The Deep Dealings of God - Part 5 - Hearkening to Gods Voice — Phil Beach Jr.

Help us, Lord, to hear. Lord, help us to hear this morning and to hearken. The children's church workers, no, wait, wait, wait, wait, children, please. I'm so glad you're very eager. We have been discussing for a number of weeks now the deep dealings of God.

And this morning, we want to continue along those lines and our subtitle this morning, you remember last week, we had a subtitle, Awakening to the Voice of God. Now this week, we want to subtitle, Hearkening to the Voice of God.

Hearing and Hearkening to God's Voice

It is so very important, beloved, listen carefully. It's so very important that we recognize not only to hear the voice of God, but we need to recognize the need to hearken to the voice of God. Listen to what He's saying and hearken to it.

Now I'd like to make a few comments about a few Scriptures which the Lord seemed to lay upon my heart just the past couple days. And so I want to encourage you to listen to God's Word this morning. And as usual, please, I trust that you take pens and pencils with you and paper because the purpose of all ministry in the body of Christ, all ministry, whoever is speaking, the purpose is that we would learn to hear the voice of the shepherd through the vessel.

Okay, that's what we need to learn. We need to learn to hear the voice of the Lord. And if we're listening, we can discover the voice of the Lord in most every member of the body of Christ. As they share, as they sing, as they exhort, as they teach, as they preach, as maybe they're just chatting with you on the phone.

If you're listening, you can hear the voice of the shepherd speaking to you. And this is the purpose of all ministry in the church. It's so that all of us together might grow to learn to hear the voice of the shepherd.

But not just to hear it, but to hearken to the voice of the shepherd. Before we go into hearkening, hearkening to God's voice, and this is very important, and we're going to discover this this morning as we begin to go into the book of Hebrews.

But before we do that, I would invite you to turn your Bibles to Luke 18. Luke 18. And I'd like to read a familiar parable that Jesus spoke of and extract some important lessons from this parable that are very imperative if we're going to be able to hear and hearken to the voice of God.

The Pharisee, the Publican, and the Humble Heart

This particular parable deals with a hard attitude. Okay? Luke 18, beginning in verse 9. When we go to the things of God and we go into our Bibles and we sit and listen to messages that are being preached, or we sit and we are in a gathering in a home and a few brothers or sisters might begin to open up the Bible and begin to share some things, it is so important that we approach the Word and approach fellowship with a right heart attitude.

Now listen carefully. A wrong heart attitude will most definitely result in a blinding over your eyes and over your heart. You won't be able to hear or see what God is saying. And all too often, the Bible is a closed book to many Christians and fellowship is not a vibrant living thing with a lot of Christians because there is a heart problem.

And we're going to look at that this morning because it's so important if we're going to derive the full intention of God's heart in our fellowshipping one with another, we must always pray that God gives us the right kind of heart.

Verse 9, chapter 18, and He spoke this parable under certain which trusted in themselves that they were righteous and despised others. Two men went up into the temple to pray, the one a Pharisee and the other a publican.

The Pharisee stood and prayed thus with himself, God, I thank Thee that I am not as other men are, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even as this publican. I fast twice in the week. I give tithes to all that I possess.

And the publican standing afar off would not lift up so much his eyes unto heaven, but smote upon his breast saying, God, be merciful to me, a sinner. I tell you, Jesus says, this man went to his house justified rather than the other for everyone that exalts himself shall be abased and he that humbleth himself shall be exalted.

I want to pull out five words or four words here. Verse 11, I am not as other men. As long as that heart attitude lurks within our bosom and we think that we are not as other men, that somehow, some way we are different, or rather should I use another word, we are better than others.

That heart attitude results in a veil over our eyes. We cannot see the things of God. We cannot hear the voice of God, and we cannot hearken to the voice of God. And so, brothers and sisters, I would exhort you by the love of God this morning that you would pray and you would ask the Lord with faith and with all sincerity, Lord, I know that this is a dreadful thing, to have the attitude in my heart, I am not like other men.

And I would pray, Lord, that you would make known to me by your Holy Spirit and by your Word if that is lurking within me and that you would smash it, you would uproot it, you would rip it out of my bosom, Lord, so that I no longer walk among the children of men or walk among the children of God or come to the hearing of the Word of God and that attitude lurks within me.

