-issue.
SPEAKER_00: Because at one time, I don't know if you know this, but in America, we had what we call fault divorce.
SPEAKER_00: You couldn't even go to a judge and get a divorce unless you had a reason for the divorce, and usually it was related to infidelity.
SPEAKER_00: Unless you could prove physical abuse, it was usually sexual in nature, and it's called fault divorce.
SPEAKER_00: Well, now we have no fault divorce, and so you can just go and get a divorce if you want a divorce.
SPEAKER_00: You can, it's really quick and easy nowadays.
SPEAKER_00: And so this is not even an issue today, but it was an issue then.
SPEAKER_00: And the reason it was an issue then is you had two views.
SPEAKER_00: You had a liberal hill, Rabbi Hillel view, and you had a conservative view.
SPEAKER_00: And the liberal hill view based on Deuteronomy 24 would be pretty much what we have today, which is no fault divorce.
SPEAKER_00: If a guy wanted to divorce his wife, he could just divorce her.
SPEAKER_00: There was nothing that you had to give to the elders or to the authorities for the divorce, except that you now wanted a divorce.
SPEAKER_00: It might be for burning the gravy.
SPEAKER_00: It could be that you know she told a joke about your mom or your dad while she was in the kitchen.
SPEAKER_00: Or she didn't sign up for cable quick enough for the Super Bowl.
SPEAKER_00: I don't know.
SPEAKER_00: But you could, you could, you could divorce for anything.
SPEAKER_00: And then there was a conservative view.
SPEAKER_00: And the conservative view was based on the word uncleanness.
SPEAKER_00: And what that meant was interpreted differently at different times, but it had to be something to do with uncleanness.
SPEAKER_00: Now what's interesting is that probably where Jesus, now listen to this, it's important.
SPEAKER_00: Where Jesus is at when they asked the question is probably Perea.
SPEAKER_00: Perea was the town where Herod and Tippus had his ruling throne.
SPEAKER_00: Do you remember who he is?
SPEAKER_00: He's the guy that John the Baptist came against for his adultery with his brother's wife.
SPEAKER_00: So he's probably going through Perea.
SPEAKER_00: It's right there.
SPEAKER_00: It's where Herod and Tippus.
SPEAKER_00: It could have been right in front of the main house where Herod and Tippus lived when just either a few months ago or a few years ago, because we don't know exactly when John the Baptist was beheaded.
SPEAKER_00: That's what and where the controversy began when John called out Herod about adultery in his life.
SPEAKER_00: Folks, if you start to take a stand on issues of the family, you can lose your head nowadays.
SPEAKER_00: And he answered, he said to them, Well, what did Moses command you?
SPEAKER_00: They said, Well, Moses permitted a man to write a certificate of divorce and to dismiss her.
SPEAKER_00: So they're basically sharing from a liberal perspective, but also biblical perspective of Deuteronomy 24.
SPEAKER_00: Let me read that.
SPEAKER_00: Deuteronomy 24, verses 1 through 4.
SPEAKER_00: When a man takes a wife and marries her, and it happens that she finds no favor in his eyes, because he has found some uncleanliness in her, and he writes her a certificate of divorce, puts it in her hand, and sends her out of his house.
SPEAKER_00: When she has departed from his house and goes and becomes another man's wife, if the latter husband detests her and writes her a certificate of divorce, this is really, this is a bad day for this gal, puts it in her hand and sends her out of his house, or if the latter husband dies, who took her as his wife, listen to this, then her former husband who divorced her must not take her back to be his wife after she has been defiled.
SPEAKER_00: For that is an abomination before the Lord, and you shall not bring sin on the land which the Lord your God is giving you as an inheritance.
SPEAKER_00: So there's this prohibition that you can divorce her and she's allowed to remarry, but he could divorce her basically for no reason.
SPEAKER_00: Now, all the women in here, is this encouraging you at all?
SPEAKER_00: Has anybody been in a relationship with their spouse where you had a situation in which, what does it say, finds no favor?
SPEAKER_00: Well, that's why it's key to what Jesus says next.
SPEAKER_00: Verse 5.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus answered and said to them, Because of the hardness of your heart, he wrote you this precept.
SPEAKER_00: Men and women, that's where it all begins, right?
