Ephesians 1:15-23

Cornerstone Church

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The topic for today is changed yet changing still.

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We'll find out how that plays in. Pastor, would you open us with a prayer? Absolutely. Lord, it is so good to come and taste your goodness here in your word, and we thank you that you are like living water.

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You are a well of living water. You give us the Holy Spirit that we would not thirst, and we pray that we would have a drink from your word and eat from this food, the bread of life that is your word.

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I pray for my brother, John, that you would give him all the words that you would have him to say today, that you would be with him in the teaching, and for all of us as we learn, as we sit at your feet,

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Lord, we pray that you would minister to us and build us up in this most holy faith. In Jesus' name, amen.

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Ephesus, the church that was established as Paul was proceeding on his missionary journeys the first time he leaves

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Aquila and Priscilla behind, and the church starts to prosper, and then he comes and spends years with them, preaching and teaching and equipping them, and then at the end of his third missionary journey, he pulls into Meletus, because the port at Ephesus was no longer navigable, pulls into Meleta, and he calls the elders at Ephesus, and he gives them another word of encouragement.

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That's all recorded in the book of Acts. And so eventually, he writes this letter to the believers, and we do know, specifically from the very beginning, that this is a letter written to believers.

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That being said, we get into, especially Ephesians chapter two, there is some amazing gospel in that chapter that is very, very applicable and usable when you were to, if you were to be sharing with somebody about Christ.

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But if we get into this, we're in, and starting in verse 15, he starts out, for this reason, because I've heard of your faith in the

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Lord Jesus Christ. We are talking about Paul's words, that he wants to encourage the believers as they proceed on, and we know that the first three chapters are gonna talk us about our identity in Christ.

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That would be the first three chapters, and then the last three chapters are gonna be our walk in Jesus Christ.

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So there is so much, so much teaching. I'm glad, Jeff, that you agree that this is a good book for us to go to.

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So Paul, I believe as he looks at this, as we look at this section of passage, having heard of the faith that the believers at Ephesus had, okay, that's a foundational comment, having heard of the faith that the believers at Ephesus have,

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Paul is gonna encourage them with the hope that they have in God. You see, as they are, none of us have attained where God eventually is going to take us, and what's going to happen in our life through the power of the

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Holy Spirit, through the blessings of God, is a hope. We know that our ultimate hope is that we're gonna spend eternity with God in heaven.

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We're going to spend an eternity worshiping him and learning more about him. In the meantime, a lot of stuff's gonna happen.

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The millennial reign, something to be really excited about. The tribulation, perhaps not so much.

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A lot of it, as you're understanding a scripture, when does the rapture occur?

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That's an exciting thought. When is he going to bring us up to be with him eventually in the millennial kingdom?

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But here and now, our life is experienced to the extent that we have grown in his grace, in our maturity, and in our relationship with him.

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I would, last night we were studying in 1 John, and I brought out the thought that if you're a parent, and to the extent that you're walking, you're walking with the

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Holy Spirit. It says, walk in the spirit, and you shall not fulfill the lusts of the flesh,

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Galatians 5 .16. To the extent that we are doing that, there is a promise in the

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Beatitudes, blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God. The flip side of that is, woe to those who are not pure of heart, because sin is creating a shield, it gets in the way.

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God hasn't stopped reaching out to you, but your ability to perceive it is impacted.

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As we go through this process, it's generally called sanctification.

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As we go through this process of conforming more, and more, and more to his will, our joy is made complete.

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That's in 1 John 1 .4, I think it is, that your joy may be made complete.

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Changed, yet changing still. Now, this is our third time together. The first time, we looked at the whole book, but we also took a little bit of a dive into the first two verses, and Sandy, I'm gonna ask if you would read the first two verses of Ephesians 1, please.

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Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus, by the will of God, to the saints who are in Ephesus, and who are faithful in Christ Jesus, grace to you, peace from God, our

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Father, and the Lord Jesus Christ. Now, this is a greeting from Paul.

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Paul often has these opening greetings. Sometimes he says, Paul, a servant of Christ, sometimes he says,

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Paul, an apostle, and then occasionally he says, Paul, an apostle, and a servant of Christ. But at this time, he is using the apostolic authority, the teaching that he has that he's gonna give them.

