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00:01 Well, good Sunday morning to you all. Quite happy to be here. As uh my dear
00:07 brother just said, uh it's been nearly 30 years since I've uh preached any
00:13 sermons in front of a a congregation. When I went to uh college, it was a Bible college and I thought the Lord had
00:20 made a claim on my life uh to be in ministry. And so I prepared with a degree in education. My original
00:28 intention was to uh teach perhaps at a Bible college or a seminary and uh you
00:34 know life has a way of uh throwing you curveballs from time to time. So at any rate it has been nearly 30 years and my
00:42 good brother Michael Tan reminded me that it's kind of like riding a bicycle. you know, you you don't really forget.
00:49 You have the recollection of the memory and the mechanics maybe, but uh I've never ridden a bicycle in front of
00:55 nearly 900 people in a in a morning service. So, if I get wobbly and if I
01:01 crash, uh you know, you just uh be respectful of the fact that I'm a little
01:06 uh uh rusty in uh that skill which I think the Lord has given me. Now, I do
01:12 want to address a couple of things. Uh first of all, one of them's quite obvious and that is that I'm a big big
01:20 guy. And uh you know, some of you are probably thinking uh you know, why does
01:25 such a big guy sit towards the front? It it's not just because I'm preaching today, but I always sit toward the
01:32 front. It's because I don't see as well as I used to. You know, the more things uh change, uh the more they stay the
01:39 same. Well, some things change and some don't. And my eyesight is one of those things that's changed uh in the last 30
01:46 years. You know, technologies also changed. Uh when I was doing this, you
01:52 know, we had books and you had to open books and study the Bible and you know,
01:57 the uh other pullpit uh s sources and and helps. Uh but now we have uh
02:03 telephones and the internet and we have all these electronic devices. And frankly, I was a little a little
02:10 confused as I worked through here thinking, you know, I've got this clicker and I've got a slide presentation. We never did this before.
02:17 And uh you know, I have to kind of have my points on there. But I was quite concerned that I would get so wrapped up
02:23 in the mechanics of delivering a presentation on the screen that I would get lost, and I did a little bit in the
02:31 first service, and uh maybe even confused and and uh just kind of get wobbly on the bike. so to speak. So, but
02:39 you know, as much as things have changed, some things uh don't change.
02:44 And one of those things that I've noticed is that uh sometimes people, particularly men, uh tend to sleep
02:52 during a boring sermon. How do you women do it? How do you stay awake? I mean, I see teenagers sometimes
02:59 they're sleeping and you know, but very rarely do I ever see a woman sleeping. So, uh I I commend you. I I do want to
03:07 commend the congregation too because we have been loved. Uh we have been received warmly uh by this congregation.
03:14 We're very thankful for that. I also want to commend you on your love for the word of God and for prayer which is
03:21 evident in every service. It's actually evident in our small group. When we uh
03:26 first arrived here, we were living in Sai Bulo. We didn't know much about the area and uh it's quite far from here
03:33 actually and we were attending church in uh downtown KLCC off Jalan Pang and we
03:39 were trying to attend life group a small group uh on Wednesday nights there and
03:44 you know from here we'd actually moved down to kota kamooning and uh from here
03:50 to that location on Wednesday nights sometimes would take 90 minutes to two
03:55 hours because of the traffic and then we would have to come home, you know, and
04:00 Julia just got to the point, and I did, a little nervous in the traffic because we're not used to driving on the wrong
04:06 side of the road. Uh, you know, it was very nerve-wracking, very hard to get
04:11 into the spirit of uh that Wednesday night session because we were just so so
04:17 nervous. And it turned out that one Sunday, our preacher announced that he was going to be gone uh preaching
04:23 somewhere else on the following Sunday. and Masimo Guy was the guest speaker and
04:28 we happened to miss that Sunday but what we did notice was that Masimo Guy attended First Baptist Church of
04:34 Sububang Jaya and my wife said isn't that close to us and I said yeah we live
04:41 just a little beyond but uh it is close so she got on the internet and started
04:46 looking at the church website and noticed that there was a care group that was hosted by Yaoin uh Wong and Vivian
04:54 and Lee in their home and their home is on Jalinon City. Jalanjarik, I think you
04:60 call it, Hans on Cidium. And you know what? That place is on the very street
05:05 on which we live. And uh they had been praying for new people to join their
05:10 life group. And so when she said uh is this close to us? I said we could walk
05:16 there. And she said uh well God has I think answered our prayer. I called
05:22 Vivian. She didn't know what to make out of this call because it was completely unexpected. And I introduced myself and
05:29 I told her, "We're interested in coming to your small group." And she was a bit surprised to say the least. She said,
05:35 "I'll let you talk to my husband, but he's not here. You know, you have to call back. I'll let you talk to Yaoin."
05:41 And we did talk to him and uh wound up attending our first life group session the very next day. That's where I met my
05:47 brother Michael and and several other people. But we were loved in that life group and we've been loved since we've
05:53 been a part of this church. So, I want to commend you for your love. I want to also commend you for your treatment of
05:59 uh uh fellow believers for the lost. This church has a burden for the lost
06:06 and the abandoned and the broken. And that is the heart of God. That is the
06:12 people from whom he really loves and uh his heart goes out to them and and so
06:17 does yours. So I praise God on behalf of you and because of you and I ask him
06:23 that his grace may increase and abound on your behalf.
