You are called to move beyond a mental agreement with scripture and into a life of tangible obedience. Take the physical steps of repentance and baptism today to prove your faith is alive. Let your actions reflect the reality of the relationship you claim to have with Jesus.
Now, by the way, if you have a discipline that's strong in an area of your life, it will overflow to other areas of your life. So how did I live my life? In most of my life, I would live and do as a sprinter. I'd find goals that I knew, hey, I have a high chance of scoring that goal, and I'd sprint as hard as I can at this thing, at this task, at this task, get it done, and then rest hard until I found the next 1. But the Lord told me, you're a marathon runner.
So he was changing an aspect of my identity, of the way that I always saw myself. I heard it, and I understood that he was talking about more than just physically running marathons, he was talking about spiritually, and in every aspect of the discipline of my life, being someone that is in it for the long haul. Ultra mar I mean, and by the way, this race that we run, guys, Christianity, it's an "ultra marathon". Right? You're not a quitter, you're not 1 that shrinks back.
Faith always finishes, and you're gonna finish, baby, but it's gonna be an ultra marathon. Okay? So I was like, let me process that for a little bit, Lord. So I processed it, and I knew that I was gonna have to physically run marathons too, because God wanted me to institute this discipline into my life in 1 area, and it overflowed to every other area of my life. The way that I lead, the way that I do stuff.
Make sense? Yeah. So I procrastinated on that for a while. And then maybe about 6 months ago, I got pretty serious. I'm like, it wouldn't go away.
A word from God that you receive in your heart, it won't go away. When he spoke to me, he transformed me and I was a marathon runner. You asked me, well, have you run a marathon yet? No, I haven't. What's the furthest you've run?
Yesterday, I ran 8.19 miles. That's the furthest I've ever run. Marathon runners in here will be like, you ain't no marathon runner. God says I'm a marathon runner. In my heart, I'm a marathon runner, and that will bear fruit in the next year or 2.
Am I a marathon runner? Is that my identity if I run 1 marathon? Nope. That is a step of faith, but faithfulness is proven by doing the same thing over and over, consistently. So when I run 2 or 3, maybe 4, then you might call me a marathon runner.
But when God spoke it, I heard it, and believed it, and received it, it changed me from the inside out. But my life doesn't understand it yet. I don't have experiential knowledge of being a marathon runner. I'm just on a faith journey towards it. You catch it?
Now, if I get to 22 miles in training, I run 22 miles, and then I quit, and I never run again. Am I a marathon runner? No. I'm not. I quit.
Faith always finishes. It wasn't real faith if I don't actually do the thing. I can have a mental ascent, I can study and understand, have a mental capacity of what it looks like to be a marathon runner. I can talk to all the other marathon runners, and understand the shoes that I need, understand the training, and all the principles that need to happen, but reality is, I don't have a life understanding of being a marathon runner until I experience it. Now, after I run a marathon, and run a couple of marathons, then I have life I have experience, so when I speak about being a marathon runner, it matters, and it holds the weight.
It holds authority. When Jesus spoke, he spoke with authority that the Pharisees and the Sadducees didn't have because his life was living out everything he was saying. He had experiential knowledge, understanding that they didn't have, and that's where the authority came from. So right now, as I'm talking about being a marathon runner, like the marathon runners in this place will be like, like, you're saying good things, but bro, you don't know what you're talking about. Because my life doesn't yet.
I'm just on a journey. Biblical understanding is tied with life experience, and to experience what he's talking about, it requires being transformed by the word, hearing it and believing it, and taking steps of faith on the heavenly reality that he spoke until it becomes your life reality. And then it proves that you were that all along. After I run a couple of marathons, you'll say, oh, man, you are a marathon runner. I'm saying, yes.
And I was transformed into a marathon runner the first time God spoke it. You just didn't know it yet. I knew it in my heart. And the proof of that will be actually doing the thing. The problem is, there's a lot of people that have a mental ascent, moments of scripture.
Moments when people are preaching and they say, amen. They write it down, and they go talk about it at lunch, but they never follow through and put it into practice, so they understand in a western sense of I have this logical mental ascent to what was being said, but their life never understands. And that's a problem. Because that's the scribes, the pharisees, the sadducees. In John-5, verse 39.