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He's placing his apostolic authority on it. But what is important in this opening thing, in addition to the fact that it's a greeting, is that it expresses the fact that this is a life that's been changed by the will of God.

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Every single one of us who call on the name of Jesus, who have been adopted into his family, have done so by God's sovereign will.

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It's also done by faith. So there's these two sides to it. Jeff challenged me last week, what do we call that?

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So Jeff, what do we call that? We call it Cal -Arminianism. Okay, that's what I call it. What do you call it?

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Compatibilism. Compatibilism. They're both true in Scripture, they're both true.

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If you don't totally buy into the sovereignty of God, Scripture is a mess.

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But we also have the responsibility for faith. We're gonna see that in Ephesians chapter two.

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And then the other thing is that there are blessings that we get because of who we are as his children.

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I think of, there's a family that attended our church for a while, he's Air Force.

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He got moved to New Mexico and he has a three -year tour down there.

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And they're trying to adopt a little girl from China. Now once this happens, and it may have already happened, do you know?

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I don't know. But once this happened and this little child gets there, this little child over time is going to be exposed to the love that the

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Peale family has, Eric and Rebecca have for this child. And as they surrender to the love that Eric and Rebecca have for the blessings that are flowing out are amazing.

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How much as adopted children are we, as we accept and really, really accept the fact that the

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Spirit helps us cry Abba, Father, how much more do we see these blessings? See, this is the foundation that, this is the reality of the background that gets us in there.

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Yeah, verse three of what Samuel just read is one of the indications of the

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Gospel of Galilee relative to every spiritual blessing. Yes. Every spiritual blessing.

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Yes. Father, we have love. Which now takes us to three to 14 and this is where Jeff took us last week.

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And he called his passage the four moments of redemption. And I love how he did that because as we went through that, we could see how

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God called, how people responded, how the Holy Spirit was involved. The Trinity is all there and the guarantee of the inheritance that we have.

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This is the background that takes us into this section of 15 through 23.

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And Jeff, you're going to read that section, please. For this reason, because I have heard of your faith in the

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Lord Jesus and your love toward all the saints, I do not cease to give thanks for you, remembering you in my prayers, that the

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God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give you the spirit of wisdom and of revelation in the knowledge of him.

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That's the Trinity right there in the verse. It is. Having the eyes of your hearts enlightened that you may know what is the hope to which he has called you, what are the riches of his glorious inheritance in the saints and what is the immeasurable greatness of his power toward us who believe, according to the working of his great might, that he worked in Christ when he raised him from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly places, far above all rule and authority and power and dominion and above every name that is named, not only in this age, but also in the one to come.

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And he put all things under his feet, gave him as head over all things to the church, which is his body, the fullness of him who fills all in all.

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Wow, you know, if you want a recruitment poster to say the message of the gospel, first of all, it's truth, it's life -changing, but if you want a recruitment poster as to why you ought to go there, it's not what many churches have.

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You have to do this, you can't do that. You must do this to satisfy God. And if you don't,

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God has got this big old club he's gonna, that's not the message of the gospel. This message here is a message of a fulfilled life.

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Now, we went through the first two verses and then we went through three through 14 and we understand how we get to where we need to be.

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It's by faith, it's this four moments of salvation that Jeff taught last week. But once you get to that point, the amazing truth is that you ain't seen nothing yet.

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It just gets better and better and better. Now, I am not here to preach a prosperity, name and claim a gospel,

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I'm not here to do that because God has told us that the world hated me that's gonna hate you.

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The world has told us that we will experience trials and tribulations. The world has told us,

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Lord has told us we'll be tested. But then he said, there's no temptation that's overcome you but such as is common to man and God is faithful.

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He will not allow you to be tempted. Beyond that which we are able with temptation provides the way of escape that you can endure it.

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What we have is living here in the world where the reality is today.

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Who is the prince of the power of the air in the world today? Satan is.

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He is allowed, he is allowed to do what he does with limits, we know this from Job.

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Satan can only do what God allows him to do. But the world that we experience is not necessarily an easy world.

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But it's a world where we as believers can experience joy. Rejoice in the

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Lord, always again I say rejoice. The foundation for what we have, give me verse 15 again please.

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For this reason because I have heard of your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love toward all the saints.

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What is the foundation that's going to get us into the rest of this passage? Say again.

