Time Doesn’t Shout – Part 5
Transcript of FLOT Line Episode 607 aired on April 16, 2017
Good morning and welcome to The FLOT Line. I’m your host Rick Hughes and for the next few
minutes I’d like to ask you to stay with me. It’s going to be a time of motivation, inspiration,
education, and we always do this without any type of manipulation. We don’t try to hustle money.
We’re not asking you to join anything. We’re not trying to build a mailing list. We’re just simply
here to give you accurate information, hopefully information that will help you verify and
identify God’s plan for your life. If you can do this, then you have the freedom and the privilege
to orient and adjust to the plan. That’s my job, get it right, get it accurate, and give it to you in
such a way that it makes sense. Sometimes people tell me, “You didn’t tell me something I didn’t
already know, but you put it in a way I’ve never really heard it put before.” I don’t know what
this means except this is the way God gives me the ability to explain the Scripture to you. Just
like you, I must stay filled with the Holy Spirit. Just like you, I must grow every day in God’s
Word. Just like you, I have a spiritual gift. My spiritual gift is the gift of evangelism, yours may
be a different spiritual gift. Some people have the gift of giving. Some people have the gift of
helps. Some people have the gift of mercy. Some people actually have the gift of pastor-teacher. I
don’t know what your spiritual gift is, it’s not necessary for you to know it right now. I remember
when I discovered exactly what my gift was, what God had equipped me to do, why He left me
here, what my mission in life was. It is an exciting thing when you really understand this. We call
this a personal sense of destiny. It is a tremendous problem-solving device. Once you walk
through the door of your personal sense of destiny, you leave your agenda behind, and for the
first time you live your life on God’s agenda. What is it God left you here to do? What does God
want you to do? This is a question you should be able to answer because we only have so much
time on this sin infested planet. While we’re here it is critical as humans that we adhere to certain
principles, certain concepts that are related to time as we live in time. If we hope to have
happiness while we travel through this sin infested planet we have to learn some things and this
is why we started teaching you these concepts that we went through on what time is it. We’re
dealing with the series on time. We’ve been doing a series of studies on time and I intended to
highlight several things that were necessary for you to make the most of your time that God gave
you in Phase 2 Time. Phase 1,
“Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved”
(Acts
16:31), this is the time that you get saved. Phase 2 is what you do after you get saved. What’s my
life about? Where am I suppose to live? What am I suppose to do? What am I suppose to think?
Then Phase 3 is eternity where there is
“No more tears, no more pain, no more sorrow. The old
things are passed away”
(Revelation 21:4). We’re not in Phase 3 yet. You’re listening, I’m
talking, so we’re still here but in this Phase 2 situation, we’ve talked about being punctual. We’ve
talked about having patience. We’ve talked about what is a priority in your life. We’ve talked
about what’s prudent or faithfulness. We’ve talked about your perspective in life. Then we got
into talking about God’s perspective. And as far as Paul was concerned, I gave you a verse last
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week. We talked about Paul’s perspective and this is what Paul said if I look back at my notes. In
Philippians 3:8 he said,
“I count everything but loss except for the excellency of the knowledge of
Christ Jesus my Lord
[it’s all worthless].
For whom I’ve suffered the loss of all things. I count
everything but dung that I may win Christ.”
If I put it in a different translation called God’s Word
Translation, it says,
“It’s far more than that. I consider everything else worthless. I’m much better
off knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. It’s because of Him that I think of everything as worthless. I
threw it all away in order to gain Christ.”
In Paul’s perspective, and remember Paul wrote over
half of the New Testament, self-confidence meant nothing. He lists what he could be confident in
if you wanted to and you have things in your life that give you new confidence. You could say,
“Well I’ve been a great church member and I’ve never missed church. I’ve been this, I’ve been
that. I’ve been a great, faithful tither. I have been faithful to raise my kids right. I’ve been faithful
to do this and do that.” We all have things that we’re proud of. We all have things that we think
would make us impressive to God. Some people say, “I’ve never smoked, I never drank, I’ve read
the Bible through every year.” Is God impressed with these things? Well, some of them are
certainly honorable things but listen to what Paul said.
