Thanks for checking out the Anchor Faith Message podcast
from St. Augustine, FL.
Now enjoy this message. All right, tonight we're going
to deal with a Kingdom principle, always like to be
able to come and bring some principles directly from the
Kingdom of God, because again, the Bible's about a king, his
Kingdom and his role offspring. All right, when you get over
into Genesis chapter one, verse 26, God said, let us make man in
our image recorded in our likeness and let him have
dominion. That means man was always
designed to have rulership or dominion over the fish of the
sea, birds of the sky, over all the cattle, over all the earth,
and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.
He gave both male and female dominion on the earth.
In essence, man was to rule in this realm as God rules in his
realm, and He rules this realm as God rules his realm.
Because God speaks the Word and that Word comes to play.
Adam is to hear God speak that Word and then act on that and it
comes to play, OK. And so he functions.
He's he in essence, Adam is the God of the world.
Are you hearing what I'm saying? And the reason we could say that
he's not God himself, but he's the God of the world or the
ruler of the world, because when he handed over his authority to
the devil, when he ate the fruit that the Lord told him not to
eat and sin entered the world. Paul says himself in 2nd
Corinthians 4 four that the devil is the God of this world.
Now the devil himself is not a God.
He has an anointed cherub that has fallen because he tried to
take over the Kingdom in heaven and God cast him out.
So when he's here in the earth and sees Adam, he says, man, he
looks a lot like God. He wants that rulership.
Are you hearing me? So he deceives Eve and saying
that, you know what is God said? As we know he asked that
question. Has God not said which was not
true? But he's looking to hear what
God says because all lies originate in truth.
And Eve says no. What's been said is we can eat
from any tree of the garden, but at the tree of the knowledge of
good and evil, we shot out and eat for the day we eat will die.
He said you're not going to die. He said Lord knows the minute
you eat him, you'll be like him, knowing good and evil.
Well, they're already like God 'cause they're creating his
image. But what they are not like God
is knowing evil. God knows evil because he's
already cast the devil out 'cause he got lifted up in pride
and a third of the angels, you know, went with him.
And then there's other things that we're not at liberty to
discuss at this point because it takes too long.
But the reality is a rebellion has taken place in the realm of
the Spirit, not on this particular planet earth.
That Adam is now the God of or son of God over by right of
dominion. So when Adam eats the fruit, he
he abdicates his authority and gives it to the devil.
That's why the devil's account in Luke chapter 4 when it is the
temptation of Christ, he takes Jesus to a high pinnacle, shows
him all the kingdoms or domains in a moment of time.
Not religions, but dominions, governments.
He said, I'll give you all this domain, all this government
power, all this authority, for they've been handed over to me
and I can give it to whoever I want.
Well, who did he get it from? He got it from Adam.
Again, the Bible is not about dying and going to heaven.
The Bible is about becoming a child of God and operating in
dominion again. That is the whole point, because
ultimately there's going to be a new heaven and a new earth.
And if we actually read the last two chapters of the Bible,
Revelations 21 and 22, we'll see a new Jerusalem will come down
out of heaven to the earth, and God the Father and the Son are
going to live actually here. That's pretty amazing.
So religion has taught us that we just need to know where we're
going to go when we die. And as a result of that, what we
do then is we think the only thing that matters is asking
Jesus into our heart to save us so that when we die, we get to
go to heaven. And the devil would love for you
to believe that that's all the Bible's about.
Because then at that point you'll be no effective for the
Kingdom of God and the earth. None effect.
In fact, it'd be very difficult to tell you different from even
people in the world. Now, I understand some people in
the world, it's pretty obvious that they live in the world and
you can live a good life. You can live a good carnal
Christian life, meaning a babe in Christ.
Because if all you know is the salvation of God, you're only
going to be a babe in Christ. You're not a mature believer.
And I don't care if you've been in the church for 50 years.
If all you know is that Jesus Christ died on the cross and
rose from the grave, that keeps you in baby status.
The scripture concludes that. However, there are a lot of
people that do good works and it is very difficult for you to not
to see their wrongdoing because they've learned how to pattern
what is good and has been able to function because God reigns
his blessings upon the just and the unjust.