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Faith. Faith. And then actually faith as manifested by love.

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I have heard, I have heard of your faith and of your love

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Romans 1 .8 Paul says something very similar to the church at Rome. I have heard of your faith.

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That is a great testimony to what's going on at the church of Ephesus or other churches.

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Philemon is an interesting little letter. We have a servant, Onesimus, who has run away and the owner's name was

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Philemon. And Paul writes a letter to Philemon. He says I have confidence in you because of your faith.

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I am confident that you are going to do. The relationship, the reputation that Philemon had with Paul was such that there was no doubt that this faith was going to have an impact.

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Can you realize that how? I don't know if any of you have heard me share with the experience

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Sandy and I had three years ago in the Highlands of Scotland. We lived there for five weeks.

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And thanks to research that my one daughter did, we found the Bradenbach Free Church in Canoosie, Scotland.

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Pastor Alistair Wilson and the little fellowship there. We had such joy with that little fellowship there that I could come back and say, if you are ever in the

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Highlands of Scotland, they have faith there. And I would hope that if the

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Peels are down in New Mexico and they have somebody that's going to be traveling up into New Jersey, that they would say

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Cornerstone Church in Mount Laurel, they have faith there. That is so much richer than saying they have a huge sanctuary.

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If you walk into the foyer, you can get coffee and bagels. Okay, fine, but to be able to say they have faith, this is a beautiful thing.

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Now, I want to emphasize something about faith. Barb, I want you to get to James 2 .17.

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James? James 2 .17. To say that this church has faith is an important thing.

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And to say, I've got faith in Jesus Christ is an important thing. But James tests that proclamation.

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Because faith needs to be genuine. We know in the book of Isaiah that the people in Jerusalem, the people in Judah, were practicing all of the things that they were supposed to practice.

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And what did God have to say about that? Good answer, nothing. He says, even when you pray,

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I'm going to turn my back. Because there was no substance. Give me James 2 .17,

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please. In the same way, faith by itself, if it is not accompanied by action, is dead.

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See, what faith is, is a life -changing force that's given to us as a gift by God through his grace, empowered by the

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Holy Spirit. So if you say, I have faith residing in me, and it isn't doing anything, he's saying that's no faith at all.

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What Paul is saying is their faith is genuine. And because their faith is genuine, things are going to get better.

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Yeah, Nancy. Faith without love is, I think, so important.

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Absolutely. You can have faith and no love, because you understand what the

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Bible may say. But if your heart isn't a heart of love, it's lost.

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100 % agree. In fact, I would so emphasize that, that Paul, in his letter to Galatians, says the fruit of the

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Spirit, which, by the way, is a manifestation of the faith that you have.

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It's the fruit that grows out of you, is love, joy, peace, long -suffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance.

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And the life that manifests those nine is a life that says that this faith is genuine.

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Richard. Like 1 Corinthians 13 says in the beginning, if you don't have love, you're like a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal.

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Absolutely, absolutely. All right, this is our foundation, and he says, I have heard of your faith and your love, which, by the way,

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Nancy, it's demonstration that their faith is more than just mere words. It is genuine faith.

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It is genuine faith. Give me verse 16. I do not cease to give thanks for you, remembering you in my prayers.

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The first thing I want to put out here is the importance of one another. We hear testimonies of people that are going through a difficult time in the hospital.

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COVID created some very, very difficult times. We have so many in our midst that are struggling with that or are struggling through the loneliness of bereavement and everything else.

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And testimony upon testimony upon testimony is I can feel your prayers. I can feel your prayers.

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There's a story, which I cannot remember the details of it, of a church that felt called to pray for a specific missionary.

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And so they all gathered together and they prayed for this missionary, not knowing why, but prayed for this missionary.

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When in another part of this world, this missionary was in danger. But God delivered this missionary from that danger.

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And as they got together and they shared the two stories, they realized that one was on top of the other.

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The importance of one another, it says in Philippians 1 that they pray with the affection of Christ.

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What a powerful way to pray for somebody, calling on and being influenced by the affection of Christ, asking that their love and their discernment, that they would be blameless, that they would be filled.

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These are prayers that we give for one another. The world has no clue what we have, but we do.

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And then in Colossians 4, Paul gets very bold and he says, I'm asking that you would pray for me that God will open doors.