“All these things in my past
[and he is
talking about the religious things that he had as he was raised to be a Pharisee],
I was
circumcised on the eighth day out of the stock of Israel from the tribe of Benjamin. I am a
Hebrew of all Hebrews and as touching the law, I’m a Pharisee”
(Philippians 3:4-5). These are
the people that gave the Lord Jesus Christ the biggest headache that He’s ever seen. As a matter
fact in Matthew 23:33 He called them snakes and vipers. He had eight woes that He gave on
those Pharisees and scribes. You should read it and see because these were the people who
plotted his death. These were the ones that hated Him even though He came and He was God in
the flesh, and even though He demonstrated this by the miracles that He did, they hated Him.
They assassinated Him. They plotted His death. He told the disciples they were going to do this
and He told Jerusalem that He wept over Jerusalem. He said,
“I wish you could come to Me like
chicks to a hen, but you’ve walked away, you’ve rejected Me”
(Matthew 23:37). It was 40 years
later that Jerusalem was in fact destroyed under Titus, the Roman emperor in 70 A.D. Here is a
Pharisee, a self-righteous man, in Philippians 3:5-6,
“Concerning zeal I even persecuted the
early church
[he was there when they stoned Stephen],
concerning righteousness which is in the
Law, I was blameless
[in other words, I never violated the law at all].
I was circumcised the
eighth day
[this is infant baptism I guess].” “I obeyed all the laws [this is a moral, do-gooder]. I
had zeal for God.” This means he was very zealous, it doesn’t mean he was accurate but he was
zealous and this is a tragedy. I’ve met a lot of zealous Christians in my life, people that are really,
“fired up for Jesus.” Have you ever met those sorts of people? “Hello brother,” I mean they are
so fired up for Jesus it’s scary, but they’re not accurate. Many of them are not accurate.
The
spiritual life must be presented accurately and you don’t live it on the basis of emotion.
You
don’t run around all day long, “Hello brother, hello sister, it’s so great to see you. What a
wonderful day. Praise the Lord, amen, hallelujah.” Remember Apollos in Acts 18:24-28. He was
a very zealous preacher but he was not an accurate preacher. He was preaching John’s baptism,
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he was not even aware that Christ had come and been crucified and resurrected. Aquila and
Priscilla had to pull him off to the side and it says,
“They expounded unto him the way of God
more perfectly.”
Here is the principle. It’s entirely possible to have zeal for the Lord Jesus Christ
but to have inaccurate information regarding the spiritual life. Why is this possible? Because
Satan assaults truth on a daily basis. Here’s what he wants to do. He wants to mislead you. If he
can mislead you by misinforming you, then you would be misguided and you will misrepresent
the plan of God to those that you come in contact with.
Misrepresenting the plan of God is a
dangerous thing because when you presume to speak for God, when you presume to tell
someone this is the way the Bible says you should do it and if it’s not right and it’s not
accurate, you are misrepresenting God and misleading people.
This is what Satan never stops
doing 1. Satan assaults truth on a daily basis. 2. He never stops trying to lure you away from
truth by distracting you with issues that are nonessential, unimportant. 3. You must review your
perspective if you want to be an effective witness for Jesus Christ. This means, are you
accurately representing Him to the world? I was talking to a friend of mine the other day while
we were fishing and he is a fairly young Christian. He’s excited about going to his church and we
were talking about some things. I just stopped the boat and I looked at him and I said, “Now let’s
assume I’m one of your friends and I’m not a Christian. I come to you and I tell you that I would
like to be saved like you are. Can you tell me how to be saved?” You won’t believe what he said.
He said to me, “Well, the first thing is you have to repent of your sins. You have to go to God and
admit your sins.” This is not correct. My sins were paid for on the cross. Your sins were paid for
on the cross.