SPEAKER_00: The hardness of our heart.
SPEAKER_00: Some of you tonight in your marriage may be struggling with the hardness of your heart.
SPEAKER_00: You get offended.
SPEAKER_00: You don't talk about it.
SPEAKER_00: You don't work it out.
SPEAKER_00: And then the offenses start to grow.
SPEAKER_00: And guess what offenses do?
SPEAKER_00: Offenses always stay there.
SPEAKER_00: Don't you wish, like when you get saved, that all the offenses just poof, they're gone, and you never have any more.
SPEAKER_00: Well, they don't.
SPEAKER_00: Now they may be forgiven, they may be under the blood of Christ for sure, and that's awesome.
SPEAKER_00: But at some point, offenses build walls between people.
SPEAKER_00: And just so that we're not misunderstood here, all of us have some of that.
SPEAKER_00: Okay?
SPEAKER_00: Nobody's perfect here.
SPEAKER_00: So some of us have offenses that can be there.
SPEAKER_00: But until you start to talk about them and maybe even get counseling, counseling's great.
SPEAKER_00: I go to a counselor.
SPEAKER_00: My counselor's in the room.
SPEAKER_00: He's watching over me.
SPEAKER_00: I make him be here.
SPEAKER_00: But I don't pay him to be here.
SPEAKER_00: Okay.
SPEAKER_00: But some of us need counseling, right?
SPEAKER_00: And so as you start to work on stuff, you can start to knock down some of the strongholds, and we can begin to have a relationship again with you.
SPEAKER_00: It's a hardness of the heart, though, if we don't deal with it.
SPEAKER_00: So Moses, recognizing his hardness of heart, kind of acquiesced to this.
SPEAKER_00: But men and women, Jesus did not harden his heart with you.
SPEAKER_00: He's there for you.
SPEAKER_00: And one of the challenges of marriage, I think, is that the Lord quickens our hearts to remember how He, Jesus, responds to us as a model for how we respond to each other.
SPEAKER_00: So really what this is is a discipleship issue.
SPEAKER_00: Some would call it maybe a lordship issue, but I'm going to use a different term here at the road.
SPEAKER_00: I'll call it a wholehearted discipleship issue.
SPEAKER_00: You see, it's not you and your spouse, it's you, your spouse, and Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: See, he's in the relationship now.
SPEAKER_00: See, before he wasn't.
SPEAKER_00: Now he is.
SPEAKER_00: That's good news and challenging news.
SPEAKER_00: Because I think you can boil down almost every issue to something to do with our relationship with God, our relationship with Christ.
SPEAKER_00: So, in that sense, when we're even parenting our kids, we're guiding them, we're teaching them responsibility, we are working with them and sometimes having to bring discipline into the relationship with our kids.
SPEAKER_00: But ultimately, aren't we not gathering together all these experiences toward making a disciple?
SPEAKER_00: Toward building a disciple.
SPEAKER_00: Because the reality is there's going to come a point where that dependence becomes interdependence, becomes independence.
SPEAKER_00: And so we we're in this process of launching our kids, and the best thing we can give them, the best thing we can give them is an encounter with Christ that becomes an intimate relationship for the rest of their lives.
SPEAKER_00: Now we can't make them want it, we can't make them desire it, but we can offer, I believe, the invitation in that.
SPEAKER_00: Well, I think in a I think that all begins in our relationship with each other, and we're always battling the hardness of the heart.
SPEAKER_00: We just are.
SPEAKER_00: We battle the hardness of our of our hearts.
SPEAKER_00: And so for you men, and I cover this in my book, Jesus entered your world, learned your genetic code, and loved you.
SPEAKER_00: Have you ever thought about that?
SPEAKER_00: Jesus learned your code.
SPEAKER_00: And the way you experience Christ is different than the person who's sitting next to you tonight.
SPEAKER_00: That Jesus knows what you need, and he meets you where you're at.
SPEAKER_00: It's not the same for everybody.
SPEAKER_00: And as a husband, I have a responsibility in my marriage to learn her code.
SPEAKER_00: And that's very, very strange.
SPEAKER_00: That is a strange code.
SPEAKER_00: That is a female code.
SPEAKER_00: And so, like Jesus entering our world, learning our code, and dying for us, we have to enter our wife's world, guys, learn her code, and believe me, if you enter her world and you learn her code, you will die there.
