Pastor Robert Morris - Lost & Found - The Believer's Battle

all right so take your Bibles and turn to Hebrew only one passage but we're going to flip to another one that's real close okay so if you're a die-hard fan that you need me to tell you two passages we will get to that but go to Hebrews chapter five please all right Hebrews chapter five and I'm getting a new series that is going to be great just just to let you know not because I'm speaking it but because the Holy Spirit is speaking it to our church but the name of the new series is lost and found a prodigal journey and we're going to take it all out of Luke 15 and you may think you've heard everything there is about the prodigal son but the things that the Lord is showing me about this parable that Jesus told are fantastic and you'll see even by this first message the Lord's really going to take us somewhere in the next few weeks it'll be a six-week series as I said well the few guest speakers in there that are fantastic but so lost and found now let me tell you what I mean by the word lost in this situation I don't mean as referring to your salvation in my opinion the prodigal son that Jesus tells this story about is about a believer because he's still a son and I do believe that believers can go straight and that the father is waiting for them to come home I think that that's really the story behind the prodigal son you know a few years ago when my daughter was young she's actually seated on the front row 25 years old now has two daughters of her own she when she was about three years old we were in the mall one time and Debbie said I want to go try these own and I want you to watch Elaine and you know I got it you know we've already had two kids I haven't lost one of them yet so um I got it you know and I remember her saying to me look at me and that's because she knew how Elaine was she said look at me watch Elaine and Lane was standing right here and I said to her I've got this I've got this okay and so she went this away to the dressing room and then I turned around I said Elaine Elaine Elaine and she was gone and we were in like Dillard's in the mall and for some reason I just thought go to the entrance we were close to the entrance that goes into the mall part you know and so I ran to the entrance and I looked left and then when I looked right I saw this little girl you know about three years old again Hedy and she was I mean you know like this and heading down so I took off after and these three wonderful ladies on the park bench realized this is not right you know for a three-year-old you know to be by herself and so they said to her hey hey honey where are you going she said I go shopping and so they stopped her begin the talk and of course when I got up there they gave me the look you know like you know what your species can't get anything right you know so but anyway I got her and then I tried to get back to the department store you know before Debbie came and as we were head back Debbie's standing there you know with another look you know so anyway here's the point my daughter was lost momentarily okay she was lost she was still my daughter she was still my daughter she shares openly she speaks a lot at Women's Conference just just spoke at one Friday night and spoke at one last week um she shares openly about a season she went through where she walked away from the Lord um but she was still my daughter and she was still the Lord's daughter and you need to know that there are God's kids that walk away sometimes they're still God's kids and they don't there's not they don't it's not saved lost saved lost saved lost there's no theology there's no scripture that could support a theology like that while saved lost saved lost saved so I want to talk to you seriously about how all of us all of us can become a prodigal in maybe even an area of our life maybe even just for a short time and how do we handle that all right so the title of the message today is the believers battle the believers battle so I asked you don't go to Hebrews 5 I'm going to read a little bit of Luke 15 and we'll eventually read the whole passage but we'll look at parts of it so I just want to show you the a few verses in Luke 15 where we're going to get the series from verse 11 Benny said this is Jesus speaking a certain man had two sons and the younger of them said to his father father give me the portion of goods that falls to me so he divided to them his livelihood and not many days after the younger son gathered all together journeyed to a far country and there wasted his possessions with prodigal living that's where we get the prodigal son prodigal living ok we you probably don't use that word in conversations everyday and probably the only time you use the word prodigal is when you restore when you're referring to this passage of Scripture what you do you agree with that I mean you probably don't use it very much and so I love to go to the Greek and see what's the Greek word ok I'm going to give you the the Strong's exhaustive dictionary the definition of the of this word prodigal from the Greek is a one-word definition when I give it to you it will clear everything all right here's here's what it means and this is from the Strong's exhaustive concordance all right dissolute lis that do it clears it all up doesn't it just makes it clear as mud to me you know so um I have no clue what the word dissolute li meant and so it's an adverb and I couldn't even find it in the dictionary I only found the adjective dissolute which describes a person you know dissolute li would be the way the person is living dissolute would be describing the person who is prodigal here's what Webster's dictionary says about dissolute the word dissolute a person lacking restraint marked by indulgence in things this even Webster's dictionary such as drink are promiscuous sex okay we understand that about this son and that you know he probably had indulgence in those things but the first part of the definition