And they're able to kind of work in it enough that it's kind of
difficult to to see the difference.
However, God knows the difference because it is only by
faith that you can be a child of God.
And that is the acknowledgement that Jesus Christ came down on
the cross and road from the grave.
That is the door. That is not the conclusion.
The door gets you into the Kingdom because Jesus himself
said when talking about being born again, which is literally
translated born from above, was saying to them, listen, in order
for you to see the Kingdom or enter the Kingdom, you're first
going to have to become a citizen of that Kingdom.
And you can't buy your way in. You can't work your way in.
You must confess Jesus as Lord, which is not a religious word.
It means supreme in authority. And when Jesus is supreme in
authority and he's actually your king, then you become a new
creature in Christ. The old pass away, behold, all
things become new. Then he'll anoint you as a king.
That's the indumen of power, which gives you the language of
the Kingdom. Pretty amazing, right?
OK, and allows you to navigate through another language system
when necessary. And it's necessary because
there's times you don't know how you ought to pray, but the
Spirit will give you utterance to pray and you'll be praying in
the language of the Kingdom. It's called praying in the
Spirit. But not only that, then he'll
begin to allow you to function as a king in the earth, where
heaven can manifest in the earth through you and you can actually
operate as Jesus said when you pray.
Pray this way. Our Father who art heaven
hallowed be your name, your Kingdom come, your will be done
on as it is, and we get to flow that way.
So all the miracles that Jesus performed, if you take the time
to go through the four gospels, every miracle was in the
dominion. The first Adam lost every
miracle. Adam had dominion over fish.
This is why Jesus could speak to fish to get into a net.
This is why Jesus could speak so that a fish could get on Peter's
hook. This is why Jesus could speak
that dead fish, Two of them would multiply and feed over
around 10,000 or more people and have leftovers.
OK. This is why he could talk to a
fig tree and it would die and wither at its roots because man
was given demeania over all the earth and plants are in the
earth. This is why it's sad when men
and women are allowing plants like tobacco and marijuana and
other types of, you know, wheat eat barley and yeast and when it
all ferments comes together and it rules their life.
In essence, plants are pulling money out of their pocket,
messing up their mind, destroying their lives.
God never intended a plant to rule us.
OK, so again, the Bible's about a king, his Kingdom, and his
royal offspring. And it's very important for us
to know that once we are born of the Kingdom of God, we're
children of God, then we are to grow in knowing our rights in
his Kingdom that function right now on the earth.
All Jesus preached about was the Kingdom of God.
He said the Kingdom of heaven is like this, and the Kingdom of
God is like that. And everywhere he went, his
parables were all about the Kingdom.
He was introducing people to this Kingdom that would, that is
in the earth functioning and then ultimately would show up
physically Again, Isaiah Chapter 9 verse 6 prophesied about this.
It makes it very clear what the Kingdom is because the kingdom's
not heaven. We've already said in the Lord's
prayers as it's titled, your Kingdom come, your will be done
on earth as it is in heaven. Earth is a place, heaven is a
place. Kingdom can be in both places.
All right, so with that being said, Jesus opens the door so
that we have access to this Kingdom.
He's talking about this Kingdom, you can function in it.
And Isaiah prophecies and says a child will be born, a son will
be given, and the government shall rest on his shoulders.
Now in the United States, the reason why this is a problem
called we've been talked about, told about separation of church
and stayed our whole life. So we only see the church as a
religious organization when the reality is the church that Jesus
is building is a government of which he's king of a domain, and
we are his citizens. And the church is more like an
embassy where the ambassadors come together to receive
information from the home country on how we are to
represent the king while we're in the earth.
Hallelujah. OK.
Which means then they're in a Kingdom.
There are principles associated with it, like the Kingdom
principle of lordship, the Kingdom principle of decree, the
Kingdom principle of authority. And we've talked about these
through the years. And I'm going to talk about 1:00
tonight. Then I actually haven't taught.
I, I, I mentioned in an introduction to the Kingdom in
our Kingdom Institute class, but I've never done a detailed
teaching on it. And I was planning on just doing
one night tonight, but in because we had to do our first
little part. I'll definitely have to go ahead
moving into next week as well. This is not a series.