SPEAKER_00: You will die there.
SPEAKER_00: You will go to the cross every day.
SPEAKER_00: Now, ladies, same thing.
SPEAKER_00: You have to somehow enter your man's world and learn his code, or it's gonna be really frustrating for you.
SPEAKER_00: And so God made us do.
SPEAKER_00: Why did God do this?
SPEAKER_00: He could have made it so much easier.
SPEAKER_00: And I believe the answer to that is that we're in a lifetime journey of discipleship and sanctification and growth to become more like Christ.
SPEAKER_00: And I can't think of anything that he's created that is harder to do than to have a joyful marriage.
SPEAKER_00: It really takes a lot of work.
SPEAKER_00: I want to encourage you, fight against that hardness of the heart.
SPEAKER_00: Because that's deadly.
SPEAKER_00: But from the beginning of the creation, God made them male and female.
SPEAKER_00: Our culture has lost this part.
SPEAKER_00: And one of the issues of the day is same-sex marriage, same gender marriage.
SPEAKER_00: Let me just say this about the road.
SPEAKER_00: We can love, and I really truly mean this, we can love unconditionally a gay or a lesbian.
SPEAKER_00: Because saint or sinner, we are called to that kind of love.
SPEAKER_00: That's what Jesus would do.
SPEAKER_00: But men and women, our authority has to be this book.
SPEAKER_00: Not the cultural twist of America or the Western world, not what the media bombards us with, and not our personal experience.
SPEAKER_00: Soon as you give up the scriptures and begin to guide your life based on just what you feel about it, man, you're on shaky ground.
SPEAKER_00: You're on shaky ground.
SPEAKER_00: So at this church, we do not affirm same-gender marriage.
SPEAKER_00: And we never will.
SPEAKER_00: This is going to be our authority.
SPEAKER_00: Reason I say that is Time magazine last week just came out with an article.
SPEAKER_00: It was quite an article, basically talking about how many evangelical churches are starting to basically give that one up and acquiesce to that.
SPEAKER_00: We're not going to do that.
SPEAKER_00: And we but but here, everybody, you hear what I'm saying.
SPEAKER_00: The preface to what I said is this doesn't have to do with love.
SPEAKER_00: From the perspective of how we love those who have that kind of attraction, we are there.
SPEAKER_00: But the scripture is clear from Genesis to Revelation about issues related to male and femaleness and what marriage was designed for.
SPEAKER_00: For this reason, a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife.
SPEAKER_00: So this is the first separation of our lives.
SPEAKER_00: The first major separation of our lives is that we leave our mommy and daddy and we cleave to our wife.
SPEAKER_00: So you have to quit being a mommy's boy.
SPEAKER_00: You have to quit being daddy's little girl.
SPEAKER_00: Now you're daddy's little girl from a distance, and you're maybe a mommy's boy from a distance.
SPEAKER_00: But when there's a conflict between those parents getting involved in your marriage when it is consistently either unbiblical or wrong, you got to take a stand, guys.
SPEAKER_00: I'm telling you, you got to take a stand.
SPEAKER_00: Scriptures are clear.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, you work it out, conflict resolution, Matthew 5, Matthew 18, all of that's crucial.
SPEAKER_00: But ultimately you do leave, you do leave your father and mother, even emotionally, and you are joined to your wife.
SPEAKER_00: Verse 8.
SPEAKER_00: And the two shall become one flesh.
SPEAKER_00: All the men in this room really like this part.
SPEAKER_00: So then they're no longer two but one flesh.
SPEAKER_00: Glued together is actually what it means.
SPEAKER_00: It means like super glue.
SPEAKER_00: One fleshness.
SPEAKER_00: This is why adultery is so awful.
SPEAKER_00: This is why adultery is so hurtful and so painful to each person, is because you became one flesh with someone else.
SPEAKER_00: This is tough.
SPEAKER_00: Men or women.
SPEAKER_00: My experience in all the years of counseling and pastoring is it's not any easier for the man or for the woman when there's been an affair or adultery or sexual infidelity.
SPEAKER_00: But it also doesn't mean that when someone has committed adultery, that it's an automatic divorce.
