In this episode of The Flatline, Rick Hughes delves into the importance of possessing the right attitude for spiritual victory. He explores Hebrews 12, discussing how Christians are likened to competitors in a race, surrounded by a ‘cloud of witnesses.’ The episode teaches us about ridding ourselves of distractions and sinful entanglements as we strive toward spiritual growth and maturity.
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.
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good morning and welcome to the flatline i’m your host rick hughes and for the next few minutes stay with me it won’t be long just about 30 minutes of motivation inspiration some education and no absolutely none manipulation that’s right we don’t try to manipulate people we’re not going to ask you for money we’re not going to try to sell you anything we just want to give you some information hopefully the information will help you verify and identify god’s plan for your life And if that’s true, you can orient and adjust to the plan if you’d like to do so. My job is to be accurate and to get it to you without charge. And so thank you for listening. Thank you for being a part of the show. Thank you for the many of you that have written to me and told you how this show has changed the direction of your life. I’m very honored for that, and thank you so very much for your contributions and gifts that help us stay on the air. And so today, we have a lot to talk about, but let me remind you of our book, God’s Grace in Aging. God’s Grace in Aging, our latest book, and I think if you’re over 50, you probably need this book. But it deals with how God will support you in your later days and what he can expect out of you in your later days. Please take advantage of that by going to the website and ordering God’s Grace and Aging or any of the other books that we have available there. They’re all free of charge. Or you can always call us at 800-831-0718. That’s up to you. But thank you for letting me be on the air 15 years, more years now. This is show 962. and we’re broadcasting over a hundred radio stations across america this morning we’ll talk about the winners attitude today the winners attitude i want you to be a winner spiritually not physically but spiritually but the bible has a lot to say about that so let’s start out with hebrews twelve verse one hebrews chapter twelve verse one let me read it to you please it says therefore Since we’re surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders us and the sin that so easily entangles us, and let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us. There is a lot of controversy about who actually wrote this epistle and whom it was actually written to, but there’s no doubt this epistle is inspired by the Holy Spirit and greatly respected in the body of Christ. And notice the human author, whoever he was, uses the analogy of the Christian life and running in a race. And he also states that we are being observed as we compete in that race. The author demands that Christians like you and I, we get rid of those things that distract us from finishing the race. And if you’re like me, you may be getting near the finish line. Those of you that have rounded the clock at 70 and headed to 80, maybe you’re getting near the finish line and you want to complete the race. So please allow me to break this verse down for you, much like a well-qualified pastor would do if he, in fact, were the one teaching this passage to you. We start off this verse with, therefore, it’s a particle. And toy garoon, toy garoon is the Greek word. I know it doesn’t mean much to you, but it actually means consequently or for this reason or therefore. This particle introduces a conclusion, and he’s just finished writing about the great faith heroes in the Old Testament. He started in chapter 11, speaking of Abel, who was a righteous man in God’s eyes that was murdered by his brother Cain. Then he highlighted Enoch, who lived by faith. He highlighted Noah, who delivered his entire family, and Abraham, the father of the Jews. Remember, Abraham was told to trust God for a child even though he and Sarah were quite old. Many Old Testament heroes, he showed how simple faith in God is a choice that we must all make. We must all decide to reject the pleasures of this world which can bring disgrace and count on the promises of God which can bring victory over the plan of Satan and essentially bring much glory to God by your decision. So when the writer of this book gets to Hebrews chapter 12, he’s saying to us that we are being watched to see how we are handling the race. I don’t know if you ever thought about that, but we are being watched to see how we’re handling the race. Now, don’t mistake this for thinking that your grandpa’s up there watching you or your aunt or your uncle’s watching you or your mom or your dad’s watching you. That’s not what it’s talking about. He says, a great