SPEAKER_00: Welcome to Sharper's World, the publication ministry of White House Baptist Church in Lemon Grove, California.
SPEAKER_00: White House believes that individuals can reach their potential for the Lord as they grow in Christ.
SPEAKER_00: We want to hear our Lord say, Well done, thou good and faithful servant.
SPEAKER_00: Let's join Pastor Doug Fisher as he preaches another important biblical message from the Word of God.
SPEAKER_01: Hebrews chapter 12 this morning, please.
SPEAKER_01: Hebrews chapter 12.
SPEAKER_01: I owe you 20 minutes from last week.
SPEAKER_01: It might take me a year to pay you back.
SPEAKER_01: Hebrews chapter 12.
SPEAKER_01: Hebrews chapter number 12, and then also Galatians chapter 5.
SPEAKER_01: Hebrews chapter number 12, please, and Galatians chapter number 5.
SPEAKER_01: Please follow along, and we're gonna go back and forth in the New Testament just a little bit this morning, but let me introduce this to you.
SPEAKER_01: The scripture is really not controversial at all.
SPEAKER_01: Just the topic is a little bit uh uh difficult to put in a in a pleasant way.
SPEAKER_01: Hebrews chapter number 12, and and may I say that uh I I don't conjure up these topics.
SPEAKER_01: Sometimes the Lord just so clearly says, here's the topic of today.
SPEAKER_01: Hebrews chapter 12, look at verse 5.
SPEAKER_01: And ye have forgotten the exhortation which speaketh unto you as children.
SPEAKER_01: So just for a moment, let's put ourselves in mind of being children.
SPEAKER_01: Doesn't matter your age, everybody in here, we're children right now.
SPEAKER_01: So it speaks to us as children.
SPEAKER_01: My son, despise not thou the chastening of the Lord, nor faint when thou art rebuked of him.
SPEAKER_01: Now, before we go on, let's make sure we understand what he's saying.
SPEAKER_01: He's speaking to us as children, and I want to tell you, he's not scolding us, he's exhorting us.
SPEAKER_01: And he's saying, look, you're going to be chastened.
SPEAKER_01: There's going to be a rebuke once in a while from God because you're children.
SPEAKER_01: May I say to you that the concept of chastening or rebuke is this correction, instruction.
SPEAKER_01: Then he says, chastening, which we're going to see a word in just a minute that brings another context, but before we get in there, look at verse 6.
SPEAKER_01: For whom the Lord, would you say the word, loveth?
SPEAKER_01: Say it again, what?
SPEAKER_01: Love.
SPEAKER_01: Brethren, he's not doing this in a manner that's trying to discourage us.
SPEAKER_01: He's saying to us, children, I love you.
SPEAKER_01: And anybody who's uh, if you would, uh, training someone and exhorting someone as children is going to love them, and once in a while, there's going to be correction, there's going to be instruction, there's going to be rebuke.
SPEAKER_01: So the action of love, he says, for the Lord, whom the Lord loveth, he chasteneth.
SPEAKER_01: And scourgeth, would you underline the next word, every.
SPEAKER_01: Every son whom he receiveth.
SPEAKER_01: And then he goes on to say, if you endure chastening, God dealeth with you as sons, for what son is he who the father chasteneth not?
SPEAKER_01: I want you to see that it's very clear that everybody receives some correction, some instruction, some rebuke, and it says, chastening and scourging.
SPEAKER_01: Now, we need to make sure we understand that.
SPEAKER_01: Scourging is an infliction of some pain.
SPEAKER_01: I want to say that again.
SPEAKER_01: Scourging is when he inflicts and there's some suffering involved to make the correction more significant.
SPEAKER_01: Come on, are you still with me or not?
SPEAKER_01: He says, Look, I can tell you, but I need to tell you so you respond to it, so I'm going to allow a little infliction or affliction or scourging to get the point across.
SPEAKER_01: Now stay with me.
SPEAKER_01: But he does it for love.
SPEAKER_01: He does it out of love, and he knows how to handle every one of his children.
SPEAKER_01: We should not question if he knows how to handle us or not.
SPEAKER_01: God is always fair.
SPEAKER_01: I'll say it again.
SPEAKER_01: God is never unfair.
SPEAKER_01: He's always fair, and it's done out of love, whether we understand it or not.
SPEAKER_01: So he says, I'm gonna scourge you, I'm gonna chasten you, I'm gonna correct you, I'm gonna rebuke you.
SPEAKER_01: Why?
SPEAKER_01: There's a reason.
SPEAKER_01: Stay with me, don't lose it yet.
SPEAKER_01: Verse 8.
SPEAKER_01: But if ye be without chastisement, whereof, notice the word, all A-L, all, everybody in here are partakers, then ye are bastards and not sons.
SPEAKER_01: Bastard.
SPEAKER_01: Uh what that speaks about, it's not genuine.
SPEAKER_01: It's it's it's uh ingenuine.
SPEAKER_01: Hey, when we're adopted and become children and we're born again, he says, you will receive some correction from me.
SPEAKER_01: If not, then it's not a genuine adoption.
SPEAKER_01: Come on, are you still with me or not?
SPEAKER_01: Now, I need to stop here just for a second and say, when young children get saved, possibly they can grow up and not have to be quite as corrected as some of us who lived in the world for a while.
SPEAKER_01: But I want to tell you, even children, when they become adults, I'll show you in a moment, they get corrected by God.
SPEAKER_01: As they're growing up, just because they don't have as much to deal with in a negative way, God still loves them and still rebukes them and still corrects them.
SPEAKER_01: Even later on, if you would, as adults, it's a continual process, stay with me.
SPEAKER_01: Don't get stuck on that word bastard, and and that's not the one I was, would I say it or not?
