Tape 6 - The Call to the Cross

Park Meadows Church

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music I appreciate that this evening being Friday evening each evening if I were to have greeted you as we started out of course as we said the

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Lord always greeted people and being as he spoke Hebrew and when he was raised from the dead he used it it's used throughout the scriptures and he would greet the people by just saying to them peace and it's a an

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Eastern greeting they just say peace and others would say safety and others would say grace but the

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Jewish people always said peace and of course the Hebrew word for peace is Shalom and you just greet one another with that the technical greeting is

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Shalom Aleichem which means peace God's blessings or God's prosperity or God's health to you but this is the one evening that you would not say it in such a manner and the reason for that is quite obvious isn't it what is today today starts the

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Jewish Sabbath it starts at six o 'clock today technically speaking when the Sun goes down but because the

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Sun varies they just say six o 'clock and it will continue until six o 'clock tomorrow evening so this is the

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Sabbath and so it is somewhat changed and instead of saying Shalom they just simply say Shabbat Shalom and Shabbat simply means

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Sabbath and so if I were to greet you and say Shabbat Shalom you would return that greeting to me so this evening

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I will say to you Shabbat Shalom thank you you're kind so you know if you meet your

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Lord you can say to him he'll know exactly what you're saying and he'll greet you and they did use this greeting all throughout the scriptures and they used it throughout all of Jewish history and so it helps us to kind of give us a little flavor it's good to study the

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Bible I mean God loves Gentiles like he loves Jews certainly no one disagrees that but it'll help you to study the

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Bible a little Jewish background a little Jewish thinking because it was written by Jews about the king of the Jews and it helps you to understand sometimes what they were thinking you know at those particular times but if you have your

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Bible with you please turn me to the book of Levi chapter 10 obviously you know what that is also you permit me my little idiosyncrasies

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Matthew chapter 10 he had two names his name was Matthew his name was Levi you can call him

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Matthew Levi or Levi Matthew whichever way you want to put it in Matthew chapter 10 we want to talk this evening and of course we've spoken all week long about the

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Christian and his relationship to the cross and we've built towards this evening you've been faithful every evening

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I'm grateful to you for your faithfulness and we've come along and then of course tomorrow morning we'll have our interlude when we will discuss the

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Middle East crises operation peace for Galilee which was the last excursion that put the people of Israel the

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Israeli Defense Force the IDF in Lebanon and what is taking place right now and what is going to occur in the very near future and then as I said we'll be sharing some things you that you

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I'm sure have been praying for and something you've been looking forward to and something you've been longing for to happen in the nation of Israel being as you are a

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Christian and we'll share some things you that will amaze you and astound you of what is actually happening today that we're becoming involved in and so you be here with us in the morning and then we'll throw it open for questions and answers and we'll try to answer as many questions as possible concerning Israel the

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Middle East and the prophetic matters concerning that and in tomorrow evening as the pastor stated we will have the

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Passover demonstration if you've never seen a Christ in the Passover then you need to be here tomorrow evening it's a very beautiful portrayal we have all the paraphernalia and we'll have all the rabbinical garb we'll have everything here and laid out for you and it's a very beautiful portrayal of how

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Jesus Christ himself is entwined within and seen very clearly by one who has the eyes of faith in a ceremony that is thousands and thousands of years old that began in Exodus chapter 12 when

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God took Moses and led the people of Israel out of Egypt and that has been celebrated every year throughout all of history from that time and yet little do they know that it speaks clearly and very vividly and very graphically about the

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Messiah himself the Lord Jesus Christ so hopefully you'll be with us during this time now tonight we want to kind of wind up our weekly session so to speak although it doesn't stop here because during the

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Bible's time we'll be talking about the proclaiming of the message of Christ or the sharing of the cross teaching the cross preaching the cross proclaiming the cross how we are to do that so that we don't make it up in of none effect in our lives and then we'll close our time together this week as far as I'm concerned in my time with you in the last message on the lamb in the midst of the throne and so tonight we want to talk about the call to the cross in Matthew chapter 10 verse 38 there is an interesting verse of Scripture in Matthew 10 38 and it says the following and he that taketh not his cross and followeth after me is not worthy of me now it is quite interesting as you read the

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Gospels about the life of Jesus Christ you'll find that Christ never one time explained what he meant by that statement there is not one place to my understanding and to the best research of which

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I personally am capable could I ever find one place in the Gospels where Jesus ever explained what taking his cross meant he never explained what it meant until he himself had passed beyond the tomb and when he ascended back to the father from his majesty on high he begins to interpret what he meant by that through his chosen vessel the

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Apostle Paul it is through Paul chosen by the Lord himself that he makes known very clearly his claims of the cross and the claims that it has upon every individual it is also significant when you go and study the writings of Paul you'll find that Paul does something very strange he never says take up your cross

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Christ says take it up and never explains it to us until he goes to heaven he turns around through Paul and explains it through Paul what he means by picking up the cross but Paul never says take the cross

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Paul assumes that the cross has already triumphed he assumes that the cross has already won the victory he doesn't say take it up he just says get involved in it he says involve yourself in the victory that has already been won just enter into the triumph of the

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Lord so what I'm saying is the words of the Apostle Paul interpret the call to the cross given by the

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Lamb of God as he made his way to the cross when you go back and read the writings of Christ they in turn will interpret what

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Paul is saying so when we put them all together we can get a clear vision of what he means by a call to the cross now although the cross has already triumphed it happened 2 ,000 odd years ago it has already triumphed and the work of deliverance has occurred nothing else needs to occur even though that is true and are the victory over the powers of hell has been accomplished yet Christians believers individually every