06:29 Now I also want to thank Peter and Arnold for offering me the opportunity to preach. It's been so long and they've
06:35 never heard me speak. So they really don't know what to expect. It's quite a big risk on their part because uh as
06:43 we're reminded in Corinthians, God said he's chosen the foolishness of preaching
06:48 to uh confound the wise and to bring people to a saving knowledge of Christ.
06:54 And in fact, some preaching is more foolish than others. Uh I hope I don't engage in any foolishness today. And I
07:01 hope that uh God speaks to you uh through the reading of his word.
07:09 Okay. I'm not sure if I've done something wrong here. Is there an onoff button?
07:18 Oh, okay. Good. So, I want to concentrate on two verses here. The
07:24 title of the sermon uh is not terribly profound. It's walking with Christ or
07:31 with thieves and robbers. And in my life of nearly 57 years, a little more uh
07:38 I've happened to have walked with both. Uh and it's been a very interesting
07:44 journey to say the least. And when we use the word walk as we do here, it's the Greek word apoteo. And it really
07:51 means all of the uh circumstances and activities of life that propel you
07:57 forward. And so this encompasses uh you know our daily behavior, our friends,
08:04 our relationships, our activities and so on. The key verse here is uh that I want
08:09 to concentrate on today is verse six and verse eight. And verse six says uh
08:15 therefore as you receive Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in him. That's a
08:22 curious phrase to me and I've thought about it for many many years. as you receive Christ Jesus the Lord,
08:30 walk in him. You know, when we get saved, when we become born again,
08:37 there's usually, not perhaps always, I don't want to get into satiriology here so much, but uh there's usually a
08:46 understanding that you can't save yourself, that you're kind of at the end of your
08:54 resources, and that a holy God, in order to be satisfied,
08:59 uh needs a payment for sin. Most of us have that in our psyche deeply ingrained. It's the the
09:06 fingerprint of God, so to speak, on the human soul. But in the Garden of Eden,
09:11 the human soul, the spirit actually died and became separated from God. And so,
09:19 there's some important message in how we receive Christ. And by the way, the way
09:26 in which we receive Christ is the same way we're to continue in Christ. So I
09:31 want to take a moment today and look at that. And then there is a warning uh in
09:37 verse 8. It says, "See to it that no one takes you captive by philosophy and
09:43 empty deceit or empty lies according to human tradition, according to the
09:50 elemental spirits of the world and not according to Christ." So the admonition
09:56 is to be careful to be uh watchful uh and don't be deceived and led astray or
10:03 taken captive. And so we'll also look at a few ways in which that can happen. and hopefully avoid any of those pitfalls.
10:12 I'd like to pray over the reading of the word of God and invite God to be among us uh today and to speak to your hearts
10:20 and to mine. And I will say that at the conclusion of the service, I am going to offer an invitation for you to come
10:27 forward if God has spoken to your heart uh about any number of things and uh
10:32 some counselors will be here to receive you and to pray with you. Uh, and I would be encouraged if you would just uh
10:39 uh search your heart and ask God to do the same and that you'd be honest with God uh through the service this morning.
10:47 Let's pray. Oh Lord my God,
10:52 my words are not powerful, but your words are powerful. You've said
10:58 they're sharper than any two-edged sword, and it divides us under between
11:04 the soul and the spirit. And so Lord, I ask you to quicken your words in the
11:10 hearts of the men and women here in the auditorium this morning.
11:16 Help us to hear from you today. Give us grace, grace enough to be honest
11:21 with ourselves and with the Holy Spirit as we deliver and listen to today's
11:28 message. quicken our soul and our spirit and grant us an opportunity to be submissive
11:34 to your call on our lives. Lord, please reveal yourself among us
11:40 today by that unmistakable presence of your spirit.
11:46 Would you walk up and down every aisle and speak to every heart,
11:52 touching each person, man, woman, boy, and girl, and teach us the humility to
11:59 walk in your strength, being mindful that life is short, death is sure, and
12:06 eternity hangs in the balance for every person, including those of our family
12:12 and friends. And we pray this in Jesus' name.
12:17 Now, let me see if I can do this correctly through the uh am I to point this somewhere.