SPEAKER_01: Bastard's not a bad word.
SPEAKER_01: It may be used in a slang way, but it's not a bad word.
SPEAKER_01: And bastard talks about being disingenuine or not authentic.
SPEAKER_01: When we're adopting, brother, one of the things we know that everybody who gets saved is going to get scourged a little bit.
SPEAKER_01: There's going to be some rebuke.
SPEAKER_01: There's going to be a little chastisement.
SPEAKER_01: And if you're discipling someone, don't be surprised when they go through that of God a little bit.
SPEAKER_01: If you're taking somebody up, mentoring them along the way, when they say, it just seems like I'm getting spanked by God a little bit, or some things are happened that are allowing me to be corrected, you just say to them, that's normal.
SPEAKER_01: Oh, go through that because it's his process.
SPEAKER_01: And it's not unfair.
SPEAKER_01: Come on, everybody's still all right.
SPEAKER_01: So the concept is there's going to be this scourging, chastening, done out of love, rebuke, correction.
SPEAKER_01: Verse 9.
SPEAKER_01: Furthermore, we have had fathers of our flesh which corrected us, and we gave them reverence.
SPEAKER_01: What's that said?
SPEAKER_01: Hey, parents correct us and we reverence them.
SPEAKER_01: Shall we not much rather be in subjection?
SPEAKER_01: So what this correction does, it makes us submissive.
SPEAKER_01: Be in subjection unto the Father of spirits and live.
SPEAKER_01: For they, dads and moms of this earth, verily for a few days chastened us after their own pleasure.
SPEAKER_01: But he, for our profit.
SPEAKER_01: We're gonna gain something out of this, that we might be partakers of his holiness.
SPEAKER_01: He chastens us, he scourges us because he loves us and he wants us to be more holy like he is.
SPEAKER_01: Stay with me.
SPEAKER_01: Verse 11.
SPEAKER_01: Thank God he gives us reality.
SPEAKER_01: Now, no chastening for the present seemeth to be joyous, but grievous.
SPEAKER_01: Okay, I'm just gonna tell you, and it's not what I was worried about telling you.
SPEAKER_01: When I was a young boy, I got spanked once in a while.
SPEAKER_01: Back in the Midwest, they did that.
SPEAKER_01: I gotta tell you, when I came out, I I got spanked in the cellar.
SPEAKER_01: Do you know what a cellar is?
SPEAKER_01: It's it's it leads down under the house, and there's cabinets down there to store canned goods.
SPEAKER_01: We always had canned goods, and it was cooler down there.
SPEAKER_01: But also it was uh noise-proof.
SPEAKER_01: So I would be told, go wait on the stairs for me.
SPEAKER_01: Literally, and I I look at that now with fond memories.
SPEAKER_01: It'll bring tears to me right now in the right way.
SPEAKER_01: Because it was love.
SPEAKER_01: It was love.
SPEAKER_01: Go wait on the stairs for me, and sometimes he wouldn't come in for two hours.
SPEAKER_01: I'm gonna tell you, your mind can really get corrected while you wait.
SPEAKER_01: And once in a while there would be the correction, and very rarely he would come in and say, Okay, you can leave now.
SPEAKER_01: Ho, ho, ho, ho, ho.
SPEAKER_01: Grace, I didn't know what the word grace meant then, but I understand it now.
SPEAKER_01: Amen.
SPEAKER_01: You know, he thought, I already corrected him.
SPEAKER_01: He already went through the mental process.
SPEAKER_01: So the idea is that no correction seems to be joyous.
SPEAKER_01: Verse 11, but grievous.
SPEAKER_01: Nevertheless, afterwards it yieldeth the peaceful fruit of righteousness unto them which are exercised thereby.
SPEAKER_01: Wherefore?
SPEAKER_01: Because it's for your profit, because it's he loves you, because it's for your betterment, because he owns you, because he's the perfect father, lift up the hands which hang down and the feeble knees.
SPEAKER_01: Brethren, what does that mean?
SPEAKER_01: Don't pout about it.
SPEAKER_01: You say that's your interpretation.
SPEAKER_01: Don't don't do this.
SPEAKER_01: Come on, lift him up.
SPEAKER_01: I needed it.
SPEAKER_01: It was for my prophet, he's right.
SPEAKER_01: Glory be to God.
SPEAKER_01: I'm not gonna walk around like a victim.
SPEAKER_01: God did it because he loves me.
SPEAKER_01: It's part of being his child.
SPEAKER_01: And I am thankful for his correction of me because I can only correct myself so much.
SPEAKER_01: Then he jumps in and says, Let's take it a little bit further.
SPEAKER_01: Now watch this if you would.
SPEAKER_01: Hold your place right there in Hebrews 12.
SPEAKER_01: And please look at Galatians 5.
SPEAKER_01: Stay right with me.
SPEAKER_01: Galatians 5.
SPEAKER_01: I'm really thinking about your time this morning.
SPEAKER_01: Galatians 5.
SPEAKER_01: Now watch Galatians 5 very carefully.
SPEAKER_01: You're holding your place in Hebrews 12.
SPEAKER_01: Look at verse 17.
SPEAKER_01: Verse 17.
SPEAKER_01: For the flesh, oh, back up to verse 16.
SPEAKER_01: This I say then, walk in the spirit, and ye shall not fulfill the lusts of the flesh.
SPEAKER_01: For the flesh lusteth against the capital S spirit, and the spirit against the flesh.
SPEAKER_01: And these are contrary the one to or the other, so that you cannot do the things that ye would.
SPEAKER_01: Now watch what he says.
SPEAKER_01: There's the spirit, then there's the flesh.
SPEAKER_01: If you're new to the Bible, the flesh talks about the carnal man, the old man, the old nature that we were born with.
