You can only have an impact on the devil’s world if you choose to renovate your thinking and grow to spiritual maturity. “Take My yoke upon you and learn of Me. My yoke is easy and My burden is light” (Matt 11:28-29). This is how you will be made rich spiritually because you will develop a treasure in your soul—the treasure of the Word of God. You’re not here to clean up the devil’s world, that’s not your job. God will handle this. Your job is to grow spiritually. Satan’s worried about you thinking as Christ thought, learning divine
Plain Talk About the Devil’s World
Transcript of FLOT Line Episode 560 aired on May 22, 2017
Good morning and welcome to The FLOT Line. I’m your host Rick Hughes and for the next few
minutes stay with me. This show is simply about giving you accurate information that will help
you verify and identify God’s plan for your life. My prayer is that this radio show will assist you.
Let me remind you, I am not a pastor, I’m an evangelist. I’m like a window, a voice of fresh air.
My objective is to give you information that will challenge you and give you a thirst, a desire to
want to grow and that you will pray God will lead you to a well-qualified pastor so you can sit
under his authority and listen to him teach you the Word of God on a consistent basis.
This is
how you will be made rich spiritually because you will develop a treasure in your soul, the
treasure of the Word of God in your soul.
If you do this, if you study under this pastor, then
you will grow in grace in a wonderful way. It’s always amazing to me. I want this to be a very
practical show today. I remember being in school and some people were happy just to get
through the eighth grade. Some people went through high school. Some people went to college.
Some people went to graduate school. Some people have a desire to know more than other
people. Some people just have a desire to get along, make a paycheck and go home. Comparing
this to the Christian life, I know that’s a silly analogy, a lot of Christians don’t have any desire to
go deep. They don’t have any desire to become graduate school type Christians. They don’t want
to learn any theology. They just want to get enough of the Bible to make them feel happy about
being a Christian. I call this going through the ritual without any reality to it. It is true that you
must know Jesus Christ as your Savior if you want eternal life because the only way we can get
to heaven is through faith alone in Jesus Christ alone and no other way. The Bible is clear about
this when it says,
“For by grace are you saved through faith and that not of ourselves, it is a gift
of God and not of works lest any man should brag about it”
(Ephesians 2:8). All of us enter into
the plan in the same way. We all enter into the royal family of God through faith in Jesus Christ.
Once we’re in the family we don’t all grow the same. It’s always interesting to me to see those
people who have a desire to grow and those people who don’t. Someone once said, there are
three types of people. The person that makes things happen, the person that watches things
happen and the person that says, “What happened?” I don’t know which one of those people you
are, but if you want God to use you, if you want to glorify God to the max, then you must be the
kind of person that makes things happen. The only way that you’re ever going to do this is to
obey the mandates found in the Bible.
The first mandate you must obey is
“Believe in the
Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved”
(Acts 16:31).
The second one is
“Be filled with the
Spirit”
(Ephesians 5:18).
You cannot function in the Christian life apart from the filling of the
Holy Spirit. This is where much of the breakdown comes in modern Christianity today because
it’s not really taught that much. If you go into any Christian bookstore and look up some of these
books, my goodness fortunes are made of printing and selling books. If you look at some of these
books very rarely will they tell you anything about being filled with the Spirit. Remember,
560-Plain-Talk-About-the-Devils-World-transcript.pdf
Ephesians 1:13 says that you were sealed by the Holy Spirit the moment you believed in Jesus
Christ. The moment you were placed in the family of God, you were sealed by the Holy Spirit.
That’s why Jesus said,
“No man can take you out of My hand. My Father, who gave them to Me,
is greater than all and no one can take you out of My Father’s hand”
(John 10:28-29). This is a
wonderful promise.
“You are sealed by the Holy Spirit until the day of redemption”
(Ephesians
4:30). Much like maybe someone canning some jelly at home. In the old way, they use to put
paraffin wax on top of the jar. They’d put the jelly in there and then put some paraffin wax on top
of it and that would seal it. You wouldn’t eat it until you broke the wax off the top. The Holy
Spirit has sealed you inside of God’s unique plan. If you have believed in Jesus Christ, you are
sealed by the Holy Spirit and you are indwelt by the Holy Spirit. This is the promise that Jesus
made in John 14 and 16, when He said,
“When I leave. I’m going to send the Holy Spirit and
He’s going to be your tutor, your guide, your mentor.”
The original Greek word for that is the
paraclete.
A
paraclete
is a mentor, not a parakeet, not a bird. A
paraclete
, a mentor, and that’s
what the Holy Spirit does. He mentors us and how does He do this? Well, if we sit under the
ministry of a well-qualified pastor and we learn God’s Word, we are being mentored by means of
the Holy Spirit. Remember operation Z, a wonderful concept much like Zorro? Z stands for the
communication of God’s Word. The pastor communicates it. The other side of the Z is the
comprehension, the Holy Spirit captures that information and then He brings it down into your
soul where you can comprehend it. Once you comprehend it then it has to be converted into
epignosis
which is literally doctrine on the launching pad of your soul. It’s called wisdom. See
there is a difference between knowing the Bible and understanding the Bible. If you know the
Bible, that’s
gnosis,
that’s knowledge you understand. But
epignosis
, the preposition
epi
in front
of the word
gnosis,
this means full. This is the knowledge you understand and use. This is the
difference between hearing the Bible taught and applying what you hear. The application is
epignosis.
The hearing or the comprehension is
gnosis.
The Holy Spirit helps you comprehend as
your pastor teaches God’s Word to you and now your volition must make a decision to comply
with the mandate. If you don’t comply that’s up to you. You have the freedom and the privacy to
say, “Yes I will” or “No I won’t” and by the way, no one is perfect. No one does it right all the
time. We all sin, we all fail. Sometimes it is a real shocker when we do something that we didn’t
think we were capable of doing and I know you’ve done it before, so have I. We shock ourselves.
We say, “My goodness, how could I have done this? I’m suppose to be a Christian. I thought a
Christian wouldn’t do this and look what I just did.” That’s right, Christians do some pretty nasty
things sometimes. Look at David. Look at Moses. Did not Moses murder somebody? Didn’t
David commit murder? Didn’t David commit adultery? I mean keep going through the Bible and
you’re not going to find any perfect people anywhere. We all have a sin nature, and this is part of
the problem. We have a sin nature and this sin nature will be with us until we die and get a
resurrection body. This resurrection body will not be related to Adam and will not have a sin
nature, but as long as you’re here, you have a sin nature. You have something that can stand
against it called the Holy Spirit. So you can do what Galatians 5:16 says,
“Walk in the Spirit and
560-Plain-Talk-About-the-Devils-World-transcript.pdf
you won’t fulfill the lust of the flesh.”
Or you can live under the power of the flesh and be called
a carnal Christian. A carnal Christian is a Christian that’s out of fellowship with God. He’s a
Christian that is not growing. He’s a Christian that does not use problem-solving device #1 which
we know to be rebound. He doesn’t confess his sin when he commits it. He enjoys it and stays in
it and relishes it. He ignores the need to confess sin and sometimes fails to admit that he sinned
because he might not even realize that mental attitude sins are some of the biggest culprits of all.
