HOW DO YOU GET FULL, STAY FILLED, & LIVE EACH DAY FULL OF THE HOLY SPIRIT?

let's open our bibles to the book of ephesians chapter five and migrate to verses 18 and 19 uh which are part of the text you'll see there and i want you to think about sitting and in fact i was uh uh during that last song as we were singing about the holy spirit coming on us i was thinking about what would be a good visual of discipleship and i was thinking of what i picture in my mind is sitting in the midst of the blur of uh you know of a panera or of a water street or starbucks or wherever you you know big b i don't want to be discriminatory and leave anybody out you know or mcdonald's coffee i mean it doesn't matter where you dispense vitamin c but just get the vitamin c and and sitting there at a table with the scriptures and intently one-on-one discussing so that's that's really my intent for these weeks is to transport all of you and i would like you to to sit there and and think as if it was just you here this morning and we were talking about these truths okay and so i would ask you to open to ephesians 5. and i would say this i would say in this discipleship lesson and a disciple is a learner uh someone that that doesn't it's not a student-teacher relationship because students just learn facts in a discipling relationship they become like the one that's training them so that's one of the hesitations people have in discipleship because they don't want anybody to become like them because their life's out of control so why didn't want anybody else to be out of control you know what i mean we're not talking about that paul said follow me in the ways that i'm following christ right be followers together with me even as i am of christ so what we communicate in discipleship is how we are following christ he is the teacher we're the conduit so discipleship is not about me becoming a paragon of christian virtue although he wants that the lord does it's about me showing someone how to follow the lord like i have learned to follow the lord and and so it's so much about us having a personal life so i'd say we're having discipleship lesson and this might be the most life impacting the most transformational and the most vital of any lesson that we could have that's in ephesians 5 18 where you are in your bibles because ephesians 5 18 is all about getting full of the holy spirit so that's the ephesians 5 part right here in our text this morning so god has ordained that the work of christ be done in the world and by the way this is everything i'm talking about this morning is supracultural what i'm talking about this morning works in muscat noman it works in guinea and bazaar however you pronounce that and it works in the heart of mexico city and it works in the the high plateau of tibet it is supracultural this is god in his plan and it transcends all generations of time this is what he's always wanted okay from the birth of the church on he's wanted us to get full of his spirit now remember in john 15 jesus already told us why he says because apart from me you can't do anything everything you do amounts to nothing and there are many people that do the work of christ in their own energy and they're frustrated and they're burned out and they're angry and they're troubled because nobody recognizes them and they're ready to quit almost every week that's the evidence of doing work apart from christ it's like your chariot wheels come off he's resistant because he says i am sending my spirit as the comforter and if you will allow and invite and welcome him and get full of my spirit you will do unbelievable incredible inexplicable things did you know that's that's how you know it's the holy spirit because you can't figure out how how on earth did they accomplish that they didn't see that's that's what fullness of the spirit is then staying full of the holy spirit we will not be able to talk about this morning that's this chapter ephesians 4 the staying full what we're going to look at that is the signs of emptiness and we'll see that after the lord willing after the missions conference what are the signs that you're having a flat tire spiritually uh this summer bonnie and i had a real bout of that i had the first tire i've had to change in 30 years this summer i was on my way to speak at word of life going up i 80 something in new hampshire vermont i was on the side of about a 22 incline and uh you know barely going up when all of a sudden it was so clear we knew exactly what was wrong we had a blowout and a flat tire on an interstate in in holiday traffic of course we called aaa i've been a member since the 70s i believe and do you know what aaa said it will be four to six hours minimum they said this is a holiday weekend and they said our trucks i think we were in vermonter new hampshire they said our trucks are all the way to maine there's so many people are having breakdowns they said four to six hours i went oh i said honey can you open the glove compartment i said there's a manual about how to overcome emptiness of the tire uh and i said i haven't i haven't really studied emptiness uh reduction of tires in a long time and bonnie got it out and i mean have you ever read what's in your manual it's just like in the bible it's it's it's amazing and by the way the uh we immediately went to costco we are members in uh vermont or somewhere and got our new tires because i wanted to stay full of uh and and by the way i crawled into the car and i was laying on an ant hill and i did not know it here i am just dutifully getting that spare tire that came with the car seven years ago underneath there and i was