cloud. Did you get that? We’re surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses. The great cloud is the Greek word toisoutos nephos. And that means a large quantity, indicating a great amount of people, a multitude of people. Followed by nephos, meaning a mass of, nephos is the Greek word, meaning a mass or a vapor of definite size and shape like a cloud. Some people believe it refers to saints who have died and are now represented as spectators sitting in the stands watching you and I. Spectators who watch from heaven, those believers who are surviving on the earth. But I assume you realize this, and let me just remind you, the government is always watching you. Everything you do is being watched. Cameras in stores, cameras on the highway, internet monitoring of the sites that you visit. Even your neighbors who have binoculars may be watching you. I’m reminded of a story of two friends of mine who lived on the lake and had a big picture glass window with one of those big fancy telescopes you can look at the moon with, and they were looking across the lake and another house on the other side, and lo and behold, the guy on the other side of the lake had one too, and he was looking at them at the same time. So we’re always being watched, but according to this passage of scripture, our actions are being observed by an angelic host that God created. Listen to 1 Peter 1.12, and this talks about the mystery. To them it was revealed that, not to themselves, but to us, that they were ministering the things which now have been reported to you through those who have preached the gospel to you by the Holy Spirit sent from heaven, the things which angels desire to look into. Angels learn from you. They watch you. They learn how you live. They learn the problem-solving devices from you. They’re watching to see how you handle this. The Bible confirms that angelic beings are watching us Christians as we carry out our day-to-day activities. Did you know that? In 1 Corinthians 4, 9, “…for I think that God has set forth us, the apostles, last.” as it were appointed to death, for we are made a spectacle unto the world and unto angels and to men. So there it is. Angels are watching our activities. Men are watching our activities, the world. We are being observed. And of course, God the Father always has an eye on us. Someone once said the word spectacle is one of an arena or a theater. Where I just read to you, God has made us a spectacle into the world. In 1 Corinthians 4 and 9, well, angels observe our activities. They see our sufferings for the gospel’s sake. They hear our voices when we read God’s word aloud. Now, they’re not omniscient. They can’t read your mind. Neither can Satan. He doesn’t have the ability to read your thoughts. Only God can do that. So anyhow, these angels, we cannot see them, but they can see us. And by watching us and listening to us, the angels better understand God’s word, especially what we call the dispensation of grace. And I took that statement from a man named Sean Brasseau who wrote that statement. Someone once said the word spectacle is one of the arena of theater, angels observing our activities. So Paul charged Timothy with these very words in 1 Timothy 5, 21. Here was his charge to Timothy. I charge you before God and before the Lord Jesus Christ and before the elect angels that you observe these things without preferring one another before another, doing nothing by partiality. In other words, don’t take favors of people. So here Paul himself says God’s watching, the Lord Jesus Christ is watching, and the elect angels are watching. What are they watching? Well, the mystery doctrine of the church. The mystery doctrine of the church was unknown to angels in eternity past. They didn’t know about this. But it’s now revealed by the Apostle Paul and demonstrated in your life and my life as we are members of the body of Christ. The mystery doctrine of the church. Listen to Romans 16, 25. now to him who’s able to establish you according to my gospel and the preaching of jesus christ according to the revelation of the mystery that was kept secret since the world began but now is made manifest by the prophetic scriptures the main node made known to all nations There it is right there. Scriptures made known to all nations according to the commandment of the everlasting God for obedience to the faith. What’s he talking about? The mystery doctrine of the church. The revelation of the mystery kept sacred since the world began. The angels didn’t know this. They had no idea what I’m about to tell you and they’re learning it by watching you. That word mystery refers to the doctrines for the great power experiment of the church age. We live in the church age and it’s called a mystery because it was never revealed in Old Testament times, but it’s been revealed to you, it’s been revealed to me, and we live in the church age and we enjoy this mystery doctrine. In 1 