It's just one service that got broke up.
How about that? OK, so we're going to talk about
the Kingdom Code of Ethics principle.
The Kingdom Code of ethics principle.
Now, you know, back in the day, I was a big Pirates of the
Caribbean fan. In fact, I saw the very first
movie here. And the people who dressed up, I
mean, they were lined up out in the mall to be able to see, you
know, the first Pirates of the Caribbean, right?
And in that, we'll remember the code, right?
You know, there's this code that was associated with the pirates,
right? And eventually, as you go
through, you know, just stick to the code, Stick to the code.
And he's like, well, you know, it's more like I said,
guidelines, right? OK.
But when it comes to the Lord, the code of ethics is serious
business. All right, So let me give you
the definition of the code of ethics principle, and that's
this. This is the standard of conduct
established by the king for the behavior and social
relationships of his citizens. We'll say that again.
This is the standard of conduct established by the king for the
behavior and social relationships of his citizens.
This is also the expectation of the king regarding the values
and moral standards the citizens must adhere to.
They must adhere to. OK, so I'm going to read it all
one time. This is the standard of conduct
established by the king for the behavior and social
relationships of his citizens. This is also the expectation of
the king regarding the values and moral standards the citizens
must adhere to. The word ethics, by definition
from the Merriam Webster Dictionary, is a set of moral
principles, the principles of conduct governing an individual
or a group. We have a code of ethics in the
Kingdom of God that we It is the standards God has set and we
must adhere to them. Now here's the cool thing.
Once you're born again, you can because it's a part of your new
nature. When you're in Christ, your new
spirit man can adhere and wants to, wants to.
In fact, your spirit has the ability to hear the Holy Ghost
that lives in you and bears witness with your spirit, your
child of God. And the Holy Spirit is not in
there just to bear witness and say, well, when you die, you're
going to go to heaven. I got you back.
That's not why he's in there. He's in there so that He can
teach you, train you, remind you, and then warn you of things
coming in the future. He is a direct connection to the
Kingdom of God. In essence, His first thing that
Jesus says concerning the Holy Spirit is not man.
Wait till you see the miracles. He can do His first introduction
to the Holy Spirit in John chapter 14, He called him the
Spirit of truth. He said when He comes, He's
going to cause things to come to your remembrance.
That I have said why 'cause I'm the king, I am the standard.
Then He's going to do what? Guide you into all truth or
teach you all things. So the first thing or the most
important thing the Holy Spirit does once we're born again is to
get us in training. In essence, He's saying you're a
king. Now you're going to need to
respond and act like a king and we're going to have to change
your thinking. This is why Jesus ministered His
first message with this word, repent.
Repent means change your thinking, because if you don't
change the way you think, you're not going to function in the
Kingdom of God. Repent for the Kingdom of heaven
as at hand. If you want to be in the
Kingdom, function in the Kingdom, represent the Kingdom.
You're going to get your mind together now.
He'll change your spirit, but it's your responsibility to
renew your mind. God doesn't change your mind,
you change your mind. He makes your spirit alive so
you can hear God, the God of heaven, our Father, who sits on
the throne because Thrones are in kingdoms, not religions.
But it's our responsibility to side with him.
I will accept that thought. I will put my thought down.
I accept your thought, your thoughts, life.
My thought is death. Are you hearing me?
OK, so with that being said, turn over to Ephesians chapter
5. Ephesians chapter 5, starting in
verse one Hallelujah. It says therefore be imitators
of God as beloved children, right, So we are to be what?
That's pretty big order, guys. It doesn't say do the best you
can till you die. It doesn't say that Paul is
writing to the church. You know, it's we want it.
We want to still live like we're in the world, and God's treating
us like we're in the world instead of He's delivered me out
of the world and now He has expectations.
You couldn't do anything to get into His Kingdom, but now that
you're in it, you're supposed to do stuff.
All right, 'cause God treats His children different, then He
treats those that are not His children.
So therefore be imitators of God as beloved children walk in
love, just as Christ also loved you and gave himself up for us.
An offering and a sacrifice to God as a fragrant aroma.
