2020 - Two Things to Remember — Sandeep Poonen

2020 Spiritual Vision and a Clear Conscience

I wanted to share, as we plan for the next year, which comes up in a few days, two thoughts. 2020 can easily be said 2020. So when you think of the word 2020, at least in the Western world, we tend to think of vision.

Somebody has 2020 vision. So I want to use that word to help us easily remember one of the words that I think will be great for us, for me personally, but us as a church too, to grab a hold of, to have 2020 vision.

What does it mean to have 2020 vision? I want to show you this verse in Matthew chapter 6. So please turn with me to Matthew chapter 6. What does it mean to have 2020 spiritual vision? A person who has 2020 vision is somebody who can see things accurately, is sensitive, and the eyes, the brain responds to what the eye tells them.

So it's a few things. There's an accuracy to it, there's a sensitivity to it, and it's the brain responding to it. What does it mean to have 2020 vision spiritually? Matthew chapter 6, verse 22 and 23.

This is something we all can obey. It doesn't mean that we have to walk without sinning, but we can have 2020 vision spiritually. Matthew chapter 6, verse 22 and 23. The eye is the lamp of the body. So then if your eye is clear, the whole body will be full of light.

But if your eye is bad, your whole body will be full of darkness. If then the light that is in you is darkness, how great is the darkness? So what is this eye that is the lamp of the body that says that if your eye is clear, your whole body will be full of light?

As we've been taught, the eye of the body is our conscience. Our conscience can be either clear or evil or bad. Those are the two choices we have. And when we think about 2020, whenever we think of the people talking about the year 2020, I hope it can be a reminder for us to have 2020 spiritual vision, which means to have 2020 vision in our conscience, which means our conscience must be clear.

If our conscience is clear, then we can live our lives full of the light of God. God said, Jesus said, you are the light of the world. When I was here, I was the light of the world. Then he left and said, you are the light of the world.

And the secret to having a body full of light is to have a clear conscience. And so keeping our conscience clear, sensitive is extremely important. Accurate is extremely important. There's a difference between a clear conscience and a dead conscience.

Some people in the world are living with a dead conscience. So they sleep easy at night. But the reason they sleep easy at night is not because they have a clear conscience, but because their conscience is dead.

It's not sensitive to the things of God. It's been so dull that they can sin and it doesn't even bother them. That's the world. What should be a Christian? A Christian should be a one whose conscience is becoming more and more sensitive so that the eye can be absolutely clear.

Jesus as the Standard for Conscience and Spiritual Light

And who's our example? Jesus. Jesus is our example. 1 John 1 verse 7. If you don't know this verse, it's one of those verses we have to know in order to keep our conscience clear. 1 John chapter 1 verse 7.

1 John chapter 1 verse 7. If we walk in the light as He is in the light. So this is how I calibrate my conscience. This is how when I go to the eye doctor and says, do I need 20 -20 vision? I just don't go to the culture of the world.

I don't go to the culture of typical Christianity. I have to go to the culture of Jesus and go to His word, ask the Holy Spirit to guide me, be influenced by God-fearing teachers who have the gift of teaching.

And I say, God, correct my vision to your light if we walk in the light as He is in the light. Not if we walk in the light we have fellowship with one another. If we walk in the light as He is in the light.

So Jesus' conscience is always my reference point. What would bother Jesus should bother me. What wouldn't bother Jesus shouldn't bother me. A lot of us come with our consciences affected by culture. Our culture told us it was wrong.

Our culture told us, you have to wake up at six in the morning and read your Bible. You have to pray for one hour. You have to pray fast once a month. You can do this, you can't watch movies, you can't do that.

Some of them are wonderful things. But we have to go to Jesus who's in the light and see how Jesus lived. And we have to walk in the light as Jesus is in the light. What do we do if our conscience gets dirty?

The Blood of Jesus Cleanses the Conscience

It says if our eye is bad, if our eye is evil, our body will be full of darkness. So we can be born again and our conscience can be clear. But then our conscience can get dirty again. And there's this beautiful verse in Hebrews 9.

Hebrews 9, verse 14. That tells me about the blood of Jesus and what the blood of Jesus does. Hebrews 9, verse 14. Hebrews 9, verse 14. How much more will the blood of Jesus who through the eternal spirit offered himself without blemish to God cleanse your conscience?