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Christian individually must make that practical in their daily experience it must experientially become true in the life of every person and every redeemed child of God must deliberately themselves by their own will choose that cross to be theirs it never occurs any other way even though it has happened the victory is ours everything has been accomplished you yourself must choose it individually or it shall never occur in your life now the call to the cross from the lips of him who endured the cross still comes to each redeemed child of God and it foreshadows the only path possible of following Jesus Christ as I mentioned to you last evening in introducing what we were going to talk about tonight

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I mentioned to you that there are five calls to the cross in the gospel accounts five is the

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Bible number for grace and they're only five and there are no more than five there are five calls to the cross and each time you find one of those calls to the cross you will find an amazing scriptural phenomena it adds a different aspect to what that means to the life of the

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Christian there are five and they're almost the same but they're not identically the same and what they do is they just add a different aspect to it and that's what

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I want us to look at if we truly obey the call to the cross a different aspect is revealed all right turn me please to the gospel according to Luke chapter 14 the gospel according to Luke chapter 14 and let's look at one verse of Scripture there verse 27 and you might want to write out beside those of you taking notes you can write it in your notes and those of you that are right outside in the board of your

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Bible you might want to write one word that will help you understand what we mean when we say the call to the cross in chapter 14 verse 27 and whosoever doth not bear his cross and come after me and you want to underline that word cannot be my disciple he didn't say perhaps would not be sure maybe they won't be or maybe there will be maybe they won't be he says it's impossible so the word you want to look at is inevitable the path of the cross is inevitable it cannot be escaped now as you think about that the path of the cross was inevitable for Jesus Christ he could not escape the cross they tried to talk him out of it they tried to stop him from going

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Peter threw himself as a human barrier before him and yet the path is the same for the Lamb as it is for the followers of the

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Lamb it is as imperative for us as it was for him did he not say in this verse of Scripture he who does not bear his cross and come after me cannot be my disciple there is no such thing as there being a

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Christian disciple who doesn't carry his cross and who doesn't take the cross you may be saved but that doesn't automatically make you a disciple a disciple is an obedient follower of another one who adheres to the teachings of another and Jesus very clearly said that if we don't bear our cross and come after him then it is impossible for that person to be a disciple of his and since Christ took the cross in our stead to redeem us he took our place upon it any person who's going to learn of Christ must take that cross or he can never be taught of Jesus Christ now since Christ did this until the time well just turn with me please if you will let me show you something in Luke chapter 9 turn back over to chapter 9 until the time when

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Jesus began to show his disciples what he was doing they never knew what it meant to follow him they never had any idea of what he was talking about they knew in their hearts that he spoke the words of eternal life they had seen the mighty works and the marvelous miracles they had seen all these things he had done but a cross what do you mean a cross suffering and death in the life of the

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Christian no such thought had ever entered their mind look at Luke chapter 9 verse 43 and they were all astonished at the mighty power of God but while they marveled everyone at all things which

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Jesus did he said unto his disciples let these sayings sink down into your ears for the

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Son of Man shall be delivered into the hands of men but they understood not this saying they had never grasped the fact that he was going to die upon the cross and it is exactly the same with the children of God today it's identically the same with Christians today but with the major difference they had never seen him on a cross but you and I know from God's Word that he has died on a cross we have the history behind us and we know that he's died on the cross we know that we've been born again we know that we have life through his death but that he bore a cross which must be our cross also that thought has never entered the minds of the majority of Christians that walk the planet earth it has never crossed their thinking that that same cross must come into their life also they have not realized that a crucified

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Lord must have crucified followers and a true following of the Lamb of God will only lead a person through the death to themselves and the death of all that wraps up there that is wrapped up in their life the way of the

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Lamb always leads to the slaughter and you have to go all the way into the heavenly realm that we'll look at Sunday morning in our worship hour before you find a lamb on the throne you always find him on the cross or in the tomb or just coming out of the tomb but you never find him ruling and reigning until you get into the heavenly realm now the cross is inevitable for your life and mine if we're going to be a disciple of Jesus Christ you might as well mark it down tonight you cannot escape it and before you leave this place

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I'm going to force you to make a decision you're either going to come to that cross are you going to reject it one more time in your life and walk out of here just like you came in with an unchanged life or an unchanged attitude or you're either going to stay closer committed to that cross if you've already committed yourself to it and you'll be stronger in your faith because of it but all of us are going to make a commitment and you're already making it by the very fact that you are here you're already making it so no one can escape it according to the

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Word of God now turn me please back to the gospel according to Matthew and let's pick up a second factor a second factor the meaning of the cross

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Matthew 16 what does it mean taking up the cross what would this mean to us what are we saying when we speak of this

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Matthew 16 and we'll pick up another verse verse 24 please then said