Lord, I don't know what you have to do, but whatever it is, do it. I must be free from this illusion that I am somehow different than anyone else. The measure of grace that we experience that enables us to come into the good of all these wonderful things that we've been preaching on is contingent upon our hearts' awakening to the fact that we are not only...

We're not only the same as everyone else, we're worse. We're worse. And so the measure of grace that a man or a woman possesses that enables them to come into the good of these truths is in relation to how deeply they have come to see that they are the chiefest of sinners.

So we're not simply talking about coming to the place where we're on equal ground with our brother. You know, we start up here. This is the better part. This is the level of being a sinner. And I want to encourage you, beloved, don't be content with just being reduced down to saying, yeah, God showed me I'm just a sinner.

Boy, I'm no better than anyone. Brothers and sisters, that's a beginning, but that's not where you need to be. It's not low enough. It's not low enough. You need to pray, God, help me to see that not only am I a sinner and that I'm not better than anybody, but I'm down here as the chiefest of sinners.

Do you want to know something of grace? Do you want to know something of the power of God to make you the man or woman that God wants you to be? Husbands, do you want to know what it means to be able to love and serve your wife?

If you do, and you think you're going to get that grace up here, you are deceived. You're not going to get the grace of God riding up here in the heights. You might get a measure of it down here, but I feel uncomfortable here.

I feel uncomfortable just seeing myself like others. I feel a little more comfortable when I come to see that I walk in the ranks below the normal sinner. Below the normal one who has fallen into the place where, God, I'm the chiefest.

And so, therefore, we need to have this word of admonition brought into our hearts as we hear the Word and as we are in fellowship one with another. Oh God, please, keep us into the place where our hearts are continuously living down in this realm where we see ourselves as the chiefest of sinners.

All the provision of grace is made available to those who have gone the lowest. And it is purely self-deception if we anticipate receiving anything from God that's of eternal value, or as far as that's concerned, anything from God that can help anybody else.

If you want to receive it up here in this position, you won't. You won't. Mark 11. So that's one brief word of exhortation and here's a second word of exhortation which is pretty much laying the foundation leading us up to the heavenly hearkening to the voice of the Lord.

The Fruit Christ Seeks in His People

Mark 11. Now, these things can only be grasped as we hear them and we pray, Oh God, please, by the Holy Spirit, make these real into our life. Now, I'd like to read a portion of Scripture in Mark 11. Beginning in verse 12.

Jesus had entered Jerusalem and typically this particular parable is mostly interpreted by theologians as being the judgment that Christ brought to Jerusalem. Verse 12. Mark 11. And on the morrow, when they were come from Bethany, he was hungry.

Now, I want you to, if you would please, just make a note of that. Jesus was hungry. Very, very important for us to recognize that. He was hungry. And seeing a fig tree afar off having leaves, He came.

If happily, He might find anything thereon. And when He came to it, He found nothing but leaves, for the time of figs was not. And Jesus answered and said unto it, No man eat fruit of thee hereafter forever.

And His disciples heard it. Verse 20. And in the morning, as they passed by, they saw the fig tree dried up from the roots. And Peter calling to remembrance unto Him, Master, behold the fig tree which Thou cursed is withered away.

And then Jesus goes on and says, Have faith in or of God, for verily I say unto you that whosoever shall say unto this mountain, Be thou removed, and be thou cast into the sea, and shall not doubt in his heart, but shall believe that those things which he saith shall come to pass, he shall have whatsoever he saith.

Therefore, I say unto you that whatsoever things you desire when you pray, believe that you receive them, and you shall have them. And when you stand praying, forgive. If ye have ought against any, that your Father also which is in heaven may forgive you your trespasses.

But if you do not forgive, neither will your Father which is in heaven forgive your trespasses. Now, this is a portion of Scripture that we have heard many times read, particularly verses 23 -26 regarding have the faith of God.

You can ask whatever you want and if you don't doubt, then God will give it to you. But I would, with permission of the Holy Spirit, like to take liberty in this particular portion of Scripture and point toward the beginning.

The whole reason why this discourse was recorded is because the Scripture says that Jesus was hungry and He found a tree that was not producing edible fruit. And so He cursed the fig tree and it dried up.

