TV 1763 | One Thing Matters Part One

Well, praise the Lord. Good to see everybody this morning. I am certainly no Paul, but I kind of understand some of the things that he experienced and went through because part of Lord using any of us is having to feel our need and our weakness. And you know, questioning, Lord, what do you want? I'm willing to let somebody else go. Are you really talking about that again? You know, I've had particularly the thought this morning is so, so central to everything and yet it's something we've heard a gazillion times before, but I just, I can't get away from it. It seems like it gets confirmed everywhere. So okay, Lord, I'll, I'll, I'll give you in here. But I had a scripture that a couple of scriptures that came to me particularly, and one of them is in John 13. All of this is well known. I don't think I'm going to say anything we haven't heard, but somehow I think there are things we need to hear pretty regularly because we can know something here and think we've got it and yet it just isn't real. We're not really there yet. In fact, as long as we're in this world, we're not there yet. We always got room, don't we? So praise the Lord. But this is at the time, I believe of the, uh, the last supper and they had had the foot washing and I believe at this point Judas has left to do his thing. And anyway, okay, Jesus said, I'm not going to be with you long, longer than God's purpose of being fulfilled. But the main thing I want to get to is in verse 34, a new command I give you, love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this, everyone will know that you are my disciples if you love one another.

It's so simple. It's so profound. It's so easy for us to think, oh yeah, we like each other. But this is so much deeper than that and so much more critical. I mean, you think about this, what the very central character of God is what? Love. You're just talking about the very foundation of everything. Do you think it's going to be anything other than love in the new creation? It's going to be so infused with this quality of God's character and His being and it's going to fill everyone who's there. We won't be living like we do here, pretty much self-serving. What affects me and how I'm doing and what do people like me and the thousand and one things that we, that all center in us. Or getting to a bunch of people together and, well, we like each other. That is so, that could be so shallow. You know, there's this, I remember hearing somebody, a preacher one time talk about the meaning of that word like. There's a connection between liking someone and what we are like. We tend to like people who are like us and we gravitate to one another and birds of a feather flock together and it's so easy to have little clicks of people who have a kind of affection for one another but it has nothing to do with what Jesus is talking about. This is so beyond human experience that we need something supernatural. We need God to fill and infuse us. And you think about this. What is it that people see when they come in here? Well, a Bible-believing church of people who are friendly, they like each other, they teach the things of God, they sing good songs, they're talented. And you can have all of that and basically have nothing. Because the whole point of God's church is for Him to live or for Christ, His Son to come and the Father through Him to come and to literally dwell in our midst.

It's when He gathers us together that He's in the midst. And the sad thing is people can get together and have friendly relations and He's, like we've said recently, He's outside knocking to get in. I don't want to have that. I don't believe we do but I don't want to ever get there. I want to get back to what God is after. And here we are coming into a meeting of particularly. This is a need all the time, though. You think of what is at stake. If the very central character of God is love, and we don't have that operating, not just sort of, okay, He loves me, let's go on, what's for lunch? We need, if that is not literally resident in us and coloring, as it were, every relationship that we have, then He's not really here and doing His thing, is He? His power, His presence, all of those things are at stake in what Jesus is saying there. They're all implied, that there is a relationship that He wants us to enjoy with Him that is beyond anything that is even possible among people. Do we want the Lord's presence? Do we want Him to, do we want when people come in here to say, God's there, and to feel, I have a need, but I'm not here being condemned. This is not a bunch of law-keeping. This is a God who sent His Son to the cross for me, just what we've been singing about. This is a love beyond imagining that He could actually, that I could feel my need and yet know that He loves me. That's incredible. But that's how Jesus loved us. That's amazing to think about Him on the cross and, and Him, His hands being nailed, and there's a pounding of that nail, and He says, that was for Carl, that was for Ron, that was for, and it's worth it. We don't know anything about that. We need a supernatural work of God in the heart. And you think about the first church. I mean, we hear about the unity that they had, but what was the foundation of that unity? It was the Spirit of Christ dwelling in them, not just, okay, I'm getting all these wonderful glory waves from heaven, and I'm just reveling in that. This was a pouring through, and it affected how they felt about each other, and how they, how they lived and worked, and they shared their resources. They were, it was practically carried out. And just, just think about the power that God wants to release in our midst. And I wonder how many of us could look in the mirror and say,