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Jesus unto his disciples now watch the changing here a little bit if any man will come after me let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me so he adds a thought or two he says let a man deny himself notice what he said he did not say let a man deny pleasant things to himself he didn't say let a man deny the sins of himself he didn't talk about pleasant things or sins he didn't say you know those he said but let a man deny himself and all that is bound up in himself himself as the central source himself as the cause of all the action of his life let a person denounce that central spring that is in his life let him denounce that himself as the central object from whence all things come to him from without everything comes to himself and let him denounce that is what he's saying to us and I believe if he'd used any other word other than the word himself he would have narrowed the meaning of what it means to take up the cross and follow him because himself covers the entire spectrum of deliverance the greatest thing salvation ever does for a person it brings deliverance from himself it brings us deliverance from making those decisions because if you let a man alone he will always make the wrong decisions outside of God and God saves us from going to the place where we were to send ourselves by his marvelous grace he moves into that life now if we will take for ourselves the cross and if we accept the spirit of the cross if we will deny or renounce push away ourselves as crucified with Christ on the cross then in doing so we will be delivered from the law we will escape the tyranny and terror of the law we will escape the bondage of sin we will move from the spirit of the world and will be released from the bondage of Satan if we'll do such a thing if you and I can understand that the himself of mankind is the core of all the trouble all the rebellion all the selfishness and all the pride and all the sin in this world is because of himself it is not because of anyone else no one can make you sin have you ever said this you made me mad that is impossible no one can make you mad

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I'll tell you what happens what they do with us is they create a circumstance around us so what is in our heart shows up that's all they did they just create a circumstance but there is a defense mechanism that's called projection and so psychologically we just throw out to them what's already in our heart and try to put them on the guilt trip so we don't have to deal with it and so we go off and they'll accept it most people will feed you monkey all you got to do is give it to them they don't know they'll take it off so you made me mad they go off feeling bad because they made you mad now nobody makes you sin as I said early in the week let me repeat it sin is predetermined premeditated rebellion against God you have to think about it and you have to decide to do it you got to think about it and decide to it no one can make you sin no and this is what he's talking about here if a person would just look at himself as nailed to the cross and day by day deny or refuse to know himself and very calmly and very quietly walk the path of the cross they will follow the

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Lamb of God not right on to the to the cross but they'll fall him right on into the center of heaven where the glory of the resurrection life lives within their life and God begins to work in that particular life so what does it mean when we say take up the cross it is inevitable you cannot escape it he requires that of every child of God but it simply means that we deny ourselves our own selfish goals and dreams and aspirations and hope just push them aside and find out what

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God wants to do with my life most people get them a program for their life and then say now

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God bless this instead of saying God what do you want me to do they figure out their own things and churches do identically the same thing they figured all out and then try to get

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God to bless it instead of getting along God saying God what do you want me to do about this God where do you want me to go

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God what do you want me to say Lord what do you want me to do and they do it just the opposite and so this is the meaning of the cross but there's another one let me add a verse let's stay right where we are and let's just think about another thought if it's inevitable and the meaning of it is here then let's look how deep that meaning goes the depth of the cross verse 24 again then said

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Jesus unto his disciples if any man will come after me let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me now let's add another verse please for whosoever will save his life shall lose it and whosoever will lose his life for my sake shall find it now you always find that verse being used when a missionary comes to speak in the church but that's totally out of context and has nothing to do with it whatsoever although you can talk about it in the mission field that's fine well and good but it doesn't mean that in this particular passage of Scripture it is quite interesting to me when

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I read this verse 25 look at it for whosoever will save his life shall lose it whosoever loses life for my sake shall find it you find it three times three times in the call to the cross

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Christ used those mysterious words you find them in three different locations in the scripture would you turn me please to the gospel according to Yolkanon chapter 12

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John that's John John chapter 12 see you get bored and you get sleepy and I gotta wake you up you trying to figure out what kind of Bible I'm using up here

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John chapter 12 again when speaking not of the cross but of the grain of wheat falling into the ground to die the

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Lord used the same mysterious words in John 12 please look at verse 24 verily verily

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I say unto you except a grain of wheat fall into the ground and die it abideth alone but if it died bringeth forth much fruit now hear those words he that loveth his life shall lose it and he that hateth his life in this world shall keep it unto life eternal now

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I suspect this now please listen to what I'm about to say I think you and I as Christian people

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I think Christians have a whole as a whole have been content on renouncing our sins we get our sins out of our lives but we keep ourselves that's what

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I suspect we've done in the church we've gotten rid of all those big sins but we've kept ourselves on the throne of our life we have not turned loose of the himself of our life we have failed to see that a himself in the life of an individual can stand completely in the way of the

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Holy Spirit working in their life just like sin can stand in the way of it we have failed to see that we have failed to see that the life which flows in us from the first Adam can hinder the manifestation of the life of Jesus Christ in your mortal flesh as you walk through this earth just as much as any gross thing you want to conjure up in your mind can do himself can stop

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God working in your life just like anything else we deal with the sins but we are reluctant to deal with ourselves we just don't want to look at it well the question is pertinent what is this life which a man may seek to save and lose in so doing what life is this that we are disposed to love instead of hate and because we love it instead of hating it we have eternal loss we suffer an eternal loss what kind of a life is it will you turn me please to the first Corinthian letter where the

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Apostle Paul deals with this and he gives us some light concerning this 1st

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Corinthians chapter 15 the great chapter on the resurrection some translators in translating these words they use the word soul for life instead of saying loses life they translate the word soul in every one of those passages and Paul gives us some understanding in verse 45 of 1st

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Corinthians 15 he says and so it is written the first man Adam was made a living soul the last

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Adam was made a quickening or life -giving spirit another verse 47 the first man is of the earth earthy the second man is the

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Lord from heaven now the life that we ought to renounce our hate is that life that we receive from the first Adam that's the light that we're not have anything to do with we may call it the soulish life in order to distinguish it from the heavenly life that comes to us when we become a new creature in Jesus Christ but man loves this life because it's a part of himself we also love it because here me carefully it works in the realms of your senses it works in the realm of your consciousness it works in the realm of your emotions and it has more of an affinity with the things of earth than any other part of you and that is why we like it the emotional sensuous life of a