Yes, sin comes in three categories. Things you think for sure. Things you say, yes. Even things
you do. With God the Holy Spirit in control He will point out these sins to you and He will
convict you of them or convince you you’re wrong and then in your own volition, your own soul,
you decide, “Am I willing to admit it to God that I failed or will I try to make an excuse? Will I
try to cover it up? Will I try to hide it?” See, this doesn’t work. If you want to be used by God, if
you want to have a full Christian life that has an impact for Jesus Christ in today’s world, you
must get with the program.
You must believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, stay filled with the Spirit,
and
“Grow in the grace and the knowledge of your Lord and Savior Jesus Christ”
(2 Peter 3:18),
that’s another mandate. It is not a request. He’s not asking you, “Please grow, please grow.” He’s
telling you “Grow.” Here’s another verse,
“Study to show thyself approved unto God, a workman
that needeth not to be ashamed”
(2 Timothy 2:15). Can you be ashamed? The answer is yes.
How would you ever be ashamed? Well, look at it this way. When you get to the Judgment Seat
of Christ, the
Bema Seat,
not the Great White Throne, that’s for the unbelievers, and you are
evaluated are you going to hear,
“Well done My good and faithful servant”
(Revelation 22:3)? Or
are you going to see all of your good works burned up as wood, hay and stubble as per 1
Corinthians 3:13? Why would that happen? Because you did the right thing, but you did it in the
wrong way. Is it right to pray? Yes. Is it right to give? Yes. Is there a right way to do it and a
wrong way to do it? Yes, anything you do for God while we are not filled with the Holy Spirit is
human good, anything. Any choir service, any giving, any testimony, any mission trip. If you are
not filled with the Holy Spirit, it’s human good, it’s wood, hay, and stubble. How would you
know for sure if you are filled with the Holy Spirit? You know you’re indwelt with the Holy
Spirit at salvation. You know you’re sealed with the Holy Spirit. You know that you’ve been told
to be filled with the Spirit and you know how to be filled with the Spirit. If you name any known
sin, God is faithful and just to forgive you, purify you from that sin and fill you with the Spirit (1
John 1:9). Is there unconfessed sin in your life? Because if there is you are not filled with the
Spirit. As long as you keep a short account, don’t wait to do it when you go to bed, if you keep a
short account of your sins you can be assured you are filled with the Holy Spirit all day long.
You will know immediately when you sin, when you choose in your volition to go against God’s
rules, go against God’s Word to do something you know is wrong, then you will know the Holy
Spirit will convict you, that you’re out of fellowship. You must confess it immediately. Does this
mean that this is a license to sin? No, it doesn’t mean that at all but it means that if you want to
grow up and get out of kindergarten, if you want to graduate from high school, if you want to get
into college using that school analogy again and become a graduate Christian, it’s going to take
560-Plain-Talk-About-the-Devils-World-transcript.pdf
you following the mandates of the Word of God. You must study, you must grow. Why should
you do this? Because our Lord said,
“Come unto Me all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I
will give you rest.”
He said,
“Take My yoke upon you and learn of Me. My yoke is easy and My
burden is light”
(Matthew 11:28-29), learn of Me. How much do you really know about Jesus
Christ our Lord and Savior? My pastor has been teaching a study in the life of Christ for over
800 hours. If you want to know something about Jesus Christ get into this study, but you’ve got
some catching up to do, over 800 hours we have been studying the life of Christ. We have not
even gotten to the crucifixion yet so there’s a lot to learn. There’s a lot to know. You will never
learn it in your entire lifetime, but if you’re going to be a graduate school believer, if you’re
going to be a believer with a PhD, if you’re going to be that believer that God could even use to
instruct other believers, you must grow up spiritually.
The Christian life is a supernatural life
and it requires a supernatural power to live it. With the filling of the Holy Spirit and the
living Word of God in your soul, your thinking begins to be renovated, changed, and this
brings on what the Bible calls divine viewpoint and a relaxed mental attitude.
You begin to
have an RMA, a relaxed mental attitude. What is this? This is using the faith-rest drill, problem-
solving device #3. When you have the faith-rest drill, when you can stand behind the promises of
God, then you are relaxed and there are over 7,000 promises found in the Bible. One of my
friends put many of these promises into a book called
Biblical Promises and Principles.
Contact
us if you want it. God’s promises are like cash in the bank. You cannot cash them if you don’t
know where they are, if you don’t know what they are. They are the shield that you stand behind.
They are your protection. They are what you can bring up to your Heavenly Father and say,
“God, you promised this. I claim this promise.” James 4:2 says,
“You have not because you ask
not.”
Don’t misunderstand, your Father is willing to give you many things but He’s not going to
give you something that will destroy you. He’s going to give you something that might glorify
Him and complement your life, but not something that will destroy you. So quit praying to win
the lottery. I know what you’re praying for and it’s not going to work because you couldn’t
handle it. I mean you’re going to wind up saying, “If I could just get that $60 million lottery, I’d
be happy.” No you wouldn’t. Unhappy people take their unhappiness with them wherever you go.
You’ll just be unhappy in more palatial circumstances but you’re still going to be unhappy
because money is not the key to happiness. You should remember this.
Jesus Christ said
“Happiness belongs to those people who hear My Father’s Word and who keep it”
(Luke
11:28).
That’s the secret to happiness. So as you grow in grace, using the school analogy as you
get through college and into graduate school, this means you’re choosing to change the way you
think. You’re learning the 10 problem-solving devices. You understand rebound. You understand
the filling of the Holy Spirit. You understand the faith-rest drill. You understand doctrinal
orientation and grace orientation. You understand the personal sense of destiny. You understand
personal love for God and impersonal love for others. You understand sharing the happiness of
God and occupation with Christ. Those are the 10 unique problem-solving devices and if you
know them and if you use them, if you learned them, then you can live an outstanding life in the
560-Plain-Talk-About-the-Devils-World-transcript.pdf
devil’s world, a supernatural life in the devil’s world. Not a life without temptation, no not a life
that guarantees you wealth and prosperity, but a life that guarantees you no fear, a life that
guarantees you no worry, a life that guarantees you no stress, a life that guarantees you complete
peace with God from knowing His Word, honoring His Word, living in His Word, by means of
the power of the Holy Spirit. Not living in guilt and shame and remorse because you drifted
under control of your sin nature and you found yourself in carnality. We live in the devil’s world.
If you, like me, read the paper, listen to the news, you see the devil making ground every day. I’m
afraid that our country the United States of America is changing quicker than we could have
imagined. We have become so obsessed with things that are so unnecessary. We spend so much
time and so much money fighting things that are goofy. Our society is changing. People are
worried and think some politician is going to cure it. Maybe if we could elect this guy or maybe
if we could elect that guy it will get better. Sure, I have my favorite politician but I know and you
know this too, that no man can change anything because the Bible says in Jeremiah 17:5,
“Cursed is the man that trusteth in man.”