Here's what I do if I have faulty eyes. If I have faulty spiritual eyes, that's my conscience. Here's what I do. I go to the master physician and he's going to wash my eyes with the blood of Jesus. And he's going to cleanse me from dead works to serve the living God.

That's what it says there. Think about the blood of Jesus. We know the blood of Jesus forgives us. You've accepted the blood of Jesus. If you're born again, you've accepted the blood of Jesus that can forgive you of every one of your sins.

But that's not all what the blood of Jesus does. The blood of Jesus also justifies you. We've talked about that, which means God looks at us just as he looked at Jesus. Think about that, dear brothers and sisters.

We will have our hearts blown open to the love of God if we would just meditate on justification, which is God looks at me right now. If the blood of Jesus cleansed me, if I allow the blood of Jesus to cleanse me, God the Father looks at me just as if I've lived just like Jesus up to this point, fully righteous.

That's massive. Forgiveness, justification. But here's another one. He cleanses our conscience to also serve him. It's one thing to be forgiven. It's another thing to have the full rights that Jesus had justified.

But here also the same blood of Jesus that we probably all are willing to accept for our forgiveness, God gives it to us for our justification, and he also gives it to us for our service. He cleanses our conscience so that we can serve Almighty God.

And I love this expression. He cleanses us from dead wounds to serve a living God. You know who does dead works? People who don't live with a living God. That's what the Lord showed me from this verse.

You know why I'm guilty of dead works? Because I, in the back of my mind, am not living with a living God. Somehow I've reduced God to a block of stone, maybe two tablets of stone. Some way in which he's written commandments and I just blindly obey, and he's not a living God.

I must go to church every Sunday. I must give to the church. My children must be well behaved. I must read my Bible every day. Every one of those things are wonderful things, but I can live with those things just as a set of rules.

And it's not a living God with which I'm doing it. And that makes it dead works. And so the secret is not, am I doing a dead work or am I not? Are you serving a living God? A God who's more living than any other living being.

A God who's more alive. He gave us life. A God who has desires. That's a living God. A block of stone doesn't have it. A rule book doesn't have it. God has desires. God has a will. He wants something from my life, from his own kingdom.

God has a point of view on certain things. He's a living God. And God said that the man who's filled with his spirit, it's like the wind. You can't catch the wind and say, there's the wind, and then there's the wind.

You can't write a formula. He's a living God. You can't write a formula to define me or you. How much more? You can't write a set of rules to define God. And God says, you want to serve a living God that has a point of view, that has a will, and most of all, that he loves?

Serving a Living God Rather Than Performing Dead Works

You want to serve such a God? You need to have a conscience that's been clean. And God can give us that clean blood of Jesus. And it's fully accessible to us because I have a feeling we've accepted the blood of Jesus to forgive us of our sins.

We have to go to that same blood of Jesus and say, Lord, I don't want to be guilty of accepting the blood of Jesus for my forgiveness, but not for my service. And I want, Lord Jesus, the blood of Jesus to cleanse my conscience that I, that is dirty.

And he'll do that as quickly as he forgives you. How quickly are you going to tell my child that he or she can be forgiven of our sins if he or she were to come and ask you? Are you going to make this a long process for my child?

Or you can say, it can happen very quickly. The blood of Jesus can cleanse you of your sins and forgive you. How quickly can the blood of Jesus cleanse your conscience? It's the same blood of Jesus. And he can cleanse you to where you start living with God as if he's a living God.

And it's a relationship. That's why we check in with him. That's why, as we heard from Brother Jeremy, we have to ask for help. Because it's not because I can't do anything. Because I need help to try to know how he wants it to be done.

It's about pleasing a living God. It's about serving a living God, not just obeying the commandment that I can read as a line in a book. It's, Lord, does this please you? Am I doing this the right way in the obedience of the command?

Lord, I need your help to show me I'm doing it the right way. Am I speaking the right way to my wife? Am I teaching my children about you the right way? I know I'm using the verses. I know I'm reading scripture and not some other book.