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Christian is largely mingled together with the true life of God when you first get saved that's the reason there's so many up -and -down experiences in the life of an early

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Christian when a person first becomes a Christian one day they're happy in the Lord next day they look like death

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I mean one day you don't think you ever gonna see him again one day they don't read the Bible next day they can't read it enough and this is the way it is until they begin to mature and they begin to understand what is going on in their life and it'll happen even whether they are convicted of some known disobedience where there's no known sin in their life but they to live in the spirit to walk in the spirit and to depend upon him who is the life -giving spirit it brings you out of the realm of your emotions it brings you out of the realm of your senses and it puts you into a realm of changeless peace it puts you into a place of deep serenity and calmness and it's infinite beyond beyond the pleasant emotions of everyday living most

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Christians live in the realm of their soul and do not know the difference between a soul and a spirit and if you want to do yourself some good my sweet people get you a

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Bible and get you a dictionary and get you a commentary and go from Genesis to Revelation and learn the difference between your soul and your spirit your soul spirit doesn't clap hands and your spirit doesn't wave its arms that is your soul that is your emotions that is those senses that you have

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I'm not saying that you're wrong and doing it I'm saying it has nothing to do with your spirit whatsoever your spirit is a changeless piece of joy in your heart and the

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Word of God separates the two if you think not please turn with me to Hebrews chapter 4 we read this so flippantly it doesn't mean anything to us listen to me carefully when

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God puts us into the walking in the spirit and we begin to walk in the light as he is in the light we may move beyond these pleasant emotions of the senses and we are not affected by the changing joys of earth many

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Christians if you can't get them running around screaming and shouting they lose their quote joy if that's what your joy is you are in bad shape spiritually my dear people your joy has nothing to do with that whatsoever your joy depends upon whether or not

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Jesus Christ is your Lord and whether or not he can do for you what he says he can do and it depends upon your position not your condition it just does now look at Hebrews 412 an interesting verse that we know well for the

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Word of God is living and powerful now watch it and sharper than any two -edged sword piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit your soul is the seat of your mind and your will and your emotions and the

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Word of God is to separate that from the spirit it has to why if it doesn't you and I'll be controlled by our emotions and we will make emotional intellectual decisions instead of rational intellectual decisions and the

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Spirit of God will not be in dominance that's exactly what happened in the Garden of Eden when Adam fell in sin he fell from being dominated by spirit he fell to the realm of where he was dominated by his psychic and his emotions and that's where man is today when man gets born again he's put back into a position where the spirit wants to dominate but most people still hang in the soul and they think the spirits dominating because they're saved but if you don't bear a cross the spirit doesn't dominate because Jesus says you cannot be my disciple except you die to yourself die to himself and all the emotion deals with himself it has nothing to do with the

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Lord not at all so what am I saying to you if the Word of God dwells in you and me richly this dividing takes place then you and I are going to hate this soul life and we will lose it by yielding it to the cross of Jesus Christ if we will follow the

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Lamb of God and have his life manifested through us so that we can truly walk in his steps in the midst of men we must know the depth of his cross and if we're going to enter into the benefits of his death we must on our part deny renounce or hate that soul life and renounce all that we have of our own in order to take that which is his and bring it into our life and let him work within our being how far and how deep the renouncing goes in my life and your life will determine how far and how deep the resurrection life comes into realization in your life just how far and deep you want to renounce it you and I renounce our sins so that we may die with Christ to our sins we die to the world so that we may be crucified with Christ to the world and in the same manner you must die to yourself so that in Christ we might be dead to ourselves and live unto

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Christ this is what he's telling us and then we shall reign with him as he comes to reign in our heart so in like manner we renounce the soulish life from whence springs all the activities of our life on earth why so that we might always bearing about in the body the dying of the

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Lord Jesus Christ this is what Paul said in 2nd Corinthians and we begin to learn to draw on the life of the

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Lord Jesus that may be manifested in our mortal flesh and by being manifested in our earthly life it might bring life to other people as we touch them in the name of Jesus Christ that is the depth and that's how deep it wants to go but will you turn back with me please to Matthew chapter 10 and let's pick up another factor another factor

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Matthew chapter 10 we're talking about the call to the cross when Jesus says take it up it touches a lot of things and sometimes they're not pleasant but death never is death is crucial so is surgery

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I mean they're all painful you can't ease it up there's no way you can make it poetic there's no way you can and use a poetic fancy to to make it some fanciful idea it's a very difficult thing to do but look at Matthew chapter 10 and let's pick up verse 37 and see another aspect of it well let's let's just start reading verse 35 and get the clear picture now watch what

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Jesus said this just the opposite of what you hear people say for I am come to set a man at variance against his father and the daughter against her mother and the daughter -in -law against her mother -in -law and a man's foes shall be they of his own household he that loveth father mother more than me is not worthy of me and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me and he that taketh not his cross and followeth after me is not worthy of me the cross is inevitable the meaning is that you die yourself the depth of it it goes all the way down to the separating of the soul and the spirit and getting the soul life out of our lives so that we can walk in pleasing to the

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Lord and here you have the cross as it relates to your ties on earth it relates to your ties on earth and this is a glimpse of one of many aspects of what renouncing the soul life means the soulish life may be bound up in earthly ties now listen to me carefully they may be very legal ties they may be very lawful ties

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I believe that husband and wife and family ought to be so closely knit together that no offense would ever sever those relationships but my dear people you and I we always go overboard so to speak we always get out of balance and we take these legal family ties we take the ties of our family and take the ties of our friends and we hold on to them so tenaciously and we grip them and grope them and we hold on to them and grasp them so strongly that they have to have the death of the cross in order to put them into their proper perspective the deep burping of the

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Holy Spirit of God has to come about in order to put them into their right place in the Lord and I personally believe that the keenest and the sharpest sword work that the

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Holy Spirit ever has to do in the life of a Christian is in relation that Christian and the relationship that they have to their families and to their friends it is extremely difficult to do because you cannot follow the path of Jesus Christ you cannot follow the

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Lamb of God without somewhere down the line you're going to come head on, you're going to clash with those that you love.