SPEAKER_00: Dozens of people that I know have been able to forgive.
SPEAKER_00: They had to go through some counseling and some work with forgiveness issues.
SPEAKER_00: But with that forgiveness, they hung together and they have happy, joyful, even better marriages as a result because they didn't quit.
SPEAKER_00: They didn't forego that covenant, but they hung in there.
SPEAKER_00: Verse 9.
SPEAKER_00: Therefore, what God is joined together, let no man separate.
SPEAKER_00: In the house, his disciples also asked him again about the same matter.
SPEAKER_00: And so he said to them, Whoever divorces his wife and marries another commits adultery against her.
SPEAKER_00: And if a woman divorces her husband and marries another, she commits adultery.
SPEAKER_00: Understand the context, church.
SPEAKER_00: Deuteronomy basically said they could easily divorce and easily remarry for nothing.
SPEAKER_00: And Jesus again, using extreme language, says what he says about it.
SPEAKER_00: He's saying, you've got to take marriage seriously.
SPEAKER_00: Our meeting today said pre-engagement counseling.
SPEAKER_00: We are maybe we should start doing that at the row.
SPEAKER_00: We have pre-engagement counseling, then pre-marriage counseling, and then post-marriage counseling.
SPEAKER_00: You might actually have a chance.
SPEAKER_00: You that have been through divorce, there's forgiveness.
SPEAKER_00: It's not the unpardonable sin.
SPEAKER_00: There's always forgiveness.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, seriously, if we could see into the hearts and homes and the backgrounds of all of us in this room, we've got some, we got some bad stuff in this room.
SPEAKER_00: And it's forgiven.
SPEAKER_00: Guess what?
SPEAKER_00: The only unpardonable sin is not giving your heart to Christ and rejecting him.
SPEAKER_00: You will go to hell.
SPEAKER_00: But if you have heaven and you've accepted Christ, you have a personal, vital, dynamic, growing relationship of intimacy with him, eternal life begins then, now on this earth.
SPEAKER_00: We're experiencing heaven now.
SPEAKER_00: Not in the hereafter yonder over the river.
SPEAKER_00: But right now we're experiencing eternal life.
SPEAKER_00: We can invite that eternal life into our marriage.
SPEAKER_00: And some of you, if you're having an affair right now, break it off tonight.
SPEAKER_00: Repent tonight.
SPEAKER_00: And get help.
SPEAKER_00: We'll be there to help you.
SPEAKER_00: We'll be there to love you through that process.
SPEAKER_00: But don't stay there.
SPEAKER_00: It's death to your heart, and it's death to your relationship with your spouse.
SPEAKER_00: I think it's interesting, and in verse 13, what happens?
SPEAKER_00: Because it says this.
SPEAKER_00: Then they brought little children to him that he might touch them, but the disciples rebuke those who brought them.
SPEAKER_00: The greatest victims are children.
SPEAKER_00: When there's been an affair and infidelity, it's actually not the other spouse, I don't believe.
SPEAKER_00: I believe it's the children that know about it and their sense of betrayal.
SPEAKER_00: It so hinders their understanding of the marriage, covenant and life in general about commitments and sexuality, right?
SPEAKER_00: And so, right here in this context of marriage and divorce, they bring the children to him.
SPEAKER_00: You kind of wonder if the moms and dads were sitting there talking and going, you know, I wonder if we should have done that.
SPEAKER_00: And we got all these issues with Caleb and Aaron.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe Jesus can lay his hands on them and bless them.
SPEAKER_00: And so they bring the children, and the mighty and powerful, insightful disciples rebuke them.
SPEAKER_00: Pretty interesting.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus has his strongest words for the disciples.
SPEAKER_00: It's going to say in the next verse, greatly displeased.
SPEAKER_00: If we use the true strength of this word, which is the only time it's used in the New Testament this way, is he rebukes them for rebuking the parents who are bringing their children.
SPEAKER_00: He is ticked off.
SPEAKER_00: Because he loves the children.
SPEAKER_00: There's something about children that's of the kingdom.
SPEAKER_00: He's indignant.
SPEAKER_00: That's probably a better word.
SPEAKER_00: He has indignation toward his disciples for rebuking the children.
SPEAKER_00: That's why it's so important with our children back here.