is what I want us to see lacking restraint now if we're honest there are it's probably at least one maybe two or three areas where we lack restraint all of us probably different but all are you yellow looking at me real self righteously stop it come on D is there an area of your life you you lack restraint in that area it's a tough area for you you know okay that does that's in that area we have a tendency to be a prodigal and so that's what I want to talk about this is this battle so so why why do we have a tendency to be a prodigal what's what is a believers battle well the reason we have a battle as believers is because we're three parts we're spirit soul and body and let me show you a verse that has all three parts in it Genesis chapter 2 verse 7 says on the Lord God for Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground so this is referring to his body and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life this is referring to his spirit because this word breath is actually sometimes translated spirit it's the Spirit of God that he breathed into us and man became a living soul there there we are body spirit and soul all in one verse so why am I saying this well it's important to understand God created our spirits to relate to him he created our bodies to relate to his creation others with our bodies we relate to his his creation he created our souls to relate to him and his creation I remember your soul is your mind your will in your emotions so he created your mind and your emotions he want you to relate to him with your mind and your emotions and he wants you to relate to his creation with your mind and your emotions and you will he wants to enjoy you'd enjoy his creation but he created your spirits to relate to him here's the problem when Adam and Eve died when they pardon me when they send their spirits died if you remember God said you eat this you'll die okay their bodies did not die their bodies didn't die their souls didn't die their minds didn't die their emotions didn't die they still had a soul their spirits died Ephesians says before we accept Christ we're dead in trespasses and sin we're dead you're actually born on this earth with a dead spirit your spirit does not come alive until you accept Christ your spirit comes alive so for years on you you returned you learn to relate to God through only your soul in other words you relate to God through what you can understand about God your mind how you feel about the situation and what you desire to do you do y'all with me you you learn to live a life and you make all of your decisions based on your thoughts about that about whatever it is your feelings about it and your desires and God never intended you to live that way he intended you to live where your spirit is in charge but the problem is we live for years where our souls are in charge this is the believers battle this is the believers battle so let me tell you some things about the soul all right here's here's number one the soul is selfish the soul is selfish we souls motto is protect number one live for number one watch out for number one you don't watch out for number one no one else will the soul is selfish the soul protects itself the soul is made up again of our minds our wheels our emotions all right so it's only what we can think only what we can reason only what we feel is right and only what we desire but let me just take one one part of that all right to explain to you the mind the mind is phenomenal it's it's it's incredible your mind is is better than any computer you own now you don't think it is I understand that but it is your your mind has logged everything you've ever done everything you've ever said and everything that's ever been said to you and everything you've ever seen or experienced your mind has it now it you're thinking where is it because I can't remember it's in your subconscious have you ever said oh what's what's her name it's on the tip of my tongue it's not on the tip of your tongue its expression it's in your subconscious and your try it's there because it'll come to you a lot of times right for you go to sleep Cindy you know it just comes out okay I remember now okay so um but the point is it sits in your subconscious you're trying to bring it to your conscious you see what I'm saying so it's there your your mind in a millisecond in a millisecond um searches through all the files and assesses every situation that you're in every situation you walk in a room and your mind says how have I ever seen heard or experienced anything like this before and your mind will call up in your subconscious you don't even know what's happening 483 times when you were in circumstances similar to that and then it'll it'll categorize it down 256 times that you're in circumstances that were very similar and then four times when you were in circumstances that were almost exactly alike I mean almost exactly what you're experiencing right there that's how you get deja vu that's how you get things over okay you you didn't experience this in a former life okay it's it's you experience it in this life but you just don't remember it in your conscious but your subconscious does that this is how you can be in a conversation and get very angry and you don't even know why you got angry it's because your mind assesses the situation and your subconscious says to you the last time you had a conversation like this on you you lost the conversation because you weren't forceful enough and you need to be more forceful and so you're in a meeting and all of a sudden you just kind of use a guy and you walk out of the room and everyone in the meeting says what got into him it's because your mind assess the situation and told you this is how you need to respond illicitly this is why you respond sometimes with insecurity let me say this again listen to me this is extremely important what I'm telling you because you assess several situations that are similar in which you felt insecure so you now