And His disciples were amazed. And then Jesus said, have faith in God and you can do this. This can be an experience in your life. But I would like to point our attention that the focus of this whole discourse is not so much on what we would want from God, but it's traced back to something Jesus wanted.

He wanted edible fruit and He couldn't find any. And so He cursed the fruitless fig tree and it withered. Beloved, I would like to challenge you this morning to consider the words of Jesus and to recognize, first of all, that Christ has an insatiable passion in His life today as He walks among you and I.

The fig tree not only represents Israel, but it represents the church now. It represents you and I. Because Israel was in the Old Testament what the church is in the New Testament. And Israel, listen, Israel was supposed to be a place where God was able to find suitable fruit for Himself to enjoy.

The Lord is looking for suitable fruit to satisfy His hunger. Not His physical hunger now, but His hunger for intimate fellowship. And the fruit that is satisfying to Christ is that which He sees in our life that's the direct result of His Holy Spirit.

The direct result of the work of the cross severing and divorcing us from all that is corrupt and all that is perishable and all that is earthly and all that would be the fruit of our own ground like Abel.

He comes into our midst looking for fruit. If you go into the Song of Solomon, you'll find that oftentimes when she was looking for her lover, she discovered that he was in his garden eating the fruit.

Enjoying the fruit. Listen, this Christianity is bigger than we are. It's not for us. It's for Him. If you plant a vineyard and you are the owner of that vineyard, you plant it so that one day you can wake up and look and see luscious, large, grape.

Juicy grapes. Sweet grapes. And you can pick it and you can enjoy it. And this is what God's heart is. And so the challenge this morning is this. And if we would connect verses 23 through 26 having faith, speaking to mountains, believing God for anything, and then not doubting in our heart, if we would connect that with this, our lives would be radically transformed.

And here's the challenge this morning. Invite the Savior to come and walk your way and walk into your home and walk into your life and walk into everything that you are currently engaging in. And let His piercing eyes come into every area of your home, every area of your heart, every area of your life, every area of your activities.

Everywhere. Everything that pertains to your life. Oh, that we would have the prayer of faith to pray this. Oh, we're praying the prayer of faith for things. We want God to do this for us. We want God to do that for us.

We're asking God for great things. But how many of us are asking God for that which satisfies Him? Not what satisfies us. Not something that we can lay hold on and most likely if God gave it to us it would be our destruction because we would glory in it.

We would boast in it. We would brag about it. We would display it before men and women. We would show them how spiritual we are. Christ is walking in the midst of His church. Revelation 1. And the Holy Spirit would want to ignite within us a faith.

A faith that is born of God. A faith that indeed will allow us to say unto the mountain Be thou removed. But it is not a faith that will result in us getting something from God. But rather it is a faith that will result in God getting something for Himself in our life.

Do you see it? Do you see it? Oh how much there is a desire for faith in among the Lord's people. But how much, oh how much of it is connected for something that we might get. But how much of our groaning how much of our weeping how much of our prayer of faith how much of our crying how much of our believing God is for something that God could get.

That will satisfy His hunger. That will bring pleasure to His heart. I challenge you today in the Lord to take special notice of this story and no longer apply it to a distant people somewhere on the other side of the world.

But with tears and pain husbands, wives, I encourage you if you're single, I encourage you if you have children, I encourage you to gather your children around. And I encourage you and challenge you in the name of the Lord to gather your family together and to stand and say we are going to pray the prayer of faith in our home.

But it's not that we might obtain something for ourselves. Oh how our children need to be taught these things. How our children are growing up under the idea that it's all about getting something for themselves.

Oh may God help us. May God help us to combat this evil leaven of corruption that is destroying an entire generation of children. They're getting this idea and they're bringing it into Christianity. And their whole Christianity is about serving God for me.

What can I get out of it? And then when God doesn't give them what they want, what do they do? They get bitter. They get angry. They don't want to serve the Lord then. Because they've been poisoned by the corruption in the world.

And may I say, have we modeled that to our children? Are we giving them the idea that it's all about God serving our needs? Have we even begun to show them that this thing called Christianity is bigger than our needs?

It's bigger than our desires? Are we teaching them that it's about a God in heaven who's committed to us? Are we teaching them it's about a God in heaven who's committed to His Son? And in His grace, He has brought us into fellowship with His Son but not for ourself, simply.