working on it and getting it out and i kept feeling stuff you know and by the time i got the tire changed you should have seen i look like a kid in church you know that can't sit still but how do we stay full and then what we're going to finish with this morning is this galatians 5 is how do you know you're living full of god's spirit did you know this morning an elder prayer one of the elders prayed a magnificent offering to the lord you know what he said he said lord deliver calvary from thinking that just knowing the truth is equivalent to doing it because our heritage is for decades for scores of years this church has had unbelievably trained and studied and supported bible teachers and the knowledge is so thick here that it's unbelievable knowing something isn't the same as doing it and what the scriptures say is there is evidence of whether or not at work at home at school in your neighborhood in the hospital when you're in the er whether or not we are living full of god's spirit there are nine indicators that are visible and other people can see them have you ever watched someone you go whoo you take a step back they look like they're ready to blow up that is an indicator of not being full of the holy spirit you see we the spirit of god wants us to get full we need to know what makes us have flat tires because he wants us living full of his spirit and that is why the first century church permeated all of the roman world in one generation not because they all went off to school and learned you know some techniques they were discipled and nurtured in the power of the holy spirit and they learned that god commanded them and their their chief occupation every day was to make sure they were full you know i live in a house of drivers and i buy the gas for a lot of the cars and i know whether they're full or not you know because it costs so much money you know and i track all that and say you're driving too much and all that but you know what if you're interested in your car you know whether it has gas or not if you're interested in your cell phone you know whether it's full you don't want it to die on you the chief pursuit that they were trained as getting full avoiding anything that emptied that punctured that destroyed that gave them a blowout and then going through life living full of god's spirit so look at what it says in in ephesians 5 as we open to 5 18 we're learning what it means to get full stay full and live full of god's spirit this might be the most vital topic in the bible for any born-again believer after they're saved because this is the essence of how to live the way god designed us and sometimes when we study a topic this massive like the holy spirit in our lives and look what it says in verse 18. do not be drunk with wine i mean they were living in the bakkian culture of dionysius and all that in the roman world where where people just uh lived you know and just it were constantly looking forward to the kind of like uh thank god it's friday attitude that they were just drinking and drunkenness was rampant in the ancient world he says don't don't be drunk with wine that's a command in which is dissipation he said the whole the whole drinking way of the world that you were saved from is dissipation contrast but similar command be filled with the spirit by the way if you look up from your bibles did you know the whole book of acts is the acts of the holy spirit a lot of bible's title that they asked the apostles those apostles couldn't have done anything in that book if it wasn't for the holy spirit that's what the whole book is about it's about what it's kind of what our missions conference is about this year an extraordinary god using ordinary people and just bursting have you looked at all those pictures they're all over the the missions conference posters with the the clay pot with the power just emanating from it that is a picture what the book of acts is the book of acts were a bunch of ordinary people some of them sub ordinary almost losers that the spirit of god so filled that their lives began to radiate his power in fact when i and i re-read i reread the book of acts and here's my conclusion you want to know this week i reread the book of acts and you know what my first human response was to reading all of that unbelievable incredible but almost in 21st century terms unattainable what do i mean by that well let me just give you three stories out of the book of acts okay you all know these uh peter from pentecost don paul saved in chapter nine the apostle john we find him you know uh in chapter four and then he goes all the way to the end to revelation let me just talk to you about the ordinary people and the incredible extraordinary unbelievable lives and in each one of these chapter 5 verse 18 is the only difference between them and us they were ordinary people that extraordinarily surrendered and opened their lives for god to flow out of them filling and overflowing their lives number one peter peter was a stumbling bumbling man who was always sticking both feet up to the ankles in his mouth during the gospels i mean he rebuked the lord and told the lord what to do and not to do i mean he was a mess in fact after the first lord's supper one servant girl in the dark scared peter into uttering some horrible curses and publicly repeatedly denying jesus christ who was in visual distance peter denied christ looking at him and denied him so yeah he's a mess yet only days later he stood up in front of 3 000 families and the murderous religious establishment that had already gotten christ crucified and their military backing the romans in front