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You're gonna clash with your family, you're gonna clash with your friends, somewhere down the line it is going to come about and it's where the claims of the crucified

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Christ are gonna be so strong on your life that it's gonna conflict with your ties of love with the people that you care about it's just and you're gonna have to make a decision.

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You're either gonna follow the Lord or are you gonna follow your family you 're gonna follow the Lord are you gonna follow your friends you 're gonna follow the

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Lord? Are you going to follow your employer? Somewhere down the line we're going to be confronted with those decisions. And then it is that a man's foes become those of his own household.

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And then it is that the master steps forth to your ear spiritually and he just whispers to you and me, he that loveth his father and mother more than me is not worthy of me.

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He that loves his son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. There are people who haven't been in your church one night this week who are members of this church for that very reason right there.

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They've put their families and they've put their friends before God. There will be people who are here Sunday morning and they'll be back

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Sunday morning and that's all their Christianity is and that's all over the world. You have Sunday morning

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Christian people. And the reason they don't do it is because of things of the family. And I tell people everywhere

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I go, it is the most amazing thing. There is a medical phenomenon. There is a medical miracle that happens every

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Sunday morning. Somewhere along about 8, 15 to 8 o 'clock, all kinds of young people have all kinds of indigestion.

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They have headaches. They have blurred vision. I mean all sorts of things happen and they just can't make it but along about 12, 15 to 12, 30 after Sunday school and church is over, all of a sudden it's gone.

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It's miraculous. It just disappears and they're healthy and whole. They can go to the beach. They can go roll. They can just do anything in the world.

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No problems at all. But it's not only with the young, it's with the old. You see grandmother, lumbago and arthritis, doesn't it set in about 9 o 'clock every

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Sunday morning? Here it comes and she just can't make it. She just can't get out of bed and all of a sudden the phone rings and it's son and daughter -in -law and the new baby are coming and they're going to Sunday and have them into their homes with a meal and they know that they're not

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Christians. They know that if they die or they know that if the Lord returns, those people are lost for an eternity and yet that man or that woman or that mom or dad or young man or young lady will never speak one word to that person knowing that their eternal destiny could be held right there in their hands in a fleeting moment and yet they'll never speak a word about Jesus Christ and turn right around and go to church and claim that they know

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Christ. Claim that they're crucified with the Lord and claim that they serve God and claim that they're disciples of Him and claim they've been born again when the

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New Testament contradicts every single word they speak. And if you don't know what

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I'm talking about, would you go home tonight and please look in the mirror and ask yourself two questions.

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How many people are Christians because of you? And how many people are not Christians because of you?

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How many of them don't want to be because you say you are? And answer those two questions and you will develop an idea of what

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I'm trying to say to my heart as well as I'm saying it to your heart. You see, He has to deal with us.

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He that loveth loved ones more than me is not worthy of me. And this obedient heart, oh you'll shed many tears and you'll turn around and you'll say to the

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Lord, but Lord I want to be yours. And your heart will consent to follow the Lord. And you'll begin to follow the

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Lord with a broken heart. And you'll trust Him and you'll walk with Him. And you'll begin to move in the way He wants and you're willing to lose all for His dear sake.

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And then an amazing thing happens without you even realizing it. He begins to put everything back into order and He gives it back to you but it's in its proper perspective when

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He deals with it. But as long as you and I don't then it'll never be in that perspective. And so what I'm saying is, was it no suffering to the

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Lord when His family said He was beside Himself? Don't you think that disturbed Him when His family didn't understand

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Him? His mother and dad criticized Him and He was just a young fellow and He said, don't you know I've got to be about the will of my

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Father? His friends turned away from Him. One of them betrayed Him. They all walked away from Him although they declared they would never turn away from Him.

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He went to the cross alone. You and I ought to do what

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He did. He could do nothing but obey although it put Him contrary to the hopes of His family and friends.

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And you and I have to obey God. May I just insert something here? Ladies and gentlemen, the greatest demand God places on your life are not to serve

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God. That's not what He wants you to do. He doesn't want you to serve Him. He doesn't want you to give money and offer Him a plate. He doesn't want you to come to church.

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He doesn't want you to pray. He doesn't want you to read the Bible. That is not the greatest thing. The greatest demand that God places on the life of any

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Christian young or old is that you obey Him. That you obey Him whatever that means.

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Obey Him above all else because the scripture says sacrifices are worthless if we don't have obedience.

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They are just not worthy at all. Well, turn with me to Mark chapter 8 please.

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You look like you're getting excited about that remark so I'll move on to the next one. Mark chapter 8.

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Every follower of the Lamb of God, remember he that loses finds. He that loses finds.

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In Mark chapter 8 we look at the cross as it's related to another aspect. Mark 8 verse 34.