Corinthians 2, 7, but we communicate God’s wisdom in a mystery that was the hidden assets which God predestined, listen now carefully, before the ages for the purpose of our glory. This is something God determined in eternity past. And now Paul is communicating that mystery of the hidden assets that God has made available to us. In 1 Timothy 3.9, with a pure conscience, keep holding the mystery Even the church age doctrine, this is what charge that he gave to Timothy as he pastored there in Ephesus. So the hidden mystery, the mystery is what? What do you think that mystery is? The mystery is that the tabernacle of the Old Testament where the Shekinah glory resided is now in the body of the New Testament believer. The Shekinah glory of the Old Testament, whom was the Lord Jesus Christ, now dwells in the body of the New Testament believer. 1 Corinthians 3, 16 and 17 tells you this. Do you not know that you are now the temple of God and the Spirit of God dwells in you? So if anyone defiles the temple of God, God will destroy him. For the temple of God is holy in which temple you are. The tabernacle in the wilderness was a very sacred place. Only the holy of holies could only be entered by Moses himself or by the high priest to make atonement for the sins of the people. Two of Aaron’s sons snuck into the temple and lifted the veil and went in with strange light and they both died on the spot. God doesn’t play around, and you are the temple of God. You are the temple of God. The Holy Spirit resides in you, Ephesians 1.13. The Lord Jesus Christ lives in you. Christ in you, the hope of glory. And you cannot afford to defile the temple of God with sin and strange light, which is false doctrine. It’s no wonder we’re being observed by the angelic host. Because they themselves don’t partake of this amazing indwelling. They are not royal family of God, but you certainly are. You are the royal family of God. So if you truly wish to glorify God, then you will press on to be a spiritually mature believer, going through whatever suffering for blessing you’ll face, having a personal and national as well as an international impact for the Lord Jesus Christ. If you really want to glorify God, You have to press on. Why? Because you’re being observed. You’re being watched. You’re being monitored by the angels to see how you handle this. A great cloud of witnesses are watching you every day. Every decision you make is that glorifying the Lord Jesus Christ. We are surrounded by a great cloud of witnesses. So the Bible says in Hebrews 12, 1, let us throw off everything that hinders us and the sin which easily entangles us. All of us have a sin nature. All of us have a lust pattern. And there are certain lusts that we give in to and we fail. Thank goodness we can rebound. Thank goodness we can confess the sin to God. And he’s faithful and just to forgive us of our sin. Where you get in trouble is when you let your sin nature get out of control and you don’t confess your sin, then you wind up under discipline, warning discipline, intense discipline, and sometimes even dying discipline, Hebrews 12, six and seven. So this mystery doctrine of the church is an amazing thing. Christ in you, the hope of glory. We are the temple of God. We are royal family. If you really wish to glorify God, press on to spiritual maturity because as a mature believer, you will have an angelic impact. You will demonstrate to the angelic host of heaven the amazing power of God’s unique plan for this church age, the body of Christ. So Hebrews 12, one again, let us run this race with endurance. With endurance, the race that is set before us. That deals with your life. There are a lot of discouraging things that happen along the way, but with the 10 problem-solving devices in your soul, you can keep the outside sources of adversity from ever becoming the inside source of stress. You can do that. You can fall down and get up. You can make mistakes and recover. You can rebound your sin and get back in the race. Keep going. Don’t quit. No angelic observer has the feeling of the Holy Spirit. You do. They don’t. God’s assets for us in this race are unbelievable. I mean, we have a Bible. We have the Word of God. The Word of God is alive and powerful, sharper than a two-edged sword, the Bible says. We have the Bible. We have God’s recorded instruction preserved for us today. We have a priesthood that allows us to go directly to God in our prayers, confessing our own sins. We don’t need to confess them to a priest. We are a priest. We are believer priests. So we can pray and rebound our sin. We can pray prayers of adoration, thanking God for his wonderful grace. We can pray prayers of intercession, praying for other people. And we can pray prayers of supplication as we pray for ourself. Also 10 amazing problem solving devices that we call the flat light on your soul. No angelic observer that watches you has any of this. They didn’t have the Bible, you do. They didn’t have the priesthood, you do. They didn’t have the 10 prophesying devices, you do. So God’s provisions for us demand, demand. And this is where it’s gonna get a little sticky here. We have to follow protocol. We have to do the right thing in the right way. We have to do the right thing in the right way. And it should be taught to you by your pastor whose job it is to explain it to you. if in fact he even knows what it is. But once you learn how to sustain your spiritual growth, then you can produce divine good, which is rewardable in eternity. 