of that whole crew in jerusalem peter stood up so boldly that people were transfixed and stood and listened to him preach and at the end three thousand people went against their pride which is to say a lot because they were all religious they were actually in jerusalem because they were so religious and he said you're a bunch of sinners and you need to repent and get saved and if you get saved i want you to demonstrate your public alignment with christ by getting baptized 3 000 first day i mean unbelievable and by the way peter has never recorded his wavering again from that day onward he faces inevitability of personal pain and certain martyrdom with serenity do you see why that's unbelievable incredible and it seems unattainable i mean doesn't that seem impossible the only thing that happened to peter was the spirit of god well how about the apostle paul the apostle paul by now we're in acts 16. so paul we're in acts 16 and paul just got beaten within an inch of his life in philippi and he was put down into a prison he was neglected to the point of abuse he was thrown into a dark damp bug infested dungeon fastened down with iron and wood stocks left to grow infection to burn with fever and probably to die by the way if if he would have been wearing the new apple watch that's coming out after the first year it would have been beeping and saying you have health problems did you know that's the direction our culture is going we are uber health conscious i mean we we want to protect everything about our bodies we want to eat right we want to rest right and i mean you got to have a sleep number bed and you got to purify your air and your water and you've got to take every possible and and exercise and monitor with your little electronic device i mean kids can't sleep without a panoply of electronic devices around them with the parents you know checking and monitoring them they got a little camera and they can't imagine that they're going to survive unless they're just did you know what paul was doing was very bad for his health did you know that that's part of how the devil is going to deter so many people from serving the lord because we are caught up in this health-saving as if this is all there is in this body being healthy and fit and toned and good-looking and manicured is all that matters in life paul said the body they may kill as luther later put into him but god's truth abides still i am i am living for something greater than manicuring and maintaining this body now it is his temple of god but paul's temple was really hurt well what's the result of all that fever-infested and infection-wracked body well paul started to quote and then he began to sing aloud from the book of psalms he was so convincing that almost everyone who heard his voice wanted to become a christian in the dark from the stocks he's not calculating how he can get an antibiotic and how he can get the er and whether he has coverage out of state you know and and what is going to happen you know and is he's going to be permanent scars he is more interested in communicating the gospel because he was filled and overflowing with holy spirit you know what that's unbelievable it's incredible and it's almost in our minds today unattainable you go to the apostle john he was alone in prison and troubled and for all he knew he was forgotten by god as well as everybody else when revelation 1 opens now john had had he was the longest surviving apostle and he was the target of the roman empire i mean if you read church history and i could bore you with church history i mean that's my phd work was in church history and i spent years studying church history and there's so much about how john was hunted and haunted and followed and and i mean he was they even tried to boil him alive in oil and you know french fry him and and according to church tradition the lord even preserved him from that but he was scarred and now he's alone he was on a bake rock in the middle of nowhere patmos was kind of like an ancient version of an alcatraz or a san quentin he had already survived being beaten and mobs and jails he even lived with the scars that marked his body from all that the romans had suggested him to but now what comes out of a scarred and wasted body we meet him in revelation 1 in the spirit worshiping god on the lord's day and he has the most beautiful and amazing vision and tour of heaven than anybody's ever had unbelievable incredible when i read it unattainable in the 21st century right now what we say they they just had something that we don't have and that is true they stayed full of the spirit they were ephesians 5 18 respondents they denied anything that would keep them from being under the influence of god which is dissipation and they sought verse 18 to be filled with the spirit and by the way it doesn't stop there the list from church history just goes on there's a galaxy of unbelievable lives that goes way beyond the apostles there are countless first century saints who found their pathways colliding with the godless belligerent roman society and their lives ended in the sands of the arena or at the stake or in ghastly martyrdom and history records they went to their death serene confident and testimonies in fact i was just at somebody's house we're still doing 100 homes and i can't remember which one it was but they had this little book that was called glimpses from church history and they were showing it to me and it got to the point where people as they were being burnt at the stake would proclaim the gospel to the crowd so they started clipping their tongues so they couldn't talk because the