feel insecure in that situation this all comes from the soul this is your mind doing this see your spirit says lay your life down turn the other cheek your soul says protect number one this is why you respond sometimes with fear not because you're in a situation that is that fearful but because you've been in other situations that remind you of that this is why you can meet someone and not like him when you meet him you can be walking out of the restaurant with your wife and your wife says oh hey this is Suzy that I'm in in the Bible study with I told you about oh hey are you and this is my husband Bill hey Bill how are you you walk out the restaurant and say I don't like that guy your wife says you just just met him how you know you like him I don't like I can tell you that I don't like it because your mind says have I ever met anyone like this before are y'all following me your mind tells you that your mind says yes you've met 499 people like this and you met 80 some people who are very similar this person and you met for people who are exactly like that person and one of them pulled your shorts down in PE and so I don't like it guys I'm the guy that you leave know me I got a whole file on you pal okay so why am I telling you this I know this is funny why am I telling you this this is how stronghold works that's why I'm telling you this is how stronghold works why am I telling you this because this is the believers battle this is hell let me just name some strongholds this how lust works your mind is categorized every perverse thing you've ever seen and you see something that reminds you of that and you begin to have lustful thoughts please hear me this is so important this is so important this is why believers fall away this is why believers end up in a pigpen when they're living in a mansion and they end up in a pigpen why because they have a stronghold strongholds in your soul you have to know that your seat see your spirit is saved your spirit is saved up if you accepted Christ this is the see this is the problem so many people they're still going to stay on grace they don't understand works okay here here's the problem they don't understand the finished work of grace in your spirit and they don't understand the progressive work of grace in your soul you can't imagine how many people I would like to help what's correct theology because there are people on both sides of the issue there are people in the grace side that really preach unrighteous living that's horrible that's it's not ever what's never what grace was intended to do and then there a preacher people on the work side that preach legalism which only puts people in more bondage so I'm almost someone say this again the problem is we don't understand the finished work of grace in our spirits and the progressive work of grace and our souls that right there's work price of admission today so you need to understand the battles in the soul the only reason you ever lose the battle is because in your soul there's a problem in your soul because your soul is selfish it is born selfish that's why it needs to be converted it needs to be renewed it needs to be transformed this is why people don't understand scriptures about the saving of the soul believe to the saving of the soul has nothing to do with your eternal destination has to do with your the word save comes from the Greek word so so it means making whole your spirits been made whole that's a work of grace if you think that you're doing something to earn your way to heaven I feel so sorry for you because you'll always have a works mentality about you and you'll have a perfectionism and illegal ISM and you'll have a judgmentalism and criticism about anybody doesn't live up to your standard and I'm preaching good ah okay but so all these scriptures about the saving of the soul it's true your soul needs to be saved but not for your eternal destination but for you right now to not go back to the Pigpen your soul is being converted it needs to be transformed by the renewing of your mind there's a conversion the transforming on okay so the soul is is it selfish all right so what do we do about it well here's number two the soul must submit to the Spirit the soul must submit to the Spirit Romans nine twelve this film at Jacob and Esau it says it was said to her the older shall serve the younger now here's the only reason I say this God uses this as a principle in Scripture it's a it's a it's a principle that's used in Scripture the older shall serve the younger there has nothing to do with firstborn so if you're you know firstborn you say oh that's the way it is in my family that's not what I'm talking about right the older shall starting to think about this you come into this world and let's say you live for 20 years before you accept Christ who's in charge for that 20 years your soul is your souls in charge and then you get born again or literally from the Greek John 3 to be better translated born from above born spiritually born of the Spirit and your spirit comes alive so what Ephesians 2 tells your spirit comes alive it was dead trespassing sin and he made us alive okay that's your spirit so your spirit comes alive so your souls been in charge for 20 years and then you get saved your spirit comes alive okay so which one then would be the older the soul which one be the younger the spirit what does the Bible say the older shall serve the younger see the soul needs to serve the spirit submit to the spirit so here's what happens you get saved and your spirit says to your soul um I'm in charge now we're going to do things God's Way and your soul being the sweet kind compassionate humble person that he is says okay know you're your soul says not without a fight pal and that's where the fight is are you going to respond the way your soul the way your mind and your emotions tells you to respond are you going to respond like Jesus would respond in that situation so what you've got to do is you've got to feed your spirit