1 Corinthians 3, 11 through 16 talks about wood, hay, and stubble, and gold, silver, and precious stones. What does that refer to? Well, the wood, hay, and stubble is all the human good you do as a Christian. Things you did for God while you were out of fellowship. The money you gave, the songs you sang, the visits you made, the church you attended while you had unconfessed sin in your life and the Holy Spirit was quenched and grieved. Yes, you did a right thing, but you did it in the wrong way and it’s not rewardable. But when you’re filled with the Holy Spirit, as Ephesians 5.18 says, then these things are rewardable and they’re called gold, silver, and precious stones because they glorify God to the maximum. So the wood, hay, and stubble are the good deeds the Christian does while out of fellowship. And the gold, silver, and precious stones are the good deeds the Christian does while he’s in fellowship. And that’s your choice. You have to know the protocol plan of God. So spiritual growth is important for you. If you’re going to sustain your spiritual growth, if you’re going to learn how to live your Christian life, if you’re going to produce rewardable good in eternity, You must lay aside those things that distract you. Again, Hebrews 12, 1. Therefore, since we’re surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off, get rid of, walk away from everything that hinders us. and the sin that so easily entangles us. We have a sin nature, we have a lust pattern. You know what yours is, I know what mine is, and when we fail, it’s because we give in to the lust of the flesh. Whether it’s power lust, approbation lust, sex lust, alcohol lust, drug lust, whatever it is, whenever that lust pattern surfaces, Satan will feed it to the best of his ability to get you to turn on the Lord and let your sin nature control your life so we are mandated to turn away from it throw it away walk out of it because it entangles us it gets us confused and let’s run with perseverance and be consistent the race marked out for us that’s our lifestyle whatever god’s put in your life you have to press on and be consistent our motivation to succeed Why would we do this? It’s found in the very next verse, found in Hebrews 12, 2. Looking unto Jesus. Do you hear that? Looking unto Jesus, the author and the finisher of our faith, who for the joy that was said before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. That’s the Lord Jesus Christ. This is your motivation to press on in the race and to get rid of the fleshly things that entangle you. Hebrews 12.2 is referring to the occupation with the Lord Jesus Christ whom we know as problem solving device number 10, occupation with Christ. Do you know those 10 problem solving devices? Do you have a list of them in your Bible? If not, we have a bookmark that’s got every one of them there. Rebound, the filling of the Holy Spirit, the faith rest drill, grace orientation, biblical orientation, personal sense of destiny, personal love for God, motivational virtue, impersonal love for all, functional virtue, sharing the happiness of God and occupation with Christ. this is talking about looking unto the lord jesus christ the author and finisher of our faith occupied with christ put your eyes on him being occupied with christ and how does that happen well first john 5 3 this is the love of god that we keep his mandates and they’re not hard do you really love god do you love god really then this is what you can do you can walk away from the entanglements of the flesh This is the love of God that we keep his mandates. And what are the mandates? I just read it to you, Hebrews 12, 1. We’re surrounded by witnesses that are watching us. Let us throw aside anything that hinders us and any sin that easily entangles us and run with perseverance. Don’t quit. Press on. Occupation with Christ is critical for you and I. The scriptures record the mental attitude of our Lord Jesus Christ during his earthly ministry. And you and I are mandated to have that same sort of attitude. You want me to remind you of that? Philippians 2, 5. Let this mind be in you that was also in Christ Jesus. That’s divine thinking. That’s mental attitude thinking. Divine mental attitude thinking. God wants you to think like the Lord Jesus Christ thinks. In other words, the Bible says, as a man thinketh in his heart, so he is. When