yeah, I'm good. I've heard this before. I love everybody just like He loves me. It's gotten quiet, hasn't it? Do you suppose we've got stuff to learn? Yeah. Well, by the way, doesn't He say, by this you'll, everyone will know that you were My, what's a disciple? A follower, yes. A learner, a student. We've got a process that we're going through that you can call discipleship. It's wonderful to get people in the door, but that only starts what God is after. His whole purpose is to make us like Him. Well, we don't start out that way. We start at exactly the opposite, and He's going to have to kind of give us a new heart that even wants that, and is willing to let Him do whatever it takes to bring that about. Anybody here willing for that? Yeah. God has to work in our will, doesn't He? He's got a job on His hands changing somebody like me to be more like Him. Give me a break. You think maybe there's a need for this here? Just because we've heard this before, we're still in the race. We're still in school. And we need God to do something in our lives, to intervene in our lives in a way that brings us face-to-face with what we really are in the mirror, and then say, oh God, help me. But aren't you glad that when He works on us, it's never with a spirit of condemnation? How is that possible? We don't do that. If we see a fault in somebody, we immediately feel up here and them down there, and we're going to make sure they know about it somehow. Oh God, change us. Aren't you glad God doesn't treat you the way you treat the people in your life? Husbands, wives, children, parents, everybody else in your life, we need God's mercy to fill us and to change us so that we are more like Him. Well guess what? This is something we've said many times. In order for God to actually bring about that kind of change, He's going to have to lead us through circumstances that, first of all, bring out our need. Because if we don't know we have a need, how can we go to Him and say, oh God, I need you? So when He does that, don't look in the mirror and say, oh God, oh, or complain or give up in despair and say, oh, look what He's showing me, I'm so helpless, I'm so bad, I'll never change, it's just me. God help us to realize the heart that's behind it.

And again, whatever we're talking about when we talk about Him, are we not talking about what He desires from us when we interact with each other? You know, when Jesus was teaching His disciples, He was training them and teaching them things they didn't know. I mean, think of their background, fishermen, tax collectors, one revolutionary, guerrilla fighter, a whole bunch of different kinds of people, and here's Jesus starting there. Think of what He started with us. Starting there and then beginning to teach them the truths of the kingdom of God. And always it was to bring them to a place where, oh God, I have no hope except to lift my heart to You and say, oh God, do in me what I cannot do. But the point is, Jesus didn't get them off in a classroom somewhere, put them through what we call an educational course, and then hand them a diploma and say, go. It was a school of life. And that's what He does with us. If we have a need, well, I say if we have a need. We all are filled with needs in this area, but when God deals with those needs, how does He usually do it? Yeah, well, trial, that's right. But in this case, what kind of a trial? If you're talking about loving each other, He's going to put you in connection with somebody you don't even like, let alone love. And that's where we're going to have to understand and be in such contact with Him and have our hearts so attuned to what He is seeking to do in our lives that we're willing to come to Him and say, oh God, I recognize this is not just somebody I need to get out of my life and stay away from. I need this relationship to be what You want it to be, even if they don't change and somehow meet my expectations. I need to have the heart that You have toward me. How many of you meet God's expectations? And yet He doesn't make that a condition.

That's one of the things that we don't understand, that God's love does not have conditions. It's not attached to performance. Now He may be displeased or unhappy and all of that, but nothing touches the underlying principle of His love and His mercy that He has toward us. And the devil will try to twist that. And one of the ways, of course, that he twists it with many of us is as we become aware of our shortcomings, how does that make you feel towards Him? I mean, does that give you a confidence that you can just come right into His presence? I would say naturally it doesn't, does it? We all think we got to fix ourselves or clean ourselves up a little bit anyway. And like the song, what, mess around another day and put it off and okay, now maybe I can sneak in there and maybe He'll accept me, when the reality is we can walk in there the day we have a need. Now we don't walk in there and say, Lord, just accept me like I am. That's not love either. Love just doesn't accept us the way we are. It doesn't approve of us the way we are. But it doesn't stop loving. It doesn't stop caring. Think of all the people that people have been pointing out for centuries that Jesus dealt with. The worst of the worst, the most unlikely people in all the region, and yet Jesus was reaching out to them, showing them their need. The woman at the well certainly comes to mind. He didn't hold anything back about her need, but yet she's sitting there, what's going on here? He's telling me everything, but I don't feel rejection. I don't feel like He's talking down to me and saying, what's the matter with you, straighten up and fly right, and then we'll talk. This is somebody who loves me.