your spirits got to grow up your spirit has to grow up and I'll show you scriptures about it in a moment but here here's one thing just even the blogs that that mention Christian leaders and I'm one of them praise the Lord I've made the Satan's hit list now you know but here's here's what blows me away you wouldn't listen to gossip but you'll read it I mean I have a friend of mine that made a comment a while back and it just blew up on the internet it blew up like he was changing his theological position and really he was saying our methods are evolving but he had to clarify later my theological positions not evolving on this issue but our methods in dealing with people who are in bondage to seeing those are evolving we're trying to learn to deal with people who who suffer with this but on the internet everybody had already judged him he's a pastor and he's a friend of mine and what what upsets me is Christians read Phil on the internet and they believed it I mean I you can't imagine how many people have told me that this is true how you know it's true read on the Internet anybody can write on the Internet and the people who write on the Internet are people who would not have a platform unless they put my name or Bill Hybels name or TD jakes name in it they wouldn't have a platform if they didn't put someone's name who already had a platform well I'm I'm jobless fired up and tell you okay I love their son I'd like you just counted up how much time do you spend reading the internet and how much time do you spend reading God's Word and which one are you feeding are you feeding your soul when you read the Internet most of the time sometimes there's good things I understand that but you need to feed your spirit this is why you're going to be in trouble if you if you don't feed your spirit because there's a battle going on this is the believers battle let me show you how David talks about this battle Psalm 131 we'll get to Hebrews five later Psalm 131 verse two says surely I have calmed and quieted my soul like a weaned child with his mother like a weaned child is my soul within me okay he gives us a clue you have to wean your soul the only way you calm and quiet your soul is to wean your soul everyone follow me on that okay so how do you how do you wean a child you take him off a milk put him on solid food right all right I'll get tea Brutus I've one more verse but let me show you this one first first Corinthians 3 verse 1 and I brethren could not speak to you as spiritual spiritual spiritual people but as to carnal as babes in Christ I fed you with milk not with solid food now Hebrews 5 here's Hebrews 5 okay verse 12 for though by this time you ought to be teachers but you need someone to teach you again the first principles of the Oracles of God and you've come to need milk not solid food for everyone who protects only a milk is unskilled in the word of righteousness for he is a babe or baby but solid food belongs to those who are full age that is those who by reason of use have their senses exercised to discern both good and evil all right so let me ask a question if you got it you have to wean your soul all right what happens when you try to wean a baby Joseph it doesn't he throws a fit and he cries right okay do you know what's going to happen when you try to wean your soul are you going to throw a fit and he's gonna cry why why does a baby cry when you try to wean him because he thinks you're trying to kill him you're taking away the only food source he's ever known so he thinks you're trying to kill him okay let me explain something though in the case of the soul he's right so and that's that's that's point number three the soul must die the soul must die you say my soul has to die he died itself your selfish thoughts need to die you're here you go I am crucified with Christ yeah you need to die it's all through Christian theology we need to die to self okay so if you're in Hebrews five you go back one page Hebrews 4 verse 12 is a real famous verse but I don't think we understand it because I think we do understand it but I don't think we understand verse 13 so I'll get to that Hebrews 4:12 says for the word of God is living and powerful sharper than any two-edged sword piercing even to the division the division of what soul and spirit what you think and what God thinks and a joint murals the discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart and and no one seems to connect verse 13 to verse 12 and there is no creature hidden from his sight but all things are naked and open to the eyes of him to whom we must give a cow let me taste something but this word open now remember that the Word of God is called a sword in verse 12 it's called a sword okay okay let me tell you what this word open isn't agree trachy leads so trachea leads so okay you can figure out lots of greek words uh if you lots of if you think about the English like graph a is graph it's it's so it's a righty um log-off's logic okay all right so trachy leads so trachy trachy what would that refer to the throat right the wind the windpipe okay all right so let me down trachy that's the good part the throat lead so that's where the word goes kind of bad okay let me show you let me tell you what this word means it means to be the back the neck of a victim to be slain listen to expose the gullet of a person to kill him okay listen God has big plans for your soul that's what the word of God does it says no Robert don't respond that way that's your soul your respond this way oh they all followed me this is why people go straight so I believers go straight because they don't let the sword divide between their soul and spirit Matthew 16:24 25 jesus said to his disciples anyone desires to come after me let him deny himself and take up his cross just once you notice the word he is his cross I'm gonna come back to that and follow me for whoever desires to save his life that Greek word here for life is su ke which is where we get the word psyche you means soul