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I'm asking that you will pray for me that when that door is open and I'm there, that he's gonna actually give me the very words

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I should speak. The power of one another building each other up.

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Carol, I'm gonna ask if you would get into Job, verse 42, verse 10. I found this verse while I was preparing this lesson and I went, that is so cool.

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That is so cool that when I choose to pray for somebody else, and in this case,

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I believe this verse is talking about those three little scoundrel friends.

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One of them, by the way, is the shortest man in the Bible, built there at the shoe height. I thought you would like that one,

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Bob. Do you have that verse 10,

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Job 42? Yeah, I have four, two to 10. Okay, that's all right. Chapter 42, verse 10.

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You know, after all was said and done, and Job is given revelation by God about truth, and he pours his heart out to God.

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He actually, according to this verse, takes the time to pray for these three scoundrels.

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Wow, that is so cool. And what does God say because of that? When Job prayed for his friends, the

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Lord restored his fortunes. In fact, the Lord gave him twice as much as before. Do you see that?

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When we respect the one another, even in front of the throne of God, God is gonna bless us for that according to his sovereign will.

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But I'd never seen that before. We all know that Job got right and the Lord blessed him. But this little verse in the middle of it, it says, and then

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Job prayed for his friends, and the Lord saw it, and he blessed them. The power of one and the other.

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Yeah, I was just thinking, what you're talking about is praying that Jesus does for us.

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Absolutely. And if we give him an opportunity in the prayer, the

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Holy Spirit will lead us in that direction. Oh, absolutely, the Holy Spirit. He's just, I have this mental,

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I have a really wild spiritual imagination. I have the picture of the Holy Spirit going, can

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I pray now, can I pray now, can I pray now? But how many times do

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I say, no, I'm too busy? But he's there. I travel a lot.

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That's 300 miles driving, and he's there.

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Yeah, actually, there's a line in prayer. Yes, yes. And I get a flashback of that prayer.

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Oh, yes, absolutely. John. Something worth noting in the

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Colossian verses that you read is how specific Paul is. Each thing, open the door, give me the words to say, make me present it clearly.

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And our prayer needs to be specific, and it's not always specific. So, Louise, I'm gonna embarrass you.

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Louise does an amazing job of keeping us current on our missionaries and their prayer requests.

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And I think it's a good thing for us to say, Lord, we pray for our missionaries that are in the field that you would give them.

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But how much stronger is it if we can take those letters that Louise gets to us, and we can specifically pray for the pictures that Terry and Gary had up there?

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I am terrible with names. What's the name of the individual that's now the director? Moises.

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I don't know. Then there's Tiahu and Matt. But if I don't remember the individual's name, if I say,

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I'm praying for that individual that is stepping up and being the director. A specific prayer, he knows the name.

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He does. He really, really does. Does it make your prayer more powerful to know the name or not?

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No, no. No, it doesn't. What's powerful in the prayer is submission to the will of God.

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So now give me verses 17 through 19, please. That the

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God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give you the spirit of wisdom and of revelation in the knowledge of him, having the eyes of your hearts enlightened, that you may know what is the hope to which he has called you, what are the riches of his glorious inheritance in the saints, and what is the immeasurable greatness of his power toward us who believe, according to the working of his great might.

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Wow, divine empowerment. Dunamos. That's the word that's in there in verse 19, dunamos.

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It is a rich word that shows up many, many times in scripture.

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Act 1 .8, it says you will receive power after the Holy Spirit has come upon you and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, Judea, and to the outermost parts of the world.

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See, he doesn't say, I need you to go to Jerusalem and Judea, that's not what he said.

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He said, I'm gonna first give you the Holy Spirit with the power, then I'm gonna send you out.

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The power that we get as his children, faith, faith with works, that foundation, living it with the power of one another, and then

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God gives us this amazing stuff. Acts 43, 4 .33

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says with great power, dunamos, the apostles witnessed.

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John 16 .13, can you get me to that, Frank? Let me ask you to go to John chapter 16, verse 13.

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James 3 talks about wisdom. This whole section in here, it says that he's gonna give us the spirit of wisdom, he's gonna allow us to understand the revelation of his truth.

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These are things that we, if I ask my brother, who is an atheist, to read

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Ephesians chapter two, he's not gonna get it at all. He's not gonna get it at all.