But am I doing it the right way, Lord? Am I not praying enough? Am I not instructing enough? Am I not disciplining enough? I need your help. Which way should I do it? This is what happens when we're serving a living God.

We're always checking in. All of us have bosses. We're connecting with them, not just a set of rules he gave me three years ago, and I'm just doing it. I'm constantly having, as the rules, have things changed?

Is the market different? Is the industry different? Lord, the kingdom of God, the devil is doing this and that. What should we be doing more as a church, as individuals? The blood of Jesus can cleanse our conscience from all these rule books to where it becomes a constant, ongoing relationship.

And the blood of Jesus can do that. And we can invite him to pour his blood to cleanse us of dead works just as often as we must ask God to forgive us of our sins. My child can sin 20 times a day, 100 times a day.

I will tell him the blood of Jesus can cleanse you, forgive you of your sins. He can cleanse us of our dead works. Let's catch ourselves often during the day of serving a dead God and say, Lord Jesus, I want to grab a hold of a living God.

You're living. You have a will. You love like a throbbing being that's pulsing, full of life. What are you trying to say to me? What are you trying to do with me? That's my conscience. And my conscience ought to be getting more and more sensitive to the way Jesus' conscience was.

Mastery Over Sin and Increasing Sensitivity

Do you believe that Jesus wants to show you new areas of sin in your life that we had never seen before in 2019? That our 2020 vision will become more 2020? Do we believe our conscience is as sensitive as Jesus?

Absolutely not. Does he want to open up new areas? Well, let me tell you what I'm sure of the Lord has been telling me. I will not have the ability for God to show me new areas if my hands are full with the existing areas.

He's not going to give me what I cannot handle. And he looks at my life and he says, Sandeep, you have your hands full with all the sins you're currently dealing with. The sins that so easily trip you up and encumber you.

Well, get rid of them. Take the sword of the spirit and pierce through those enemies. There should be no sin that we have mastery over. That's all right, the sin that masters us. We should have sin. We should have mastery over everything that the Lord points out to us as sin.

I didn't say a perfect track record, but we should have mastery over it. We tell our unforgiveness, you sit down. And the unforgiveness stands down. I tell that anxiety, stand down, sit down. And it sits.

I tell that bitterness, sit down. Or that anger or that lust, stop. And it stops. That's what mastery is. It doesn't mean I don't trip up into sin here and there, but I have learned how to live under grace where no sin has mastery over me.

Until then, God says, your hands are full. I can't show you the next level of your sensitivity of your conscience to be like Jesus. And God has already given us that power, and he wants us to live in that power.

Philippians 1, 6, I believe it is. God will complete the work that he started. He's not going to complete it for everybody. It's not a promise that isn't with it without conditions. He wants to conform us to the image of Jesus.

That's our goal. But do you think everyone is increasing at the same level and the same rate? No, because God says, walk in the light that I've shown you. If I've told you to be sin, stop it. Stop doing it.

Gain mastery in that area. Then I can show you new light. I can give you 2020 vision in your conscience. I can conform your conscience to be as sensitive as Jesus is and to free you from some of the wrong consciences the way it trips you up like you should have.

That's 2020. 2020 spiritual vision. Let us have a conscience. May that, whenever that year comes up, whenever you write that word, 20, you put your date and you write that 2020. Ask yourself, Lord Jesus, I want a conscience that is so sensitive, like my vision is.

Correct me, Lord, cleanse me. The other thing about the year 2020 is that it is a leap year. It is not ordinary. It has one extra year. And I thought about that word leap. And I want to show you this beautiful passage that the Lord laid on my heart in Isaiah chapter 35.

Isaiah 35 is a small chapter, 10 verses. In a sense, Isaiah 35 is the last. I don't know if you know this very briefly. Isaiah has 66 chapters, like the Bible has 66 books. And interestingly enough, the way Isaiah is divided is the first 39 verses, 39 chapters, the first 39 chapters of Isaiah are, in a sense, about the old covenant.

And then Isaiah 40 through 66, interestingly enough, is almost blowing open the new covenant, where Isaiah 40 talks about John the Baptist saying, prepare a way for the Lord. And all those chapters in Isaiah 40 onwards have a significance about the new covenant.