Our sins are not the issue in our salvation. Our sins have already been paid for
on the cross.
What exactly is the issue? Let’s go back to John 3:16.
“God so loved the world that
He gave His only begotten Son so that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have
everlasting life.”
What does 1 John 5:1 say?
“He that believes that Jesus is the Christ is born of
God.”
What does Acts 16:38 say?
“Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved.”
The issue is always this,
“He that believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life”
and
“He that believes not, the wrath of God abides on him already”
(John 3:18).
The issue is
what do you think about Christ?
Do you believe that Jesus Christ is the anointed Son of God?
Do you believe this? I asked a young man this one time. “Do you believe Jesus Christ is the
anointed Son of God?” And he looked at me and he said, “Well, I don’t know how you could
rightly believe this.” This man was not saved. He is not a Christian. If you asked someone what
does it take to be saved? The answer should be simply, “I believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of
God and I willingly accept Him as my Savior.” What is He saving me from? Well, He’s paid for
my sin. He went to the cross and died for me. My judgment has been paid. God judged Him,
“He
that knew no sin was made sin for us so that we could be made the righteousness of God through
Him”
(2 Corinthians 5:21). If I want to be saved, I don’t have to repent of my sin. I know I’m a
sinner. I know I’ve been sinful. I simply go to the Savior and as Romans 10:13 says,
“Whosoever
shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved.”
I go to the Savior and express my faith in
prayer and I simply say, “Father, I believe Jesus Christ is Your Son and I am willing to accept
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Him as my Savior.” Some people add, “And make Him my Lord.” You can’t make Christ Lord,
He is already the Lord. What you’re simply saying is I want to follow Him. I want obey Him. I
want to be His disciple, His learner. I want to learn His Word. Well, that’s good, that is what you
should do. When I asked this person this question, he wasn’t accurate and so we talked a little bit
about it. He understood this and then I asked him the second question. “Let’s assume I am a
Christian and I want to be a good Christian, what should I do to be a good Christian?” The
answer again was wrong. “Well you should do this and do that and do this and do that.” By the
time the list runs out, I would go crazy trying to do everything because I know I couldn’t do all
these things. What he didn’t tell me, he didn’t mention to me was that first of all, you have to
learn how to be filled with the Holy Spirit.
The first problem-solving device you must ever
learn is you still have a sin nature, you will commit sin, and you have to learn how to deal
with this sin because when you sin, you quench God the Holy Spirit and you grieve God the
Holy Spirit. You break fellowship with God in time, so God gave you a way to be cleansed.
This is simply if you go to 1 John 1:9 where it says,
“If we confess our sin, He is faithful and just
to forgive us of our sin and purify us from all of our wrongdoing.”
That’s the way it goes.
If you
want to be filled with the Spirit you cannot have unconfessed sin in your life because if you
do, then you are out of fellowship with God and you cannot grow as a Christian.
Think
about the letter Z in your mind, picture Z for Zorro. Remember this, that the pastor
communicates the Word of God to you, this is the first part of the letter Z. If you go across the
top part of the Z, the Holy Spirit will capture what the pastor communicates. Now, if He’s not in
control of your life because you have unconfessed sin in your life, He can’t capture anything
because He’s quenched and He’s grieved. If He’s not quenched and grieved because you’ve dealt
with any known sin in your life, then once He captures it, He can bring it to your mind where
you comprehend it. That’s not all of it. This is the bottom part of the Z, now let’s go across the
bottom part of the Z. Once you comprehend it, then you have to comply with the information. So
this is the process for living the Christian life. The pastor communicates the Word of God, the
Holy Spirit captures it, you comprehend it and you comply.
As you grow, you learn to live like
Christ. The first thing you learn to live then is think a different way, to think in terms of
divine viewpoint and not human viewpoint.
This means,
“Let this mind be in you that was also
in Christ Jesus”
(Philippians 2:5). Romans 12:3,
“Stop thinking of yourself in terms of
arrogance beyond what you should think.”