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But if I ask one of you guys to read Ephesians chapter two with the Holy Spirit, it says that you get the spirit of wisdom and the revelation of knowledge in him, the things that he gets.

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Our eyes are enlightened, it says. The things that are dark to the world that were dark to us before are made open to us and we get to understand the hope of what he has.

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What a despairing life it is to live, thinking that I have no hope, or thinking that my hope resides in me.

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Sandy, if you think that your hope is in me, you're gonna be disappointed.

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Cause I'm not perfect. I'm sorry, I hope I didn't pop your bubble with that.

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I don't know, maybe a little bit. You petition.

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There is one that I can trust on, and he will never, ever, ever disappoint, the hope that I was called.

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The inheritance that I have, I have no right to it, but it's given to me by inheritance.

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That's such an amazing thought, and then the riches of the glory, the amazing power that we get.

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Do you have John 16, verse 13? Albeit when he, the spirit of truth, is come, he will guide you into all truth, for he shall not speak of himself, but whatsoever he shall hear, he shall speak, and he shall show you the things to come.

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I don't have to be clever enough to study more and more and more to be able to discern.

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What Jeff and I love to do when we're teaching this class in preparation for it is called exegete.

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What's exegete, Jeff? To draw out from the text. To draw out from the text.

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How can you do that? By allowing the text to tell you what God thinks, rather than you reading in what you already thought was there.

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And how can you understand what the text is teaching you? By hermeneutics.

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By the Holy Spirit. And the Holy Spirit. By the Holy Spirit. Jeff, Richard. I was going to say, when you were talking about man, maybe man is strange.

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Jeremiah 17, verse 5, thus says the word cursed is the man that trusts in man and makes flesh his strength.

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Absolutely. And by the way, you go down that chapter to verse 9, and what does it have to say about the source, my source within me of wisdom and power and understanding?

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The heart is more deceitful than all else who can understand it. But. Christ in you.

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Yes. The glory. Yes. Yes. Christ in me. And so we go back to that, and it said that the

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Lord Jesus Christ may give you the spirit of wisdom and knowledge and revelation, your eyes enlightened to know the hope that is within you, the glorious inheritance and the immeasurable greatness of his power towards us who believe.

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When you become a believer, this isn't necessarily something that you totally can grasp and comprehend.

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But what we are to be has not yet been revealed. We are growing in him according to his sovereign plan.

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That's an amazing, it's an amazing thing. Give me verses 19 and 20. 19 again, and then verse 20.

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And what is the immeasurable greatness of his power toward us who believe according to the working of his great might that he worked in Christ when he raised him from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly places.

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To compare us to Christ, we can become Christlike.

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Christlike. Oh man. And that is quite a thought. It shouldn't be just thrown out there.

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But as we live our lives, the Christ in us, not when we're here, but wherever we are, should shine through.

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That is so true. There's a stupid little saying, set the bar low, succeed.

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That's right. That's not who we are. Philippians tells us all about the humility of God, for the blessings set before him.

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He surrendered who he was, even to the point of death on the cross. Yeah. Wow. I was thinking about the reference to the power of the

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EMT. And 400 jewels out of a box run through a man's chest just to get his heart started.

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There's a lot of power. But to taste a man who's been dead for three days.

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I've never raised a dead man for three days. Maybe three minutes were lucky.

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Then it struck me that that's power. That is amazing.

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I love that picture. It struck me.

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So John, could you repeat that? I had a hard time getting that. So Bob was saying as an

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EMT, there are occasions where he has to use the paddles of life. And 300 jewels,

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I think you said? 400 jewels? If you go to four, yeah. 400 jewels, that's a measure of the current.

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And so if Jeff were down, and we're trying CPR and stuff, and it's like, he's flat, he's flat -lined, he's flat -lined.

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And they take it, they put this gel on it, right? And they go clear. And the picture,

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I don't know, because I only see it on TV. You've seen it in real life. But the picture is that body just jumps because of the power.

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The spasmodic effect of that power. And on occasion, you get to bring somebody back from being flat -lined.

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But what about somebody that's been dead for three days? What power can possibly bring that back?

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Wow. There you go.

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There you go. That's what we're talking about. We're talking about the power of God.

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Absolutely. When Jesus goes to the tomb of Lazarus, he was dead.