And Isaiah 1 through 39 is, in a sense, a symbol of the old covenant. Isaiah 36 through 39 are almost historical chapters. It's all about Hezekiah. So in a sense, Isaiah 35 is the last chapter that talks about the old covenant.

And then Isaiah 40, John the Baptist brings it in. And Isaiah 34, the previous chapter, and Isaiah 35 are two chapters that are almost connected. And Isaiah 34 talks about God's judgment. Read it sometime.

It's about God's strong judgment. Against sin. And the destruction of God's enemies. And then Isaiah 35 talks about this life after God destroys the enemies. And it starts with the wilderness in Isaiah chapter 35, verse one.

And it ends in Isaiah chapter 35, verse 10, in, not in heaven, in Zion, the church. This is the kingdom of God that we will see in its fullness. But Isaiah 35, the new covenant life, begins from taking us from a desert after God has decimated our enemies.

God has destroyed the enemy of the devil and the power of all the demons. Then he says, now we've got a wilderness. It's an empty land. We've destroyed all the enemies, but it's an empty, barren desert.

And God says, I'm gonna take this desert. I'm gonna bring them all the way to Zion, which is a picture of the church. This is what the transformation ought to be for every new covenant Christian. It should be a vision of a removal from the old covenant life by God destroying enemies that we could never destroy.

The power of the devil, the power of death, the power of the demons. And then he says, well, but then after the devil and the demons have been destroyed and lost their power, it's still a wilderness. And God wants to take us from a wilderness, a desert, to Zion.

And if you read this chapter, I encourage you to take the time to read it. Isaiah chapter 35, one through four. It's a message of encouragement. Even the wilderness, I'll just read a few statements from one through four.

Even the wilderness and desert will rejoice in those days. The desert will blossom with flowers. Think about your life, dear brothers and sisters. It's the new covenant life. There will be an abundance of flowers.

Think about your life, and I hope you can picture a desert and see what God's prophetic word is for you. There will be an abundance of flowers and singing with joy where the sins have been dominating your life.

Can you see flowers, the prettiness of flowers? And verse three, bring these news of cheer to all the discouraged ones. Verse four, encourage those who are afraid. Tell them, be strong, fear not, for your God is coming.

He's coming to save you. Now remember, this was before the new covenant, but then that happened. That happened in Isaiah. This happened when Jesus destroyed. Then it says there, verse five, the eyes of the blind will be opened.

That's what's happened to us. Those of us who lived in sin, we were veiled. We couldn't see the glory of Jesus because the God of this world had blinded us. But our eyes have been opened. And I want to underline a few words.

Verse seven, it says in verse seven, the mirage, the scorched earth. In my margin, it says the mirage. A mirage is something that you go in the desert and you think there's water, but there's no water.

People come into your life and think you have the rivers of living water, but it's just a mirage. If people were to come into your house and see the way you talk to your spouse, they'll say, it's just a mirage.

What a waste of time. They say they go to a new covenant church. The church is called New Covenant Christian Fellowship, but it's just a mirage. It's nothing there. If people were to look at your thoughts, how you're addicted to the things of this world and better things and nicer things or lustful things, it's just a mirage and the devil's not fooled.

The mirage will become a pool, no more unreality. When people come into my life, they'll see reality. I will no longer offer false waters. I won't say, Lord, when people come into my life, there'll be a depth to it.

There will be a pool where there was just, looked like water, had all the prettiness of water, but when I came in, really interacted with them, just like the rest of them. No, in the new covenant, the mirage will become a pool.

Walking Toward Zion on the Highway of Holiness

And I remember I said that Zion is the ending place, but there's a highway to get to Zion. Verse eight, the church is our final landing spot on this earth. This is our home, the new Jerusalem. Zion, not one particular church, but a local church where Jesus alone, his name is being honored, where the name of Jesus is our only refuge, where no human has any glory.

We seek to cover all human glory. The way to that Zion is through a highway, a roadway that's made, and it's called the highway of holiness. We want a life that's full of rivers. We want the desert to give way to rivers, but there's only one way we can get there, is on the highway of holiness.

You'll find a lot of roadways where fools can wander around, but here in verse eight it says, not on the highway to holiness. You don't wander around on the highway to holiness. You want to know this mark of people who are walking on the highway of holiness towards Zion.