SPEAKER_00: That we disciple them.
SPEAKER_00: That we, when they, when you guys come in and we put and they're in that class, those teachers have poured into that lesson all week getting ready.
SPEAKER_00: And there's worship in there.
SPEAKER_00: It's really cool worship.
SPEAKER_00: Sometimes the worship in there is better than in here.
SPEAKER_00: It's really, really good worship.
SPEAKER_00: And we engage those kids in the Bible and we engage them in worship because we're training them at an age-appropriate level to be a wholehearted disciple.
SPEAKER_00: And guess what?
SPEAKER_00: They get it better than us most of the time.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, some of you right now, I mean, you're just you're completely daydreaming.
SPEAKER_00: You don't even know what I'm talking about.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, you don't.
SPEAKER_00: Because I know I'm not that good.
SPEAKER_00: And um, and you're, you know, you're thinking about the Super Bowl, and are they gonna deflate the footballs for this one too?
SPEAKER_00: I mean, I don't know.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, sometimes I'm preaching and I don't even know what I'm talking about.
SPEAKER_00: But when you go in there and you see 50 some odd kids in that elementary, they're they're in it, man.
SPEAKER_00: They are focused.
SPEAKER_00: I'm walking out of a meeting here, and uh, and there's Jay Inman dressed like Moses or something.
SPEAKER_00: And he had a staff and he had the whole thing on.
SPEAKER_00: I'm going.
SPEAKER_00: Charity's gonna have a lot of cool things to say about the meeting tonight.
SPEAKER_00: Because Jay's gonna engage him.
SPEAKER_00: I guarantee you, Mr.
SPEAKER_00: Teacher is at it and he's dressed up, right, Jan?
SPEAKER_00: I'm surprised he didn't dress you up like Mary or something.
SPEAKER_00: He tried to?
SPEAKER_00: Okay, it doesn't surprise me.
SPEAKER_00: But when Jesus saw it, he was greatly displeased.
SPEAKER_00: He was indignant, that's a better word.
SPEAKER_00: And he said to them, Let the little children come to me.
SPEAKER_00: Do not forbid them, for such is the kingdom of God.
SPEAKER_00: You know, if we understood this halfway, we wouldn't have any problem with getting teachers in the elementary school class.
SPEAKER_00: Because you'd be in there and you'd be going, such is the kingdom of God.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, last week we had a big, you know, we had all the refreshments out there and everything, and all you guys were all packed out there, and there were kids just running everywhere.
SPEAKER_00: Can I tell you my personal opinion about that?
SPEAKER_00: I love it.
SPEAKER_00: I love kids running around.
SPEAKER_00: Now, if you don't know where your kids are, I'm gonna be mad at you, okay?
SPEAKER_00: But basically, if they're in the area, I there's there's a joy, there's a spontaneity, they mess up things, but it's a childlike faith that Jesus is speaking of here.
SPEAKER_00: And church, have time in your life to love kids, to bend down and listen to them.
SPEAKER_00: There's so many cool things they're up to.
SPEAKER_00: I walked in today, and my daughter had made these little, she has this little business now.
SPEAKER_00: She's nine years old.
SPEAKER_00: And her and Victor's daughter, Gabby, they've got a business.
SPEAKER_00: And they've got tape and stuff, and they make little wallets and they're colorful tape and everything.
SPEAKER_00: I told her, I'm not buying it till I get camo.
SPEAKER_00: So she's gonna get camo.
SPEAKER_00: But she had her little table out there with the prices and everything.
SPEAKER_00: Is that priceless or what?
SPEAKER_00: Assuredly, I say to you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God as a little child will by no means enter it.
SPEAKER_00: And he took them up in his arms and he laid his hands on them and he blessed them.
SPEAKER_00: You know, kids are cool.
SPEAKER_00: You say to kids, you know, you're gonna go to heaven.
unknown: Yeah.
SPEAKER_00: First question is, do we have to take a bath up there?
SPEAKER_00: I mean, that's what they're concerned about, right?
SPEAKER_00: And then, and then you get with, you know, you get with folks like you.
SPEAKER_00: And you're talking about heaven, and they want to know, well, which heaven?
SPEAKER_00: You know, which heaven are we talking about?
SPEAKER_00: You know, is it is it the one, you know, with paradise and there's a gap?