whoever desires to save his soul will lose him whoever loses his soul for my sake will find it all right have you ever heard the saying Jesus went to the cross so you wouldn't have to I got a problem with that sing because this says if you want to follow me take up your cross so apparently I have to die too uh Luke 9:23 he said to them all this is Jesus if anyone desires to come after me let him deny himself watch this now watch he's on taking a step further and take up his cross daily why did you have to put the word daily in there look look uh first Corinthians 15 31 Paul said I die daily do you think that means he got saved every day no means he crucified himself every day his soul sad you I just want to walk down now at one time preacher doesn't work that way it's an everyday you come to the cross every day I beg you I beseech you by the mercies of God that you present your bodies a living sacrifice holy and acceptable in God which is your reasonable service and don't be conformed to the world but be transformed by the renewing of your mind say it I don't know if I'm making myself clear nod I really don't why would a believer why would a believer ever leave the family of God and go live in a pigpen because he's not in this book every day and he's feeding his soul instead of his spirit all right here's last thing I'm gonna tell you I um my zone sabbatical Lord started dealing with me and then he was actually after I came back from sabbatical but the Lord spoke thing really clearly one day and he said you've gotten in a real bad habit let's say what'd he mean Lord he said I've never heard this phrase before the Lord made it up I guess he said you're having drive through quite times fast food quite times he said used to spend a lot more time with me he said I just want to spend time with you no agenda no message to prepare no Church to pray over I just won't just shoot me so I said Lord I'm sorry and so I set some time aside more time to start having those times with the Lord very first day I'm in there and the Lord reminding me say do you remember when you when you were 30 years old is when I really taught you how to have a quite time I was starting to have a lot of headaches and I'd gone to doctors nobody could figure it out I was having my quiet time one morning and the Lord said to me you think I know why you having headaches I said yeah I do he's let me tell you why he said cuz you're not really spending time with me you're coming in in the mornings and giving me your to-do list and then you leave you're not spending time with me and he said stress and sin snowball that's what he said he said if you don't deal with stress and sin every day it's gonna snowball on you and so when I started again putting aside more time I'm telling that just the look I'm not long ago okay the Lord said you remember that I said yeah he said it long tap was telling you was it adds up let's say I can see that well I felt like he told me to read in the message Bible during my quite time so he said I want you to go look at reached on 32 today so I went ready and they just one show you one verse son 32 verse 6 says these things add up every one of us needs to pray these things add up every one of us needs to pray here's the reason I'm preaching to you I don't want you to be a prodigal I don't want to be a prodigal this is the battle about Liz are we gonna let the Word of God divide between our thoughts and between God's thoughts I want you to bow your heads and close your eyes I want you to just take a moment say Holy Spirit what he's saying to me like we do every week what he's saying to me I think possibly he could be speaking to many of us about drive through quite times I think you could be speaking to us about time we spend reading things that don't feed our spirit instead of the time we spend reading the word I don't know what God's speaking to you but we want to pray for you no matter which service you're attending no matter which campus you're attending no matter if you're in an overflow room right now we want to pray for you so we're gonna do like we do every weekend we're going to have one more worship song we're going to have leaders at the front of every campus every room if you need prayer for any area of your I think some of you got is speaking something about this to you and I think you oughta by simply humbling yourself and coming to someone and saying I need prayer I think God can do a work in your life I know he can so we're gonna have one more worship song if you need prayer for any area of your life ever campus you just in just a moment you stand up and just step out don't be embarrassed and just come forward and say I need some prayer Holy Spirit I pray you'll draw every person at every campus that needs any prayer today in Jesus name Amen I was 19 years old when I gave my life to the Lord and everything changed I didn't have any desire to go back to that old life I wanted to walk with the Lord and learn more about him and some people helped me to learn the Bible and to learn how to pray and to learn about my new life in Christ and that's what we want to do for you I am so excited that you've given your life to the Lord he's forgiven all of your sins and you're on your way to heaven but we need to learn some things now about the Bible about prayer about some basics of the Christian life so that you can be victorious and live for the Lord like I know you want to so we've designed the class called fresh start and I want to encourage you to sign up for this class because we want to help you grow in your walk with the Lord now I love you and I'm so proud of you

Channel: gatewaychurchtv

Views: 188,868

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Keywords: gatewaypeople, Gateway Church, Pastor Robert, Robert Morris, Southlake, Texas, DFW, Lord, God, Jesus, Christ, Church, Bible, Truth, Lost and Found, Lost & Found, The Believer's Battle

Id: EoMMto1E7hE

Length: 37min 56sec (2276 seconds)

Published: Wed Sep 30 2015