holy spirit was prompting them to share the gospel just a few amazing ones 4 from the 4th 16th 18th and 20th century athanasius he stood at a church council in the 4th century and he was the only pastor only bishop pastor of a church in the whole council that believed jesus christ was god the son god in human flesh all the rest of the council were following the jehovah's witness view that jesus was a creator kind of the mormon view to that jesus is a created being par you know with with deity but not divine you know worshipable but not really god in human flesh and anthony just said no his famous statement is athanasius contra mundum contra means against mundum the world he said i don't care if everybody is going that way it's not true and i am standing for christ and he swayed the pastors who began to read the scriptures and the vote went for christ being god the son amazing how about martin luther he stood alone at the diet of worms in the face of excommunication death by fire what did he say here i stand upon god's word i can take no other stand how did he do that was it because the university of leipzig he went to was he in a campus organization that kind of worked with him a little bit how did he get that it was the fullness of the spirit see apart from god's spirit we can't accomplish anything and these connected and were filled how about judson and kerry had an arm judson william carey uh adnan arm judson in the 18th century worked seven years in burma without seeing even one soul converted he was starved for weeks he was left for dead in prison yet he never quit i wonder if his prayer letter's coming back what the people supporting him thought i mean after seven years can't you do something over there you know what kept him going how about william kerry of india he was in the same century he faced the mental insanity of his beloved wife his wife went crazy in india now we definitely would have jerked him home modern missions you know get her in treatment he took care of her in india took care of his house full of kids and said i'm not leaving because god called me to translate the bible into the language of the largest people group that at that point did not have the word of god and he faced the hostility of the hindus and never quit until god's word was translated unbelievable incredible probably not attainable nowadays the way we think how about ct stud 20th century he faced sickness personally by the way he died they did a little post-mortem on him and they said that his a gallstone was the size of a baseball can you imagine the intense endless pain and nausea and sickness and by the way he had that for for a long time by his symptoms he faced weakness because of all of his debilitating diseases mortal dangers he lived among cannibal pygmies in africa's darkest jungle and yet in 1931 20 000 of those he had led to christ and baptized were wearing clothing they were naked by the way when he met them and they lived as saints in the devil's own deep dark jungle how did he do that did he go to some conference and learn some technique that works with pygmies no it's the power of the spirit of god and that is what god wants us well is it possible to live this unbelievable and incredible life yes and the scriptures tell us that in verse 18 the only connection we need is to be filled with the spirit but it doesn't just it it it comes down the secret is in one word this is the greek word be filled play ruth is the greek word and that word that single word describes everything that god wants to do through us if we will just yield to him now there's four parts to that word it's an imperative it's in the plural it's passive and it's present and of course it's a verb so it's an imperative verb a plural verb a passive verb and a present verb and that that summarizes what god wants to do in our lives first of all it's an imperative an imperative verb means god is commanding something you remember the structure of the scripture is there is all of the doctrines those are in the form of greek language called the indicatives it's just the listing of doctrine it's just the truths of god in his word and then scattered among all of those will be one of these flaming imperatives a command that says based on this doctrine you have a duty to respond and it isn't a suggestion it's a command from almighty god that on the basis of now let's just think about this one being filled with the spirit this is what the lord says he says i bought you if you're born again christian and i own the ground of your life so imagine this platform is a little plot of land and god says i bought and paid for that land with my own blood so now it's mine now i'm asking you to surrender every part of the ground your body your life every part the field that you are to me in any part you surrender to me i will start growing fruit that's what the fruit of the spirit is it's an indicator of what parts of our life god is controlling if he's controlling our amusements then the fruit of that is we only amuse ourselves with things that are true honest just pure lovely and of good report and that's what we think about and if if he's controlling our family life then the wisdom is from above which is first pure and peaceful and gentle and easily treated and full of mercy and good fruits without partial without hypocrisy that's growing in that part of our life but if there's anger and irritation and and kind of rivalrous living and and and kind of like sneaky parts of our life that that we're doing stuff we would be ashamed of and and we're hiding those parts are not under his control so number one it's an imperative