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And when He had called the people unto Him with His disciples, also He said unto them, whosoever will come after Me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow

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Me. For whosoever would save his life shall lose it, but whosoever shall lose his life, now watch he changes it here a little bit, for My sake and the

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Gospels, the same shall save it. Now the context of these words indicates that the soul life may be centered very strongly in the love of popularity and the fear of people.

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The love of being popular or fear of people. Afraid what they'll think, afraid of what they'll say, or afraid of what they'll do.

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And that would cause a Christian, that would cause a believer to become ashamed of the words of Christ, to become ashamed of Jesus Christ in a time when the sinful generation or when people, their peers, began to put pressure upon them, they began to back off and compromise the convictions that they have in their heart.

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They refused to stand at this time. Mark 8, 38 is thrown in with it. That's why

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He said, whosoever therefore shall be ashamed of Me and My words in this adulterous and sinful generation, of him also shall the

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Son of Man be ashamed when He comes in the glory of His Father with the holy angels. That statement is made in connection with His call to the cross.

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And the Lord knew before He ever called you, the cross was an offense. He knew before He ever touched your life, that the message of the cross was an offense.

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He knew that when He revealed the word of the cross to the Apostle Paul, He knew that every Christian that came to the cross, it would be an offense to this world.

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This world doesn't like the cross. This world doesn't like the message of the cross. This world doesn't like people of the cross.

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And this world detests, with all the hordes of darkness, they detest crucified Christians. Because that's where the power of God is, in the life of a crucified follower of the

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Lamb. And they do not like that. And let me say to you to proclaim a preach, and I know the pulpits are full of them.

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Your city has them, just like our city has them. There are preachers all over the land. There are people all over the land.

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There are teachers all over the land, who preach a patterned man, that Jesus is a model man, and that He's a patterned man.

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But that is not a cross. That is not a cross at all. The arch deceiver of souls, Satan, will even help men to copy the

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Sermon on the Mount. He will give them the ability to imitate and to duplicate the Sermon on the

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Mount, if he can keep them away from the blood atonement of the cross. He will just do it. He will help them do many, many things.

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He will even help them have the outward stamp of the kingdom of God upon them. They will act like Christians, talk like Christians, look like Christians, and even believe they are

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Christians many times. And yet, they belong to the enemy. You need to read the parable of the wheat and the tares. Jesus plainly taught that in the parable of wheat and tares.

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What am I saying? I'm saying to proclaim a gospel of Christ and His cross, with peace alone through the blood of the cross, that there's no contentment or peace with God aside from the cross.

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And a cross that speaks of you and me being separated from the world, and claims an absolute surrender to the man of Calvary, and that there is no other way than that, will mean in a truth a losing, a renouncing of the soul life.

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Because in preaching a gospel like that, in teaching a gospel like that, in you sharing a truth like that, with its love of the glory of the men, the soul life is going to be lost, and the glory of God is going to shine in your life as you walk day by day, wherever God puts you.

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Because you can't share that kind of a message and love the soul. You just can't do it. You can't share that kind of message and love yourself, because it'll make you the most unpopular person in town.

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It will not make you popular. And you can't make it easy for people. Well, you say, well, how often do

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I have to do that? Turn back to the gospel according to Luke. The gospel according to Luke.

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You see, Jesus didn't leave anything untouched. He covered all the bases. Luke 9, 23.

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And he said to them all, if any man will come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross, and then he adds another aspect daily.

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When do you do it? When you get saved? When do you do it? When you get baptized? When do you do it? When you join the church?

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No. Take up his cross daily and follow me. For whosoever would save his life shall lose it, but whosoever will lose his life for my sake, the same shall save it.

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He says it is to be daily. And just as the Apostle Paul said, always bearing about in the body the dying of Jesus.

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So the Lord himself said daily. So you see in the writings of the Apostle Paul that there is a oneness.

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There is a union with Jesus Christ's death, which admits us and allows us to move into a new sphere of life, where we can look back upon the cross, as I've said earlier this week, as a great gulf fix between us and the world.

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That cross just sits there and illuminates our path behind us, so that we know how we came, and we know that we don't ever want to go back that way.

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And it's that great gulf fix as the cross separates us, and prevents us, and stops us, and hinders us, and detours us from going back into the world from whence we came.

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And in like manner as you read Paul's writings, you not only see the cross as a great gulf fix, but you see that day by day there is a continuous conformity to the image of the

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Son of God. Day by day we ought to be growing more Christ -like in our character. Day by day we ought to learn more about what it means to walk with the

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Lord. Day by day our responses and our attitudes ought to be more what he talks about. And we ought to know the necessary condition for the ever increasing manifestation of the power of the resurrection life in reality in our lives.

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Instead of singing about it and talking about it, it ought to be a reality in our everyday life. Now in harmony with all of that, the

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Lord just simply says daily. Take up your cross daily Christian. Child of God, he says daily.

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You must definitely realize, and you must definitely account, and you must definitely reckon the fact that you have been crucified with Christ.

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You must arm yourselves with the same mind of your crucified Lord, and you must be willing to be obedient to death daily.

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Willing to die to yourself daily. Willing to die to the friends daily.

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Willing to die to family daily. Just to be obedient to death daily. There must be the deliberate losing of the soul life that we may exchange it for the resurrection life of the

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Lord himself. And daily we must be willing to fall into a fuller conformity to his death.

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He just simply says daily, daily, daily. You cannot escape it. The Lord calls you, and the

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Lord calls me to the cross daily, daily, daily. If we ought to be his crucified messengers to a needy world, it's going to have to be done every single day of our life.