Really, if I wanted to bold this one verse down, and I'm not
going to do this so that it'll take us forever if I just start,
you know, trying to dissect every verse, but Jesus yielded
his will when he took on the form of a man emptying himself
of his glory. This is what this is saying
Jesus walked in love. Why?
Because he only did what the Father said.
Jesus defines what love is. If you love me, you will keep my
word. So the demonstration for us to
imitate God or to imitate Jesus says, look, Jesus loved us.
Why he gave himself up for us. That's not just that he died for
us is that he gave up his will, his way of doing it to keep his
Father's will. That's why he said, Father, if
there's any other way for this cup to pass, let it pass, but
not my will. But because if you say I have to
do it, I'm doing it. I only do what you say, Dad.
I'm going to stay in my love relationship with you.
Your word is life. Your word is love.
OK. So he sacrificed his will first,
which ultimately led to a personal sacrifice so that we
could be forgiven of all of our debt.
Verse three but immorality or any impurity or greed must not
even be named among you as it is proper as as is proper among the
Saints. I feel like we've lost that like
people are OK to have all immorality or impurity or greed
to be associated with them. Well, I'm I'm still going to die
and go to heaven and the grace of God's, it shouldn't be named
with you. It's not proper.
It's not proper to live any moral impure or greedy life as a
believer. Say it's not proper.
Say it's not proper and and it's without excuse because God
placed in you a spirit that will rise above all this.
Before you couldn't help it, but now you can and you have the
greater one on the inside. So it's not proper guys, verse
four. And there must be no filthiness
and silly talk or course jesting, which are not fitting,
but rather giving a thanks. So again, when you're talking
crazy, saying dirty jokes or using foul language, that's not
OK. Well, it's just a word.
It's not OK. It's just not OK.
Why are you giving yourself an excuse to live your old life
'cause there's a code of ethics with us and God defines the
behavior. Now He's paid the price to
deliver us from all that stuff, not just hell.
He did not deliver us just from hell.
He delivered us from all the behavior that placed us in
rebellion in the 1st place. Verse 5.
For this, you know, with certainty, with certainty, Paul
says to the church that no immoral or impure person or
covetous man who is an idolatry has an inheritance in the
Kingdom of Christ and God. Are you seeing this?
So these these behaviors or these code of ethics do not
allow entrance into the Kingdom of God.
Meaning if you habitually live like this, God would have to
conclude you're not of his Kingdom.
Just say Amen anyway. Verse six, Let no one deceive
you with empty words, for because of these things, the
wrath of God comes upon sons of disobedience.
So don't let someone deceive you and say because you've asked
Jesus to come into your heart and save you, and by grace
you're saved, that grace is enough and you don't actually
have to do anything. You can continue to have
behavior that is not fitting and grace pretends like it's not
there. That is deception.
Those are empty words. That is a fleshly person wanting
to maintain their flesh and act like God's OK with it.
When the reality is God has placed a greater one in you, the
third person of the Godhead, God himself who teaches you and say
you don't have to talk like you don't.
You do not have to talk like that anymore.
You do not. There's no reason for you to
talk that way anymore. Making sure I don't have a
double negative I got my English teacher out there is helping me
learn how to speak well. It's true.
I need to continue to up my gown.
I'm growing all the time. So, you know, the good news is
when you do it repetitive enough, you start hearing
yourself and you're making sure you're adjusting OK.
Therefore, do not be partakers with them.
Do not be what? Do not be partakers with them.
For you were formerly darkness, but now you are light in the
Lord walk as children of light. You can't say because again, we
have every, you know, nationality.
It seems like in here, you know, as far as when you look at all
of us, we look different on the outside.
You can't say, well, my people because you're identifying by
the outward. We just act like this.
No, who's your people? You only have one people.
It's God or the world, Jesus said, who's my mother and my my
brothers and citizens. It's those who do the will of
the father. It's not the color of my skin.
It's not where MyHeritage came from.
It's where those who do the will of my father.
And I do not make an excuse for the color of my skin or
MyHeritage that I have the right to act a certain way.
No, I've been delivered. I'm in a new nation.
OK, so we formally walked away. The expectation is you change
the way you act. Say Amen.