god asks us to respond our duty in the indicatives are the doctrinal explanations the imperatives are the personal responses to god's truth remember back that prayer this morning in the elder um prayer before the service lord deliver us from thinking that knowing is equivalent to doing we are saturated with the indicatives and often non-responsive to the imperatives because we know so much we know a lot more than we do sometimes and lord says don't allow that to persist in your life the filling of the holy spirit of god into our life is our supreme obligation because the almighty god himself is commanding us it's an imperative it's plural a plural verb means god is speaking to all of us when he said prior in the 18th verse to not be drunk with lying he's speaking to all believers it's an imperative command and the same is for the filling the spirit-filled walk is for every believer it's passive passive means it's not something we do we don't say i'm gonna fill myself now see there's a real danger some people equate excitement and and feeling excited with being full of the spirit that's why the whole christian concert movement goes and people just they think if they can it's almost like pumping up enough if i can get so excited this conference let's see how far i can go no it's not something we pump into ourselves it's something that god takes over when we surrender and when we consecrate and when we deny ourself and crucify that part of our life more and more of our being comes under his control remember we got all of him you know it says in john 1 god gives not a sphere by measure he doesn't say oh you get a quarter teaspoon 8 teaspoon for you no he gives all of himself to us at salvation and then he waits for us to surrender the garden plots of our life to his planting and plowing and roundupping and and getting ready it's passive which means a passive verb means god is asking us to open our lives to his filling passive means allowing this to come into your life let the spirit fill you is what god is saying this is a direct call to my unreserved yielding to god's control he's saying i want your driving i want your communication i want your thoughts i want your entertainment life i want your spiritual disciplines under my control i want your finances i want your schedule i want every part of your life i don't want you cubbyholing me and have your little church part and say that's yours god and the rest is mine he said i want all of it now can you imagine some of you have gotten a little comfortable you know you're sitting in the stadium can you imagine hearing this this far from someone with them looking in your eyes and saying do you believe that's an imperative do you believe it's to you do you believe it's something that god does that you have to surrender and it's a present verb which means you know jesus said phil twice he said phil in in john 2 7 to remember the wedding in canaan of galilee and jesus said go go fill those pots with water that's an arist verb and eris means fill them once this is not talking about filling once with the holy spirit this is a present passive plural imperative jesus commanded them to fill the pots once and they did he's commanding us to keep our pot constantly overflowingly full of the holy spirit that's what god wants so basically we can say this spirit-filled living is god's plan for all of us okay let's go back to galatians now and this always in the discipleship you know when you move off of one passage they kind of feel ah you know it couldn't get worse than that you know that was a little hard you know now let's go to galatians chapter five spirit-filled living is god's plan for all of us and if you look in in chapter 5 starting in verse 19 it says now the works of the flesh are evident which are adultery fornication and cleanness and lewdness and by the way every time a believer has an unsurrendered part of their life the weeds of the old way that you used to be have you ever seen these massive cornfields you know and they just chemical those things to death and i mean they can plow them and they stay absolutely looking plowed for months there's everything's been killed in sight you know except there's this lone weed you ever seen those they just stick out i mean there's some of them are massive weeds and it's like ah whatever chemical you used did not affect that you know and it just shows up in the or in the corn you see it too you know it's like a chemical resistant monster weed you know they call them frankenweeds nowadays because they're being no literally the genetic engineering and all the chemicals are actually kind of like antibiotics in the human body producing super germs we're producing super you know chemical resistant weeds but that's what shows up in the plowed ground of the purchase by the blood of christ lives of believers when we do not apply by the way the holy spirit's roundup kills all weeds he's not like you know monsantos he can kill them all you know and and he wants to anything under his control does not have these things in it look what what shows up when the holy spirit's not working the works of the flesh unspirit filled and controlled and led people have adultery fornication uncleanness lewdness idolatry sorcery you know believers would say we don't do any of those things hatred hmm contentions hmm jealousies hmm outbursts of wrath i lost my temper no you didn't it's still there and you found it and it's springing up you know outbursts of wrath selfish ambition that's at the core of getting ahead if the goal in life is to be wealthy and successful and comfortable and secure you better have strong