There’s only one thing that can change this and that’s
you and me.
If we grow to be spiritually mature believers then we become part of the
anchor and the pivot that can deliver the nation.
But we’re not here to clean up the devil’s
world. See, this is what religious activism wants to do. Religious activism wants to clean up the
devil’s world. They want to shut down all the houses of ill repute and to make sure that there’s
nothing on television but G rated shows and on down the line. Well, it’s the devil’s world and
you’re not going to clean it up. People have sin natures and anybody you elect to the office of
president, vice president, has a sin nature also.
You’re not here to clean up the devil’s world,
that’s not your job. God will handle this. Your job is to
“Grow in the grace and the
knowledge of your Lord and Savior Jesus Christ”
(2 Peter 3:18).
If some Christian comes
around and says you need to get involved in politics and we need to clean up the devil’s world,
I’m just telling you it’s not going to work. If you will focus on your spiritual life, if you will
focus on growing in grace, if you will get under a well-qualified pastor and begin to study God’s
Word every day, take notes and go back over them to learn, you will deliver your nation. You
will do it because you will be part of the pivot. You will be the anchor. But if you get involved in
politics and you waste your energy and your time supporting some candidate that has a sin nature
that you think is going to turn things around, you’re kidding yourself. It won’t happen. The only
thing that will turn the course of history around for this nation, what we’re facing right now, is a
spiritual revival and the only way that’s going to happen is through some sort of awakening.
Right now I don’t see that awakening on hand. We’ll never see another evangelist like Billy
Graham or someone like that who held mass crusades and many, many people came to Christ. I
don’t know what you will see in the future as our country changes, as our attitude changes about
Christianity, and Christians begin to be demonized and marginalized in the devil’s world. Even in
the military, even in schools and institutions where it shouldn’t be, all of a sudden we find God
being forced out of the public venue. We find people that are looking for answers in the devil’s
world. There are no answers except the ones the devil gives and human solution are no solutions.
560-Plain-Talk-About-the-Devils-World-transcript.pdf
You want to have an impact? You want to be that man of God, the Gideon of your
generation? Then learn God’s Word and grow to spiritual maturity and you can have a
historical impact on your nation.
Your mission is not to stabilize American politics. Your
mission is to stabilize your spiritual life, to become a mature believer and to grow in the grace
and the knowledge of your Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. The only way you will ever deliver
America, the only thing that will ever get us back on track, is one believer at a time, reaching
spiritual maturity. One believer in Cheyenne. One believer in Tulsa. One believer in Grass
Valley. One believer in Houston. One believer in Jackson Mississippi, on and on where this radio
show is broadcast. When these types of believers surface, mature believers growing under the
ministry of a pastor, learning God’s Word, every day replicating the life of Christ, glorifying God
to the maximum, they will have an invisible impact in the devil’s world. This is why he fights
you so much. This is why he doesn’t want you to hear these things. This is why he doesn’t want
you to study your Bible. He’s not worried about you going to church and singing 97 verses of
Do
Lord
. He’s not worried about your emotional overload. He’s worried about you renovating your
thinking and beginning to acquire the mind of Christ. What do I mean by this? Philippians 2:5,
“Let this mind be in you that was also in Christ Jesus.”
Satan’s worried about you thinking
like Christ thought, learning divine viewpoint, beginning to use the faith-rest drill,
beginning to use the problem-solving devices, and becoming a part of the pivot, part of the
anchor that will hold this nation together.
As the pivot grows one person at a time, God’s hand
will keep this nation afloat. No pivot? We’re going down. As the storms of political unrest appear
on the horizon this is the answer, it always has been. This is the devil’s world. He’s not ever
going to leave it alone. See, we send out missionaries all over the world so what does Satan want
us to do? Shut us down, he doesn’t want missionaries going out all over the world. Now there are
some religions He doesn’t mind because they are not truth and so he will promote these things.
When you talk about Jesus Christ, the anointed Son of God, the King of kings and the Lord of
lords, that’s going to cause problems. Our Lord was crucified. He was put to death by criminals
who manipulated the charges against him, and then they turned on the disciples. Jesus warned
them, “You’re going to pick up your cross and follow Me and what happened to Me is going to
happen to you. When I’m gone, they are going to come after you.” How do you prepare to live in
the devil’s world? You need to put on the armor of God, Ephesians 6. You need to pick up the
shield of faith, the helmet of salvation, the sword of the Spirit, the belt of truth, the breastplate of
righteousness and put it on. If you don’t understand this, let me know. I’ll do everything I can to
help you.
You must decide. Will I have an impact in the devil’s world? Will I grow to
spiritual maturity? Will I put on the armor of God? Will I renovate my thinking and begin
to replicate the life of Christ?
Or will I just get to the sixth grade spiritually and drop out? If
you don’t grow spiritually you’re never going to have an impact in the devil’s world. I hope
you’re paying attention. These are critical times and we need you. This is your host Rick Hughes
saying thank you for listening to The FLOT Line.Plain Talk About the Devil’s World
Transcript of FLOT Line Episode 560 aired on May 22, 2017
Good morning and welcome to The FLOT Line. I’m your host Rick Hughes and for the next few
minutes stay with me. This show is simply about giving you accurate information that will help
you verify and identify God’s plan for your life. My prayer is that this radio show will assist you.
Let me remind you, I am not a pastor, I’m an evangelist. I’m like a window, a voice of fresh air.
My objective is to give you information that will challenge you and give you a thirst, a desire to
want to grow and that you will pray God will lead you to a well-qualified pastor so you can sit
under his authority and listen to him teach you the Word of God on a consistent basis.
This is
how you will be made rich spiritually because you will develop a treasure in your soul, the
treasure of the Word of God in your soul.
If you do this, if you study under this pastor, then
you will grow in grace in a wonderful way. It’s always amazing to me. I want this to be a very
practical show today. I remember being in school and some people were happy just to get
through the eighth grade. Some people went through high school. Some people went to college.
Some people went to graduate school. Some people have a desire to know more than other
people. Some people just have a desire to get along, make a paycheck and go home. Comparing
this to the Christian life, I know that’s a silly analogy, a lot of Christians don’t have any desire to
go deep. They don’t have any desire to become graduate school type Christians. They don’t want
to learn any theology. They just want to get enough of the Bible to make them feel happy about
being a Christian. I call this going through the ritual without any reality to it. It is true that you
must know Jesus Christ as your Savior if you want eternal life because the only way we can get
to heaven is through faith alone in Jesus Christ alone and no other way. The Bible is clear about
this when it says,
“For by grace are you saved through faith and that not of ourselves, it is a gift
of God and not of works lest any man should brag about it”
(Ephesians 2:8). All of us enter into
the plan in the same way. We all enter into the royal family of God through faith in Jesus Christ.