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He wasn't just asleep. Four days. He was dead. Wow. And Jesus prays to the

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Father out loud. Why did Jesus pray to the Father out loud at the tomb?

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Was he incapable of doing it on his own? He wanted them to say, wow, there's a

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God. Yes. Yes. I think for the same reason he waited four days to walk into that cemetery.

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Oh, yes. Yeah. All of this is so true. And that dunamis that is

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God, one of the questions that gets asked when you're pursuing ordination is what are the attributes of God?

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And there are attributes that are purely God's. And there are some that are communicable.

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Communicable. Which means that people get to actually have that in a very tiny measure.

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We get to love because God loved. Okay. There are things that we get.

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But this dunamis power, I'm sorry, an EMT is doing an amazing thing.

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And I cannot, but yeah, you've never taken somebody out of the grave. Incomparable.

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Yeah. This life that we're living now, it says that this is coming through Christ Jesus.

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It says in 1 Corinthians 15, 3 and 4, for I delivered unto you for first importance.

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That's a phrase that should make you stand up in attention. If the apostle

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Paul says, I got something to give you of first importance. If I were taking a class and if my professor said,

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I guarantee this question is going to be on the final exam. I'm going to listen. I'm going to take notes.

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Right? I'm delivering unto you for first importance that which

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I also receive. What is it? 1 Corinthians 15 verses 3 and 4.

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That Christ died according to the scriptures. And that modifier is so important.

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Because if we go into the scriptures, it prophesies that the

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Messiah is going to suffer and die. It's not just the

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Romans killed him. That's not it. It's that God's sovereign will was fulfilled.

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It was made complete. What does your shirt say there, Rich? What does that mean?

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It is finished. It is finished. Christ died according to the scriptures. And then it says that he was buried.

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You see, it is not a swoon. It cannot be argued away.

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In fact, he was buried so much that what did they do when they put the boulder in front of the tomb? Sealed it.

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They put a guard out front. So that if something happened to that body, what would happen to that guard?

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Take his place. Yeah. He was buried. He was buried.

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This was real. And then on the third day, he arose again. This is the important message he says

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I want to give you. Because if you get this message, then you can get the gospel.

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There are things that if you can get, you can get the gospel. In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the

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Word was God. If you get that, this stuff makes sense. The Word is a person? Yeah.

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Yeah, when we had the incarnation. Not a verb. It's a person. Yes, it is.

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Yes, it is. And do you know Jesus is still with the heavenly body? That one blows my mind. For an eternity, he had no heavenly body.

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And now for an eternity, he does. That totally blows my mind. There are just so many cool things.

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But it's him. So about this Jesus that he's talking about, raised him from the dead and seated him at the right hand in heavenly places, we cannot lose that message.

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Hebrews 8 .1 says that we have a high priest sitting at the right hand of the

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Father. Rich, I'm going to ask you to get Romans 8 verses 33 and 34. Romans 8.

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33 and 34. 33 and 34. It says in Hebrews 1 and 2 that God in times past spoke to us through his prophets.

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But now he speaks to us through his Son. The words that we get come to us because of Jesus.

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Hebrews 8 .1 says that not only has he done all that he's done, he died on the cross, was buried, was raised.

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But that's not the end of it. He's at the right hand of the Father. When Satan goes up to the

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Father and says, did you see what John did? Do you really want him? Jesus is saying,

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I got that one covered. I took it to the cross. That's a beautiful, beautiful.

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Do you have that, Romans 8 .38? 33 and 34. 33 and 34.

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Yes. Who shall bring any charge against God's elect?

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It is God who justifies. Who is to condemn? Christ Jesus is the one who died.

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More than that, who was raised, who is now at the right hand of God, who indeed is interceding for us.

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I'm not alone in this life. First of all,

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I've got the Holy Spirit. I've got Christ. Yeah, Nancy? I was just saying, there's only one God. There's only one

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John. But he has a personality. He has a spirit. He has a body.

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But it's all encompassed in one. I think sometimes what we do is separate them.

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And I don't know if God did that, I assume, to teach us. But there's only one

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God. There's only one God. This is a mystery. Very, very, yeah. We've talked about occasionally interjecting within our study time a special class.

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And I think a study on the Trinity would be a great class for us to have.