SPEAKER_01: When we get born again, we get a new nature that wants to follow God.
SPEAKER_01: But there's still an old nature in us that's rebellious.
SPEAKER_01: Let me say amen for you on that one.
SPEAKER_01: Everybody's got one.
SPEAKER_01: So he says this the flesh, the old man, the carnal, lusted against the spirit, and the spirit against the flesh.
SPEAKER_01: These are contrary.
SPEAKER_01: They don't get along the one to the other.
SPEAKER_01: So that you cannot do the things that ye would.
SPEAKER_01: Now, what you do this?
SPEAKER_01: If you can, you're holding your place in Hebrews 12.
SPEAKER_01: You're holding your place in Galatians 5, and look over at Romans 8.
SPEAKER_01: Stay with me, you're doing great.
SPEAKER_01: You're holding in Roman Hebrews 12, we're going back in a moment.
SPEAKER_01: You're holding in Galatians 5, and look at Romans 8.
SPEAKER_01: Watch this carefully.
SPEAKER_01: You're doing great.
SPEAKER_01: Look at verse 7.
SPEAKER_01: Romans 8, verse 7.
SPEAKER_01: Because, because the carnal mind, that old man, that flesh, is enmity.
SPEAKER_01: It's an enemy against God.
SPEAKER_01: For it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be.
SPEAKER_01: Let me make this statement right now.
SPEAKER_01: When God is chastening us, he's chastening the carnal part of us.
SPEAKER_01: When God is correcting us, he's correcting the old nature.
SPEAKER_01: He's correcting the old carnal person.
SPEAKER_01: He's correcting, if you would, the one that would say the flesh, the old man, the natural man, the carnal man.
SPEAKER_01: He's correcting, if you would, our old nature.
SPEAKER_01: You say, boy, I'm glad this is just for men.
SPEAKER_01: It's men and women.
SPEAKER_01: Just want to include you in there, amen.
SPEAKER_01: It's everybody, all his children get corrected.
SPEAKER_01: But what he's correcting is that old nature, and let's make a statement to ourselves.
SPEAKER_01: We can only correct our old nature so much.
SPEAKER_01: The reason we can't correct our old nature like we should is we like ourselves too much.
SPEAKER_01: I like myself enough that I don't want to inflict pain upon myself except for a little fasting once in a while.
SPEAKER_01: Fasting is a wonderful thing, but sometimes it's not enough.
SPEAKER_01: That old nature for some of us is pretty strong.
SPEAKER_01: That carnal nature is pretty strong.
SPEAKER_01: And the idea is the spirit and the carnal nature are against each other.
SPEAKER_01: They're enmity.
SPEAKER_01: Now, look if you would at verse 13.
SPEAKER_01: Verse 13.
SPEAKER_01: And by the way, you could read 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13.
SPEAKER_01: We just don't have that time to do it all.
SPEAKER_01: But you could read that whole context, verse 13.
SPEAKER_01: If you live after the flesh, ye shall die.
SPEAKER_01: But if you through the spirit, through the spirit, do mortify the deeds of the f body, ye shall live.
SPEAKER_01: For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God.
SPEAKER_01: So, brethren, our flesh wants to do different things, and the Spirit says, no, I'm gonna correct that.
SPEAKER_01: I'm gonna chasten that.
SPEAKER_01: I'm gonna I'm gonna scourge that.
SPEAKER_01: I'm gonna correct that.
SPEAKER_01: I'm gonna instruct you in that, and I'm even going to once in a while bring some affliction your way to put that old nature in its place.
SPEAKER_01: What?
SPEAKER_01: The old nature should not be ruling us, the spirit of God should be ruling us.
SPEAKER_01: But the old nature wants to rise up and rule us, and God says, I need to correct him.
SPEAKER_01: I need to correct you.
SPEAKER_01: I need to do it in such a way that I'm going to inflict a little pain.
SPEAKER_01: I'm gonna inflict a little pain just a little bit so you suffer, so you submit.
SPEAKER_01: And everybody gets this.
SPEAKER_01: And it's not unfair because God knows what he's doing and he told us about it.
SPEAKER_01: I'll give you an illustration in a moment in the book.
SPEAKER_01: The idea is he loves us, it's gonna profit us, it's gonna make us better, it's gonna make us partakers of his righteousness, his characteristics.
SPEAKER_01: But in order to do that, he has to, if you would, discipline the old nature, and that's us.
SPEAKER_01: It's still me.
SPEAKER_01: When you get saved, there's two of you.
SPEAKER_01: There's two of you.
SPEAKER_01: Old and new.
SPEAKER_01: When God corrects, he's correcting the old.
SPEAKER_01: So the new can take over.
SPEAKER_01: He's getting rid of the old.
SPEAKER_01: So the new that wants to fellowship with God is in charge.
SPEAKER_01: Now, with that in mind, leave off Romans 8.
SPEAKER_01: You're still holding Galatians 5.
SPEAKER_01: Go back to Hebrews 12.
SPEAKER_01: You're doing great.
SPEAKER_01: Hebrews 12.
SPEAKER_01: We're halfway through.
SPEAKER_01: We're not to the controversial statement yet.
SPEAKER_01: Still deciding.
SPEAKER_01: Hebrews 12.
SPEAKER_01: Now watch it again.
SPEAKER_01: Now we're going to read it with some thought.
SPEAKER_01: Hebrews 12.
SPEAKER_01: Look at verse 5.
SPEAKER_01: Verse 5.
SPEAKER_01: And ye have forgotten the exhortation which speaketh unto you as unto what?
SPEAKER_01: Say it, everybody, please.
SPEAKER_01: Children.
SPEAKER_01: Say it again, please.
SPEAKER_01: Children.
SPEAKER_01: We're in the mindset of a children.