Once we’re in the family we don’t all grow the same. It’s always interesting to me to see those
people who have a desire to grow and those people who don’t. Someone once said, there are
three types of people. The person that makes things happen, the person that watches things
happen and the person that says, “What happened?” I don’t know which one of those people you
are, but if you want God to use you, if you want to glorify God to the max, then you must be the
kind of person that makes things happen. The only way that you’re ever going to do this is to
obey the mandates found in the Bible.
The first mandate you must obey is
“Believe in the
Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved”
(Acts 16:31).
The second one is
“Be filled with the
Spirit”
(Ephesians 5:18).
You cannot function in the Christian life apart from the filling of the
Holy Spirit. This is where much of the breakdown comes in modern Christianity today because
it’s not really taught that much. If you go into any Christian bookstore and look up some of these
books, my goodness fortunes are made of printing and selling books. If you look at some of these
books very rarely will they tell you anything about being filled with the Spirit. Remember,
560-Plain-Talk-About-the-Devils-World-transcript.pdf
Ephesians 1:13 says that you were sealed by the Holy Spirit the moment you believed in Jesus
Christ. The moment you were placed in the family of God, you were sealed by the Holy Spirit.
That’s why Jesus said,
“No man can take you out of My hand. My Father, who gave them to Me,
is greater than all and no one can take you out of My Father’s hand”
(John 10:28-29). This is a
wonderful promise.
“You are sealed by the Holy Spirit until the day of redemption”
(Ephesians
4:30). Much like maybe someone canning some jelly at home. In the old way, they use to put
paraffin wax on top of the jar. They’d put the jelly in there and then put some paraffin wax on top
of it and that would seal it. You wouldn’t eat it until you broke the wax off the top. The Holy
Spirit has sealed you inside of God’s unique plan. If you have believed in Jesus Christ, you are
sealed by the Holy Spirit and you are indwelt by the Holy Spirit. This is the promise that Jesus
made in John 14 and 16, when He said,
“When I leave. I’m going to send the Holy Spirit and
He’s going to be your tutor, your guide, your mentor.”
The original Greek word for that is the
paraclete.
A
paraclete
is a mentor, not a parakeet, not a bird. A
paraclete
, a mentor, and that’s
what the Holy Spirit does. He mentors us and how does He do this? Well, if we sit under the
ministry of a well-qualified pastor and we learn God’s Word, we are being mentored by means of
the Holy Spirit. Remember operation Z, a wonderful concept much like Zorro? Z stands for the
communication of God’s Word. The pastor communicates it. The other side of the Z is the
comprehension, the Holy Spirit captures that information and then He brings it down into your
soul where you can comprehend it. Once you comprehend it then it has to be converted into
epignosis
which is literally doctrine on the launching pad of your soul. It’s called wisdom. See
there is a difference between knowing the Bible and understanding the Bible. If you know the
Bible, that’s
gnosis,
that’s knowledge you understand. But
epignosis
, the preposition
epi
in front
of the word
gnosis,
this means full. This is the knowledge you understand and use. This is the
difference between hearing the Bible taught and applying what you hear. The application is
epignosis.
The hearing or the comprehension is
gnosis.
The Holy Spirit helps you comprehend as
your pastor teaches God’s Word to you and now your volition must make a decision to comply
with the mandate. If you don’t comply that’s up to you. You have the freedom and the privacy to
say, “Yes I will” or “No I won’t” and by the way, no one is perfect. No one does it right all the
time. We all sin, we all fail. Sometimes it is a real shocker when we do something that we didn’t
think we were capable of doing and I know you’ve done it before, so have I. We shock ourselves.
We say, “My goodness, how could I have done this? I’m suppose to be a Christian. I thought a
Christian wouldn’t do this and look what I just did.” That’s right, Christians do some pretty nasty
things sometimes. Look at David. Look at Moses. Did not Moses murder somebody? Didn’t
David commit murder? Didn’t David commit adultery? I mean keep going through the Bible and
you’re not going to find any perfect people anywhere. We all have a sin nature, and this is part of
the problem. We have a sin nature and this sin nature will be with us until we die and get a
resurrection body. This resurrection body will not be related to Adam and will not have a sin
nature, but as long as you’re here, you have a sin nature. You have something that can stand
against it called the Holy Spirit. So you can do what Galatians 5:16 says,
“Walk in the Spirit and
560-Plain-Talk-About-the-Devils-World-transcript.pdf
you won’t fulfill the lust of the flesh.”
Or you can live under the power of the flesh and be called
a carnal Christian. A carnal Christian is a Christian that’s out of fellowship with God. He’s a
Christian that is not growing. He’s a Christian that does not use problem-solving device #1 which
we know to be rebound. He doesn’t confess his sin when he commits it. He enjoys it and stays in
it and relishes it. He ignores the need to confess sin and sometimes fails to admit that he sinned
because he might not even realize that mental attitude sins are some of the biggest culprits of all.
Yes, sin comes in three categories. Things you think for sure. Things you say, yes. Even things
you do. With God the Holy Spirit in control He will point out these sins to you and He will
convict you of them or convince you you’re wrong and then in your own volition, your own soul,
you decide, “Am I willing to admit it to God that I failed or will I try to make an excuse? Will I
try to cover it up? Will I try to hide it?” See, this doesn’t work. If you want to be used by God, if
you want to have a full Christian life that has an impact for Jesus Christ in today’s world, you
must get with the program.
You must believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, stay filled with the Spirit,
and
“Grow in the grace and the knowledge of your Lord and Savior Jesus Christ”
(2 Peter 3:18),
that’s another mandate. It is not a request. He’s not asking you, “Please grow, please grow.” He’s
telling you “Grow.” Here’s another verse,
“Study to show thyself approved unto God, a workman
that needeth not to be ashamed”
(2 Timothy 2:15). Can you be ashamed? The answer is yes.
How would you ever be ashamed? Well, look at it this way. When you get to the Judgment Seat
of Christ, the
Bema Seat,
not the Great White Throne, that’s for the unbelievers, and you are
evaluated are you going to hear,
“Well done My good and faithful servant”
(Revelation 22:3)? Or
are you going to see all of your good works burned up as wood, hay and stubble as per 1
Corinthians 3:13? Why would that happen? Because you did the right thing, but you did it in the
wrong way. Is it right to pray? Yes. Is it right to give? Yes. Is there a right way to do it and a
wrong way to do it? Yes, anything you do for God while we are not filled with the Holy Spirit is
human good, anything. Any choir service, any giving, any testimony, any mission trip. If you are
not filled with the Holy Spirit, it’s human good, it’s wood, hay, and stubble. How would you
know for sure if you are filled with the Holy Spirit? You know you’re indwelt with the Holy
Spirit at salvation. You know you’re sealed with the Holy Spirit. You know that you’ve been told
to be filled with the Spirit and you know how to be filled with the Spirit. If you name any known
sin, God is faithful and just to forgive you, purify you from that sin and fill you with the Spirit (1
John 1:9). Is there unconfessed sin in your life? Because if there is you are not filled with the
Spirit. As long as you keep a short account, don’t wait to do it when you go to bed, if you keep a
short account of your sins you can be assured you are filled with the Holy Spirit all day long.
