SPEAKER 01 : 0:08

Welcome to The Flatline with your host, Rick Hughes. For the next 30 minutes, you’ll be inspired, motivated, educated, but never manipulated. Now, your host, Rick Hughes.

SPEAKER 02 : 0:23

Good morning and welcome to the FLOT line, F-L-O-T, the Forward Line of Troops, using the military analogy to explain how a believer like yourself can learn God’s 10 unique problem-solving devices and deploy them in the thinking of your soul so that you can stop the outside sources of adversity before they ever turn into the inside source of stress. We always say adversity is, of course, inevitable, but stress is optional, especially in the Christian life. You don’t have to worry. You don’t have to be afraid. You don’t have to be bitter. You don’t have to be antagonistic. It’s a better way to live. It’s called the mind of Christ or living with the mind of Christ. So my job is to help you verify and identify that concept, and maybe you would like to orient and adjust. I hope so. because we’re about to go into the year 2022. Never thought I’d even live this long, 2022. How about yourself? Did you think you’d live to see 2022? And here we go. And one thing I’d like to talk to you about today before we get started, remember, we always trust the Lord to provide our funds. We don’t hustle money on this radio show. Nothing’s for sale. We’re not trying to gimmick anybody. We believe that God’s in it, God will pay for it, and he always has, of course. We have various printed material that’s available to you. Our latest book is A Crash Course in Christianity. Brand new, small booklet, very nicely done. It’s free. If you’d like to have one, just write to us. Rick Hughes Ministries, P.O. Box 100. in the mighty city of Cropwell, Alabama. Cropwell, Alabama, 35054. That’s Rick Hughes Ministries, P.O. Box 100, Cropwell, Alabama, 35054. We also have all of the year 2021 and 2020 on transcripts. Actually, 2020 and 2019, excuse me. All 52 messages in each year are written out in a transcript in a book available that you can read. If you’d like to have those transcripts, if you’ll let us know, we’ll ship them right on out to you, no charge. Get them as quick as we can to you. We have books called God’s Problem Solving Devices, a brand new book we wrote this year too. It identifies each of these 10 unique problem-solving devices, and we’ll talk about some of those today. Remember what they are. Do you remember? Rebound, confessing your sin to God, filling of the Holy Spirit, allowing the Holy Spirit to control your life, faith thrust drill, walking by faith, and seven others that we’ll talk about. Today, we want to get into a subject that is very interesting. As we approach the new year, we want to get into the word peace, P-E-A-C-E, peace. God’s peace is available to all the world. In the book of Luke, we find the angels of the Lord, which were messenger angels at the time, appearing to the shepherds in the field, the ones that were keeping watch over their flock. And they were suddenly confronted by this angel. Some people say these were the sacrificial lambs used in the temple sacrifice, the Paschal lambs, I’m not sure. But whatever they were doing, they were shocked when this angel appeared to them. Listen to Luke 2, verses 8 through 14. And there were in the same country shepherds abiding in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night. And lo, the angel of the Lord came upon them, and the glory of the Lord shone round about them, and they were sore afraid. This means in a modern translation, they were scared to death. They freaked out. And the angel said unto them, Do not be afraid. Calm down. You’re not going to die. In other words, I’m bringing you some good news, great joy, and it shall be to all the people. For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, which is Christ the Lord. And this shall be a sign unto you, and you shall find the babe wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger.” And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of heavenly hosts praising God and saying, glory to God in the highest and on earth peace and goodwill towards men. Glory to God on the highest and on earth peace and goodwill towards men. These verses indicate God’s mercy. The Greek word for mercy, Elias, is expressing compassion to those in need. a product of God’s love extended to every person on this planet through the birth, life, death, and resurrection of Jesus, his anointed son. God loves you so much in 2 Peter 3, verses 8 through 9, the Bible says, but beloved, don’t be ignorant of this. One day is the Lord as a thousand years and a thousand years as with one day. And the Lord is not slack concerning his promise as some men count slackness, but is long suffering to us. not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance. This is God’s mercy demonstrated in his patience with the unbeliever. Mankind can never produce peace on earth. Why? Because of the sinful nature of each individual. But individually, you can have peace with God, meaning you’re free of his judgments. Peace with God means you’re free of his judgments. Listen to John 3, 18. “‘Whosoever believes in him is not condemned.'” But whoever does not believe stands condemned already because he has not believed in the name of God’s one and only Son. So what do you have to do to escape condemnation? Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved. Paul wrote it this way. He said, I’m not ashamed of the gospel of Christ. For it is the power of God to salvation to all who believe it, to the Jew first, then to the Gentile. The good news, the gospel, the death, burial, and resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ is your ticket to heaven. And it’s how God demonstrates his mercy to you and how you can have peace with God. The Bible very clearly says you can have peace with God. Therefore, being justified by faith, in Romans 5.1, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. Again, therefore, being justified by faith, Romans 5.1, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. Not justified by works, not justified by sacrifice, justified by faith. For by grace are you saved through faith, the Bible says. It’s a gift from God, not of works. as any man should brag about it. So we’ll come back to that subject, having peace with God. But before we do that, I may ask you a simple question. Are you at peace with God? Are you? Are you at peace with God? If not, then I pray that you would consider receiving Christ as your Savior. You can do it with me right now. You could pray a simple sinner’s prayer. You could say, Heavenly Father, I know I’m a sinner. I believe Christ died for me, and I’m willing to accept him as my Savior. That’s all you have to do. It’s just an act of faith. The Bible says, whosoever should call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. And you can have peace with God. You will not face any judgment. God loved you so much in mercy that he sent his son, the Lord Jesus Christ, to pay the penalty for all of our sins. So peace with God is available to anyone who believes in the Lord Jesus Christ. They will never face judgment. However, there is also the peace of God. Peace with God, believing in the Lord Jesus Christ, peace of God is different. The peace of God in John 14, 27, peace, Jesus said, I leave with you my peace I give unto you, not as the world giveth, give I unto you. In other words, the world could take it back. I give it unto you and let not your heart be troubled and don’t be afraid. Peace I leave with you. My peace I give unto you. Our Lord Jesus Christ knew what he was facing that night. He knew that Judas had betrayed him. He knew he was going to the cross. He had tried to tell him he was going to be killed. He had tried to tell him he was going to be resurrected, and he was at peace with it. Didn’t mean he was happy about it. He prayed, Father, let this cup pass away from me if possible, but nevertheless, not my will, thy will be done. And he was at peace with God’s, the Father’s decision. And he went to the cross in peace. Our Lord spoke these words recorded in John 14, 27 on the eve of his arrest. Peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you. Not as the world giveth, give I unto you. Let not your hearts be troubled and don’t be afraid. He spoke those words, John 14, 27, on the eve of his arrest by the Jewish Sanhedrin, which was the highest court in the land, in Jewish land. But remember this, they were under Roman occupation. And before the Lord Jesus Christ could be put to death, he had to be judged by the Roman governor Pontius Pilate, who in fact, ironically found him not guilty. Luke 23 verse four, then said Pilate to the chief priest and to the people, I find no fault in this man. How was it possible that Jesus, knowing what was coming, had this sort of peace in his soul? It’s the same peace he’s now bestowing upon his disciples. And his two admonitions in John 14, 27 explain exactly what this sort of peace can provide for anyone who believes in him and follows him. And that includes you. First of all, he said, let not your hearts be troubled. The Greek word tarasso, T-A-R-A-S-S-O, means anxious or distressed. Remember now, they didn’t have the whole picture yet. They had not grasped his betrayal. They had not grasped his arrest. They certainly had not grasped his crucifixion. So he did not want them to be troubled. Don’t be anxious. Don’t be distressed. It’s all coming. And then he said, neither let it be afraid. Da-li-ah-oh, the Greek word. Da-li-ah-oh. It means don’t be intimidated by all of these things that are going to happen. later he even had to reveal to them that they would be sought out and killed did he tell them that well yes listen to john 16 2. they will put you out of the synagogue in fact the time is coming when anyone who kills you will thank their