SPEAKER_00: And, you know, what, I mean, really, are they gonna be, I mean, what do they mean we're gonna be angels?
SPEAKER_00: I mean, we're not gonna be married.
SPEAKER_00: That means we're gonna know our spouse, we're not gonna know our spouse, and we totally miss the point.
SPEAKER_00: They're just like, they want to know, do we have to take a shower?
SPEAKER_00: They just believe it.
SPEAKER_00: It's good, it's awesome, right?
SPEAKER_00: There's something about kids, they just take it by faith, they believe it, and church don't lose that completely.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, I think there's maturity.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, we we we have a 13-year gap, no 17-year gap between our oldest and our youngest.
SPEAKER_00: That's a pretty big gap.
SPEAKER_00: And we treat our each of our children differently according to their maturity level.
SPEAKER_00: So for one of our kids, it's issues about a job or an interview.
SPEAKER_00: With our other one, they just want to cuddle up when there's a lightning storm.
SPEAKER_00: So I'm for maturity.
SPEAKER_00: Mature.
SPEAKER_00: If I've got a 30-year-old that needs to cuddle up in a lightning storm, we got some issues there.
SPEAKER_00: Something went wrong.
SPEAKER_00: But it, but I think what he's saying is remember the heart of a child, not being child-ish, but being childlike.
SPEAKER_00: Some of you guys, seriously, me too.
SPEAKER_00: We take ourselves way too seriously.
SPEAKER_00: We're way into us too much.
SPEAKER_00: Enjoy Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: Enjoy your life in Christ.
SPEAKER_00: Kids do, and he says that there's something about them that's attuned to the kingdom of God.
SPEAKER_00: Verse 17.
SPEAKER_00: Now, as he was going on the road, one came running.
SPEAKER_00: I like this part.
SPEAKER_00: Running, running.
SPEAKER_00: He knelt down before him and he said, Good teacher, what shall I do that I may inherit eternal life?
SPEAKER_00: This is ironic.
SPEAKER_00: So he just said, they're like kids, eternal life.
SPEAKER_00: And then here comes, and this is in Matthew and Luke, the rich young ruler.
SPEAKER_00: And he doesn't walk up, he doesn't sachet up, he runs up.
SPEAKER_00: Kids just believe in heaven, no question.
SPEAKER_00: But the rich young ruler, he wants to know if he's going to heaven or not.
SPEAKER_00: And he says, What must I do?
SPEAKER_00: What must I do?
SPEAKER_00: He's a moralist, he's a religionist.
SPEAKER_00: What, here's what he's saying.
SPEAKER_00: And Jesus can see into his heart.
SPEAKER_00: He says, What must I do externally to get into heaven?
SPEAKER_00: Listen, this guy has everything, but he has nothing.
SPEAKER_00: Like most of those that we read about who are NFL players.
SPEAKER_00: They have everything, they have nothing.
SPEAKER_00: So that's why your NFL player guy makes, you know, three, four million a year and he's in a gunfight.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, what do you what do you need to be in a gunfight over when you're a millionaire?
SPEAKER_00: Or we have to watch again and again on ESPN, like a dozen times, this guy whacking his girlfriend in an elevator and then dragging her out.
SPEAKER_00: He has everything, he has nothing.
SPEAKER_00: And we have rock stars that make millions off their concerts and their music, and we find out they're in rehab.
SPEAKER_00: There's even now a reality show about rehab.
SPEAKER_00: It's almost like the coolest thing is that you're in rehab in Hollywood.
SPEAKER_00: Have you ever been with somebody who's in rehab?
SPEAKER_00: It's actually not a very cool thing.
SPEAKER_00: He has everything, he has nothing.
SPEAKER_00: So Jesus said to him, Why do you call me good?
SPEAKER_00: I love this.
SPEAKER_00: No one's good but one.
SPEAKER_00: That is God.
SPEAKER_00: Only God is good.
SPEAKER_00: So here's what he's saying.
SPEAKER_00: He's saying, either I'm not good, or I'm God.
SPEAKER_00: And quite frankly, for you, Mr.
SPEAKER_00: Young Ruler, that's your issue.
SPEAKER_00: Because I like what he says next.