SPEAKER_01: My son, despise not the chasting, the correction, the rebuke, the instruction of the Lord, nor faint.
SPEAKER_01: Don't faint.
SPEAKER_01: Don't quit.
SPEAKER_01: Don't walk away from Christianity.
SPEAKER_01: Don't faint when thou art rebuked of him.
SPEAKER_01: For whom the Lord loveth, he chasteneth, scourgeth.
SPEAKER_01: Every son whom he receives, if ye endure chastening.
SPEAKER_01: God dealeth with you as sons.
SPEAKER_01: And what son is he whom the Father chasteneth not?
SPEAKER_01: Everybody needs corrected.
SPEAKER_01: But if ye be without chastisement, that correction with a little bit of pain inflicted, whereof all are partakers, then are ye bastards and not sons.
SPEAKER_01: You're not corrected yet.
SPEAKER_01: You're disingenuine.
SPEAKER_01: The authentication, the process of the old giving way to the new has not happened yet.
SPEAKER_01: Furthermore, verse 9.
SPEAKER_01: We have had fathers of our flesh which corrected us, and we gave them reverence.
SPEAKER_01: You know what he's imploring there?
SPEAKER_01: In this process, you ought to reverence God more because he's taken time with you.
SPEAKER_01: Let me say it again.
SPEAKER_01: We should reverence God more because he's taking time to make us better.
SPEAKER_01: Shall we not much more be in subjection to the Father, Spirit's lives?
SPEAKER_01: And for they, Mom and Dad, verily for a few days chastened us after their own pleasure, but he, watch now, for our profit, that we might be partakers of his holiness.
SPEAKER_01: Brethren, the character has to change inside of us.
SPEAKER_01: The one that, the old that follows the wrong stuff must give way to the new character that's been, if you would, born again by the Holy Spirit, that we can walk like Jesus walked.
SPEAKER_01: Now, no chastening for the present seemeth to be joyous, but grievous.
SPEAKER_01: Nevertheless, after it, what?
SPEAKER_01: That affliction, that tribulation, that trial that came, it yieldeth the peaceable fruits of righteousness unto them which are exercised thereby.
SPEAKER_01: Wherefore, lift up the hands which hang down.
SPEAKER_01: Please, let me make this statement to you.
SPEAKER_01: If you know somebody going through a trial right now, that doesn't mean they're being chastened.
SPEAKER_01: I want to say that again.
SPEAKER_01: You say, I know somebody going through a trial right now.
SPEAKER_01: That's what's going on.
SPEAKER_01: They're being chastened.
SPEAKER_01: You're not their master.
SPEAKER_01: You're not their father of lights.
SPEAKER_01: You're not their father of spirits.
SPEAKER_01: We're not God.
SPEAKER_01: What right and jurisdiction do we have to judge one another?
SPEAKER_01: If my wife is going through a little bit, I'm not going to look at her a husband and saying, Well, honey, you're probably just being chastened right now.
SPEAKER_01: I want to eat tonight.
SPEAKER_01: Nor should a wife look on a husband and say, I know what he's doing, I know what God's doing.
SPEAKER_01: Careful.
SPEAKER_01: Because most of the time we do not know what God's doing with someone else.
SPEAKER_01: Brethren, my wife and I corrected our children, but we always tried to do it privately.
SPEAKER_01: In respect for the child.
SPEAKER_01: Tried to.
SPEAKER_01: I want to tell you, when God works on us to make us better, I think often He'll do it in a private, respectful manner.
SPEAKER_01: And it's not for us to judge one another.
SPEAKER_01: I want to say that.
SPEAKER_01: Please listen.
SPEAKER_01: It's not for us to judge one another.
SPEAKER_01: Now, if some guy comes to us and asks us a little bit, we might say, well, there's a couple things that may be happening here.
SPEAKER_01: I'm not sure exactly what it is, but here's a couple of options.
SPEAKER_01: Now, what is God doing in changing us?
SPEAKER_01: Boy, stay with me.
SPEAKER_01: You can let go of Hebrews 12, go to Galatians 5.
SPEAKER_01: What is God doing to change us?
SPEAKER_01: Stay with me.
SPEAKER_01: I'll give you an illustration in a moment.
SPEAKER_01: Pick you back up.
SPEAKER_01: Galatians 5.
SPEAKER_01: In Galatians 5, here's what he wants to discipline out of us.
SPEAKER_01: Here's what he wants to take away from us.
SPEAKER_01: Here's what he wants us to cause to not walk there anymore.
SPEAKER_01: Verse 19.
SPEAKER_01: Galatians 5.
SPEAKER_01: Here's what he's chastening.
SPEAKER_01: Here's what he's rebuking.
SPEAKER_01: Now the works of the flesh are manifest, which are these.
SPEAKER_01: This is what Wants to chasten adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lasciviousness, idolatry, witchcraft, hatred, variants, emulations, wrath, seditions, heresies, envying, murders, drunkenness, revelings, and in case he didn't mention it, such like.
SPEAKER_01: These are the areas that he wants to change us in.
SPEAKER_01: These are the areas that the Spirit of God is enmity against.
SPEAKER_01: Would you agree with that statement?
SPEAKER_01: These are the areas where God says, I need that corrected in you because I want to replace those characteristics with my characteristics in you.
SPEAKER_01: And here's his characteristics, verse 22.
SPEAKER_01: The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, long-suffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance.
SPEAKER_01: Against such there is no law.
SPEAKER_01: So here's what he's saying.
SPEAKER_01: I want to discipline you about verses 18, 19, and 20 and 21.
SPEAKER_01: I want those things removed.
SPEAKER_01: 19, 20, 21.
SPEAKER_01: And I'll help you to make those less prevalent in your life by bringing you through some chastisement, scourging, it's because I love you.