selfish ambition because you're going to have to climb to the top and everybody there's everybody competing and you're going to outdo them [Music] did you notice that selfish ambition has bad company we're right by idolatry and immorality and selfish ambition dissensions heresies envy i mean you've probably never heard of anybody that doesn't like it that someone i mean they're being paid too much and they have two nights of stuff and they shouldn't have that you know it's just envy murders the lord says if you're angry at someone without a cause you're a murderer drunkenness revelries and the like which i tell you beforehand i tell you now in time past that those who practice such things will not inherit the kingdom of god did you know those things are not allowed to grow in our life without divine intervention and by the way that's what we studied last sunday night at communion that if we don't examine our life and say oh i have a spirit of those things in my life lord i confess and forsake and i want you to get rid of that if we don't the lord moves in and gets rid of it that's called the chastening of the lord and first corinthians 11 says some are weak and some are sick and some are sleeping they're dead the lord will not allow a believer to persist in any of these things he resists it in their life but that's not what we're talking about that'll be in the flat tire part look at verse 22 here's the evidence the fruit of the spirit now now here's what i call the fruit of the spirit what we're going to look at very very quickly in 14 minutes there are nine life altering personality changes that are the evidence now this is when the person starts really squirming at the table say we're going to look at the fruit of the spirit and what we're going to do is going to examine if god is at work and if you've surrendered the soil of your life to the lord just as i am to be we are going to see visible crops that show up in every dimension of our life that's what the fruit of the spirit is they're the evidence of what the spirit of god brings into our life he changes our personality he alters our life he starts plowing plowing and disking and spraying and preparing and then he plants and he waters there's a crop that he's looking for in our life and there are nine of them and here they are number one love by the way don't think of love as how i treat people it starts with how i treat god see love it starts loving god and then it flows into how we treat people and if you see someone that has a little problem with the way they treat people it's because there's a defective connection in their love of god and so it says in in romans 5 5 love is the absence of selfishness it's the product of the holy spirit that flows out of our lives through the power of god the whole law is fulfilled by loving god and our neighbor that's what jesus said love involves always a sacrifice it's not a feeling so let's do a personal checkup questions do i sacrifice my way so i can follow god's way now you say where does that come from well john 14 21 says he that has my commandments and keepeth them he it is that loves me and he that loves me beloved to my father and i will love him we'll manifest ourselves to him the basis of my relationship with god is that i respond to his word because i love him if you love someone you want to please them you want to do what pleases them jesus said i always do those things that please my father why because he was scared to death of him because he thought god was going to hurt him because he loved him how do we show love we sacrifice god so loved that he gave do i give up my way sacrifice my way so i can follow god's way hmm what is god's way matthew 6 33 i would pause and say you remember that verse but seek ye first the kingdom of god god's rule in your life do you do that how about matthew 4 4 man should not live by bread alone but by every word that proceeds out of the mouth of god does god's way have a priority in your life is god the priority or is he secondary and you know what in our world of christendom 21st century it is fashionably accepted in the church to have christians who have lost their first love and god basically it's like this if if uh uh let me get another page in there if you have a shelf this is the top shelf this is the number one spot and when we got saved god was up there and everything else in our life was to be under his gracious lordship but what happens is not more important than god but you know i gotta work oh you know i gotta please my family oh you know i've gotta i've gotta you know enjoy life a little bit and what we do is a lot of other stuff gets on god's shelf of the top spot all of those things are part of life eating and sleeping and working and loving and amusing and entertaining i mean as long as it's not directly sin they're all okay now they don't count forever and a lot of them are going to be burned up in the fire but god says i want i want to be the priority of your life and everything else i want to be secondary so is that kind of love operative in my life i meet people because i grew up with one my dad who got offered at general motors double time to work sunday do you know what during those years of general motors when they were conquering the world there were so many godly men that were absent from the church because they got double time and what'd they do with their double time they bought a boat they bought a cottage they bought a nicer car and they did not sacrifice their way to follow god's way you know what my dad after one week of double time he went back in he says i'm not going to work anymore he said