duffering offering a service to god and in fact they were all put to death martyrs death with the exception of john who was cast to the isle of patmos where he lived out his life and wrote the book of revelation This peace, this , this peace, this quietness, this rest, this calm, the peace of God is available to each one of us simply by using problem-solving device number two, the filling of the Holy Spirit. How are you filled with the Holy Spirit? Well, you’re indwelled with the Holy Spirit the minute you believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, and you’re filled with the Holy Spirit the minute you believe in the Lord Jesus Christ. But you can quench the Holy Spirit and grieve the Holy Spirit by committing sin. So when you sin, you lose the filling of the Holy Spirit and you become carnal, not spiritual. If you go to the Father and use Rebound, problem-solving device number one, if you go use 1 John 1, 9, where it says, if we confess our sin, he’s faithful and just to forgive us and to purify us from all of our own doing. If you do that, then you will be instantaneously, automatically filled with the Holy Spirit. And Galatians 5, 22 through verse 23 says, the fruit of the spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. And against such things, there is no law. That’s the Christian life right there. What a wonderful way to live at peace. This is the peace of God at work in your soul. There is no greater peace for the believer than to know one thing, and to know that you are exactly in the middle of the will of God, fulfilling God’s plan in time for your life. It’s a test for me as we broadcast these radio shows to have peace as we face the financial stress of paying for 113 radio shows every Sunday morning. You have the tendency to worry, to be afraid. Can we afford it? Can we do it? But God, through the filling of the Holy Spirit, gives us peace not to be afraid. He’s in charge. If he’s in it, he pays for it. That’s exactly the way we operate. So the Bible tells us in Philippians 4, 6, and 7, don’t be anxious about anything. but in everything by prayer and pleading with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God and the peace of God, which surpasses all comprehension will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. The peace of God. which surpasses all comprehension. In other words, it doesn’t make sense. How can you face adversity? How can you face, for example, what we face every Sunday, paying for those radio shows and still have peace? It’s beyond comprehension. And yet God supplies it through the filling of the Holy Spirit. And we’re mandated never to be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and pleading with God, thanksgiving, make your requests known to him, and the peace of God which surpasses all comprehension will guard your heart and your mind in Christ Jesus. You know what you’re doing? You’re just taking the load off your shoulders and putting it on his shoulders. You’re just saying, I can’t handle this, Father. You can. I’m going to give it to you. And then you can sit back and watch whatever God does. And your mind and your heart is guarded, protected. That means that you’re not intimidated with fear. This verse that I just read to you in Philippians 4, 6, and 7 is a description of a relaxed mental attitude, which is the result of using problem-solving device number three, the faith rest drill. When you function inside of God’s plan for your life, you can overcome doubts. You can overcome fears that the world will throw your way. As a matter of fact, in the future, this client nation, good old USA, America, may face severe testing and severe discipline from God due to our failure of spiritual leadership and our disrespect for God’s word. Social unrest, criminal activity, racial tension, frustration, all add up to a bleak future for America. And throw into that A worldwide pandemic and you have a prescription for chaos. Can you have peace in the middle of all of that? And the answer is yes. In spite of what may come, you can have peace and objective optimism by being filled with the Holy Spirit and using the faith rest drill. Problem solving device number two, problem solving device number three. If you don’t understand it, order the book, Christian Problem Solving. We’ll send it to you free of charge. and study it and understand how to be filled with the spirit and how to use the three stages of the faith rest drill. Now this piece means no worries for you. Why? Because the Lord Jesus Christ controls history. Listen to Matthew 6, 25. For this reason, I say to you, do not be worried about your life as to what you will eat or what you will drink, nor for your body as to what you will put on. Is not life more than food and the body more than clothing? Look at the birds in the sky. They do not sow, they don’t reap, neither do they gather crops into the barn. And yet your heavenly father feeds them. Are