12:25 Is it going okay? We're talking about Colossians. And a little background on
12:30 uh the the epistle of the Colossians to the church at Colassy. Uh Colasse was in
12:36 Asia Minor. It was in the uh the same area as the seven churches in the uh the
12:41 book of Revelation. But this was not a church that Paul had ever visited. In fact, Paul had been teaching at Ephesus
12:47 for about three years. And uh let me just
12:54 Okay. Paul had been teaching in Ephesus for about three years. And there at Ephesus
13:01 was a young man by the name of Epiph. And Epifras was the guy who actually
13:06 went back to Colasse and helped organize and start that church. And uh several
13:12 years later while Paul was in prison there in Rome during his first imprisonment uh Epipras returned to him
13:19 and said uh we have some problems that you need to be aware of in the church. And it was on that occasion that Paul
13:26 wrote the letter to Colossians which he probably handed to Epipro who delivered
13:32 it to the congregation. And throughout chapter 1, we see God or excuse me, we see Paul talking about the excellency
13:40 and the superiority of Christ to all religious traditions and other ways of
13:45 thinking. And he's preaching Christ and Christ alone. Christ is the creative agent of the universe. Christ who
13:53 redeems in salvation by the uh the work that he committed on the cross. And then
13:59 we also see that the church was primarily a church of Gentiles. Uh not
14:05 very many Jewish uh members there. Church of Jerusalem was filled with Jewish people obviously, but some of
14:12 these churches in Asia Minor not so much so. And the reason we know this is because of a couple of verses in uh
14:18 Colossians and because there's no illusion to some of the Old Testament scriptures really and not much illusion
14:25 to uh Jewish practices or religious practices of that time. There is in the
14:31 uh verses of chapter 2:es uh 18- 23 or so some talk about uh what we have come
14:39 to know as Judaizers people who were adding to the gospel adding to what's
14:44 necessary to be saved uh and and we would understand the gospel to be the
14:49 death burial and resurrection of Christ that Christ paid for our sins which satisfied the justice and righteousness
14:56 of a holy God. And and we say in our uh tradition as uh Baptists or
15:02 evangelicals, whatever you want to call us, we say that salvation is in Christ alone through faith alone. And uh I do
15:10 believe that. But these people, they were being uh deceived. The Judaizers
15:16 kind of pretended like they were Christians or they bought into some of what was going on, but they wanted to
15:23 bring these people back to Judaism. So they insisted that the new believers
15:28 become the Gentiles become circumcised. They were adding something to the gospel
15:33 so to speak to please uh themselves but certainly not God. And uh they also
15:40 insisted on uh uh you know uh working uh worshiping or maybe not worshiping but
15:47 uh giving angels a certain uh uh preeminence uh holy days rituals that
15:54 were traditional to the Jewish faith. And Paul was saying uh none of this really applies.
16:01 And so that's really the third point there. The doctrinal problems that they were facing. And Paul said here, "Don't
16:08 let anyone deceive you. Don't let anyone carry you away captive with these lies."
16:15 And he's uh he was very emphatic about that. So let's look at uh verse six or
16:21 Yeah, verse six. And it says, "Therefore, as you receive Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in him."
16:28 How do we receive Jesus into our lives?
16:34 Well, that's a good news, bad news story. And the issue is that uh the bad
16:39 news must always precede the good news. And so what is the bad news? Well, the
16:44 bad news is found in Romans chapter 3 where scripture tells us that there is none righteous, not even one. And later
16:52 on in the same chapter, it says there's none that seek after God. No, not one.
16:58 And so you've heard uh maybe years ago in the states it was very popular to
17:03 say, "I found Christ." You did not find Christ. You weren't
17:08 looking for Christ. Christ found you. That's the more accurate uh uh
17:15 scriptural position of what actually took place. Verse 23 of chapter 3 says, "For all
17:22 have sinned and we've fallen short of the glory of God.
17:27 In Romans 6:23 it says the wages of sin is death. That's bad news. The word
17:32 there is than it means separation. And so we were forever separated in God.
17:38 First in the Garden of Eden and then later on that curse passed to all
17:43 mankind. Our spirit died in the garden of Eden. Uh 1 Thessalonians chapter 4 I
17:49 think verse three says that man is a tripartite being. He's composed of body,
17:55 soul, and spirit. And in the Garden of Eden originally, all of those aspects of
18:01 men were working. The body has uh relationship with the nature and the and
18:07 the environment in which we live. And the personality, it has a relationship to uh other personalities. It's kind of
18:14 who we are. People can identify us by our personalities. But the spirit is something unique. You remember when man
18:21 was created, God said he breathed into them the spirit of life. And that word
18:26 breathe is actually the word for spirit or or wind, numa or numatas. So God
18:33 breathed into man the spirit of life. But at the fall when Satan approached Eve,
18:40 he told her, "Did God really say that you can't eat of everything that's in the midst of the garden, including that
18:46 tree of the knowledge of good and evil?" Did God say that? And we can see that even at that time, Satan was starting to
18:53 spin his lies to deceive and to destroy
18:58 uh Adam and Eve there in the Garden of Eden. And Eve didn't fall for the first lie. Uh she she withstood that uh and
19:07 and was successful. She didn't partake of the fruit at that time. But then Satan said, you know,
19:14 God doesn't want you to eat that fruit because you'll become just like God. He knows that you will become just like
19:22 God, knowing good and evil. And the remarkable thing is
19:28 God does want us to become just like God. But we don't do that on our terms. We
19:36 don't do that uh by the methods that we want to uh select or or take or we have
19:43 a preference for. If we come to God, we have to do it on his terms. Why? Because
19:48 he's God and he gets to define what the nature of the relationship is with mankind.
19:55 And so he said to Eve, "You won't surely die." And God has
20:02 uh a problem. He doesn't want you to know good and evil. And that was a lie. And Eve started
20:09 thinking about it. And it was at that point where Eve began to doubt the loving purpose for God in her own life.
20:17 And we do that sometimes. We begin to think that, you know, all the trials that I'm going through and
20:24 and struggling with, God doesn't really love me. You know, where is God?