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Our last passage is in the same book. Let's go back where we started. Let's just go back to where we started and end up in the same place we started.

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Luke chapter 14. Let me pick up a verse before, and then read the verse we read, and let me add another verse please.

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In Luke chapter 14, let's begin reading verse 26. If any man come to me, and hate not his father, and mother, and wife, and children, and brethren, and sisters, yea, and his own life also, he cannot be my disciple.

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And whosoever does not bear his cross, and come after me, cannot be my disciple. Now he's got you hedged in either way you go.

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Either way you go, he's got us hedged in. We cannot be his disciple. What's he really talking about?

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Could we not agree tonight that he's just speaking about unconditional surrender? Just throw up your hands and say, Lord I'm tired of it.

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Lord I'm tired of fighting you. I'm tired of just struggling with you. Lord I'm tired of rebelling against you.

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I'm tired of having this war going on in my will and your will. I'm tired God every time you lay something on my heart,

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I try to find all these reasons as to why I can't do it. Lord I'm tired of just resisting you, and I'm going to give you unconditional surrender.

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That's the keynote of this entire passage for the absolute claim of God as the Creator and the

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Redeemer upon all that we are, all that we have, all that we ever will be, all that we ever have or will have is graphically put forth by the

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Word of God itself, by the Creator Redeemer himself. Every single word that you read in verse 26, every word that you read in verse 27 is significant, and it is unqualified.

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You don't have to check it out. You don't have to look it up in the dictionary. You can read it with your own eyes, and it means exactly what it says.

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If any man come to me and hate not his father and mother and wife and children and brethren and sisters, yea in his own life also, he cannot be my disciple.

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And whosoever doth not bear his cross and come after me cannot be my disciple.

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What does it mean? It simply means this. When you talk about taking up your cross daily, it just simply means nothing more than this, how the cross of Jesus Christ affects your life every day.

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How his cross affects your life every day, that's what it means. How is it going to affect your life that day?

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That's what it means by taking that up and making it yours. And you follow him in his path, and you'll follow him in the path of the cross no matter where it goes.

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And the taking of the cross will lead you into places where you will learn very quickly that you have no resources within yourself.

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You will run out of resources and you won't have answers, and you won't have solutions, and you will be compelled to renounce everything that you've got available to you as to no avail to meet the forces that would be brought against you by the terrible enemy of the souls himself as you try to walk with your

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Lord. Now notice our last verse, verse 33. He's gonna sum it up.

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He said, well I can't remember all that. All you got to do is remember verse 33. So likewise, whosoever he is of you that forsakes not all that he has cannot be my disciple.

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Just renounce it all. Just renounce it all. Turn loose of all of it. It seems to be the summing up of all the claims of the cross.

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It's where Jesus Christ purchased each of us. You are redeemed child of God. He's purchased you with his own precious blood, and you know the

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Scriptures as well as I. You are not your own. You're bought with a price. He bought you and he has a right to you.

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He paid for you, and he has a right for you. And ladies and gentlemen, you also know as well as I, that he does not ask you, he does not beg you, nor does he plead with you to live for him.

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He demands you do. He commands that you live for him. And if you don't live for him, then you will bear the consequences of that kind of a life.

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Because he will deal with that kind of a life. Jesus does not sit around begging people to walk with him.

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He doesn't sit around pleading with people to live for him. He lays it out in his words, and they are imperatives, and they are commands.

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You never have to understand a command. You understand a promise, but you obey commands. Commands are not directed to your understanding.

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They're just directed to your will. Just do them. Just do them. Promises, we understand promises, and we can activate promises.

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But you see, you and I are misconstrued sometimes, and we want to evaluate everything. And some Christians seem to have the strange idea that they can choose if they're gonna serve

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God or not. One good car accident will solve your problem. One case of leukemia will solve your problem.

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And if you don't believe that happens, you better read the life of Moses and Aaron. God gave Miriam leprosy for seven days because she griped against Moses.

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She complained. Ananias and Sapphira, God killed them because they told him one lie. God killed both of them, a man and his wife.

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Does God want to do that? No. But can you force God's hand? Yes. First John 5 16, there is a sin unto death.

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God's patience is long. His long -suffering is great. But dear people, where there's life, there's hope. It's not in the

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Bible. And there comes a time when God says, all right, if that's what you want, if that's the way you want it. You see,

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God's a holy God, and God's a sovereign God, and God doesn't play games with people. God is in a serious business of redeeming people and redeeming this earth.

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And it cost him his son, and he's not gonna allow anybody to play games with his son. He didn't send his son to die on a cross for you and I to play games in church.

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He just didn't do it. And you and I must never forget that the scripture tells us in Mark chapter 10, that if we renounce anything on this earth in this lifetime, it'll be returned to us a hundredfold.

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I never understood that. I've heard them on television. They tried to tell me it means if you renounce a house, a home today, well you'll get a hundred houses.

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And only one or two of them ever get a hundred houses. The rest of them help support that one who gets them. I never understood that until I began to walk in the

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Christian life, and I found out that God began to do just what he said. Because when I first became a

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Christian, many of you know that our life story is put on NBC radio, and it's been dramatized, etc.,

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etc. But I found out very early what it cost to be a Christian as a young Jewish, a

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Jewish young man, 21 years of age. But you know, since that time, I've also found out what that scripture meant.

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I have hundreds of mothers in the Lord. I have people all over the world, willow ladies and moms and dads who befriended my life.