SPEAKER_00: Verse 19, you know the commandments, do not commit adultery, do not murder, do not steal, do not bear false witness, do not defraud, honor your father and mother.
SPEAKER_00: Every one of the ten commandments that Jesus quotes here have to do with morality, have to do with external behavior.
SPEAKER_00: He actually bypasses all the relational commandments because he's revealing his heart.
SPEAKER_00: He's saying, you know the rules, right?
SPEAKER_00: He goes, Yeah.
SPEAKER_00: So he says, Teacher, all these things I've kept from my youth.
SPEAKER_00: Then Jesus goes to the core church, to the heart of being a disciple of Christ.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, I wish I wish we could just camp here for another two hours, but Jesus looking at him loved him.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus, here's what it means.
SPEAKER_00: Looking into his heart, he loved him.
SPEAKER_00: And he said, one thing you lack, just one thing.
SPEAKER_00: Go your way, sell whatever you have, and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven.
SPEAKER_00: And come take up the cross and follow me.
SPEAKER_00: Some of you might have a King James version.
SPEAKER_00: I think the King James Version says, Beholding him, he loved him.
SPEAKER_00: He says, Look, one thing, one thing, not 300 things, one thing, one thing I long for in your life.
SPEAKER_00: I love you.
SPEAKER_00: I love your heart.
SPEAKER_00: I love your passion.
SPEAKER_00: You ran over here.
SPEAKER_00: You knelt down at my feet.
SPEAKER_00: I love you.
SPEAKER_00: But it's not 300 things.
SPEAKER_00: It's one thing.
SPEAKER_00: One thing.
SPEAKER_00: Follow me.
SPEAKER_00: Have a relationship with me.
SPEAKER_00: I want to know you.
SPEAKER_00: I want to love you.
SPEAKER_00: I want to be your friend.
SPEAKER_00: I want to be your Lord.
SPEAKER_00: I want to be your king.
SPEAKER_00: Come and be my disciple.
SPEAKER_00: Look, everything you have, you have nothing.
SPEAKER_00: And all I say is if you'll follow me, you'll have everything you long for.
SPEAKER_00: Everything you've dreamed about will be yours.
SPEAKER_00: Because I made your heart.
SPEAKER_00: I know what's in your heart.
SPEAKER_00: I know what every heart is longing for.
SPEAKER_00: Come, follow me.
SPEAKER_00: Take up the cross.
SPEAKER_00: Follow after my lifestyle, my life, my heart.
SPEAKER_00: And in so doing, that's how you'll find eternal life.
SPEAKER_00: Now, not later.
SPEAKER_00: Now he said that because he could see into this young man's heart that he had an idol.
SPEAKER_00: And the idol was possessions.
SPEAKER_00: And the idol was money.
SPEAKER_00: That's his particular issue.
SPEAKER_00: Church, he's not saying to everybody here, sell all you have.
SPEAKER_00: He said it to this rich young ruler, saying, This is your idol.
SPEAKER_00: That's what's hindering you from the kingdom of God.
SPEAKER_00: But he was sad at this word, verse 22, a went away sorrowful, for he had great possession.
SPEAKER_00: One thing tonight, church, in becoming a wholehearted disciple, is your intimacy with Christ.
SPEAKER_00: To get to know him and to love him.
SPEAKER_00: And we can look at the externals of our lives till the cows come home.
SPEAKER_00: And those are certainly something important in our lives.
SPEAKER_00: But at the core of how we're transformed is at the heart level.
SPEAKER_00: And that's why we call it P, B, and J.
SPEAKER_00: Not peanut butter and jelly, but prayer, Bible, and journal.
SPEAKER_00: Every day.
SPEAKER_00: Prayer, Bible, and journal, prayer, Bible and journal, prayer, Bible and journal.
SPEAKER_00: You know, in the morning or in the afternoon or in the evening, whatever it might be, you know, open God's word and we give you a bookmark, which we're out of now, so steal somebody's, I guess, if you don't have one.
SPEAKER_00: I think they're online now, but you've got this bookmark, and it's give it gives you all the verses right there.
SPEAKER_00: All our D groups use them, but you can follow this.
SPEAKER_00: And uh and one chapter, read the chapter, ask God what He's saying to you, write it in a journal.
SPEAKER_00: Just keep doing that.