There's a code of ethics. Look at Galatians chapter 5.
Galatians chapter 5, verse 19 to 21.
It says Now the deeds of the flesh are evident, which are
immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery,
enmities, strife, jealousies, outbursts of anger, disputes,
dissensions, factions, envying, drunkenness, carousing, and
things like these. Of which I forewarned you, just
as I have forewarned you, that those who, what, who, what?
What do they do? Practice such things will will
inherit the Kingdom of God. They will not Amen.
So again, it's one thing to have an outburst of anger.
You get an argument with your spouse.
The next thing you know, it kind of escalates.
Nobody's really listening to the Holy Ghost on how to keep this
thing. And eventually somebody blows up
as an outburst of anger. It can happen, but again, we
don't do this every week. But what happens when it
happens? We repent.
We recognize that was wrong. I should have never let myself
get to that point. We ask God to forgive us who is
merciful, and if we confess our sins, he's faithful to just
forgive us of our sins and cleanse us from all
unrighteousness as if we never did it.
Because the grace of God now empowers us is really the mercy
of God, and then the grace of God is what empowers us to
maintain our composure. All right, but if you're
practicing, meaning you don't care that any of these things
are happening, you're going to do them anyway and still show up
to church on Sunday and act like God's fine with you because you
sing a song and you dance and you run and you shout
Hallelujah. Now let's read this out of the
Passion translation. The Passion says it this way.
The cravings of the self life are obvious.
Sexual immorality, Lustful thoughts, Pornography.
Chasing after things instead of God, Manipulating others, hatred
of those who get in your way, senseless arguments, Resentment
when others are favored, temper tantrums, angry quarrels.
Only thinking of yourself, Being in love with your own opinions.
Good being envious of the blessings of others, murder,
uncontrolled addictions, wild parties and all other similar
behavior. Haven't I already warned you
that those who use their quote UN quote, right?
Freedom for these things will, will not inherit the Kingdom
realm of God. So dad's not up there going
like, well, I'm fine with it. They at least they asked Jesus
into their heart. No, there's a code of ethics.
I mean, think about it. Do you think any of this is
going to happen when we're in heaven
again? We want God to have mind
control, but love doesn't function that way.
Love empowered you with the Spirit and his Spirit so you can
control your behavior now. Before you were dead, it was
your behavior, but now you're of God.
Come on. Can I get an Amen?
All right, First Corinthians, First Corinthians chapter 6,
verse 9 through 11, Amen says this the new living translation
Again, let everything be confirmed by what two or three
witnesses we have had different types of behaviors that are not
the standard of the Kingdom that Paul to the churches 'cause he's
already written to two churches here.
We've written to the church in Galatia and the church in
Ephesus. Now we're right to the church in
Corinth, OK, And he is communicating to them.
These behaviors are not the behaviors of the Kingdom.
OK, Excuse me, don't you realize, New Living Translation,
that those who do wrong will not inherit the Kingdom of God?
Don't fool yourself. Those who indulge in sexual sin,
or who worship idols or commit adultery, or or are male
prostitutes, obviously it could be a female, or practice
homosexuality, or of thieves or greedy people or drunkards or
abusive or cheat people. None of these will inherit the
Kingdom of God. And then he goes on to verse 11.
Some of you once were like that, but you were cleansed.
But you were cleansed. You were made holy.
You were made right with God by calling on the name of the Lord
Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God.
So again, there's some things that are happening.
We see this in the world. And here let me say this.
No, we'll address it here in the next one, and I'll say it there.
It'll be good. So again, here's 3 passages to
three different churches where he's saying these are not the
code of ethics of the Kingdom because these behaviors do not
inherit the Kingdom, period. And he has addressed in two
cases, you used to live this way, but now you don't live this
way. Amen.
Listen, you are on the first step of backsliding when you
begin to long for something you used to do before Christ,
because the enemy's trying to convince you there's more
freedom there and there's not more freedom there.
You be. And and that can be not in just
things you did. It can be in relationships,
relationships that all they do is bring you down and you
haven't grown to the place of maturity that you can resist
every temptation they bring at you.