For ourself, but for His pleasure. For His heart's desire. And so I challenge you, men. Take the lead. Take the lead. Pray the prayer of faith. Teach your family that the prayer of faith is essentially not about believing God for something for me.

It's about believing God to go through my life. To go through our home. To go through everything. And to curse which is not producing suitable fruit for His pleasure. Oh, that's a trying word. That's a testing word.

I've wrestled with this for some time now. And I took my wife and we went out. She might have thought we were going out for ice cream. I had a little surprise. It was a prayer of faith for the Lord to walk in the midst of our home, in the midst of our family, in the midst of all the things that pertain to our life and our children's life.

And the things that we're doing and the things we say to our children, the things we allow our children to do. Everything. Everything was brought into the direct authority of this truth. And we prayed the prayer of faith.

And it felt good. Because it wasn't about something for us. It was something for God. It was something for Christ. It was something that would satisfy His hunger. Will you do it? Hebrews chapter 1. Please take note not of what this preacher sang, but I trust that through the earthen vessel you're hearing something of what our shepherd would be saying.

And I say blessed are you if you are not offended by what you hear him say. As I had suspected several months ago when we seemed to be on this message of grace over and over and over again. And God reassuring of our unconditional acceptance in His Son and unconditional love and His embrace and oh, how it was just so cuddly, wasn't it?

Just to be overcome by the fact that it's by grace through faith and that not of ourself. But I suspected that we were indulging in a season of revelation for grace so that our hearts could be secure and rest.

That we could be settled in the fact that God loves me and has nothing to do with me. And that was a foundation leading us to where we're heading as a company of people. That being into the place of great purging and great shaking.

Into the place where each and every one of us eventually will have to be brought by the hand of God to the point where we hear God say, choose you this day whom you will serve. And when God says that He's not talking about serving the Christian religion because, getting ahead of myself now, Christ did not come to establish a religion called Christianity.

Hebrews and the Call Back to Christ

Did you know that? He didn't come to establish a religion. When Christ says serve me or serve Baal, He's not saying serve Christianity. And this is what the book of Hebrews is all.

About. The book.

Of Hebrews is not pro Christianity and against Judaism. No! That's where we've gotten all confused. We think the book of Hebrews supports our Christianity and denounces Judaism or legalism. Christ never came to start a new religion and I don't care if we call it Christianity.

Because Christianity, for the most.

Part, has departed from the head.

It's just another religion full of the Bible, full of Scriptures. But the dynamic, the vital heart passion of God has been lost, for the most part, in Christianity. And I'll show you exactly what the Spirit is referring to.

And now this is coming now into this hearkening to the voice of God. Did you know people can be quote, unquote, committed Christians, but never, ever, ever awaken to the voice of God or hearken to the voice of God?

And when that element of Christianity, if you want to call it Christianity, if that element of our relationship with God has somehow been taken away, then we don't have anything. We don't have anything.

But what we do is we pride ourselves in our Christianity. Brothers and sisters, Christianity is anathema without a living, vital, daily hearing the Word of God and bowing to the Lordship of Jesus Christ and obeying Him all the way to the cross.

There is a call from the heart of God into the church today saying, Come back to Me! Not your religion, not our Christianity, not our dedication to whatever we think our Christianity is. Come back to Me!

Hearing and hearkening to the voice of God. Hebrews chapter 1 and this is a call of the Spirit of God into our hearts, loved by God, cherished by God. It is a call and is a loving warning to each and every one of us and to the entire body of Christ.

But since you and I are here and this is our world, it's a warning to us and it is we must come back to hearing God. Christianity is all about hearing the Son of God. You go through your New Testament and you don't find Jesus establishing some new religion.

You don't find Him teaching His disciples how to do a Christian thing. You don't see Jesus teaching His disciples how to make Christian churches. You see Jesus walking among His disciples saying, I am the One.

You follow Me. You obey My voice. Period. That's what Christianity is. Vital, living, vibrant relationship with Christ where He is Lord and Master and we are increasingly bowing down to His authority.

Anything, anything that substitutes that is the beginning of spiritual decline, which results in away with your religion, away with your songs, away with your music, away with your commitment and your faithfulness, away with it all.

I don't see.

I don't see any longer a heart. That's.