You will know immediately when you sin, when you choose in your volition to go against God’s
rules, go against God’s Word to do something you know is wrong, then you will know the Holy
Spirit will convict you, that you’re out of fellowship. You must confess it immediately. Does this
mean that this is a license to sin? No, it doesn’t mean that at all but it means that if you want to
grow up and get out of kindergarten, if you want to graduate from high school, if you want to get
into college using that school analogy again and become a graduate Christian, it’s going to take
560-Plain-Talk-About-the-Devils-World-transcript.pdf
you following the mandates of the Word of God. You must study, you must grow. Why should
you do this? Because our Lord said,
“Come unto Me all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I
will give you rest.”
He said,
“Take My yoke upon you and learn of Me. My yoke is easy and My
burden is light”
(Matthew 11:28-29), learn of Me. How much do you really know about Jesus
Christ our Lord and Savior? My pastor has been teaching a study in the life of Christ for over
800 hours. If you want to know something about Jesus Christ get into this study, but you’ve got
some catching up to do, over 800 hours we have been studying the life of Christ. We have not
even gotten to the crucifixion yet so there’s a lot to learn. There’s a lot to know. You will never
learn it in your entire lifetime, but if you’re going to be a graduate school believer, if you’re
going to be a believer with a PhD, if you’re going to be that believer that God could even use to
instruct other believers, you must grow up spiritually.
The Christian life is a supernatural life
and it requires a supernatural power to live it. With the filling of the Holy Spirit and the
living Word of God in your soul, your thinking begins to be renovated, changed, and this
brings on what the Bible calls divine viewpoint and a relaxed mental attitude.
You begin to
have an RMA, a relaxed mental attitude. What is this? This is using the faith-rest drill, problem-
solving device #3. When you have the faith-rest drill, when you can stand behind the promises of
God, then you are relaxed and there are over 7,000 promises found in the Bible. One of my
friends put many of these promises into a book called
Biblical Promises and Principles.
Contact
us if you want it. God’s promises are like cash in the bank. You cannot cash them if you don’t
know where they are, if you don’t know what they are. They are the shield that you stand behind.
They are your protection. They are what you can bring up to your Heavenly Father and say,
“God, you promised this. I claim this promise.” James 4:2 says,
“You have not because you ask
not.”
Don’t misunderstand, your Father is willing to give you many things but He’s not going to
give you something that will destroy you. He’s going to give you something that might glorify
Him and complement your life, but not something that will destroy you. So quit praying to win
the lottery. I know what you’re praying for and it’s not going to work because you couldn’t
handle it. I mean you’re going to wind up saying, “If I could just get that $60 million lottery, I’d
be happy.” No you wouldn’t. Unhappy people take their unhappiness with them wherever you go.
You’ll just be unhappy in more palatial circumstances but you’re still going to be unhappy
because money is not the key to happiness. You should remember this.
Jesus Christ said
“Happiness belongs to those people who hear My Father’s Word and who keep it”
(Luke
11:28).
That’s the secret to happiness. So as you grow in grace, using the school analogy as you
get through college and into graduate school, this means you’re choosing to change the way you
think. You’re learning the 10 problem-solving devices. You understand rebound. You understand
the filling of the Holy Spirit. You understand the faith-rest drill. You understand doctrinal
orientation and grace orientation. You understand the personal sense of destiny. You understand
personal love for God and impersonal love for others. You understand sharing the happiness of
God and occupation with Christ. Those are the 10 unique problem-solving devices and if you
know them and if you use them, if you learned them, then you can live an outstanding life in the
560-Plain-Talk-About-the-Devils-World-transcript.pdf
devil’s world, a supernatural life in the devil’s world. Not a life without temptation, no not a life
that guarantees you wealth and prosperity, but a life that guarantees you no fear, a life that
guarantees you no worry, a life that guarantees you no stress, a life that guarantees you complete
peace with God from knowing His Word, honoring His Word, living in His Word, by means of
the power of the Holy Spirit. Not living in guilt and shame and remorse because you drifted
under control of your sin nature and you found yourself in carnality. We live in the devil’s world.
If you, like me, read the paper, listen to the news, you see the devil making ground every day. I’m
afraid that our country the United States of America is changing quicker than we could have
imagined. We have become so obsessed with things that are so unnecessary. We spend so much
time and so much money fighting things that are goofy. Our society is changing. People are
worried and think some politician is going to cure it. Maybe if we could elect this guy or maybe
if we could elect that guy it will get better. Sure, I have my favorite politician but I know and you
know this too, that no man can change anything because the Bible says in Jeremiah 17:5,
“Cursed is the man that trusteth in man.”
There’s only one thing that can change this and that’s
you and me.
If we grow to be spiritually mature believers then we become part of the
anchor and the pivot that can deliver the nation.
But we’re not here to clean up the devil’s
world. See, this is what religious activism wants to do. Religious activism wants to clean up the
devil’s world. They want to shut down all the houses of ill repute and to make sure that there’s
nothing on television but G rated shows and on down the line. Well, it’s the devil’s world and
you’re not going to clean it up. People have sin natures and anybody you elect to the office of
president, vice president, has a sin nature also.
You’re not here to clean up the devil’s world,
that’s not your job. God will handle this. Your job is to
“Grow in the grace and the
knowledge of your Lord and Savior Jesus Christ”
(2 Peter 3:18).
If some Christian comes
around and says you need to get involved in politics and we need to clean up the devil’s world,
I’m just telling you it’s not going to work. If you will focus on your spiritual life, if you will
focus on growing in grace, if you will get under a well-qualified pastor and begin to study God’s
Word every day, take notes and go back over them to learn, you will deliver your nation. You
will do it because you will be part of the pivot. You will be the anchor. But if you get involved in
politics and you waste your energy and your time supporting some candidate that has a sin nature
that you think is going to turn things around, you’re kidding yourself. It won’t happen. The only
thing that will turn the course of history around for this nation, what we’re facing right now, is a
spiritual revival and the only way that’s going to happen is through some sort of awakening.
Right now I don’t see that awakening on hand. We’ll never see another evangelist like Billy
Graham or someone like that who held mass crusades and many, many people came to Christ. I
don’t know what you will see in the future as our country changes, as our attitude changes about
Christianity, and Christians begin to be demonized and marginalized in the devil’s world. Even in
the military, even in schools and institutions where it shouldn’t be, all of a sudden we find God
being forced out of the public venue. We find people that are looking for answers in the devil’s
world. There are no answers except the ones the devil gives and human solution are no solutions.
560-Plain-Talk-About-the-Devils-World-transcript.pdf
You want to have an impact? You want to be that man of God, the Gideon of your
generation? Then learn God’s Word and grow to spiritual maturity and you can have a
historical impact on your nation.