you have divine viewpoint, you’re thinking like Christ thought. You’re orienting to the scriptures. You’re using your father’s word like he did when he was confronted by Satan in Matthew 4. He quoted scripture, quoted scripture, quoted scripture, and Satan left him alone. This is your strength. This is your occupation with Christ. If you love him, you will obey him. And he is laying this out for us right here. Here’s the interesting thing. Our Lord Jesus Christ used the same faith rest drill that you and I use. The same faith he trusted his father with, you have the opportunity to do the same thing. Here’s his faith rest. Listen to it. Luke 22, 42. Father, if it is your will, take this cup away from me. Nevertheless, not my will, but yours be done. That’s trusting the Lord with the circumstances that he now faced. He didn’t relish going to the cross, but he knew that the Father expected him to do it, and he did it. You might not relish what’s in your life. You might not relish what you’re going through with some disease or some difficulty. But if the Lord allows it, press on. Don’t quit. Stand by faith and know that God has not deserted you. He’s not going to throw you under the bus. He hasn’t turned his back on you. He loves you. Don’t be discouraged. Don’t be full of fear. Don’t be intimidated by the circumstances. As Moses told the Jews looking at the Red Sea, stand still and watch what God’s about to do for you. So you have to answer these questions yourself. Whose will are you going to follow? Your own? Are you gonna follow your own personal desires? Are you gonna do what God asks you to do? I promise you it’s easy to compromise. It’s easy to substitute. It’s easy to convince yourself that you’re doing the right thing, but many misguided believers insist on running a race that they were never even called to run. Like the policeman who wants to be the preacher, the pastor who wants to be the evangelist, the evangelist who wants to be the sports hero thinking he could use it as a platform to proclaim the gospel. Wasted energy, wasted time, due to what? Unrealistic self-image and some impetuous attitude. You must enter the correct race that God has set out for you. And you must step away from the besetting sin that’ll trip you up. And you must run patiently. And you must keep your eyes on the Lord Jesus Christ. So before we wrap up today, let’s go back one more time and take a look at that verse we started with. Hebrews 12, one is critical for us today. That we are being observed. We’re being watched. We’re being surrounded. by a great cloud of angelic witnesses. Let us throw off, take it off, get rid of it, everything that hinders us. Hinders you from doing what? Being obedient. Hinders you from obeying God. Hinders you from studying the Word of God on a daily basis. Hinders you from staying filled with the Holy Spirit. Hinders you from following God’s plan for your life. There’s a lot of things that will hinder you and they have a reason. Satan’s very good about this. Very good at distracting you and discouraging you. So throw off anything that hinders you. And the number one sin that so easily entangles you, there’s two different things here, distractions and sin. Some things distract you and some things are sin. Get rid of them and let’s run with perseverance the race marked out for us. To be consistent, to be solid, to be sound. to be the believer that God can count on in circumstances. You know, Gideon had a lot of people to defeat the Midianite army, but God said, I only need about 300. I just need a few well-qualified believers, and that’s what God’s looking for today. You’ve heard me talk about you being a member of the pivot, about God looking for well-qualified believers, and I want you to be that person. I want you to be the one that God can count on. I want you to be the one that perseveres in your race and doesn’t quit, doesn’t get distracted. And remember that you’re being observed at all times and angels are watching you because you have assets they never had. You have abilities they don’t possess. You have the indwelling of the Holy Spirit. You have the indwelling of the Lord Jesus Christ. You have the canon of scripture. You have all these things they didn’t have and they are learning, watching you. And when you get to heaven, you’re not going to be an angel. You’re going to be royal family of God as you are now. You’ll be higher than angels. So keep that in mind. You are being observed. You’re being watched, not only by the angels, but by God the Father himself. So press on. Don’t quit. Don’t complain. Get a hold of that book we wrote called God’s Grace in Aging, and it will explain more of it to you, and you’ll understand what I’m talking about. So until next week, I’m your host, Rick Hughes, and I thank you so very much for listening to The Flatline.
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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.