20:31 And yet we know that God is love. The scripture tells us that. But we listen to that lie and we begin to doubt God
20:39 and we begin to be led away captive through the lie. And so I want to
20:44 continue to uh talk to you about that. But we don't stop with the bad news. The
20:51 good news is that uh in the last half of Romans 6:23 where it begins the wages of
20:57 sin is death. It says, "But the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ
21:04 our Lord." I did not put all these verses up here because I was afraid I would get lost in all the clicking and
21:10 whatnot. So, I apologize for that. I do have them written here and I'll read them uh faithfully. Uh most of these are
21:17 coming from the ESV. Uh so, in addition to Romans 6:23 that
21:23 says, "The gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord." Romans 5'8 says, "But God shows his love toward
21:29 us. And though while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us." In John
21:36 1:12 and13 it says, "But to all who did receive him, who believed in his name,
21:43 he gave the right to become children of God, who were born not of blood, nor of
21:51 the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but God." And so I want to see I
21:58 want to show you three different uh things in this last verse. First of all, we do not become children of God by
22:06 virtue of our family ties.
22:11 That's what it means when it says uh not of blood. We're not born of a natural
22:16 family. You cannot become a Christian simply because your parents are
22:22 Christian. I've heard others say, "Well, of course I'm a Christian. I live in the US. This is a Christian nation." That is
22:28 not how you become a Christian. It's not how you receive Christ. Second, it says
22:34 it's also not of the will of the flesh. And by that, it means I cannot live a
22:40 spiritfilled life or be reconciled to God simply because I choose out of the
22:47 force of my will or my self-determination to live a righteous life. That is not
22:54 how we become Christians. Some of us, we have our confidence in the wrong thing. And and it it goes more
23:02 to the point of after you've become a Christian and uh you're walking with Christ or you're continuing with Christ.
23:10 So, I can't shed my own selfish nature strictly by resolve and willpower. As a
23:15 matter of fact, the more that I try, it seems the more that I'm challenged by my own sinful nature.
23:23 And even when I do seem to get on top of things and start living a righteous life, if I do that through the power of
23:30 the flesh, then God is not satisfied and ultimately I'm unhappy as well.
23:37 Last it says it's not by the will of man. So someone else cannot determine my
23:43 salvation for me. Your parents can't uh make you saved. They can pray for you.
23:51 They can lead you and guide you. But salvation is a personal individual
23:58 experience. And for you to be saved, you have to be saved personally and
24:04 individually. Nor can a husband or a wife
24:10 cause you to get saved. They might be used by God in the process, but if
24:15 you're saved, it's not by the will of man. It's by the will of God and it's by
24:21 the power of God. So I can't possess a divine nature except and apart from the
24:28 work and the grace of God. We're told in 2 Corinthians 5:21
24:34 that God hath made him to be sin who
24:39 knew no sin so that we might become the righteousness of God. So salvation is
24:46 all of God. It originates with God. It continues with God. And it ends with
24:53 God. It is not a work of the flesh. I only become a son of God by receiving
24:58 Jesus Christ. In verse 12, it says, "But to all who did receive him, who believed in his
25:05 name, he gave the right to become the children of God. He is the one who gives
25:11 me the authority or the power to become a child of God. He became what I was so
25:18 that I could become what he is. He took my sin. In exchange, he
25:26 reconciles me to God. He came as the son of man to make me a
25:34 son of God. And so, what happens when we really get saved? Well, uh, a couple of things. In
25:41 Acts 2021 20 and 21, Paul was preaching from house to house
25:48 in uh Jerusalem, not long after the uh the Pentecost and the moving of the Holy
25:53 Spirit, all in very short order. But listen to what he said. He went from house to house preaching.
25:59 He said, 'I did not shrink from declaring to you anything that was profitable and teaching you in public
26:04 and from house to house, testifying both to the Jew and to the Greeks of
26:10 repentance toward God and faith in our Lord Jesus Christ. Repentance toward God
26:16 and faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. So repentance means a change of mind. It
26:23 means I was thinking this way and I got new information. I've changed my mind.
26:30 And it doesn't only mean a change of mind by a confrontation of truth. It means that that truth turns me around
26:37 and I start walking in a different way. It changes my behavior. That's
26:43 repentance. But some of us think, you know, well, we can repent on our own or that's a work of the flesh. You know, I
26:49 can be sorry for my sins. That all originates again with God. When God opens your mind through the Holy Spirit,
26:56 when he begins to illuminate and show you the truth of the word, the truth of your circumstance, then God has the
27:02 opportunity to move in to your life. If you'll deal with that truth, if you'll deal with that confrontation by God
27:09 honestly. You know, the only thing that really a lost man can do is to approach
27:15 God honestly, in sincerity, and in humility.
27:21 But even God has to give that grace uh to a lost person.
27:26 So Romans chapter 2 verse4 tells us that it's the goodness of God that leads men
27:31 to repentance. We've heard the bad news. But you know what's so remarkable about God?
27:38 God gives us space to repentance. He never gives up on us. I think about the story that we went through here in the
27:44 church recently through the book of Jonah. how Jonah fled from God, tried to avoid his responsibilities.