Jesus is talking to them and he says, you search the scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life, and it is they that bear witness about me, yet you refuse to come to me that you may have life. There are scholars that spend 12 hours a day searching the Bible, but they're dead Because there's no life application, there's no fire in their heart, there's no They can quote to you almost every scripture in it, but many of them, not all of them, and maybe not even most of them, are are it's just "dead religion" to them. They have this mental ascent, but no life application. There's no authority when they speak except for the fact that they have big brains. When they speak, it doesn't create fire in someone's heart to actually follow Jesus more.
It's just like, oh, they know a lot. That's cool. I have a mental ascent and understanding. I think that's awesome. And Jesus is talking to them about that because there's a lot of people and Christians that will read the Bible and get revelatory moments, but never adjust their life to put it into practice so they can actually understand who Jesus is, who the word is by experience.
So they read the word, find out about the word, but never go to him to to be empowered to live it. So going back to Matthew-13. Understanding includes this experiential knowledge. I wanna give you another example of that, like in Matthew-18, you got the parable of the unforgiving servant. And I'm just gonna kinda summarize it for you, the parable of the unforgiving servant, this king had a servant that was indebted to him, and he threw him in jail.
But the servant instead begged, would you please forgive me of my debts? Please forgive me of my debts. And the king was merciful to the servant, and forgave him of his debts. So the servant then went and found everyone that owed him debts, and didn't forgive them, and instead threw them in jail. Well, word got back around to the king, and the king's like, what's up?
What's going on? And so he took that servant and threw him in jail to be tortured by the jailers. And then it says, this is what your father will do to you if you don't forgive. That is crazy. But it's the same principle.
The king forgave the servant, but the sir the servant heard it. But the servant wasn't transformed by what the king did. The servant didn't become forgiving because the king forgave, so he didn't understand forgiveness. You get it? God has forgiven you when you receive Jesus as the Lord of your life.
He loves you. When you understand that, you'll be so transformed by it, you can't help but forgive those around you. You what he does for you, you not only hear and say, that's great, but you're transformed by it. See, every revelation, this is another thing that's been hitting me over and over over the last month. When I say the word revelation, I don't mean that it's a new revelation of God that nobody knows.
When I when I say the word when revelation, or my dad likes to call it, my uncle, heavy revi. It's like that moment, something about God maybe you've never seen. It's always been there in scripture. It's been there for 2000 years, but you've never seen. It's revealed to you as a son because he loves to reveal himself because you're his children.
Right? More and more. So you're seeking after him, and you have a revelation of him. He reveals himself to you. Just because you heard that revelation in your spirit doesn't mean you understand it yet.
Every revelation from him is an invitation to you to imitate him as a dearly loved child. You understand it when you start to imitate him. When you start to put it in practice in your life, then your life is reflecting that character, that nature, that power of your father. And other people begin to see that in and through your life. And when you start to imitate him as a dearly loved child, you begin to reflect his character and nature into others, and your life becomes a revelation of the father to those around you.
It's called discipleship. Let's go to second Timothy. You guys okay? You following me? Alright.
This is bible study with pastor David. 2 Timothy-3. This is crazy. Verses 1 through 9, and then we'll break it apart. Brace yourself.
I love you. But understand this, that in the last days, we're in the last days, guys, there will be times of difficulty, for people will be lovers of self, meaning they'll be selfish. There's a lot of selfishness in the world today. Lord, root out all selfishness in my heart. Whatever it takes, discipline me as a son.
Prune my life, Lord God, so that I can lay my life down for others like you did for me. Lovers of self, lovers of money, proud, arrogant, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, heartless, unappeasable, slanderous, without self control, brutal, not loving good, treacherous, reckless, swollen with conceit, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God. What is a lover? A lover is 1 who lays their life down for something. So they sacrifice everything for pleasure instead of sacrificing their life for God.
Reorienting their life around pleasure instead of reorienting their life around God. Having the appearance of godliness, but denying its power. Now, having we'll get to that. Let's keep reading. Prepare yourself.
Avoid such people. For among them, there are those creep in households and capture weak women, burdened with sins, and led astray by various passions. Always learning and never able to arrive at a knowledge of the truth. Just as Janus and Genbers opposed Moses, so these men opposed the truth, men corrupted in mind, I'll say and women, and disqualified regarding their faith. But they will not get very far for their folly will be plain to all, as was that of those 2 men, Genesis and Jambers.
Okay, let's go back. Having the appearance of godliness, but denying its power. I never want in my life to have the appearance of godliness, but deny its power. But, the way that you have the appearance of godliness, and deny its power, is you have a conceptual knowledge of scripture, and you become a pretender because your life doesn't experience it, you have no experiential knowledge of scripture. That's how.