God has a new way He wants you to think. He has
a new way He wants you to live. He wants you to live under grace and Biblical orientation.
He wants you to live under grace orientation and doctrinal orientation so that you begin to
exploit grace, you begin to live in grace, share grace, and you begin to study the Scripture
earnestly on a daily basis. Anyhow, it’s not that complicated but if you tell me, “Well, you know,
you’ve got to go to church every Sunday.” Okay, I’ll do that. “You’ve got to pray every day.”
Okay, I’ll do that. “You have to read your Bible every day.” Okay, I’ll do that. “Then you can’t sin
you know.” Okay, what’s sin? Is eating an apple a sin? “Oh, eating an apple is sin.” What about
oranges? “Oh, you can’t eat oranges either,” and so you got all these little sins you can’t do out
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here that are not in the Bible by the way. They are just sins that somebody doesn’t like so they
throw them at you. Before long, you’ve got about 15 things you’ve got to do to be a good
Christian. This is not the Christian life. There is only one thing you’ve got to do, this is to stay
filled with the Holy Spirit. As you’re filled with the Holy Spirit then you will obey the mandate
to,
“Grow in the grace and the knowledge of your Lord and Savior Jesus Christ”
(2 Peter 3:18).
Do you want to be a good Christian? Stay filled with the Spirit, get under the ministry of a
well-qualified pastor, listen to God’s Word, and grow up. Apply what you learn.
What you
comprehend, you comply with. You have got to review your perspective if you want to be an
effective witness for Christ so that you can accurately represent Him to the world. You don’t
want to tell somebody, “Do you want to be saved?” “Yeah, I’d like to be saved. I’d like to go to
heaven.” “Okay, now here’s what you’ve got to do. You’ve got to confess all your sins to God,
invite Jesus into your heart, repent of your sins,” and nobody can do all this stuff. This is not
what the Bible says. It’s simply,
“Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved.”
Is
He the Son of God or is He not? Are you willing to accept Him as your Savior or are you not?
It’s this simple. How do you accept Him?
“Whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall
be saved.”
What am I suppose to believe?
“He that believes that Jesus is the Christ is born of
God”
(1 John 5:1). It’s this simple. When it happens, what am I suppose to do?
“Grow in the
grace and knowledge of my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.”
I’m to be filled with the Holy Spirit
(Ephesians 5:18). Once we do these things, then we begin to effectively represent Christ to the
devil’s world and you are dangerous. Satan won’t like you for this. You have to reinstitute your
affections too by the way, get your affections right. What’s your number one priority in your life?
This is my question for you today. Here’s what Mark 12:30 says, or Deuteronomy 6:5 where it
came from,
“Love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind,
and with all your strength.”
This is where your priority has to be, personal love for God. You
can’t love Him if you don’t know Him. Personal love for God you see is the motivation that
causes you to be obedient. Personal love for God is motivational virtue in your life. 1 John 5:3,
here’s a test, you want to see it?
“This is the love of God, that we keep His mandates and His
mandates are not a burden.”
If you love God you will obey God.
You obey God because you
love Him, you don’t want to disappoint Him. You love Him and you’re going to do everything
you can to have His blessing and to hear Him say, “Well done.” In John 14:15 Jesus said,
“If you
love Me, you will keep My mandates.”
One of the great problems in the church at Ephesus in
Revelation 2:1-4 was this very thing. The Lord Jesus Christ said,
“The One who holds the seven
stars in His right hand, the One who walks among the seven golden lampstands says this.”
That’s Christ, He is speaking. He speaks to the church at Ephesus and to the pastor of the church
at Ephesus. Listen to His words,
“I know your deeds, your toil, and your patience, and that you
cannot tolerate evil men, and you put to test those who call themselves apostles but they’re not
and you found them to be false; and you have patience and you have endured for My namesake
and you’ve not grown weary. But I have this against you, you left your first love.”