27:51 In some ways, I kind of feel like a modern-day Jonah because when I went to Bible college in uh 1977 to 81, as our
27:58 brother said, I felt like God had made some claims on my life. And uh you know,
28:04 I wanted to teach in university, maybe pastor a small church or something like that, but I got married and it didn't
28:11 turn out that way. uh I started thinking about providing for my family and uh as a result I took
28:18 some jobs that resulted in me traveling for the last 30 years somewhere between
28:23 150 and 180 days a year on average for those 30 years and uh I stayed in a lot
28:30 of hotels and I ate a lot of restaurant food which is why I'm a big guy. Uh but
28:36 I'm pretty healthy given the size and all that. All my dear brothers and sisters who are smaller, they always
28:43 pray for me and say your health must be bad. Uh I have some issues like all of
28:49 us, but generally speaking, my health's quite good. Uh that being said, uh there
28:55 are lots of different kinds of flesh. You know, there is big flesh and small
29:01 flesh. There is uh intelligent flesh and uh somewhat I mean to be honest stupid
29:08 flesh you know there's flesh that is uh attractive and appealing on a personal
29:15 level as you relate to them and there's flesh which we find difficult and hard
29:21 to deal with but it's all flesh and Nicodemus was talking to Jesus in
29:27 John chapter 3 and Jesus said that which is born of the flesh is flesh and that
29:35 which is born of the spirit is spirit. And so salvation is a work not of the
29:44 flesh. We're born of the flesh by blood and by water in this particular verse uh
29:50 verse three of John 3. But when we're born of the spirit, we're born from above. And that that spirit of man which
29:59 died in the garden of Eden, that is what needs to be regenerated to come alive
30:05 again to God so man can be whole and reconciled in his entirety to God.
30:12 And so uh the spiritual birth is something that we cannot avoid if we want to receive
30:20 Christ. We don't receive Christ just by mental ascent where we understand and we
30:25 know the facts. But we receive Christ when we actually repent. When we're
30:31 confronted with the fact of our sin, the helplessness of anything to do to save ourselves, God says, "I've prepared a a
30:39 a propitiation or a vicarious atonement, a a substitutionary death on the part of
30:46 Christ to pay your sin debt so that you could be right again." when you begin to understand what God has done for you, it
30:52 results in a change of mind and a change of uh your walk.
30:58 So the next that's that's how we receive Christ. The next one is how do we walk
31:04 or continue in Christ? Well, the scripture says just as you received him. You know what the funny thing is? Most
31:10 of us who are saved will say yes, it is a work of God. It's not from men.
31:16 There's nothing I can do to save myself. I get it. But then we turn around and say, the way
31:22 that we continue to please God, the way that we continue to walk with God is by
31:28 a list of dos and don'ts, by our own performance, by our own behavior. And
31:34 when we do the things on the good list, we feel close to God. But when we do the
31:40 things that we shouldn't do on the bad list, well, then we feel bad about ourselves and we feel distant from God.
31:47 That is a lie. The scripture says, "As you receive Jesus, so walk in him." And
31:53 how do you how do you continue that walk in Christ? You continue it in faith. 2
31:59 Corinthians 5:7 says, "For we walk by faith, not by sight. You continue in
32:06 Christ. You walk with Christ in obedience." I love this verse. John 1 John chapter 2 3-6. It says, "And by
32:14 this we know that we have come to know him if we keep his commandments." Now,
32:19 that's how we can know that we know him, but it's not how we become Christian.
32:25 Whoever says, "I know him," but does not keep his commandments is a liar and the truth is not in him. But whoever keeps
32:32 his word, in him truly the love of God is perfected or matured or it comes to
32:38 full measure. But whoever keeps his word, in him truly the word of God is perfected. By this we
32:45 may know that we are in him. Whoever says he abides in him ought to walk in
32:52 the same way in which he walked. And so there's the admonition to obey the Lord
32:59 in all things. Micah 68, there's a a poetry to the King James
33:05 version. So, I'm going to read this in the King James version, but this uh says
33:10 we should walk in humility. Uh Micah 6:8, "He has showed thee, oh man, what
33:16 is good, and what does the Lord require of thee,
33:22 but to do justly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with my God."
33:31 So, we have to walk in humility. You know, when you got saved, you didn't come to God and say, "God, look what you
33:37 got here. You got a very talented person. You know, I've got all this potential and capability. You really
33:44 need me on your team." That's not how it works. And if you
33:49 think that you're going to please God after you're saved by saying, "Uh, God,
33:55 I went to Bible college. I tithe. I pray. I attend church regularly. Aren't
34:01 you pleased with me?" No, he's not pleased with you because you do those things. You know who God is pleased
34:08 with? His son Jesus Christ. You remember when Jesus was baptized by John, he said,
34:16 "This is my beloved son in whom I am well pleased." When you stand before God
34:22 at the judgment day, do you know the question you're going to deal with? The question you're going to deal with is,
34:28 "What did you do with my son? Did you become a believer? Did you
34:33 accept his death, burial, and resurrection in exchange for your imputed
34:39 righteousness? The righteousness that comes from God by that act. If you did that, then you have a home in
34:46 heaven. And I don't want to confuse anybody here to make you think that if you are led away, as I was and have
34:54 been, and and many of us have been in our lives if we've been a Christian long enough. When I was led away by the lie
35:01 of Satan and I spent 30 years making a living for my family, you know what I told myself? I told myself, "My wife is
35:09 really a better Christian than I am. She'll be a better influence on the boys
35:15 than I will. I have two sons, 32 and 27 at this time. And uh you know, they
35:21 won't miss me. You know, uh I can do go out here and make a living." And I made a very good
35:27 living for a lot of years. And uh you know, but that was a lie of Satan. I was
35:34 pursuing success by human standards, which is in the states, a big house, a
35:39 big car, and uh plenty of money in the bank. And I did that for 30 years. Now,
35:45 I didn't completely walk away from Christ and abandon the faith and start womanizing and drinking and and you
35:52 know, partying, as the phrase goes. I was still by everybody that knew me in my business a very dedicated Christian.