i felt so horrible knowing that the church was gathering my sunday school class was gathering that i taught my family was gathering and what was i teaching my family that if someone will pay you twice as much you can neglect the only time the body of christ gathers in the week as a body to earn a little more money wow does anybody think of that anymore if you want your kids to excel in sports you got to travel every weekend if you want to excel in anything you got to travel every weekend we almost count on the fact that as soon as sports season starts we aren't going to have any of the key people because they are out trumping into hotels and sitting out in the rain at fields what is that teaching your kids in 20 years when they look at all those trophies and those state things and they got the big scholarship to go to the state school where by the way they lost their faith what does it teach him that your way is more important than god's way very interesting to think about but i can feel the tension i'm going to get off of that point do i sacrificially deny myself so god gets his way we all have 168 hours a week am i denying and seeking first the lord or do other things now can you think this is a little can you imagine sitting across the table asking people these questions and waiting for an answer when do you have your time with the lord when do you schedule that is that a priority when do you read god's word what are you getting out of when's the last time you read it what did you find last time by the way can others the people close to us trace your progress in expressing god's love do those who watch me see me as less selfish less self-seeking less doing my own way than i was last month how about the next one joy you know what joy is it's a detachment from my circumstances most people's lives are like this you know uh they're sick they got a raise uh they're uh oh come on it doesn't like me doing this there we go they're sick they got a raise uh you know they lost their job their child just won something they have cancer and their lives are just like a roller coaster you know what joy is it's when i'm detached from my circumstances it's isaiah 26 3. you know what that says thou god will keep them that's 26 3. in perfect peace whose mind has stayed on thee because he trusts in the yea trust in the lord he is the everlasting joy of our countenance as it talks about the joy that comes because god is keeping us detached from our circumstances do those that know me watch my life see evidences throughout my daily life at work at school at home that i'm a more and more joyful person would that be what people that are watching you and observing they say boy he is so joyful how about peace peace shalom uh that word means to be made complete shalom you've heard you know shalom is a greeting but but it actually is the same to be made complete as a peaceful person i have been made complete in christ i have christ i don't need anything else i have everything i need you know i met with someone this morning first service and i said how you doing they said great i said they said but i hope i'm alive in a year and i looked him right in the eye and i said i can assure you you will be because i know them personally and they were kind of probably going to tell me about a cancer test they had i said you will be alive forever because whoever lives and believes in me jesus said we'll never what but we don't really sometimes connect that with our daily lives we're worried about dying and jesus said you're never going to die your your body i asked and i said you ever have a car that got old and you got rid of it you got a new car i said your body is like a car but you inside of it will never die you'll just get a much better car in heaven you know but that's what peace brings it's an anchor of our soul both sure and steadfast has peace through the changes and the upsets and the unexpected twists and struggles and challenges and trials whoop trials and pains become more and more a way of life for me this year do people notice your growing peacefulness that no matter what the news says no matter what the job outlook there's peace how about this one by the way see each of these long suffering or patience you know what that is a long-suffering patience is an absence of personal irritation at the behavior of others that's what it is other things other people i don't get irritated personal irritation at what other things and other people do ask yourself am i more patient than i was three months ago or less does patience absence of personal irritation at people and things would that characterize the way others would describe my driving oh we go that's one of the fashionable sins you know how about my explaining constant questions you know to people that constantly are questioning everything i do how about the way i direct the way things need to be done if you're a supervisor or a parent how about my interacting with people in general is there a growing absence of personal irritation are you patient if we're not increasing in patience it's only an evidence that we're not yielding submitting that part of our life to the holy spirit how about kindness that's a an absence of personal abrasiveness i remember i was at a shower once i don't know what i was doing there it was a wedding show or something and the challenge i mean there was a little challenge to the couple and they said well we know that marriage is like sandpaper and it's going to shape both of your lives and i thought no we're not supposed to be sandpaper we're not supposed to be abrasive i mean is god changing my way of looking at