That's where you become religious in mind, and you become a hypocrite and pretender because you know all of this stuff, but your life doesn't know. I'll give you an example of Individuals, groups of people, like whole denominations, I'd say some denominations, 90% or more of the denomination would fight for divine healing, that they believe in divine healing. Man, I believe you lay hands on people, you can see the dead raised, and the sick healed, you ask them, have you ever experienced that? Nope. When's the last time you laid your hand on somebody to be healed?
There's a head knowledge of it, but no experience. Which means they conceptually believe something that they're not willing to actually put into practice. They don't understand what they're saying. You mean so good. Is is the "great commission" important, or is it a great suggestion?
Oh, it's the great commission. We're supposed to make disciples. Part of making disciples is sharing the gospel with people, and then being intentional to build a relationship with those that we lead to Jesus, and lead them to Christ, and and tell them follow me as I follow Jesus. Yeah? I mean, it's important.
I think most of the church would say the great commission is a big deal. I think most of the church would agree that being able to share the gospel with others is a big deal. And there's this conceptual head knowledge in the American church, and a lot of the church around the world, how that is important. But you ask how many people in the church have led somebody to Jesus in the last 3 months? How many people in the church have actually stepped outside of themselves to share the gospel with somebody?
In the last year. In the last 5 years. So there's this conceptual head knowledge that I understand. I had this moment that that's important. But you don't biblically understand unless there's an experiential life knowledge because you've been doing it.
So you can't say you understand until you have the fruit in your life. Because in that parable, it was the 1 that bore fruit, Psalm 30, 60, and 90, whose life really understood it in the biblical way that it was talking about. Understanding, real understanding, has action and fruit tied with it, and he will always empower you to do what he tells you to do, but you have to trust it enough to readjust your life to put it into practice, and until you do, you don't understand it. And until you do, in that area of your life, you may be having the appearance of godliness, but denying its power. How are you denying its power?
Either with your words or with your life. And then it goes on to talk about Janus and Jambrews. Who is who are they? You don't you're not gonna see those names mentioned in the Old Testament, but there are stories about them in the Old Testament. Jewish tradition says that Genesis and Jambres were the 2 of the magicians in Egypt.
So in in Egypt, Moses came to Pharaoh, and 1 of the first things he did, he said, Pharaoh, let my people go, and he said, no. And God told him, cast his his rod down, and it supernaturally turned into a snake. It was a sign. What did Janus and Jambers do? Janus and Jambers, according to tradition, they were 2 magicians that went and got their rods.
They knew that trick, so they threw their rods down, and it looked like it turned into snakes too. And the pharaoh was like, hey, my magicians can do that. They had a form that looked like they were doing the same thing, but they weren't really. They could turn the water to blood, quote unquote, but they couldn't do all of the things of God because they were just pretenders. There's a lot of religion and religious that conceptually understand and try to mimic others.
They have a "form of godliness", but their life really denies the power because they're just pretenders. And in any area of my life where I have a conceptual understanding of my father, but my life's not experiencing it, by faith I'm going to trust him. I'm gonna continue to fall forward and say, yes Lord, and continue on my journey to the marathon, so that my life understands what I my in my spirit I know is possible. And if you're not willing, then that's not good. Not good at all.
Because the Bible says in Hebrews-4, those that died in the wilderness were those that shrunk back. They had no faith. They heard, but they didn't believe enough to obey, which shows that they didn't really hear. They had a mental ascent, but no life application. If you've given your life to Jesus, the seed of the gospel is in you, and it's real, and that will never go away, and just like I'm being pulled to run a marathon, and I can't get away from it, you will be pulled into a life that looks like Jesus more and more and more, and you can't get away from it, and so these messages will be pressing you forward into living a life that looks more and more like Jesus, until you actually lay your life down on the altar and say, yes Lord, and as you take those steps of faith, eventually you'll see what Jesus says is impossible in his word come to life in your life.
You mind if I just go deep for a moment? Is that okay? Alright. I mean, I think this is deep, maybe it's not to you. John-3.
Jesus is speaking to 1 of those pharisees, 1 of those people that knows the word but had no knowledge of Jesus. Okay. This is where he talks about being born again. You can't see the kingdom of heaven. You can't experience it unless you have been born again.
Then you start this journey of being transformed into who God made you. You're physically starting to experience more and more of the reality of who you are in him from that moment that you surrendered your life to him. And the fruit of your life down the road is proof that you were really changed. Some, you know, may not experience all of the things in their life by the time they get to the end of their life, but they never quit. So they finished the race well, and they passed on to the next generation who started where they left off, and that's how it's been going for the last 2000 years.