35:60 But the power of God did not rest on my life because I wasn't doing what I was
36:05 supposed to be doing. And even as I say that, I realize of course that God is in
36:11 control, that he's sovereign. The scripture says, "The steps of a righteous man are ordered of the Lord."
36:18 And again it says in another place that a man plans his ways but the Lord
36:24 directs his steps. That direction has led me here
36:29 and uh with my wife to help found and and start this school when we we're kind
36:35 of semi-retired. She's a retired school teacher and school administrator. And uh when we got married just a little less
36:41 than two years ago uh I told her I think on our very first
36:47 date you know I'm not sure I'll even be in the US in a year because I've been
36:53 talking to this guy uh about a school that he wants to begin in Koala Lumpur
36:59 and it's very likely that I could be in Koala Lumpur a year from now and uh you
37:05 know if that is not where your life is headed then we really probably don't
37:10 need to spend a lot of time together uh getting to know one another. And uh she
37:16 was uh I she tells me that she was pleased with my honesty and my sincerity
37:22 and uh we had a second date and you know a few more after that and dated over a a
37:27 fairly short period about eight months and and got married. The uh the beautiful part of that is that uh when
37:34 you're in your 50s and you find yourself single again for whatever reason, you kind of know yourself at that age and
37:41 you know what you want. So making that decision to get married was uh in my view the right thing to do because I
37:47 felt God had led us together to continue in that walk together in the calling uh
37:53 of God on my life. You know the scripture says that the calling of God is without repentance. He doesn't change
37:58 his mind. Once he makes a call on your life, then uh he intends to complete that or see you complete it.
38:07 Now the second verse that we were talking about is Colossians 2:8. And it says, "Beware that anyone deceive you or
38:13 lest anyone deceive you or take you captive." Spoil you is in the uh the King James version. Uh spoil means to
38:21 take as bounty or booty uh you know in a in a war in a situation like that. So
38:27 who is it that is taking you, spoiling you, robbing you uh and doing it how?
38:33 Through philosophy and vain vain deceit. So actually the one who's taking us, the
38:40 robber is Satan himself. The scripture tells us that uh
38:48 the scripture tells us in John 8:44 that you're of your father the devil and the lusts of your father you will do.
38:55 You know, it it is very common for people to say, "Well, you know what? We're all trying to go to the same
39:01 place, heaven, and God is a God of love, and he's just going to take us all to heaven. Uh he's going to weigh the good
39:06 and the bad. Uh God is the father of all." You know what? Another lie. That's
39:13 just not true. And again, John 8:44, he says, "You are
39:18 of your father, the devil." He was talking to the Pharisees at the time, religious people, Jewish people, people
39:24 who were the uh the identified uh people of God in that day. And he called them
39:32 children of the devil. Your father's the devil and you will do the will of your father
39:38 and his desires. He was a murderer from the beginning and he does not stand in the truth because there's no truth in
39:44 him. When he lies, he speaks of his own character, for he is a liar and the
39:49 father of it. Not only was he lying in the garden of Eden, but there is in Isaiah chapter 14, even before creation,
39:58 Satan, Lucifer says, "I will exalt my throne above the most high God."
40:04 Lucifer had a problem. He was jealous of the glory of God. But do you know when
40:10 he looked at God and saw the glory of God, do you know what he was actually looking at? He was looking at Jesus.
40:17 The Bible tells us in uh John 1:14 that uh we beheld his glory as the only
40:25 begotten of the father full of grace and truth.
40:31 And so Satan's agenda has always been to murder or assassinate the character and
40:37 the reputation of Christ to make it of no effect. And the method in which he
40:42 does that, the method in which he pulls off that murder is the lie.
40:47 And so we have to ask ourselves how do these lies take place? Well, it tell it
40:52 tells us right here through philosophy. What is philosophy? It's the love of wisdom. Fileos logos. It's the love of
40:59 wisdom which simply means that uh it's a world view of how we see things. It's
41:05 the wisdom with which we figure out the world. And some people will be led astray by
41:10 these empty philosophies. What are those philosophies? I've already mentioned one of them that we're all children of God
41:15 and God's the father of all and we're all going to heaven. That's obviously not the case.
41:21 The second one is, you know, well, I don't need to do anything with Christ now. I I've got plenty of time.
41:30 You know, we're not promised tomorrow. Uh, I'll be very brief with this, but in
41:35 uh September 6th, 19, excuse me, 2013, my life changed
41:40 forever. I had uh dated a girl in Bible college and ultimately married her and
41:47 uh we had two boys together and spent the next 32 years in marriage and uh I
41:54 want to say happily married. But on September 5th, she came home and
42:00 she said, 'You know, I've got this burning, this heartburn in my chest and
42:06 uh you know, I think I'm going to go to the doctor. And she went to the doctor and they gave her a prescription for
42:12 something to deal with the heartburn. And that night in the middle of the night, she died. Uh just here one day
42:20 and gone the next, you know, but she died of a massive heart attack in the middle of the night. And I woke to my
42:27 wife being gone and it changed my life forever. And I said to myself, never got
42:35 bitter at God, but I said to myself, there's purpose in this. God did not
42:40 take her because he hated her or he hated me. He loved her and he took her and he
42:47 loved me and he left me. Now, what am I supposed to do with the rest of my life?
42:53 And that brought about the conversation with our employer, meeting my new wife,
43:00 who is such a blessing to me. If I could only begin to tell you how much I love her and what she has done for me, I
43:07 would have never ever thought that I could do business with God again.