you not much more important than that bird? And which of you by worrying can add a single day to his lifespan? So don’t be worried. Psalm 55 verse 22, cast your burden upon the Lord and he will sustain you. He will never allow the righteous to be shaken. That’s peace. That’s having phenomenal relaxed mental attitude, phenomenal objective optimism, a great peace in the middle of the fog and the chaos that descended over this country. The peace with God that I talked about, peace with God, with God, not of God, with God. That’s your salvation. That comes through the finished work of Christ on the cross. And James 4.4 says, you adulteresses, do you not know that friendship with the world is hostility towards God? Therefore, whoever wants to be the friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God. Are you an enemy of God? Have you rejected Jesus Christ as your savior? Have you decided to stand alone and point your finger at God and say, I don’t need you. You’re in serious trouble. My friend, the unbeliever such as yourself is at a disadvantage with God. And I’ve had people say, I don’t believe in God. Well, great. Good for you. Bully for you. Did you look on the moon? Maybe God was on the moon. Oh no, I didn’t look on the moon. Well, maybe Mars, maybe he was on Mars. Maybe he’s on Venus. See, in order for you to say there is no God, you’ve got to look everywhere in the universe at one time, because if you leave one place out and God’s there, you’re cooked your history. So you have to say, I don’t think there’s a God. And now in your own arrogance, you’re saying you’re smarter than God. You don’t think there’s a God, right? Proverbs 3.33, the curse of the Lord is on the house of the wicked, but he blesses the home of the righteous. So exactly how do you become righteous? Listen to 1 Peter 3.12, for the eyes of the Lord are towards the righteous and his ears attend to their prayers but the face of the Lord is against the evildoers. In Romans 3.10, as it is written, there are none righteous, no, not even one, not one. So the only way that you and I could gain any righteousness standing with God is through the Lord Jesus Christ. In 2 Corinthians 5.21, he has made him to be sin for us, the one that knew no sin, so that we could be made the righteousness of God by means of him. That’s how we get that way. That’s how we have standing with God, through Jesus Christ. Romans 5.10, for if when we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of his son, much more being reconciled, we shall be saved by his life. So the question I must ask you is, are you at peace with God? Or do you have the peace of God in your soul? Have you received the forgiveness of the Lord Jesus Christ through your faith in his son? Have you done that? If not, now is the time to settle your eternal future. Just a simple prayer of faith can solve the issue and propel you into the new year where you can begin to experience the peace of God along with the peace with God. In 2 Thessalonians 3.16, Now the Lord of peace, this is our Father, the Lord of peace himself shall give you peace always by all means. The Lord be with you all. There’s two things he wants to give you, peace with God and the peace of God. When you believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and when you grow to spiritual maturity, you can become an agent of peace. In 2 Peter 3.8, so all of you should live together in peace. Try to understand each other. Love each other like brothers and sisters and be kind and humble. There’s so much in that verse, you won’t believe it. We’re talking about impersonal love and personal love. Problem-solving devices number seven and number eight. Impersonal love gives you the ability to love a person that you don’t even like because you’re loving them based on your character, not theirs. It’s the same way God loved you. God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son. Weren’t you a jerk? Weren’t you a sinner? Weren’t you lost in your sin and separated from God and he loved you? He didn’t love you with a personal love. He loved you based on his character, not your character. Once you believed in Christ and received him as your savior and became a member of the royal family of God, now he loves you as his child and that’s a personal love. So we have to learn how to use the problem-solving devices of impersonal love when it says live together in peace. That means no bickering, no backbiting, no fighting, no gossiping, no maligning. Try to understand each other. Love each other like brothers and sisters and be kind and be humble. Be kind and be humble. Humility profile is what the Lord Jesus Christ himself had in Philippians 2. It says he humbled himself and he made himself of no reputation. So that’s the key. By doing this, you become an agent of peace. When you live with people in peace, And you love each other in Ephesians four, three, the Bible says, make every effort to keep the