You know, we just sang the song, and we better understand that. He loves me where I am doesn't mean He's going to leave me there. It means He loves me enough to help me to get out of where I am. But I don't have to qualify myself to get His help. Where does your qualification come from to be able to go into the throne room? Where does it come from? What qualifies somebody like you and me, as bad as we mess up sometimes, to walk into the very throne room of God? What is it? The blood of Christ. That's it. And what was it that motivated Him to provide that? You're talking about the ultimate demonstration of what love means. It's the ultimate opposite of selfishness. It was, I'm willing to do whatever it takes because I care about them. That's what love is. Love wants to reach out and embrace. Just think about our relationships, even in the home. Many times the Lord will put us, and I'm not talking about my house or anybody's house in particular, but I'm just saying the closest relationships, many times, are the ones that the Lord will bring out all the bad, all the stuff that's in us that's selfish and critical and whatever our nature is. Nobody here knows what I'm talking about, right? Yeah. And He's going to bring that out. And your kids are going to drive you crazy sometimes. I mentioned this last time we talked about this, and I thought it was like the other week or something. It was January, the last time we talked about God's love. But anyway, I'll just mention this briefly.

I can't ever remember my parents disciplining me and my not having this sense that it was done out of love. I never felt condemned. I never felt that they were angry with me and taking it out and straighten up, you're messing with me, you're making my day miserable, just go away, hide in your room and get away from me. I don't even want to be around you. It wasn't that spirit at all. It was always with a, I can't let you get away with this because I know it's bad for you. I know where that road goes and I love you enough to stop you. And I understand where it comes from because I'm made of the same stuff. There's not one of us that can look at somebody else and interact with them and see their faults that has any right to point a finger and say, what's wrong with you? Go look in the mirror. One way or another, you're the same way. We need the Lord, don't we? And I feel like the Lord's burden is to just to remind us of this simple truth, this simple principle. I don't know how long I'm going to be, but I just, I couldn't get away from it. I would say, well, Lord, I don't have this organized. I don't know, is this really you? And then something else would happen and something else would happen and a thought would come and I'd say, all right, this must be what we need. That doesn't matter if we've heard it. God wants, do you think God wants to be with us this morning for starters? But do you think when people come in here, what is it that they want, they need to see? Just a friendly bunch of people or do they need to see Him? Well, if they're going to see Him, He's going to have to be in, not just in us, but through us so that our relationships, our attitudes, our deeds, our everything reflects that spirit

and not what we were born with. And that is what the Lord's wanting to clean up. And I guess I started to say a while ago, if God's going to change those things and we are being changed into His image, meaning we're not there, we got a lot of work to do. work. He's got a lot of work. But if he's going to do that, he is going to have to put you with somebody that you don't like, that rubs you the wrong way, and teach you how to act and react. Now, it's wonderful when he can take two people that rub each other the wrong way and work in both of them and bring out harmony. That's wonderful. But what happens if he doesn't fix the other person? First place, it's not your job to fix them. Jesus said, love your enemies. You've got to be kidding. Well, he did. He died for all, didn't he? There was both thieves on the cross. There he was dying for them. Both of them were mocking him at the beginning. Somewhere along the line, one of them woke up and started paying attention and realized who this really was. And he said, Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom. And Jesus said, after the life you lived, you've got to be kidding me. No, he said, today you will be with me in paradise. That's the heart that God wants us to have towards other people. There are people that could come in here that we would say, what in the world is somebody like that doing in our midst? Their lives are so messed up. They're such a bunch of sinners.

That's the people Jesus came to save. This has been the Midnight Cry broadcast. If you would like a DVD or CD of today's message in its entirety, please request it by program number. While it is not required, a donation of $10 for DVDs and $5 for CDs is suggested to help with expenses. Also for those who request it, we will send you our quarterly publication, the Midnight Cry Messenger, free and postage paid. Send your requests to Midnight Cry Ministries, Post Office Box 685, Southern Pines, North Carolina, 28388. We invite you to join us again next week at the same time, and may God richly bless you until then.