Your mission is not to stabilize American politics. Your
mission is to stabilize your spiritual life, to become a mature believer and to grow in the grace
and the knowledge of your Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. The only way you will ever deliver
America, the only thing that will ever get us back on track, is one believer at a time, reaching
spiritual maturity. One believer in Cheyenne. One believer in Tulsa. One believer in Grass
Valley. One believer in Houston. One believer in Jackson Mississippi, on and on where this radio
show is broadcast. When these types of believers surface, mature believers growing under the
ministry of a pastor, learning God’s Word, every day replicating the life of Christ, glorifying God
to the maximum, they will have an invisible impact in the devil’s world. This is why he fights
you so much. This is why he doesn’t want you to hear these things. This is why he doesn’t want
you to study your Bible. He’s not worried about you going to church and singing 97 verses of
Do
Lord
. He’s not worried about your emotional overload. He’s worried about you renovating your
thinking and beginning to acquire the mind of Christ. What do I mean by this? Philippians 2:5,
“Let this mind be in you that was also in Christ Jesus.”
Satan’s worried about you thinking
like Christ thought, learning divine viewpoint, beginning to use the faith-rest drill,
beginning to use the problem-solving devices, and becoming a part of the pivot, part of the
anchor that will hold this nation together.
As the pivot grows one person at a time, God’s hand
will keep this nation afloat. No pivot? We’re going down. As the storms of political unrest appear
on the horizon this is the answer, it always has been. This is the devil’s world. He’s not ever
going to leave it alone. See, we send out missionaries all over the world so what does Satan want
us to do? Shut us down, he doesn’t want missionaries going out all over the world. Now there are
some religions He doesn’t mind because they are not truth and so he will promote these things.
When you talk about Jesus Christ, the anointed Son of God, the King of kings and the Lord of
lords, that’s going to cause problems. Our Lord was crucified. He was put to death by criminals
who manipulated the charges against him, and then they turned on the disciples. Jesus warned
them, “You’re going to pick up your cross and follow Me and what happened to Me is going to
happen to you. When I’m gone, they are going to come after you.” How do you prepare to live in
the devil’s world? You need to put on the armor of God, Ephesians 6. You need to pick up the
shield of faith, the helmet of salvation, the sword of the Spirit, the belt of truth, the breastplate of
righteousness and put it on. If you don’t understand this, let me know. I’ll do everything I can to
help you.
You must decide. Will I have an impact in the devil’s world? Will I grow to
spiritual maturity? Will I put on the armor of God? Will I renovate my thinking and begin
to replicate the life of Christ?
Or will I just get to the sixth grade spiritually and drop out? If
you don’t grow spiritually you’re never going to have an impact in the devil’s world. I hope
you’re paying attention. These are critical times and we need you. This is your host Rick Hughes
saying thank you for listening to The FLOT Line.Plain Talk About the Devil’s World
Transcript of FLOT Line Episode 560 aired on May 22, 2017
Good morning and welcome to The FLOT Line. I’m your host Rick Hughes and for the next few
minutes stay with me. This show is simply about giving you accurate information that will help
you verify and identify God’s plan for your life. My prayer is that this radio show will assist you.
Let me remind you, I am not a pastor, I’m an evangelist. I’m like a window, a voice of fresh air.
My objective is to give you information that will challenge you and give you a thirst, a desire to
want to grow and that you will pray God will lead you to a well-qualified pastor so you can sit
under his authority and listen to him teach you the Word of God on a consistent basis.
This is
how you will be made rich spiritually because you will develop a treasure in your soul, the
treasure of the Word of God in your soul.
If you do this, if you study under this pastor, then
you will grow in grace in a wonderful way. It’s always amazing to me. I want this to be a very
practical show today. I remember being in school and some people were happy just to get
through the eighth grade. Some people went through high school. Some people went to college.
Some people went to graduate school. Some people have a desire to know more than other
people. Some people just have a desire to get along, make a paycheck and go home. Comparing
this to the Christian life, I know that’s a silly analogy, a lot of Christians don’t have any desire to
go deep. They don’t have any desire to become graduate school type Christians. They don’t want
to learn any theology. They just want to get enough of the Bible to make them feel happy about
being a Christian. I call this going through the ritual without any reality to it. It is true that you
must know Jesus Christ as your Savior if you want eternal life because the only way we can get
to heaven is through faith alone in Jesus Christ alone and no other way. The Bible is clear about
this when it says,
“For by grace are you saved through faith and that not of ourselves, it is a gift
of God and not of works lest any man should brag about it”
(Ephesians 2:8). All of us enter into
the plan in the same way. We all enter into the royal family of God through faith in Jesus Christ.
Once we’re in the family we don’t all grow the same. It’s always interesting to me to see those
people who have a desire to grow and those people who don’t. Someone once said, there are
three types of people. The person that makes things happen, the person that watches things
happen and the person that says, “What happened?” I don’t know which one of those people you
are, but if you want God to use you, if you want to glorify God to the max, then you must be the
kind of person that makes things happen. The only way that you’re ever going to do this is to
obey the mandates found in the Bible.
The first mandate you must obey is
“Believe in the
Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved”
(Acts 16:31).
The second one is
“Be filled with the
Spirit”
(Ephesians 5:18).
You cannot function in the Christian life apart from the filling of the
Holy Spirit. This is where much of the breakdown comes in modern Christianity today because
it’s not really taught that much. If you go into any Christian bookstore and look up some of these
books, my goodness fortunes are made of printing and selling books. If you look at some of these
books very rarely will they tell you anything about being filled with the Spirit. Remember,
560-Plain-Talk-About-the-Devils-World-transcript.pdf
Ephesians 1:13 says that you were sealed by the Holy Spirit the moment you believed in Jesus
Christ. The moment you were placed in the family of God, you were sealed by the Holy Spirit.
That’s why Jesus said,
“No man can take you out of My hand. My Father, who gave them to Me,
is greater than all and no one can take you out of My Father’s hand”
(John 10:28-29). This is a
wonderful promise.
“You are sealed by the Holy Spirit until the day of redemption”
(Ephesians
4:30). Much like maybe someone canning some jelly at home. In the old way, they use to put
paraffin wax on top of the jar. They’d put the jelly in there and then put some paraffin wax on top
of it and that would seal it. You wouldn’t eat it until you broke the wax off the top. The Holy
Spirit has sealed you inside of God’s unique plan. If you have believed in Jesus Christ, you are
sealed by the Holy Spirit and you are indwelt by the Holy Spirit. This is the promise that Jesus
made in John 14 and 16, when He said,
“When I leave. I’m going to send the Holy Spirit and
He’s going to be your tutor, your guide, your mentor.”
The original Greek word for that is the
paraclete.
A
paraclete
is a mentor, not a parakeet, not a bird. A
paraclete
, a mentor, and that’s
what the Holy Spirit does. He mentors us and how does He do this? Well, if we sit under the
ministry of a well-qualified pastor and we learn God’s Word, we are being mentored by means of
the Holy Spirit. Remember operation Z, a wonderful concept much like Zorro? Z stands for the
communication of God’s Word. The pastor communicates it. The other side of the Z is the
comprehension, the Holy Spirit captures that information and then He brings it down into your
soul where you can comprehend it. Once you comprehend it then it has to be converted into
epignosis
which is literally doctrine on the launching pad of your soul. It’s called wisdom. See
there is a difference between knowing the Bible and understanding the Bible. If you know the
Bible, that’s
gnosis,
that’s knowledge you understand. But
epignosis
, the preposition
epi
in front
of the word
gnosis,
this means full. This is the knowledge you understand and use. This is the
difference between hearing the Bible taught and applying what you hear. The application is
epignosis.