There's certain seasons you need to cut, some people just slap
off because it'd be too easy for you to fall back into a formal
manner of life. And God loves you too much.
He wants to surround you with those that can help you stay
within the code of ethics. Amen.
All right. Can you do at least one more,
maybe one more. We'll be in first Corinthians 5.
I'm going to do this a couple verses here in first Corinthians
chapter 5. Now here's this is crazy.
Paul has to address them, which obviously we just read 6 where
he again, he's listing behaviors that will not end.
He said don't fool yourself. You're not going to inherit the
Kingdom of of God. The if you're practicing these
behaviors, I don't care if you say you love God.
I don't care if you're telling me that God loves you.
I would tell you you're lying. You cannot be functioning in
those behaviors habitually, and you're telling me God's OK with
you can't do it, can't do it now you need to repent.
At the end of the day, God will forgive.
These are not in pardonable sins.
Even if you backslide and get into a lifestyle or a way of
living that you used to live and you know you shouldn't live that
way anymore. And God's out there.
I mean, you're like, you're like a prodigal son in pig slot right
now. You know what?
Get yourself up, Know what's that?
Dad's house and come on back home.
Come on back home. I'm not being judgmental, do
you? I'm saying free yourself.
Get out of the pig pen. Come on back home, come to the
place where the blessing is and you can and and the place where
God will empower you to live the way that produces life and life
more abundantly. OK, but in first Corinthians 5,
Paul addresses which is just mind blowing.
Look at this verse verse one. He says it is actually reported
that there is immorality among you, and immorality of such a
kind as does not exist even among the Gentiles.
He's saying you've moved into a morality in the church that the
world's not even doing. Oh, my gosh.
Now, again, if we gave a history lesson of the Corinthian church,
I mean that the paganism they were in was a big deal and a lot
of their worship had to do with sexual immorality.
OK, you went up to higher Corinth.
I've been to Corinth, you got lower and the higher Corinth and
you would go up there. That's where you made your
sacrifices. But typically during those
sacrifices, they would have sexual orgies.
It was part of their worship. If anybody just said, man, I
wish we could do that, that's a problem.
That is a problem. That's a problem.
OK, So what he's doing is he's like, look, this doesn't happen
in the Kingdom. But unfortunately a guy, a son
has taken his father's wife. And what's crazy is this church
is keeping them there as if it's OK.
At least they're in church. Not not every behavior should
stay in church. Now, again, I can tolerate
behaviors from the lost. They can't help it.
If someone's in some kind of sexual immorality and comes to
church and I find out about it, but I know they're not born
again, I'ma let them sit because eventually the conviction of God
the Holy Ghost is there to draw them and they be delivered from
that. But if they won't be delivered,
they won't stay because they can't stay in the environment
where they know the behavior is ungodly and they can't be around
those who are living the behavior by the Holy Spirit and
the new Christ reality that they don't live that way anymore.
The atmosphere is just too overwhelming now.
Those atmosphere aren't overwhelming if everybody else
is doing it. You can keep drunkards in church
if people think it's OK to drink.
You can keep people who are fornicators or adulterers, you
know, or any other sexual sin in the church if everyone else
seems to think it's all right. I mean, I, I go to a lot of
restaurants and sometimes people start talking to us because they
know we pastor and then they talk about, yeah, you know, I
have this problem, you know, but I, my boyfriend moved in with,
in my mind, I'm like, and you and you just told me you went to
what church? Now, that's not the reflection
of the church, but in my mind, I'm like, this doesn't even
compute that we've even are in this conversation right now.
You obviously don't know who you are because the code of ethics
you are violating right now is a big deal and God is not OK with
it. You don't try out your mate.
All right, jump down to verse 11.
Verse 11 of this chapter. He says this, but actually I
wrote to you not to associate with any so-called brother if he
is an immoral person or covetous or an idolatry or a reviler or a
drunkard or a swindler, not even to eat with such a one.
For what have I to do with judging outsiders, meaning those
that are lost outside the Kingdom?
I'm not judging them. Do you not judge those who are
within the church? In essence, he says, but those
who are outside, God judges. But on the inside, because we
have a code of ethics, we're examining fruit.
You're not in keeping with the Kingdom.