SPEAKER_01: But the peaceful fruit that comes out of that is you can be partakers of my holiness.
SPEAKER_01: And I'll replace those things that you used to do with love, joy, peace, long-suffering gentleness, the fruit of righteousness.
SPEAKER_01: It's said in 12, chapter 12 of Hebrews, the fruit of holiness.
SPEAKER_01: There's the fruit of the Holy Spirit.
SPEAKER_01: It's the new characteristics.
SPEAKER_01: Now, statement: it is so wonderful when God frees us from something we can't free ourselves from.
SPEAKER_01: It is so wonderful when He says, You used to be a very angry, contemptuous all the time person.
SPEAKER_01: But I've been working on you.
SPEAKER_01: And through my process of chastisement and discipline and love, did you notice I've replaced a lot of that with temperance?
SPEAKER_01: You're more patient.
SPEAKER_01: You don't get as angry as you used to as quickly.
SPEAKER_01: And that's freedom.
SPEAKER_01: I didn't say you don't get angry, I said you don't get as angry as quickly over things that don't matter anymore.
SPEAKER_01: As you used to, it would just eat you up with anger.
SPEAKER_01: But I've been working on you, chastening you, scourging you, perfecting you, refining you, sifting you, and now you don't get as angry as quick, and there's more temperance, which is what I want you to be.
SPEAKER_01: It's the yielded fruit of righteousness.
SPEAKER_01: I did that through the trials I put you through.
SPEAKER_01: I did that, he says, through the tribulations I allowed to come.
SPEAKER_01: Now, let me show you an illustration, watching your time.
SPEAKER_01: Look at the book of Luke.
SPEAKER_01: Luke 15.
SPEAKER_01: And we when we turn here, and even though you've read it however many tens of times, look at Luke 15.
SPEAKER_01: Luke 15.
SPEAKER_01: Everybody still all right?
SPEAKER_01: Say amen.
SPEAKER_01: Look, I understand chastening, scourging, rebuking, but but put in there as children.
SPEAKER_01: He loves me, he loves me, he's correcting me, it's for my profit, it's to make me better, it's so I can be partakers of his holiness.
SPEAKER_01: Now, statement.
SPEAKER_01: There's a good possibility that every one of us in here, in some way, shape, or form, he's teaching us something right now.
SPEAKER_01: Because when you're walking in the spirit and I'm walking in the spirit, he's instructing, he's teaching.
SPEAKER_01: You may be learning it down at your job in your business.
SPEAKER_01: As an employer, as a manager, you may be learning more about what God wants you to be through the trials going on in your business.
SPEAKER_01: It may be in your family, your extended family.
SPEAKER_01: It may be something going on health-wise.
SPEAKER_01: It could be something going on in the church, it could be something, you name it, in relationships, it could just be an internal struggle going on, having to do with no other people, just something God has you going through, and it's going to yield that peaceful fruit of righteousness when it's done.
SPEAKER_01: But what we need to do is not run away from God and endure it.
SPEAKER_01: Let me say it again.
SPEAKER_01: If ye endure chastening, if you stay at it, if you keep walking with me, I'll make you what I can make you into.
SPEAKER_01: May I say this to you?
SPEAKER_01: Sometimes people, well, I'm done with that.
SPEAKER_01: I'm done with that.
SPEAKER_01: I'm tired of getting in that Bible and it correcting me all the time.
SPEAKER_01: I'm tired of going to church.
SPEAKER_01: Every time I go in there, I get convicted.
SPEAKER_01: I get convicted by the music.
SPEAKER_01: Brethren, if he's working on us, let him work on us.
SPEAKER_01: You say, how do people walk away from God?
SPEAKER_01: I'm gonna get away from the Bible, I'm gonna get away from church, I'm gonna get away from preaching, I'm gonna get away from Christianity, I'm gonna, I'm just gonna watch movies that don't remind me about that.
SPEAKER_01: I'm gonna watch feel-good movies.
SPEAKER_01: I'll do that for 20 years.
SPEAKER_01: I'm saved, but I'm just gonna watch things that make me feel happy about myself for 20 years.
SPEAKER_01: That's not Christianity.
SPEAKER_01: God brings joy for the presence, it's grievous, but afterwards it revealeth and it produces that fruit that brings great joy because it's correction that is eternally purposed to make us better down here.
SPEAKER_01: Everybody still all right?
SPEAKER_01: Well, I'm just not gonna walk in Christian anymore, I'm not gonna read that book anymore, I don't want to hear preaching anymore.
SPEAKER_01: I just want to feel good about myself all the time.
SPEAKER_01: That's not growth.
SPEAKER_01: Growth is when somebody comes in and says something, you go, I didn't expect that.
SPEAKER_01: Man, we have preachers in and I go, I didn't expect that.
SPEAKER_01: But didn't you say they could preach?
SPEAKER_01: Yes, but I didn't expect that.
SPEAKER_01: Why?
SPEAKER_01: It convicted me.
SPEAKER_01: Come on, you still with me or not?
SPEAKER_01: We want the kind of preaching led by the Holy Ghost that edifies us.
SPEAKER_01: We do.
SPEAKER_01: We want the Holy Ghost to give the preachers, the teachers, that which we need to edify us, to make us better.
SPEAKER_01: Now watch Luke 15.
SPEAKER_01: Luke 15.
SPEAKER_01: Luke 15, uh, if you read it carefully, you'll see something that's uh throughout the chapter.
SPEAKER_01: Something's lost that's found.
SPEAKER_01: Rejoice with me.
SPEAKER_01: Something's lost that's found.
SPEAKER_01: Rejoice with me.
SPEAKER_01: It starts out in verse 4 with a sheep that's lost, that's found.