SPEAKER_00: Give it 30 days, you'll get hooked.
SPEAKER_00: You'll become an addict.
SPEAKER_00: You'll become a junkie for Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: Because here's why we all struggle with idols in our life.
SPEAKER_00: And the question in becoming a wholehearted disciple is this whole issue, it says, go sell.
SPEAKER_00: He says, go sell everything you have.
SPEAKER_00: Go sell.
SPEAKER_00: Well, some of us have something we need to go sell.
SPEAKER_00: It might be pornography, it might be a relationship you're in.
SPEAKER_00: It's not healthy, it's not good.
SPEAKER_00: You're gonna get in trouble.
SPEAKER_00: It might be the crowd you're hanging out with.
SPEAKER_00: And you say, well, Steve, that's all the friends I've got.
SPEAKER_00: And I would say, then begin to trust Christ, do PB and J, start coming to the road, start developing new relationships.
SPEAKER_00: For some of you, it's gossip.
SPEAKER_00: For some of you, it's envy.
SPEAKER_00: Some of you struggle so much with envy that all you do is compare yourself because that's what your parents did, or that's what they did to you.
SPEAKER_00: Oh, you're not, you know, why don't you be more like your brother?
SPEAKER_00: Why don't you be more like your sister?
SPEAKER_00: And they're like this perfect kid.
SPEAKER_00: Like this, you got a Boy Scout, you know, Eagle Scout.
SPEAKER_00: One every, you know, lettered in every sport in high school.
SPEAKER_00: And you're like barely able to pass a math test and show up to class on time.
SPEAKER_00: And so that's a stronghold.
SPEAKER_00: And so God would want to begin to break that because you're becoming a wholehearted disciple.
SPEAKER_00: And when you become a wholehearted disciple, you can just say that, you know, I struggle with envy.
SPEAKER_00: I struggle with pornography.
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I've got some relationships I need to deal with.
SPEAKER_00: And then you get in a D group and you start having some other guys and gals around you support you.
SPEAKER_00: Folks, it's the only way to get free.
SPEAKER_00: Go like this if you halfway understand what I'm saying.
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, it's true.
SPEAKER_00: I'm in the same boat.
SPEAKER_00: I'm as broken as everybody in this room.
SPEAKER_00: We're all broken.
SPEAKER_00: But you can be set free.
SPEAKER_00: You can be set free.
SPEAKER_00: And so tonight, let's stand.
SPEAKER_00: I want you to say this to me before we go into worship here.
SPEAKER_00: We are all pilgrims.
unknown: We are all pilgrimers.
SPEAKER_00: We are.
SPEAKER_00: So we're on a pilgrimage.
SPEAKER_00: Some of us are a little ahead of the others, but we're all on a pilgrimage.
SPEAKER_00: And as we go into worship tonight, some of us, you know, we just need to give that idol up to God.
SPEAKER_00: And the team's going to start to play.
SPEAKER_00: And I want you to close your eyes right now.
SPEAKER_00: And I'm going to ask the Holy Spirit to speak to your heart.
SPEAKER_00: Is there something?
SPEAKER_00: Or maybe there's a whole bunch of stuff, you know.
SPEAKER_00: Um, is there some stuff that's an idol?
SPEAKER_00: Is there some stuff that really is a burden on your heart?
SPEAKER_00: And you just need to say, Jesus, to the best of my understanding of you, I I just I give this over to you.
SPEAKER_00: Just do that right now.
SPEAKER_00: It might be a relationship.
SPEAKER_00: It might be a character flaw.
SPEAKER_00: It might be something at work.
SPEAKER_00: It might be something at school.
SPEAKER_00: It might be a habit or an addiction.
SPEAKER_00: He loves you.
SPEAKER_00: He sees into your heart.
SPEAKER_00: He already knows this about you.
SPEAKER_00: So you're not like giving him any new information.
SPEAKER_00: But he needs you to know what's happening in your heart.
SPEAKER_00: So he can start to invade with his love, his agape, his heart into your heart.
SPEAKER_00: Begin to set you free.
SPEAKER_00: Lord, settle our hearts.
SPEAKER_00: God, you're convicting our hearts tonight that next step in being a whole hearted disciple.
SPEAKER_00: Come, Lord, have your way.