You are practicing a behavior that is obviously written to
multiple churches that this is not the the standard or the
morals that have been set down by the king of which that you
are well able to do. If you will renew your mind to
your spirit and what the Holy Spirit is saying, because the
Holy Spirit is not telling you to live a lifestyle different
than what he's telling the rest of the believers to live.
So he goes and says remove the wicked man from among you.
Now the good news is because they did this in the second
letter, that individual actually repented and they were able to
restore them, but restore them without them sleeping with their
father's wife. That relationship had been dealt
with. Are you hearing me?
Are you hearing what I'm saying? So again, to remove someone
doesn't mean it's over. It just means you can't corrupt
the code of ethics. It's not acceptable because
again, a little leaven leavens the whole bad character,
corrupts good morals. And it's a very daunting task as
a pastor because it's really easy just to communicate and
never hold you accountable because then I can get a crowd
because I'm never actually dealing with you personally
telling you what to do. But yet Paul, who was an apostle
and started churches had personal responsibility with the
congregation members. Hallelujah, which means let's
talk about your behavior. Let's talk about your lifestyle
now in Christ. And again, we're patient, no
problem. We can grow, we can all develop,
we can all overcome. We are to do this.
But you need to know I there is an expectation by God for me to
live a very specific way and I'm going to do so now.
The Message Bible says it this way, but I am saying that you
shouldn't act as if everything is just fine when a friend who
claims to be a Christian is promiscuous or crooked, is
flipped with God or rude to friends, gets drunk, or becomes
greedy and predatory. You can't just go along with
this, treating it as acceptable behavior.
It is not responsible for what? I am not responsible for what
the outsiders do, but I don't. But don't we have some
responsibility for those within our community of believers?
God decides on the outsiders, but we need to decide when our
brothers and sisters are out of line and if necessary, clean
house. Now you're saying if I clean
house, they probably just go to another house.
You can't do it. I wish there was.
I wish there was a way that all this pastor could actually
network together and say, who do you have now?
So I'm their 5th congregation. I'm their 5th pastor in town
now. Is that what you're telling me
right now? The good news is you can go
somewhere else and actually get right, you know, And that's the
hope is that they get right somewhere.
But a lot of times they don't, you know, and it's always that
kind of like, what do you do? You know, you're almost like, I
want to warn you who's in your church now.
But understand this, some pastors don't mind.
In fact, they're set up for that purpose.
Why do I say that? Because the Bible says in the
last days Saints will keep teachers to themselves so that
they will give them what they want to hear.
Which means they're going to jump one ship or be cleaned out
of one ship just to run to another one that says, come on
over here, we'll accept you just as you.
Now let's deal with that myth, right?
Does Jesus accept you as you are?
No, you can't change yourself. What he does is He identifies
who you are. You can't be right with me.
You're not right with me, and what you are right now is
unacceptable. But my son has died for you, and
if you'll call on his name, guess what?
You're not going to be the same person.
You're going to become a brand new person, a new person in
Christ. I'm not accepting the old person
in to the Kingdom. I'm going to accept the new
person that who that's who gets to cross the threshold of the
door called the cross. Because when you accept Jesus,
the old passes away. Behold, all things become so
again. I'm coming as I am in the
context. I can't make myself good enough
so that God would be. I can't live in such a way that
the judge of all righteousness could look at me and say you did
good enough. Your way was a good enough.
I mean, it's just it my it rivals my way.
Nope, can't do it. But what I do it as I say, I
know I can't and this person is never going to get into your
Kingdom. I need Jesus and the Lord says,
well then I'm going to make you another person so you can get
in. Aren't you glad he does?
I said, aren't you glad he does? Come on, aren't you glad he
does? Hallelujah.
So there is a different code that we are responsible for, all
right? And again, in Ephesians and
Galatians, both of them alluded imitate God.
You used to live, don't live. You have a new standard, a new
code of ethics by which you function in the Kingdom so that
when you walk out in the world, people are saying you don't act
like everybody else, you don't behave the same way, you don't
treat people the same way. You're different, well, because
your standard's different, and God's giving you a higher
standard of which now you can't obtain to.
Amen. We'll finish this out next week.
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