SPEAKER_01: Rejoice with me.
SPEAKER_01: Then a woman loses something in verse 8, it's lost, it's found, rejoice with me.
SPEAKER_01: And then in verse number 11, he brings it to two sons.
SPEAKER_01: You know the sons.
SPEAKER_01: If you haven't read Luke 15, even even those who haven't been in Christianity ever before have heard of the prodigal son.
SPEAKER_01: Come on, is that right?
SPEAKER_01: There's certain things everybody in the world's heard about, as far as you know, in our language.
SPEAKER_01: Most people have heard about the prodigal son.
SPEAKER_01: So what happens is, verse 11, certain man has two sons.
SPEAKER_01: Even if you read this before, stay with me.
SPEAKER_01: And uh the one uh asked for his portion, verse 12, of goods, and and he's decided to leave with that portion, and the other son stays back and stays working uh with the father for the father.
SPEAKER_01: Verse 13, the one who asked his portion goes into a far country.
SPEAKER_01: And uh verse 13, there he wastes his substance.
SPEAKER_01: Notice this, and this is the key, verse 13, with riotous living.
SPEAKER_01: Riotous living.
SPEAKER_01: He didn't learn riotous living at home, he did not learn riotous living from his father.
SPEAKER_01: He knew when he went out to be a riotous lifestyle that he was going against his father's wishes and character and what was going on in the home.
SPEAKER_01: So he went into a far country to do it.
SPEAKER_01: And he did it quietly, he did it privately, from as far as his father not being around.
SPEAKER_01: Verse number 14.
SPEAKER_01: And when he had spent all, everything he got, he spent it all.
SPEAKER_01: What did he spent it on?
SPEAKER_01: Himself.
SPEAKER_01: Those characteristics I just read you in Galatians 5, lust of the flesh, etc.
SPEAKER_01: When he had spent all, there arose a mighty famine in that land, and he began to be in want.
SPEAKER_01: He wasted everything, wasted.
SPEAKER_01: He's now in a land away from his dad, away from his family, and now he's in want.
SPEAKER_01: Verse 15.
SPEAKER_01: And he went, joined himself to a citizen of that country.
SPEAKER_01: You know what that citizen did?
SPEAKER_01: He sent him into the fields to feed pigs, swine.
SPEAKER_01: Now watch verse 16.
SPEAKER_01: And he would have, he would fain have filled his belly with the husks that the swine did eat.
SPEAKER_01: You know what he was saying?
SPEAKER_01: I I got no food.
SPEAKER_01: I got I got I got nothing.
SPEAKER_01: I'm in a far country, I've wasted everything, there's a famine, I got no food.
SPEAKER_01: I need to just eat what the pigs are eating.
SPEAKER_01: And there's a little message that people talk about, like he ate with the pigs.
SPEAKER_01: It said he would have fain have filled his belly with the husks that the swine did eat.
SPEAKER_01: He was so desperate.
SPEAKER_01: Now, here's a little controversial statement.
SPEAKER_01: And no man gave unto him.
SPEAKER_01: Huh?
SPEAKER_01: No man gave unto him.
SPEAKER_01: What do you mean?
SPEAKER_01: Well, at that point in time, God had nobody helping him.
SPEAKER_01: What do you mean, God?
SPEAKER_01: The father wasn't there, he was away from the father.
SPEAKER_01: He was in riotous living in a far country.
SPEAKER_01: He had wasted everything, gone away from the blessings of his father, the safety of his father, the rules of his father.
SPEAKER_01: And now there was a famine, and he wanted, and he thought about eating with the pigs.
SPEAKER_01: Please listen, and no man gave him.
SPEAKER_01: You say, why is that controversial?
SPEAKER_01: Because we are taught and told, and I believe it's by the Holy Ghost, help everybody you can.
SPEAKER_01: Help everybody you can.
SPEAKER_01: The rule is if you got it, help them.
SPEAKER_01: Would you agree with that?
SPEAKER_01: Show mercy, show compassion, help them.
SPEAKER_01: But don't be surprised if the Holy Ghost, once in a great, great, great, great while says, don't help that one.
SPEAKER_01: Okay, I know that's controversial.
SPEAKER_01: Because if someone with the gift of mercy says, No, you help everybody, you help everybody, you help everybody, and that's the rule.
SPEAKER_01: Help everybody.
SPEAKER_01: If you have it, help your brother.
SPEAKER_01: Come on, is that right?
SPEAKER_01: Show compassion, show mercy.
SPEAKER_01: Hey, if he asks for this, give him that.
SPEAKER_01: Go that extra mile.
SPEAKER_01: Give him the coat off your back.
SPEAKER_01: Come on, is that right?
SPEAKER_01: But once in a great, great, great while, God will say, Leave that.
SPEAKER_01: I'm working with that one.
SPEAKER_01: But make sure it's God.
SPEAKER_01: Because that's the exception of the exception.
SPEAKER_01: Why would God do that?
SPEAKER_01: It was part of God's love.
SPEAKER_01: What do you mean it's part of God's love?
SPEAKER_01: He wasted everything.
SPEAKER_01: He wanted.
SPEAKER_01: He was down really, really low, but he was away from the Father.
SPEAKER_01: And this was the way to get him back to the Father.
SPEAKER_01: This was the way to get him back to his walk with the Father, to his fellowship with the Father.
SPEAKER_01: So he got to the place where he's feeding the pigs and thinking, I'm going to eat what they're eating.
SPEAKER_01: And no man gave him.
SPEAKER_01: And the father wasn't around to give him.
SPEAKER_01: What do you mean?
SPEAKER_01: He was away from the father.
SPEAKER_01: And the father didn't have anybody there to give to him.
SPEAKER_01: And he had nothing, and no man gave to him.