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Yeah, that would be a great class to have. I'm not alone in this. I've got the Holy Spirit dwelling within me.

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And I have Jesus sitting at the right hand of the Father while Satan is going up there accusing me.

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Jesus is saying, I took that one to the cross. How many times does he have to say that for me?

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He does. But we have a Jesus. We have a God who is not under the authority of anything else.

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Our God is supreme. He is not subservient to anything or anyone else.

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Give me 21 to 23. Far above all rule and authority and power and dominion and above every name that is named, not only in this age but also in the one to come.

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And he put all things under his feet and gave him as head over all things to the church, which is his body, the fullness of him who fills all in all.

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It says in Isaiah 9, a child will be born, the government will be upon his shoulders and he will sit on the throne of David forever.

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These are promises that are made. That God coming incarnate, the second person coming incarnate will dwell and he is on the throne today.

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He wasn't just here for 33 years. He is on the throne of David today.

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I love to think about what the millennial is going to be like with Jesus sitting on the throne right there.

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It's like, that's kind of exciting. That's kind of exciting.

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Hebrews 2 says God ordains that everything, everything is to be put under the authority of the son.

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Now, I am going to tell you about a passage of scripture that can be confusing, because it says in Ephesians 2, 1 -3 that Satan is reigning today as the prince of the power of the air.

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Ephesians 2, verses 1 -3 tells us that Satan is the prince of the power of the air.

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So we're walking according to his design, but with, fortunately verse 4 says, but God.

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Those are two great words at the end of those three verses. But I want to tell you that as a believer, as a believer, our citizenship is in heaven.

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We're still living here today. But John had told me, if you would get Ephesians 2, verses 19 and 20, and while we're doing that,

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Rich, Rick Thompson, if you would get 1 John 3 -2 and Matthew 6 -33, is that candy back there?

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Yeah, get Matthew 6 -33. We're going to close out with those verses.

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Ephesians 2, verses 19 and 20, John? So then, you are no longer strangers and aliens.

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All right, I've got to stop there. I do this. I rudely stop people. You are no longer strangers and aliens.

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As a believer, that is not who you are anymore. Don't let Satan push you down that way.

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You are no longer strangers and aliens. Go ahead. You know,

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I kind of feel a smack in the back of the head when you all say that. Yeah, I know you do. You're no longer strangers.

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Okay, 19. So then, you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God.

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Built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone.

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Can you see this picture that we are now, our identity has changed. We're no longer strangers.

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We are part of the household of God. And think about this holy temple that is there.

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The chief cornerstone. When we get to that, we're going to spend time in that concept. Jesus is the chief cornerstone.

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The foundation are the apostles and prophets. If you have a foundation that is laid true, that all the bricks on top of it can be true, but if your foundation is cattywampus, yes,

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I said cattywampus. That's kind of onomatopoeia. You know exactly what

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I meant when I said it. If you allow somebody in this pulpit that preaches other than truth, if you allow somebody in this pulpit who preaches wokeism or any other ism, then your foundation's got a problem.

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But our foundation is built on truth with Christ as the cornerstone and we are built up into this beautiful, beautiful temple.

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The supreme authority is Christ, is God of all things.

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We are changed, but changing still. Rick, if you could give me 1

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John 3, 2. Beloved, we are God's children now. And what we will be has not yet appeared.

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But we know that when He appears, we shall be like Him because we shall see

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Him as He is. Do you know that we are going to be continually conforming gradually to His will, never achieving that until that moment when we see

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Him face to face. Our life can only get better step by step.

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And Candy, if you have Matthew 6 .33. But seek first you.

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That's our challenge to you today. All of this that we've just talked about today is yours for the taking.

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But seek ye first the kingdom of God. And then all this stuff will be added to you.

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Father, pray. Yes. Father God, thank you so much for the great promises, great and precious promises are given unto us.

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And we thank you, Lord, for that dunamis power that is our inheritance because of what

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Christ has won for us. And the same power that raised Jesus from the dead now lives in us.

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So we pray that we would walk in it with the full fruit of the Spirit operative in our life. Lord, as you are a living

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Savior and you live in us by your Spirit, we pray that you would send us out in your power to make disciples.

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Lord, we look to you in Jesus' name. Amen. Amen. Thank you very much. This is a great book.