unity of the spirit through the bond of peace, the bond of peace. That’s the relaxed mental attitude under the filling of the Holy spirit, using the faith, rest drill and operating under impersonal love. That’s how you do it. I just said a mouthful. I know I just gave a lot of doctrine. I could have taught you for hours just to what I just said. The bond of peace is an amazing way to live. In Romans 12, 18, if it is possible, as much as depends on you, live peaceably with all men. What a wonderful way to live. There have been times that you don’t like certain individuals. There have been times you get frustrated with individuals. There have been times in my own life where I’ve disassociated with individuals. If I can’t live peaceably with them, then I just move away from them. I leave them alone, get away from them. What you have to remember is God didn’t send me or you to straighten anybody out. You and I have enough problems trying to keep our own self straight without trying to straighten out other people that we don’t like and don’t understand. So if we want to live at peace with other people, we don’t judge them. Therefore, the Bible says in Matthew 7, don’t judge or you will be judged. Because any measure or measure you measure out is going to be measured back out to you as well. You want to get yourself in a jam, stick your nose in God’s business. Go try to straighten somebody out that God’s dealing with. Tell them what you think about them. Let them have it. You are asking for divine discipline. But what measure you measure will be measured back to you again. Matthew 7, 1 through 7. So, agent of peace is what God wants you to be. living together in peace, in the bond of peace. There’s a great preacher named John MacArthur, and he said these words, in a world marked by conflict, the ministry of peacemaking is an indispensable one. Learning about peace, how to spread peace is critical. And this is the ministry the followers of Jesus have. They’re called in Matthew 5, 9, blessed are the peacemakers. They shall be called the sons of God. That’s our opportunity to make peace. How do you do that? Number one, you maintain a relaxed mental attitude through the filling of the Holy Spirit. Number two, you be a messenger of God’s forgiveness through Jesus Christ. That’s the similitudes in Matthew 4. You are the light of the world. You are the salt of the earth. That’s you being the messenger of God. Go forth unto all the world preaching the gospel. you are a messenger of god’s forgiveness to your friends to your children to your family you’re the agent of peace when you do that you’re bringing people to peace with god the gospel gives them peace with god and that’s what your job is to do to give them the lord jesus christ give them the message so they can have peace with god you can be a messenger of god’s forgiveness Number three, avoid any revenge, motivation, or retaliation. That’s not peace of God. That’s frustration, anger, emotional revolt of the soul that you’re trying to get even with somebody that stuck it to you. If you’ve got that kind of attitude, you do not have the peace of God in your life. And number four, very important, keep your mouth shut when you’re angry, when you’re frustrated, or when you’re bitter. You have to learn to keep your mouth shut. More believers get into trouble by running off at the mouth and saying things they shouldn’t say. And then they try to cover it up and say, oh, I know I shouldn’t have said that. I’ve heard that a lot. I know I shouldn’t have said that, but I did. Oh, you are in serious trouble, my friend. Keep your mouth shut. Do not run people down. Do not judge people. Do not malign people. That is not a peacemaker. That’s a troublemaker. And that’s the person that God lowers the hammer on, the troublemaker. In Proverbs 6, 16, and 17, you can see a list of the seven sins that God despises and And one of them is the troublemaker. Don’t be that person. Be the agent of peace. You have the peace with God through faith alone in Christ alone. And you have the peace of God by learning God’s word, staying filled with the Holy Spirit, using the faithless drill, using impersonal love. Talk about that. You are God’s agent of peace. And that’s my prayer for you, that you will do that, that you will make that impact on those in your periphery and your surrounding in your world. I hope you’ve been listening. I hope you’ve learned something. I hope this is a show that will propel you into 2022 as an agent of peace so that you can see the marvelous things that will happen through the gospel, giving the good news of the Lord Jesus Christ. Until next week, I’m your host, Rick Hughes, saying thank you for listening to The Floodline.

SPEAKER 01 : 27:14

Thank you for listening to The Floodline with your host, Rick Hughes. If you’d like to contact Rick, please write to him at P.O. Box 100, Cropwell, Alabama, 35054, or online at www.rickhughesministries.org.