SPEAKER_01: Again, that's the exception.
SPEAKER_01: Once in a great, great while God may say, No, leave that to me.
SPEAKER_01: Are you still with me or not?
SPEAKER_01: Don't go out of here and say, you know what?
SPEAKER_01: Pastor this morning preached against compassion.
SPEAKER_01: I didn't.
SPEAKER_01: He preached against mercy.
SPEAKER_01: I didn't.
SPEAKER_01: He preached against going the second mile.
SPEAKER_01: I didn't.
SPEAKER_01: I said, once in a great, great while, God may say, No, I've got him right where I want him.
SPEAKER_01: And I'm loving him.
SPEAKER_01: And I'm loving her.
SPEAKER_01: Leave it alone.
SPEAKER_01: Pray for him.
SPEAKER_01: Don't judge him.
SPEAKER_01: But they're not quite low enough yet.
SPEAKER_01: What do you mean they're not low enough?
SPEAKER_01: They haven't come to themselves yet.
SPEAKER_01: They haven't realized yet.
SPEAKER_01: That old nature's still strong.
SPEAKER_01: I'm helping them.
SPEAKER_01: You say, why?
SPEAKER_01: Read the rest.
SPEAKER_01: And no man helped him.
SPEAKER_01: Verse 17.
SPEAKER_01: And when?
SPEAKER_01: He came to himself.
SPEAKER_01: Brethren, God has a way of allowing us to come to ourselves.
SPEAKER_01: It's when we want, we wasted, and there's no help.
SPEAKER_01: You say, what does it mean he came to himself?
SPEAKER_01: He realized.
SPEAKER_01: What am I doing out here?
SPEAKER_01: Why am I in this far country living against what my father taught me?
SPEAKER_01: All I have to do is go back and go home.
SPEAKER_01: And I'll just go back and say, Father, like he says, forgive me, I've sinned.
SPEAKER_01: I'm not even worthy to be your son.
SPEAKER_01: See, there's a humbling thing going on there.
SPEAKER_01: Please.
SPEAKER_01: I know we're supposed to give mercy and compassion and don't think, oh, gee, the other day I gave something to somebody.
SPEAKER_01: Maybe I shouldn't have.
SPEAKER_01: Don't think that.
SPEAKER_01: Don't go out here and say, I knew I shouldn't have given it to them.
SPEAKER_01: Don't think that.
SPEAKER_01: Give the second mile, compassion, mercy, everything.
SPEAKER_01: You're not going to get in trouble for giving somebody something, doing something for someone.
SPEAKER_01: But once in a while there might be something in you that says, careful.
SPEAKER_01: Now, if you're the type of person that's not charitable, you're going to say, Well, there you go, right there.
SPEAKER_01: I'm that's me right there.
SPEAKER_01: I knew I was right for 15 years.
SPEAKER_01: He came to himself and said, How many hired servants of my fathers have bred enough and despair?
SPEAKER_01: And I perish with hunger.
SPEAKER_01: So God used hunger to bring him down.
SPEAKER_01: And hunger was suffering, and hunger was affliction, and hunger was chastisement, and hunger was scourging.
SPEAKER_01: It was the affliction of the pain to correct him.
SPEAKER_01: It was hunger.
SPEAKER_01: He said, My father's hired servants.
SPEAKER_01: They got food and to spare.
SPEAKER_01: What am I doing here?
SPEAKER_01: I'm his son.
SPEAKER_01: I'm above the servants.
SPEAKER_01: But even the servants have food and to spare.
SPEAKER_01: And here I am out here wasting what I could have.
SPEAKER_01: I know what I'm going to do.
SPEAKER_01: I'm going to go back and say, Lord or Father, I'm going to be one of your servants.
SPEAKER_01: Because at least I'll have food.
SPEAKER_01: The hunger is the affliction.
SPEAKER_01: And go on just a little further.
SPEAKER_01: He said, verse 18, here's what I'm going to do.
SPEAKER_01: I'm going to rise.
SPEAKER_01: Why?
SPEAKER_01: He came to himself.
SPEAKER_01: He turned around.
SPEAKER_01: You say, what does it mean he came to himself, brethren?
SPEAKER_01: It was a low part of his life where in his own mind he said, What am I doing here?
SPEAKER_01: Please look up here.
SPEAKER_01: And in his mind he repented.
SPEAKER_01: Come on, is that right?
SPEAKER_01: Yes or no?
SPEAKER_01: In his mind, he said, I'm turning my thoughts around.
SPEAKER_01: What am I doing out here?
SPEAKER_01: This is ridiculous.
SPEAKER_01: He said, I'll rise, go to my father, and will say unto him, see, his mindset's different now.
SPEAKER_01: Father, I have sinned.
SPEAKER_01: I've sinned against heaven before thee.
SPEAKER_01: Notice the new mindset, am no more worthy to be called thy son.
SPEAKER_01: Brethren, when he asked for his goods from the Father to leave, that was not his mindset.
SPEAKER_01: He said, I'm no one more worthy to be called thy son.
SPEAKER_01: He's humbled now.
SPEAKER_01: Make me as one of thy thy hired servants.
SPEAKER_01: And he rose, came to his father.
SPEAKER_01: When he's a great way off, you know the story.
SPEAKER_01: I want to be careful.
SPEAKER_01: His father saw him.
SPEAKER_01: We all know, and you should know, the father's always looking.
SPEAKER_01: Come on, is that right?
SPEAKER_01: The father's always waiting.
SPEAKER_01: If we get away from God a little bit, don't think God's not there waiting for us.
SPEAKER_01: He's always waiting.
SPEAKER_01: From afar off, you know the story.
SPEAKER_01: From afar off, his father saw him.
SPEAKER_01: That means the father was looking for him.