The hearing or the comprehension is
gnosis.
The Holy Spirit helps you comprehend as
your pastor teaches God’s Word to you and now your volition must make a decision to comply
with the mandate. If you don’t comply that’s up to you. You have the freedom and the privacy to
say, “Yes I will” or “No I won’t” and by the way, no one is perfect. No one does it right all the
time. We all sin, we all fail. Sometimes it is a real shocker when we do something that we didn’t
think we were capable of doing and I know you’ve done it before, so have I. We shock ourselves.
We say, “My goodness, how could I have done this? I’m suppose to be a Christian. I thought a
Christian wouldn’t do this and look what I just did.” That’s right, Christians do some pretty nasty
things sometimes. Look at David. Look at Moses. Did not Moses murder somebody? Didn’t
David commit murder? Didn’t David commit adultery? I mean keep going through the Bible and
you’re not going to find any perfect people anywhere. We all have a sin nature, and this is part of
the problem. We have a sin nature and this sin nature will be with us until we die and get a
resurrection body. This resurrection body will not be related to Adam and will not have a sin
nature, but as long as you’re here, you have a sin nature. You have something that can stand
against it called the Holy Spirit. So you can do what Galatians 5:16 says,
“Walk in the Spirit and
560-Plain-Talk-About-the-Devils-World-transcript.pdf
you won’t fulfill the lust of the flesh.”
Or you can live under the power of the flesh and be called
a carnal Christian. A carnal Christian is a Christian that’s out of fellowship with God. He’s a
Christian that is not growing. He’s a Christian that does not use problem-solving device #1 which
we know to be rebound. He doesn’t confess his sin when he commits it. He enjoys it and stays in
it and relishes it. He ignores the need to confess sin and sometimes fails to admit that he sinned
because he might not even realize that mental attitude sins are some of the biggest culprits of all.
Yes, sin comes in three categories. Things you think for sure. Things you say, yes. Even things
you do. With God the Holy Spirit in control He will point out these sins to you and He will
convict you of them or convince you you’re wrong and then in your own volition, your own soul,
you decide, “Am I willing to admit it to God that I failed or will I try to make an excuse? Will I
try to cover it up? Will I try to hide it?” See, this doesn’t work. If you want to be used by God, if
you want to have a full Christian life that has an impact for Jesus Christ in today’s world, you
must get with the program.
You must believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, stay filled with the Spirit,
and
“Grow in the grace and the knowledge of your Lord and Savior Jesus Christ”
(2 Peter 3:18),
that’s another mandate. It is not a request. He’s not asking you, “Please grow, please grow.” He’s
telling you “Grow.” Here’s another verse,
“Study to show thyself approved unto God, a workman
that needeth not to be ashamed”
(2 Timothy 2:15). Can you be ashamed? The answer is yes.
How would you ever be ashamed? Well, look at it this way. When you get to the Judgment Seat
of Christ, the
Bema Seat,
not the Great White Throne, that’s for the unbelievers, and you are
evaluated are you going to hear,
“Well done My good and faithful servant”
(Revelation 22:3)? Or
are you going to see all of your good works burned up as wood, hay and stubble as per 1
Corinthians 3:13? Why would that happen? Because you did the right thing, but you did it in the
wrong way. Is it right to pray? Yes. Is it right to give? Yes. Is there a right way to do it and a
wrong way to do it? Yes, anything you do for God while we are not filled with the Holy Spirit is
human good, anything. Any choir service, any giving, any testimony, any mission trip. If you are
not filled with the Holy Spirit, it’s human good, it’s wood, hay, and stubble. How would you
know for sure if you are filled with the Holy Spirit? You know you’re indwelt with the Holy
Spirit at salvation. You know you’re sealed with the Holy Spirit. You know that you’ve been told
to be filled with the Spirit and you know how to be filled with the Spirit. If you name any known
sin, God is faithful and just to forgive you, purify you from that sin and fill you with the Spirit (1
John 1:9). Is there unconfessed sin in your life? Because if there is you are not filled with the
Spirit. As long as you keep a short account, don’t wait to do it when you go to bed, if you keep a
short account of your sins you can be assured you are filled with the Holy Spirit all day long.
You will know immediately when you sin, when you choose in your volition to go against God’s
rules, go against God’s Word to do something you know is wrong, then you will know the Holy
Spirit will convict you, that you’re out of fellowship. You must confess it immediately. Does this
mean that this is a license to sin? No, it doesn’t mean that at all but it means that if you want to
grow up and get out of kindergarten, if you want to graduate from high school, if you want to get
into college using that school analogy again and become a graduate Christian, it’s going to take
560-Plain-Talk-About-the-Devils-World-transcript.pdf
you following the mandates of the Word of God. You must study, you must grow. Why should
you do this? Because our Lord said,
“Come unto Me all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I
will give you rest.”
He said,
“Take My yoke upon you and learn of Me. My yoke is easy and My
burden is light”
(Matthew 11:28-29), learn of Me. How much do you really know about Jesus
Christ our Lord and Savior? My pastor has been teaching a study in the life of Christ for over
800 hours. If you want to know something about Jesus Christ get into this study, but you’ve got
some catching up to do, over 800 hours we have been studying the life of Christ. We have not
even gotten to the crucifixion yet so there’s a lot to learn. There’s a lot to know. You will never
learn it in your entire lifetime, but if you’re going to be a graduate school believer, if you’re
going to be a believer with a PhD, if you’re going to be that believer that God could even use to
instruct other believers, you must grow up spiritually.
The Christian life is a supernatural life
and it requires a supernatural power to live it. With the filling of the Holy Spirit and the
living Word of God in your soul, your thinking begins to be renovated, changed, and this
brings on what the Bible calls divine viewpoint and a relaxed mental attitude.
You begin to
have an RMA, a relaxed mental attitude. What is this? This is using the faith-rest drill, problem-
solving device #3. When you have the faith-rest drill, when you can stand behind the promises of
God, then you are relaxed and there are over 7,000 promises found in the Bible. One of my
friends put many of these promises into a book called
Biblical Promises and Principles.
Contact
us if you want it. God’s promises are like cash in the bank. You cannot cash them if you don’t
know where they are, if you don’t know what they are. They are the shield that you stand behind.
They are your protection. They are what you can bring up to your Heavenly Father and say,
“God, you promised this. I claim this promise.” James 4:2 says,
“You have not because you ask
not.”
Don’t misunderstand, your Father is willing to give you many things but He’s not going to
give you something that will destroy you. He’s going to give you something that might glorify
Him and complement your life, but not something that will destroy you. So quit praying to win
the lottery. I know what you’re praying for and it’s not going to work because you couldn’t
handle it. I mean you’re going to wind up saying, “If I could just get that $60 million lottery, I’d
be happy.” No you wouldn’t. Unhappy people take their unhappiness with them wherever you go.