See, here is a
letter of commendation but here’s a point of condemnation,
“You left your first love,”
the
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motivation for why you do what you do. Listen to me today. Do you really love God? Because if
you really love God and you really appreciate God, you wouldn’t do what you’re doing right now.
You wouldn’t allow yourself to be sucked into what you’ve allowed yourself to get into. You
would go to your Father right now and you would admit your sin. You would tell Him exactly
what’s going on in your life and He will be faithful and just to forgive you. You will find out
where you can start getting some answers to why you do what you do and how you stop doing
what you do and how you can grow in the grace and the knowledge of the Lord and Savior Jesus
Christ. I can help you with these answers. I can give you information that will help you but I
can’t give it to you if I don’t hear from you, so keep this in mind. John now was directed to write
to the pastor of the church at Ephesus and those were the words of the Lord. This is a perfect
picture of how God’s omniscience controls the direction in which the pastor leads his
congregation. He’s directing him. “Wait a minute. You are doing all these things, all the right
things but you’re doing them for the wrong reasons.” See, this is how the Lord Jesus Christ
oversees and protects His body of believers called the Church. They are commended for their
hard work but they are condemned for their lack of love. Their issue that they had to deal with
wasn’t their skills. It was their motivation. Personal love for God should be your motivation for
everything that you do. Paul warned pastors and believers in Ephesus way before this was
written to be aware of the wolves, the canine clergy that would attack them as soon as Paul left
town. Listen to what he said in Acts 20:29.
“I know this, that after my departing shall grievous
wolves enter in among you, and they won’t spare the flock.”
Their condemnation was not the lack
of faith or trust but the lack of occupation with Jesus Christ, this was the condemnation. They
were not occupied with Christ. Listen to 1 Peter 1:8,
“Even though you have not seen Him, you
love Him
[this is occupation with Christ]
and though you do not see Him now, but you believe in
Him, you greatly rejoice with inexpressible happiness and full of glory.”
These are the mandates,
to be occupied with Christ, to love Him. Hebrews 12:2
, “Concentrate on Jesus, the author and
the perfecter of our doctrine, who for the exhibited happiness He endured the cross and
disregarded the shame and sat down at the right hand of the Father.”
Do you want to focus on
something? Do you want to make something a priority in your life? Be concentrating on Jesus
Christ, the author and the perfecter of our salvation.
You concentrate on Christ by staying
filled with the Spirit and learning God’s Word.
My very own pastor has been teaching a study
on the life of Christ. I would encourage you to get the study. By the way, we’re up to 1,000
hours, that’s right, 1,000 hours in the life of Christ. You say, “How can anybody study the life of
Christ for 1,000 hours?” Get the tapes, listen, you’ll see. You will learn so much like I have
learned. If you’re occupied with Christ, you must know what He thought, what He did, where He
went, who He was, why He did these things. In 1 Peter 3:15,
“Sanctify
[or set apart as more
important than anything else]
the Lord Jesus Christ in your hearts.”
God makes a direct, positive
demand for you, a demand on your volition to be occupied with Christ. It’s a mandate to be
consistent in the intake and the metabolization of His Word. Be occupied with Christ, set Him
apart.
When you choose to be occupied with Christ, it takes precedence over occupying
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yourself with people.
It takes precedence over being occupied with circumstances because
Christian fellowship is no substitute for occupation with Christ. Hence, you can have all the
social interaction with Christians you want but it’s never a substitute for learning Bible doctrine
in your life.
This is the most critical thing for you, to be occupied with Christ, to have your
priorities in order so that while you are here in the devil’s world, then you’re going to be
doing the right thing in the right way.
Remember this, God’s protocol plan demands a right
thing be done in a right way. A right thing done in a wrong way is still obviously wrong but a
right thing done in the right way, that’ll get you, “Howdy, well done My good and My faithful
servant.” Until next week, I hope you’ll come back and I hope you keep listening, but until next
week, I’m your host Rick Hughes saying thank you for listening to The FLOT Line