Amen? We're growing in our relationship with Jesus. I'm gonna skip that 1. I'll teach that another time. Let's go back to second Timothy.
So verse 7, 2 Timothy-3:7, always learning and never able to arrive at a knowledge of the truth. So understanding is tied to some extent with knowledge. Biblical knowledge is once again not just a knowing in your mind, but biblical knowledge has this experience with it. When it says Adam knew Eve, he didn't just know her in his mind, but he had an experience with her that produced fruit. It produced children.
In the same way, when the Bible is talking about knowing the truth, it's your intimate with the 1 who is truth in your daily life such that it produces fruit in your daily life. The Bible says those who remain in my word, those are the 1 who know the truth, a biblical intimate, not just knowing up here, but your life knowledge knows the truth and experience freedom from whatever the lies are. Know the truth and the truth will set you free. Right? That knowing of the truth comes from remaining in his word, and in remaining in his word, you're experiencing the 1 who is truth and it produces the fruit of freedom.
If there's no freedom, then you don't know the truth in a way that that you can yet, and you need to go back to the 1 who is truth and remain there with him. So what areas of your life are you on the journey with him to finishing the marathon you haven't experienced yet, but you know it's possible? Is it healing? Like, have you prayed for the sick and seen them healed yet? No?
Do you believe it's possible? Do you see in scripture that you believe it's possible? Yeah? Well, don't stop. The Bible says in 1 Corinthians-14, eagerly desire the gifts of the spirit.
That's a command. So to shy away just because you don't you're you logically don't understand has nothing to do with it. It's do I believe in my spirit that the word is true? And if I believe in my spirit that the word is true, then I take steps of faith, because my spirit understands before my brain does. And I trust him before I logically get it.
And as I take steps and I experience perception opens up where I can see what was going on, and I begin to logically understand the way of the Father. That's the way a relationship with with him works. But to take those steps, you actually have to trust that he's good. You have to trust that he knows better than you do. He's the Lord of your life, and you're willing to take those steps.
I'll give you a good example of what a lot of people struggle with, and I'm kind of I'm at this point of where I'm like, anything that I see in scripture, if I see it in scripture, then I'm just on a journey until it becomes reality. You know? But if I see it in scripture and I'm not willing to put it into practice, like, is he the Lord of my life or is he not? Do I trust him or do I not? I'll give you an example.
This is a tough 1. This is 1 of those examples that a lot of people are like, oh, you can't talk about that right now in here? Are you serious? Tithing. Now, it's 1 thing if you don't see in scripture that you don't think that it's biblically something that you should do, that's 1 thing.
You gotta move forward with a clear conscience. But here's the deal, if you see that tithing is biblically something that you should implement in your life, and you're willingly not doing it out of your excuses, fear, or whatever it is, you're saying that you don't believe God is a man of his word with your actions. You have a mental ascent to what is necessary, but no life understanding of it. You're saying, my good is better than God's good. You're saying, God doesn't know what's best for me in my experience right now.
Right? I mean, we're just gonna So so either acknowledge that, and just move forward, saying, nope, I'm just I'm doing my own thing. I get it. I know what Bible says, but I don't believe God's good enough to trust for me to trust him in that area. And acknowledge that, that that's the case, or, man, God, you called me out today, and I see what the word says about it.
I have no more excuses. I'm gonna take steps towards experiencing this in my life, so my life can be a testimony so others can experience that freedom. Sharing the gospel. It's not my personality. It's not me.
The word says, do the work of an evangelist, but I'm not an evangelist. Right. But you're supposed to be able to do the work of 1. We have an evangelist to equip you to do ministry in your daily life, And people around you, 1 of the things that they need is the gospel. When?
When you have the thought, and you get all nervous about it. Your flesh is fighting the Holy Spirit speaking to you to love that person in that way. But, oh, do you believe scripture enough to adjust your life so that your life understands the need of it? And until you actually believe scripture to take the steps to do that, you're gonna have a mental ascent of its importance, but no life understanding. When you have life understanding, you never go back.
You start sharing you start you start sharing testimonies. Oh my gosh. It was so amazing. Like, I shared Jesus, and they didn't accept it, but man, I felt fulfilled. It was awesome.