It's not whether they're a member of NCCF or whether they believe certain doctrines or not, it's whether they are living a life that is not wandering. They have lives of purpose and their holiness. They're on the highway called holiness.

Very, very simple. That is the only way to get to the family of God. It's on the highway of holiness, where holiness is revered. And it's not for fools who want to wander. Verse nine, we don't have to be worried about any lions that will be there.

We don't have to be afraid of any lion or vicious beast, not the devil, not his demons, not even our flesh that has dominated us. That loose tongue, those loose eyes, that spirit of unforgiveness. Dear brothers and sisters, in the name of Jesus, I want to encourage us to say, we need to take up the sword of the spirit and say, I'm not afraid of you.

David, Goliath, and Freedom From Sin’s Mastery

Like we heard about David. Think about David, think about Goliath and see the spirit of David in this young little boy and say, Lord, I want to have the exact same spirit towards those enemies that have dominated me and my parents and my culture for centuries.

We know this about the Indians. We know this about the whatever culture there is. We know how they are, hot blooded or loose with their tongues or whatever it is. Well, it stops now. I'm not married into the culture of that culture.

It stops with me. It doesn't matter what my physical or emotional makeup is. No sin will have mastery over me. No lion, no vicious beast is going to scare me on the highway to holiness. There's no place for it.

Those who've been bought with a price, the redeemed will willingly, joyfully walk there. And it's a life where we can hopefully go from walking into a leap forward. It said then verse seven, oh, sorry, was it verse six?

The lame will leap like a deer. I want a life of leaping, not a life of walking. I have a lot of distance to make up. We have to walk. We have to make up ground by leaping. And when we think about the leap here, I hope that we will not be content to go at the pace at which we're going.

Spiritual Leaping, Joy, and the Presence of Christ

On the highway to holiness, then verse 10, let us come with joyful shouting with Zion. And they will, that word find, in the margin of my word, it says they will overtake gladness and joy. Do you want gladness or joy?

Or do you want to overtake gladness and joy? Lord, I want my life to be so full of joy. Joy is not a feeling. Joy is not an emotion. Joy is a deep rest and satisfaction and contentment that I have Jesus, that I found my resting home in God.

And there's a joy that says, I don't want the pleasures of this world. It does not have an attraction to me. I'm so happy with what I have in Jesus. That gladness and all the gladness and joy that attracts the people of this world, we are overtaking that.

Because we found the one who gives joy, the one who is light. So things may not go well for us in 2020 physically. We may suffer more struggles in 2020 than we did in 2019. But I hope that we will still have a way of leaping, leaping forward spiritually, but also having a heart that leaps.

You know who leaped in the person's womb when Jesus came? And John the Baptist was in Elizabeth's womb. And Jesus came by. John the Baptist couldn't help himself. He leaped. His master was here. His creator was here.

The one who he couldn't tie his shoelaces was here. He was still in the womb, but he leaped. This is the, I don't know if the baby could do anything else. It was still in the womb. Didn't know if it even had all its fingers.

But it leaped. Jesus was here. This is the year of leaping. This is the leap year, a year in which we can leap. Even if we're still being formed. Even if the baby's not yet ready to come out. Even though God's still saying, you're a work in progress.

You're not ready to come out of the womb. But Lord, I want there to be a leaping. As I see you, as I sense you, I wanna look for you. I wanna have a clear conscience. I wanna meditate in your light. John the Baptist is now in heaven.

We have a great cloud of witnesses that are wishing they could have had the life we did. Where they didn't get to be near Jesus. They say, you get to have Jesus in you. You get to have God in you. John the Baptist leaped at the thought that this life was gonna happen.

It wasn't just God with us. It's now God in us. Jesus was God with us. The Holy Spirit is God in us. And John the Baptist leaped. And all the great cloud of witnesses are leaping at the thought of what we can experience.

And I pray that the Lord will give us that life of leaping. Leaping into the future, not steady to just walk or to crawl anymore. No sin will have mastery over us. That we'll have a conscience. The pathway to it will be having a conscience that's increasingly becoming more and more sensitive to sin.

And asking the blood of Jesus to cleanse us so that we can serve the living God. May God help us.