You’ll just be unhappy in more palatial circumstances but you’re still going to be unhappy
because money is not the key to happiness. You should remember this.
Jesus Christ said
“Happiness belongs to those people who hear My Father’s Word and who keep it”
(Luke
11:28).
That’s the secret to happiness. So as you grow in grace, using the school analogy as you
get through college and into graduate school, this means you’re choosing to change the way you
think. You’re learning the 10 problem-solving devices. You understand rebound. You understand
the filling of the Holy Spirit. You understand the faith-rest drill. You understand doctrinal
orientation and grace orientation. You understand the personal sense of destiny. You understand
personal love for God and impersonal love for others. You understand sharing the happiness of
God and occupation with Christ. Those are the 10 unique problem-solving devices and if you
know them and if you use them, if you learned them, then you can live an outstanding life in the
560-Plain-Talk-About-the-Devils-World-transcript.pdf
devil’s world, a supernatural life in the devil’s world. Not a life without temptation, no not a life
that guarantees you wealth and prosperity, but a life that guarantees you no fear, a life that
guarantees you no worry, a life that guarantees you no stress, a life that guarantees you complete
peace with God from knowing His Word, honoring His Word, living in His Word, by means of
the power of the Holy Spirit. Not living in guilt and shame and remorse because you drifted
under control of your sin nature and you found yourself in carnality. We live in the devil’s world.
If you, like me, read the paper, listen to the news, you see the devil making ground every day. I’m
afraid that our country the United States of America is changing quicker than we could have
imagined. We have become so obsessed with things that are so unnecessary. We spend so much
time and so much money fighting things that are goofy. Our society is changing. People are
worried and think some politician is going to cure it. Maybe if we could elect this guy or maybe
if we could elect that guy it will get better. Sure, I have my favorite politician but I know and you
know this too, that no man can change anything because the Bible says in Jeremiah 17:5,
“Cursed is the man that trusteth in man.”
There’s only one thing that can change this and that’s
you and me.
If we grow to be spiritually mature believers then we become part of the
anchor and the pivot that can deliver the nation.
But we’re not here to clean up the devil’s
world. See, this is what religious activism wants to do. Religious activism wants to clean up the
devil’s world. They want to shut down all the houses of ill repute and to make sure that there’s
nothing on television but G rated shows and on down the line. Well, it’s the devil’s world and
you’re not going to clean it up. People have sin natures and anybody you elect to the office of
president, vice president, has a sin nature also.
You’re not here to clean up the devil’s world,
that’s not your job. God will handle this. Your job is to
“Grow in the grace and the
knowledge of your Lord and Savior Jesus Christ”
(2 Peter 3:18).
If some Christian comes
around and says you need to get involved in politics and we need to clean up the devil’s world,
I’m just telling you it’s not going to work. If you will focus on your spiritual life, if you will
focus on growing in grace, if you will get under a well-qualified pastor and begin to study God’s
Word every day, take notes and go back over them to learn, you will deliver your nation. You
will do it because you will be part of the pivot. You will be the anchor. But if you get involved in
politics and you waste your energy and your time supporting some candidate that has a sin nature
that you think is going to turn things around, you’re kidding yourself. It won’t happen. The only
thing that will turn the course of history around for this nation, what we’re facing right now, is a
spiritual revival and the only way that’s going to happen is through some sort of awakening.
Right now I don’t see that awakening on hand. We’ll never see another evangelist like Billy
Graham or someone like that who held mass crusades and many, many people came to Christ. I
don’t know what you will see in the future as our country changes, as our attitude changes about
Christianity, and Christians begin to be demonized and marginalized in the devil’s world. Even in
the military, even in schools and institutions where it shouldn’t be, all of a sudden we find God
being forced out of the public venue. We find people that are looking for answers in the devil’s
world. There are no answers except the ones the devil gives and human solution are no solutions.
560-Plain-Talk-About-the-Devils-World-transcript.pdf
You want to have an impact? You want to be that man of God, the Gideon of your
generation? Then learn God’s Word and grow to spiritual maturity and you can have a
historical impact on your nation.
Your mission is not to stabilize American politics. Your
mission is to stabilize your spiritual life, to become a mature believer and to grow in the grace
and the knowledge of your Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. The only way you will ever deliver
America, the only thing that will ever get us back on track, is one believer at a time, reaching
spiritual maturity. One believer in Cheyenne. One believer in Tulsa. One believer in Grass
Valley. One believer in Houston. One believer in Jackson Mississippi, on and on where this radio
show is broadcast. When these types of believers surface, mature believers growing under the
ministry of a pastor, learning God’s Word, every day replicating the life of Christ, glorifying God
to the maximum, they will have an invisible impact in the devil’s world. This is why he fights
you so much. This is why he doesn’t want you to hear these things. This is why he doesn’t want
you to study your Bible. He’s not worried about you going to church and singing 97 verses of
Do
Lord
. He’s not worried about your emotional overload. He’s worried about you renovating your
thinking and beginning to acquire the mind of Christ. What do I mean by this? Philippians 2:5,
“Let this mind be in you that was also in Christ Jesus.”
Satan’s worried about you thinking
like Christ thought, learning divine viewpoint, beginning to use the faith-rest drill,
beginning to use the problem-solving devices, and becoming a part of the pivot, part of the
anchor that will hold this nation together.
As the pivot grows one person at a time, God’s hand
will keep this nation afloat. No pivot? We’re going down. As the storms of political unrest appear
on the horizon this is the answer, it always has been. This is the devil’s world. He’s not ever
going to leave it alone. See, we send out missionaries all over the world so what does Satan want
us to do? Shut us down, he doesn’t want missionaries going out all over the world. Now there are
some religions He doesn’t mind because they are not truth and so he will promote these things.
When you talk about Jesus Christ, the anointed Son of God, the King of kings and the Lord of
lords, that’s going to cause problems. Our Lord was crucified. He was put to death by criminals
who manipulated the charges against him, and then they turned on the disciples. Jesus warned
them, “You’re going to pick up your cross and follow Me and what happened to Me is going to
happen to you. When I’m gone, they are going to come after you.” How do you prepare to live in
the devil’s world? You need to put on the armor of God, Ephesians 6. You need to pick up the
shield of faith, the helmet of salvation, the sword of the Spirit, the belt of truth, the breastplate of
righteousness and put it on. If you don’t understand this, let me know. I’ll do everything I can to
help you.
You must decide. Will I have an impact in the devil’s world? Will I grow to
spiritual maturity? Will I put on the armor of God? Will I renovate my thinking and begin
to replicate the life of Christ?
Or will I just get to the sixth grade spiritually and drop out? If
you don’t grow spiritually you’re never going to have an impact in the devil’s world. I hope
you’re paying attention. These are critical times and we need you. This is your host Rick Hughes
saying thank you for listening to The FLOT Line.