43:12 And yet, here I am. You know, we've just gone through the book of Jonah, and I told you sometimes
43:18 I feel like a little bit of Jonah. You know, I've experienced some of his experience
43:24 and that's true. But here's the important thing. You have to do business with God when you can.
43:30 You're not promised tomorrow. You could face the same kind of
43:35 circumstance as my wife. We're not promised tomorrow. If you hear the voice of God, do not harden your heart as in
43:42 the day of rebellion. He told uh some people in the book of Hebrews
43:48 in uh 2 Corinthians chapter uh 6:2 it says in a favorable time I listen to
43:54 you and in the day of salvation I helped you. Behold now is that favorable time.
43:60 Behold now is the day of salvation. If you're here this morning and you're
44:05 relying on something other than the work of Christ on the cross, the shed blood which satisfies God's
44:12 righteousness. If you're relying on your works, your intelligence, your wealth,
44:18 your charity or benevolence to get you into heaven, I've got to tell you,
44:23 that's not going to do it. If you can't hear the voice of God speaking to you in
44:28 your heart or your mind and convincing you of the truth, which he is the truth,
44:35 then you're going to be lost. Now, I want you to be clear. I want to
44:41 be clear. I don't want to confuse anybody. When Paul wrote these words about being deceived and led astray, he
44:46 was writing to Christians. These people knew the Lord, okay? They walked with the Lord. But
44:53 somehow or another, just a little bit started getting added to the story of the gospel. You know, you need to be
44:60 circumcised. You need to keep holy days. You need to do this and that. And by adding to the gospel, they just
45:06 basically were led astray. And they were robbed. But what were they robbed of? They were robbed of their freedom in
45:13 Christ. And that's one of the most powerful tools we have as a Christian is the freedom in Christ. John 6 says, "If
45:21 the son makes you free, you shall be free indeed. And if you know the truth, the truth will set you free. Jesus is
45:29 the truth." And so, we have to be careful not to listen to the devil's lies. It also says in that same verse,
45:36 chapter uh uh uh verse chapter 2:8, vain deceit can lead us astray. And some of
45:43 those areas of vain deceit, those empty lies, so to speak, uh are hedonism. You
45:50 know, I'm going to do my own thing. Back in the 70s, we had a beer commercial from a company called Slits in the US.
45:56 And they had these very engaging pictures of family life and young life and always beautiful people in beautiful
46:03 places doing fantastic things. And the tagline was you only go around once in life, so you have to reach for the
46:09 gusto. And that became very popular. As a matter of fact, it became the cry of a
46:15 generation, the hippie generation of the 60s, you know, that threw off the restraints of their parents in the past
46:22 and they were all about free love, free expression, you know, let's do our own thing. That became the battlecry. And
46:29 are those people happy and satisfied? No. They're the same people that are in the states today rioting in the streets.
46:36 Very same group of people, a couple of generations removed. And now they're trying to shut down free speech. They
46:43 have not submitted themselves to the will of God or the work of God. In fact, they reject
46:50 God. So, that's one of them. Others, pride and self-sufficiency.
46:55 I'm a self-made man. You know, don't need God. Religion's a crutch.
47:02 And the Bible says and warns us in uh Luke 12:20, "Thou fool, this night your
47:10 soul will be required of you and the things which you have prepared." This guy was very wealthy. He built barns and
47:16 enlarged them. He was amassing a great fortune. And God called him a fool. And he said, "Whose will those things be
47:22 when I require your soul tonight?"
47:29 Moral superiority is another one. Well, I'm not really like the others. I I'm I'm a good person. You know, I was
47:34 preaching in the Memphis City jails for four years. And I met some really tough guys. I met
47:42 some assassins, some hired killers. I I met some guys that were in the bars
47:48 drinking. I met one guy who was the son of a preacher who got drunk in a bar one night and he took a bottle and broke it
47:56 and cut a man's throat and the man died. And this guy tried to tell me at the end of our sermon, uh, I I don't need
48:04 Christ. I'm already saved. I'm really a good person. And I'm thinking, uh, not by your
48:11 behavior, you're not. But, you know, it's it's possible that the man was a Christian. Christians do bad things.
48:19 But I want to relate to you a particular story, one that's interesting, and that is uh uh I used to work in the 1980s
48:26 going to school at a place that manufactured railroad track for the trains. Big heavy steel pieces, some of
48:33 them 10,000, 20,000 lbs times 2.24 for kilo. Uh you know, heavy stuff. And
48:42 beside me were two brothers, Philip and David Doro. Now, Philip's name I remember. David, I'm not so sure. I'm
48:48 just going to call him David because that seems right. But we worked together for a couple of years side by side. And
48:55 one February night in 1980, Philip didn't show up for work. And I thought,
49:00 well, that's a little strange. But you know what? He didn't show up the next night either and the night after that. And I said, "David, where's Philillip?"
49:08 And he said, "He's gotten in trouble." And I said, "Well, what do you mean?"
49:13 And he said, "Well, he's killed a man." This guy was really quiet. He is not a,
49:20 you know, not what I thought was a partyier or anything like that. Shy even. And and David told me he's killed
49:27 a man. And I said, "What happened?" And he said, "You know, uh,
49:35 we were raised in a Baptist church. Our father was the chairman of deacons in a Baptist church in Memphis, Tennessee.