SPEAKER_01: And ran and fell on his neck and kissed him.
SPEAKER_01: Read that again carefully, you'll see.
SPEAKER_01: And he rose, came to his father.
SPEAKER_01: But when when he, the son, was yet a great way off, his father saw him.
SPEAKER_01: Wait a minute.
SPEAKER_01: The subject is still the father.
SPEAKER_01: The father saw him, the father had compassion.
SPEAKER_01: The father ran.
SPEAKER_01: The father fell on his neck and kissed him.
SPEAKER_01: Is that right?
SPEAKER_01: Yes or no?
SPEAKER_01: Brethren, don't think God's forsaken you.
SPEAKER_01: If you're a child, you're born again.
SPEAKER_01: He loves this.
SPEAKER_01: And so the father came.
SPEAKER_01: And the father, verse 21, the said son said, Here's the humility, I've sinned.
SPEAKER_01: I've sinned against heaven in thy sight, no more worthy to be called thy son.
SPEAKER_01: But in context of the chapter, the father says, Okay, time to rejoice.
SPEAKER_01: He's back.
SPEAKER_01: I found the sheep, he's back.
SPEAKER_01: I found the piece of silver.
SPEAKER_01: My son's back.
SPEAKER_01: Rejoice with me.
SPEAKER_01: Brethren, our attitude when somebody comes back to the Lord should be rejoice.
SPEAKER_01: Rejoice.
SPEAKER_01: Hey, we've seen through the years, military personnel come to San Diego.
SPEAKER_01: Uh they were saved at a young age, grew up in a good church.
SPEAKER_01: Get in the military for a while and go into a far country.
SPEAKER_01: Not everybody.
SPEAKER_01: I didn't say everybody.
SPEAKER_01: Some.
SPEAKER_01: I don't know how many people.
SPEAKER_01: We've knocked on the doors.
SPEAKER_01: And they said, yeah, I grew up in Christianity.
SPEAKER_01: I I know better.
SPEAKER_01: We didn't think we could find a good church out here, and we're just all messed right up right now.
SPEAKER_01: We need help.
SPEAKER_01: Saved.
SPEAKER_01: We'll come.
SPEAKER_01: Don't judge them.
SPEAKER_01: Welcome them back from the far country.
SPEAKER_01: Because the Father sent us there to knock on their door and talk to them.
SPEAKER_01: Come on, is that right?
SPEAKER_01: But they can be right in San Diego in riotous living, wasting from what they know is right.
SPEAKER_01: And we come along by God's grace, not knowing what we're doing.
SPEAKER_01: What do you mean?
SPEAKER_01: Just doing what we're supposed to be doing?
SPEAKER_01: Reaching out, give them a track, gospel.
SPEAKER_01: They look on the internet, whatever they do to find a church, and in they come.
SPEAKER_01: Start getting right.
SPEAKER_01: Don't be surprised when you get a call from the family saying, Oh, we're so happy.
SPEAKER_01: Please work with them.
SPEAKER_01: Rejoice.
SPEAKER_01: They're back in church again.
SPEAKER_01: Their marriage was breaking up.
SPEAKER_01: Why?
SPEAKER_01: Because they're both carnal.
SPEAKER_01: When they walked down the aisle back at that home church, they loved each other so much.
SPEAKER_01: They were going into just the perfect life together.
SPEAKER_01: And then they got in the military and they fell away.
SPEAKER_01: And then their carnal natures started in at each other.
SPEAKER_01: By the way, I'm not talking about anybody in here.
SPEAKER_01: I'm saying after three decades of this, you run into this stuff.
SPEAKER_01: It's quiet in here, but I'm just being honest with you.
SPEAKER_01: And they come back, and what should we do?
SPEAKER_01: Judge them?
SPEAKER_01: Oh, rejoice.
SPEAKER_01: Say, do you help them?
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, if they've been out in the far country long enough, we can help them.
SPEAKER_01: If they've already got to the place where they come to themselves and say, I'm coming back to church.
SPEAKER_01: It's time to get the fatted calf out.
SPEAKER_01: Cook that boy.
SPEAKER_01: Let's eat meat, amen.
SPEAKER_01: Unless you're a vegan.
SPEAKER_01: Unless you're vegan.
SPEAKER_01: We'll be careful of that.
SPEAKER_01: It's because God loves us.
SPEAKER_01: Why shouldn't we rejoice when somebody comes to the Lord?
SPEAKER_01: Or comes back to the Lord.
SPEAKER_01: And by the way, you say, you said back east.
SPEAKER_01: Please listen.
SPEAKER_01: It can happen to somebody that grew up in this church.
SPEAKER_01: It can happen to someone who got saved in this church.
SPEAKER_01: It can happen to anybody.
SPEAKER_01: Who are we?
SPEAKER_01: By the grace of God, we're in church today.
SPEAKER_01: But some of us may be going through a little training.
SPEAKER_01: It's because he loves us.
SPEAKER_01: If you've not yet received Christ as Savior, say, I don't know if I want to be a part of that kind of God.
SPEAKER_01: I want to tell you, there's a heaven and there's a hell.
SPEAKER_01: There's a heaven with God and there's a lake of fire away from God.
SPEAKER_01: Don't you dare, don't you dare think that there's any thought about not becoming a Christian because in this book it's very clear there's those that are away from God forever and with God forever.
SPEAKER_01: And after you get saved, we can testify you we have a wonderful father that watches out for us, loves us, cares for us, and does it for our profit when he corrects us.
SPEAKER_00: Thank you for listening to this message by Pastor Doug Fisher of Lighthouse Baptist Church in Lemon Grove, California.
SPEAKER_00: To learn more about Lighthouse Baptist Church, visit our website at www.lighthousebaptist.com or call six one nine four six one fifty five sixty one.