Or I shared Jesus and they just rejected me. I'm like, but but I knew like in my heart this is what I was made to do. Or I shared Jesus and they gave their life to Christ, and I said all this crazy stupid stuff, but it was anointed and oh my gosh. You were made for this. Or or actually adjusting your life to make disciples and and meet with people or or or meet with your neighbors or or start like calling them, and and talking with people, and helping people to grow further than they were.
And you start seeing life change in their life. Like if you don't if you've never done it before, you have a mental ascent of making disciples, but you don't have no life application, no real understanding. But when you're really doing the thing, man, it's like, oh, dude. Did you see them take that step in their life? Like, they were just struggling with it 3 months ago, but now they're seeing Jesus in them, and you feel like a father that's proud of their son.
Even though you're like 2 years old in the Lord, and they're like a year and a half. You're like, wow, this is cool, and there's this love for people that you never would have experienced without making disciples. And that only comes from life understanding. The biblical understanding, not this mental ascent. And it sets your life on fire.
Remember, you are the "custodian of the fireplace" of your heart. How do you keep fire burning? By putting wood on it every day. Who's the wood? You are.
Present your bodies as a "living sacrifice", holy and acceptable to God. Take all of your uncomforts, all of your excuses for your fears, and tell them to shut up. There's no fear in love. But "perfect love casts out fear". You're perfectly loved by your father.
Fear fear will gather every every bit of information necessary to legitimize its its existence. And so then you just continue to legitimize the existence of your fear, and you become 1 of those that has a form of godliness, but deny its power with your life because you have no life understanding. Don't do that. In in any area of your life where you've been doing that, repent. Repent is simply, I've been thinking about it wrong.
God, I'm sorry. I repent, So I adjust my life. It's not repentance until you adjust your life and take a step in the other direction. Just merely saying I'm sorry, ask ask wives in here. The husband just merely says he's sorry over and over, and doesn't change.
Is it repentance? Ladies? There is action involved in hearing understanding. There's action involved in repentance. Did the change happen when you believed and received?
100%, and if it 100% happened, there will 100% be fruit and results in action. Amen? Amen. You guys okay? Yes.
You sure? Yes. I wanna invite the altar team forward to come, prepared to minister, to give out what other people need. You know why baptism? I think we're gonna have a baptism after this.
Is there a baptism? Yeah. You guys roll with it when it's time. Jesus said when he got baptized, he said, do this to fulfill all righteousness. Why did he say that?
Because spiritual decisions always result with physical actions or physical fruit. When you spiritually give your life to Jesus, the action is the fulfillment of what you did. So it was real when it happened, and it will be shown by a physical act of obedience. Right? What is baptism?
It's the physical act that represents what you spiritually did. Without being willing to say, yes, Lord, in baptism, the question is, was it real when you gave your life to Jesus? If you haven't been baptized, we're doing baptism today. Better to go home wet and obedient than to worry about your appearance. Amen?
But we got towels too. Know? We'll probably give you a shirt. So are there areas of your life where you've had a mental ascent, but no life application or understanding yet? Would would people be willing to say that?
Yeah. Yeah? Okay. Here's what I want you to do. When we close, we're about to, I want you to take a physical step of obedience.
Come forward. Confess your fault 1 to another, and they're gonna pray for you to encourage you so that you'll be healed in that area and begin to experience what you say you believe. You catch what I'm doing here? Put physical steps to your confession. Right?
You just spiritually confessed. Okay. You really believe that, put a physical step. There's there's there's always physical steps. Makes sense?
Now, I wanna do this too. I believe that there are people in here who have never given their life to Jesus. You've never really surrendered. Maybe you just had a mental ascent of scripture and church stuff, but you've never really surrendered your life to know Jesus as your Lord so you can experience him in your daily life. Here's what I'm gonna do.
I'm not even gonna have you raise your hand. I'm gonna say if that's you and you know that's you, when I dismiss, Ashland dismisses, come forward to 1 of these and say, I need to know Jesus. Would you show me how to experience him in my life? Don't leave here with just realizing that's me, and have a mental ascent, oh, I need that, but no physical step application. Make sense?
If you need healing in your life, the Bible says, lay hands on the sick and they shall recover. These guys wanna lay hands on you. Don't say, well, my my sickness, I've had it prayed for before, nothing happened. No. Come get prayed for.
Why? Because the bible says it. We're gonna continue to exercise our faith until we see it come to reality. If you need other prayer in other areas, mentally, physically, relationship, this is the time for the body to minister to the body, the body of Christ to minister to you. Amen?
It's a beautiful thing.