people in responses to our people would someone follow me around for a day say that my actions are showing an increasing tendency toward personal abrasive freeness with others how about goodness you know jesus said i am meek and lowly in heart and his goodness was a manifestation it says in acts 10 38 when the holy spirit filled christ it says he went about doing good good is god-like behavior am i visibly a person that's better to those who feel my life up close do people see me doing good remember let your good works be seen by others that they might praise god it's not just the boy scouts that are supposed to do that to get a merit badge all of us are supposed to yield our lives so that goodness increases do people think of the presence of god when they see how i act or the absence of god how about faithfulness faithfulness is me or psalm 15 doing what i say i'm supposed to do am i making strides in reliability and dependability christians are supposed to be more reliable more dependable every year of their life is my life less and less out of control did you know god wants my life under control so that i can help people whose lives are out of control and when we have so many people in the church whose lives are out of control they can never help anybody else because their lives are out of control and the fruit of the spirit see anything that's not under control is because i haven't surrendered it to god's control am i faithful in my punctuality you know there's some people you know that if you say it's at nine o'clock they'll get there at nine ten you know how about in your finances i mean we're always supposed to spend less than we make so all you do is just decrease the spending but they don't teach that anymore our government and our culture is driven on on borrowing enough money to get totally out of debt you know it's just like we we don't even think about what we're saying how about my promises do i do what i say do i swear to my own heart psalm 15 how about my spiritual disciplines like prayer in the word do i always say i don't have time i do have time but i'm not yielding my time to god's faithfulness and any part of my life that's out of control is reminding me that that area is not under god's control gentleness would people say i'm assertive or gentle this is a virtue in our culture this is a weakness but jesus said in matthew 11 29 i'm gentle so do you want to be assertive or christ-like that's the choice that any assertive part of my life has not surrendered to the lord do i fight for my ideas my plans my agenda my preferences or am i willing to let others express their ways what shape is my personal agenda and my ambition are they intact are my rights being defended is my personal self-driven agenda in hopeless shape is it crucified and finally self-control whoop self-control that's actually self-control is is the virtue of having all of my life not dominated by an external influence they used to use it for athletes in the in the olympics is my life dominated by the spirit of god do i have a disciplined life or an undisciplined life would others think of me as graciously under the control of god's spirit am i beating my flesh down does it seem like god's taken over more and more of my life and my attention and my schedule that's only possible by that's only possible by the spirit's power so let's turn to 366. you can close your bibles and let's turn to 366 and we're just going to sing a prayer before we go and uh so grab your green book 366 and let's stand together and we're gonna go two minutes late as we sing this prayer and as we sing these words i want you to think about something think about the life that god bought with his own blood through the cross of christ and as you're singing all to jesus i surrender say lord have i surrendered to you my schedule have i surrendered to you my entertainment have i surrendered to you my public life am i driving how about my business career you know how about my appetites how about my finances how about my spiritual disciplines i mean i want to surrender all that to you and i want you to be growing in your control i want your spirit to fill every part of my life so i can do unbelievable incredible things and you get all the credit wow what is our response we're supposed to do we're supposed to surrender all of our life to jesus okay so we'll just sing the first stanza and then i'll pray here we go and father i pray that these words of this song be the reflection of our hearts and that we would invite you to invade and control and plant the fruit of your spirit to grow in every part of our life and i pray that we would be constantly renewing that surrender and looking through our lives to see any part that's out of control and realize it just needs to get back under your control i pray that you would keep us full and that we would live the spirit-filled life for your glory in the precious name of jesus and all god's people said amen god bless you as you go you

Channel: DTBM

Views: 10,081

Rating: 4.8997912 out of 5

Keywords: Bible, God, Jesus, Christian, teaching, biblical, teach, sermon, trinity, church, lesson, traditional, truth, true, divine, theology, freedom, guilt, testament, pure, interpret, spirit, holy, John, Barnett, christ, father, heaven, hell, doctrine, doctrinal, sinful, forgive, forgiveness, history, teachings, chapters, verses, discover, the book, ministries, dtbm, Dr. Barnett, controversial, repent, helpful, sin, the, book, dr, john, doctor, barnett, training, videos, series, resources, savior, god, jesus

Id: N76Om6wQg7U

Length: 53min 46sec (3226 seconds)

Published: Sun Jul 26 2020