Listening. That's why in the Book of Revelation, the seven churches, the cry, the cry of the Holy Spirit to each church after He revealed the things that were going on, He that hath an ear to hear, let Him hear.

You see, Christianity is hearing God. Christianity is listening to God in His Word through the Holy Spirit. Christianity is, God is dealing with me about this. God is demanding that I lay this down. It's about hearing and hearkening to God.

That's what Christianity is. And the churches in Asia Minor were losing this quality. And this is the great warfare of the Book of Hebrews. There is a warfare in the Book of Hebrews. The Book of Hebrews, as we mentioned last week, is a book of intense warfare.

It's a book of a clarion call. It's a book, and it's a war between hearing the Son of God as the church, versus resorting to something. I don't care how good it looks, how religious it looks, where the voice of God no longer has a place.

Whether it's Judaism or whether it's a New Testament Christian church. If the voice of the Son of God, verse 2, chapter 1 of Hebrews, He hath in these last days spoken unto us by His Son. There's the battle of the whole Book of Hebrews.

God has spoken finality in His Son. The church's existence hangs upon the Person of Christ, the finished work of Christ, and continually subject to the Word of Christ. That's what Christianity is. The Book of Hebrews, as we mentioned last week, is broken up into two categories.

The first category has to do with phrases that have the word lest in it. The second category has to do with phrases that have the word or words let or let us. What we're going to do today is we're going to look at the first lest.

The Warnings of Hebrews Against Drifting

And we want to point out that this particular word lest I have it somewhere here in my notes. The word lest is used nine times in the Book of Hebrews. Nine times. Oh, I encourage you to do a Bible study but not just to gather information.

Don't do this just so you can gather. Do this with a heart down here and you will hear God speak to you and I'm telling you if you'll listen, He'll devastate you. He'll devastate you. But the word lest is used nine times and the word let us or let is used fourteen times in the Book of Hebrews.

Every time the word lest is used, it is a phrase of warning and it's over one issue, hearkening to the voice of the Son of God. This was a marvelous discovery when I began to search through the lests.

Every time lest is used, if you read the context, it has to do with the voice of God and so therefore the whole issue is settled. The Book of Hebrews is not a call from God to affirm your Christianity or to affirm whatever you think your Christianity is.

It is a letter from the heart of God to the church to affirm their commitment to the person of the Lord Jesus Christ and a continual submission to His voice. His voice of authority in every area of your life, every area of your life, every area of your being is to be subject to the final voice God spoke in times past through prophets and in many different ways but in this hour, in these days, God has spoken to us in His Son and now it is He to whom all of us are now accountable.

Oh, to return back to the Son of God! To return back to hearing His voice and then hearkening to His voice. Okay. Let's begin. As we can see, first of all I'd like to say that in the Book of Hebrews, reference to the voice of God or Him speaking, the word voice or speaking that refers to the voice of Jesus Christ is seven times in the Book of Hebrews.

Seven times. And so it is allegiance to the voice of the Son of God as revealed in the Word of God. That's the battle cry of Hebrews. And all the powers of darkness and all the powers of hell are arrayed against the church corporately and against you and I individually for one and one thing alone.

Families, do you want to know the warfare right now attacking you? Do you want to know the warfare attacking you? It is over the issue of is your family going to be governed by the voice of God or another?

You can be governed by every voice other than Christ and still be a faithful Christian. Ironic, isn't it? But it's true. You can be a faithful Christian and your life and your family is under the government of another.

Perhaps your own. Perhaps you call the shots in your life. Perhaps you're the boss. Oh, but Brother Phil, you don't understand. I read my Bible. I tithe. I'm a part of a church. The Son of God, if He's not, then the best thing you can do is take your Christianity and put it in the fire.

Because if your Christianity is either preventing you or keeping you or taking the place of, hearing the voice of the Son of God and walking under His headship and growing together in an organic way with other believers who are of the same heart and mind, if your Christianity is leading you away from that, it's not worth it.

Throw it out. Get rid of it. Because at the day of His appearing, it will burn like chaff. It will burn like chaff. At the day of His appearing, when Christians try and boast about all the things that they did in their Christianity that had nothing to do with hearkening to the voice of the Son of God, it will burn like chaff and be carried away.