49:43 And uh both of us became Christians when we were young because we were raised in church. But he said along about the time
49:50 of 12 or 13, we really began to resent
49:55 the restrictions that our religion was putting on us and we kind of started hanging out with
50:01 people who didn't have the same views and values. We started smoking pot and
50:08 drinking and uh Philillip basically
50:13 got stoned one night smoking pot and he had remembered that he had given a
50:20 pistol to a friend and he thought I've got to get that back. And so he went
50:26 over to his friend's house and he got his pistol and for whatever reason he stuck it, you know, back here like you
50:32 see in the movies sometimes. And uh because he had been smoking pot, he had
50:37 what we referred to as the munchies. He was hungry and he went into a convenience store like a 7-Eleven and he
50:45 was walking up and down the aisle looking for something to eat. And he didn't know it, but at the time the
50:51 clerk, the cashier was watching him and he noticed the gun in his back.
50:58 And so when Philip got his toasted pastries, we call Pop-Tarts, and took those to the counter to pay, the clerk
51:05 thought he was going to be robbed. So he grabbed a baseball bat, a small bat from underneath the counter, and was prepared
51:12 to defend himself and swing it at Philillip. And Philip without thinking, pulled that gun, stuck it in his head,
51:18 and shot and killed Frank Crimin or Carmony. Frank was 59 years old. He died right
51:25 there on the spot. Philip ran and in the running he stole his girlfriend's car
51:33 and to keep himself moving fleeing from the police he committed four other armed
51:38 robberies and he was caught about three or four weeks later returned to Memphis and I
51:46 saw him in the city jail and I said Phillip
51:51 h how did this come to be and the short version was I turned my back on God. I
51:58 started listening to the lies of my friends and my life is ruined. He was convicted
52:04 of five life sentences and he's still in prison to this day. My wife and I just looked it up. This was
52:11 nearly 40 years ago and he's still in prison today. And you know what? He's
52:16 not likely ever to get out. If Philip was saved when he was a young boy, as he claims to have been, he's
52:24 still saved today. He'll find a home in heaven. But you know what he's lost? You
52:29 know what was robbed from him? His freedom. One of the most powerful things you can
52:36 have as a people is your freedom. And particularly your freedom in Christ.
52:42 To see the power of God rest on your life and to see Christ moving in your life touching other people.
52:50 I'm going to ask the worship team to come forward and I'm going to ask you to think about
52:55 two things. I said at the start of the sermon that I'm going to ask you to come
53:00 forward if you believe that God's speaking to you about the condition of
53:06 your life. Whether it's the fact that you need to be saved, that
53:12 you need to make a firm commitment to Christ and salvation, to quit trusting in your works, or whether it's a
53:19 decision to say, "God, I have been deceived. I have been led astray. I
53:25 received you, but I'm not walking in you like I received you. I'm working walking
53:33 in my flesh through the works of the flesh." my own determination, my own choices. And so,
53:40 I've walked away from God. Anytime you're ready, brother.
53:47 So, I'm going to lead uh two prayers while they're singing. The first is a prayer of salvation. If you're here
53:55 today and you've never really been saved, this will be an opportunity for you to do that. And should you decide to
54:02 make this prayer, should God illumine your mind, your your spirit uh and
54:08 energize you with the uh the truth and you feel like you need to respond, I would like to ask you to come forward.
54:14 And on the other hand, I'm going to lead in a prayer for those who have been deceived and carried away and ask God to
54:22 bring you back to the truth and that you'll live in him
54:28 just as you received him. So, Father, I just come to you now,
54:33 Lord. There are people in all likelihood in this congregation that are trusting in things other than you for their
54:42 eternal life, for their salvation, for their right standing with God. If you're in that group, I just want you
54:50 to pray after me. Dear Lord, I am a sinner
54:56 and I am incapable of saving myself.
55:01 I ask you to forgive me of my sin
55:06 and to come into my heart and save me. And I pledge to give you the rest of my
55:13 life. You'll be the Lord. You'll direct my steps.
55:21 and I thank you for saving me because you said you would in Jesus name.
55:28 And now for that other group which I spent a a long time in, the group that has been led astray, who's lost your
55:35 freedom in your faith, I'm going to ask a prayer on behalf of you for a
55:42 rededication to Christ. Dear Lord, I ask you to forgive me of my
55:50 sin and my willfulness. Lord, you said in First John that you
55:56 would forgive us of our sins if we would confess and you would cleanse us from all unrighteousness.
56:02 Lord, I want to know the truth. I want to live the truth. I want to live in you. And so, I ask you to forgive me from
56:09 listening to lies and living a self-directed life. Lord, I pledge here and now to submit to
56:16 you and to live through your power and in your control.
56:22 So now I'm going to ask you as a congregation if you prayed either one of those prayers, I'd like for you to come
56:28 forward and you just stand here for a moment and we'll pray with you.
56:35 We'll not be long about this, but if you hear the voice of God, please respond.
56:42 I sing praise to the king of kings.
56:47 You are my everything.
56:54 Father, I entrust the congregation to your care. I pray that the truth of the word of God has been alive or made
57:00 alive. Lord, I pray that the people in this congregation, every man, woman,
57:06 boy, and girl will have been brought a little closer to you by what has been
57:11 shared today. It's your word that gives life. And Lord, I pray for that in Jesus name.
57:18 Amen. Thank you. Forest.