They'll stand naked. You won't be able to bring any of that stuff to God. Nothing. The book of Hebrews doesn't support that. It supports one thing. Obeying the voice of God as it is recorded in the Word.

Seven times hearken to the voice of God. Okay. Okay. In Hebrews 2, we're working toward a close. So please, suffer the lengthy word of exhortation. Verse 1, chapter 2,. Therefore we ought to give the more earnest heed to the things which we have what?

Heard. What does that imply? Why? Someone said something, right? I mean, you can't give heed to something unless someone said something. Now, who do you think the writer of Hebrews chapter 2 is talking about when he says, therefore, let us give the more earnest heed to the things which we have heard?

Brothers and sisters, he's referring to the things that they heard that pertain to the Lord Jesus Christ and the fact that God spoke through Him. In other words, give heed to what Jesus has and is saying.

Immediately here, we have a warfare going on. It's over what? The voice and authority of the Son of God. Now follow through with this. Follow with me here. Lest... There's that word, lest. That's the first usage of the word lest.

Lest at any time we should let them slip. Now, this is the first usage of the word lest in the book of Hebrews. And therefore, being the first usage, it has gathered up in it a truth that if we don't grasp it, all the other lests, all the other warnings will most likely fall on dead ears.

Just like the first usage of the word let us. You know what it is? Let us fear. In other words, if we don't together learn to fear our God, then we're not going to be able to affirm our resolve to stay committed to the Lordship of Christ.

So the first usage of both fear or both lest and let us have gathered in it something of significant value. But we won't go to let us. We're going to go to lest they slip. Now, the words let them slip, they are made up of two words.

The first word is to pass by. And the second is to float under the power of a current.

To pass by and to float under the power of a current. This phrase describes a ship or a boat that is floating away under the power of a current. Now, allow me to read an illustration of this that will, what I believe, drive this home.

This is an illustration that is used by Mr. Sparks in regard to this phrase, lest they slip. I used to be a yachtsman in Scotland and we would go out on our day sail. But the most anxious moment, the most tense moment, was when we came back to pick up our moorings.

Now, a mooring, this is my addition here so that we're all working from the same page because I didn't know myself. I had to read it and study it and look in books. A mooring is that which moors a vessel as anchors or cables.

The place or position of a moored vessel. And so the most anxious moment was when he came to pick up their moorings. In the tide of the current, if the tide of the current was flowing strongly and if the wind was high, there would be a chance of missing our moorings.

You have got to take off your power. Take down your sails. Get your head toward the mooring and then everybody would look toward the one with the boat hook up in the bow. Someone lying down flat on the deck with outstretched hands to take hold of that mooring and to grab it and hold it.

Because the tide or the current flowing would even pull you into the sea if you did not hold tightly enough. Here was tenseness. The peril was that you would miss it and drift past it. And there were rocks over there.

Beloved, you could drift past. You could miss the drift carried by the tide or the current or the wind. Oh, it was a tense moment. You got it, held on, and were able to pull the boat up on the moorings and make fast.

Then the tension was gone. We've reached home. It is all right now. Everything is all right. Now that is the picture here which is actually used lest we drift. Therefore, we ought to give the more earnest heed to the things which we have heard lest at any time we should let them drift.

Brothers and sisters, listen closely as we're closing. Every single person here is in a current. It's called the current of life. The current of your life. And with that current of life comes the very serious danger of drifting right past the voice of the Son of God.

The thing that anchors our ship. The thing that anchors our boat. The thing that anchors our family. The thing that anchors our children. The thing that anchors everything. And today, the Holy Spirit gives us our first warning over hearkening to the voice of God.

The greatest danger. And you'll find that all the subsequent warnings, lest ye be hardened. Lest you become profane. Lest you become a fornicator. Lest you resist. These are subsequent warnings we're going to look into.

But all of these warnings are connected to the drift. If we drift past, we are then so much more vulnerable to all the other pitfalls that can come into our life. And so let me ask you this question as we begin to contemplate these things.

Are you being driven by the current of your life today to the point where you've missed your mooring this morning? Are you just drifting through life? You're daily missing the mooring. The anchor. The cable.

The voice of the Son of God. I tell you, beloved, O God, give us ears to hear. If you are drifting in the current of your life and you are missing your mooring, you can be sure of this one thing. You are heading for rocks, stones.