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I have thousands of homes around the world, and you do too, if you're a Christian. There are homes that are open to you.

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There are people across this country and in other countries that if you or I could just pick up the phone and call them and say, I have a need, they'd meet that need in your life.

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They're Christians. They love you, and they're brothers and sisters in the Lord. Their lives are open to you, and they're part of the family of God, and our lives are entwined together, and they're interlaced together, and they're interwoven together.

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And that's what he's talking about, because we're members of the same family, and we ought to be sensitive to each other and care about each other.

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We ought to know what our hurts are, and what our agonies are, and we ought to sustain one another, and we ought to undergird one another.

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We ought to lift one another. We ought to build one another. We ought to encourage one another, and we ought to stand beside one another.

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And he says, whatever you give up in my name, don't you worry about it. I'll replace it. I'll replace it for you. But when he replaces it, it's always better, and it's always in its proper order, and it's always in its proper perspective, and that brings the blessings of God into your life.

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Now, what would happen? What do you think would happen if every one of us who are in this place tonight?

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Now, I know you don't want me to assume that everybody here is walking a crucified life. I mean, you would want me to assume that, that we're all dead to self, because I know y 'all got problems.

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I don't have them, but you probably do. But what do you think would really happen if every person here tonight really renounced themselves, and really yielded, and let

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Jesus be Lord of their life? What do you think would happen to this church? What do you think would happen to this community?

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And what do you think would happen not only to this community, but this city? If just everyone right here, isn't it true that Jesus took 11 million with a handful of women, and what did they say?

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You have filled this city of Jerusalem with your doctrine. Over three million people in that city.

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They had to walk everywhere they went, and they said, you fill this city with your doctrine. You've taught everybody about this

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Jesus. Everywhere you go they know about him. Well, why can't it happen?

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Why couldn't it be? I don't know how far God wants you to extend your life, but this I believe.

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He certainly wants, number one, your life. And he secondly, certainly wants your home. And thirdly, he wants your church.

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But now listen to me carefully. If you're a member of this church, this church is never going to be any stronger than your family is.

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Your church is not going to be any stronger than its families. And the families are not going to be any stronger than the man in that family.

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It's not going to happen any other way. That's just God's way. That's God's way.

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So I'm going to ask you. I'm going to ask the pastor in a moment to come. We're going to have what we call an invitation.

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And to me that is simply nothing more than giving you an opportunity to do whatever God's laid on your heart. If God speaks to your heart where there's some kind of a public commitment or some kind of a public statement or something you want to make, that'll be between you and the

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Lord and the pastor as the spiritual leader of this church. I'll have nothing to do with that. That'll just be between you and the

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Lord. If he doesn't want you to do that, if he wants you to make a commitment in your heart, then I believe you ought to make that.

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But I want to give you that opportunity to do that in this service. Because as I said earlier, the demands of Christ are very clear.

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You cannot escape it and you cannot ever stand before the Lord and point me and say I didn't tell you. When we stand before the judgment seat of Christ, you're not going to stand and say that Jew didn't tell me because I did tell you.

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And I know many of you walk with the Lord. But the heartache is that we all don't. When we all can, we all can.

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All you got to do is just figure out you want to pay the price. There is a price to be paid in becoming a Christian. There's a price to be paid to walk with God.

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It is not easy. It's not an easy road to walk with Jesus Christ. But it's a marvelous, joyous, thrilling adventure to day by day to walk the

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Christian life with him. If you just walk it with church, it'll be dismal. If you're just walking it religiously, it'll be a drag to you.

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But if you walk it with Jesus, it'll never be. It'll never be. And there's a big, big difference.

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Peter followed afar off because he's walking by himself. But the two men on the road to Emmaus, they said, didn't our hearts burn within us when this man talked to us?

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Because it was the resurrected Lord. When you walk with him, your life will always be different.

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It just always will. Let's stand together and let's pray. Father, these people, most of them, have been here every single night.

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Young people as well as young adults, young marrieds, widows, widow men, ladies, older people, senior citizens.

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They've been so faithful night after night after night. Lord, you know my heart.

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I thank you so much for their faithfulness. Because by their faithfulness, not because I am here, but because they love you, because they love your word, because they love the son, because they love their church, because they love their community, because they love each other.

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Father, they've come. They've prayed. They've watched. They've waited. They've worked.

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And now, Lord, you've brought us all individually distinctly to a point where we must make some kind of a particular commitment.

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I would doubt very seriously if there's a one of us in this place tonight that would not have something in their life, something that we are all evaluating, considering, thinking about, pondering, meditating upon, something that disturbs us, something that's come up into our life that we don't care about, that we don't want.

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It may not be a sin. It may be a weight. It may just be that which is not necessary for our Christian growth. It may be an amusement.

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It may be a friend. It may be a date. It may be any number of things, Lord, that the enemy has placed before us to entrap us and to throw the snare out in front of us, to dupe us and to deceive us and entice us away from the cross of our

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Savior. So, Father, I pray for those who need to come and just renew their vows to Jesus Christ as the

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Lord of their life, as well as being the Savior of their soul, that they'd come and do so. If there are those here who were, have become

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Christians, they were joining the church, and they moved to a church, but they never followed you in Believer's Baptism, and they've been saved, but they've never followed you in Believer's Baptism since that time, then,

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Father, I pray that this would be the night they just come and say, Pastor, I am a Christian. I know I belong to the

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Lord, but I've never been baptized since I became a Christian, and I want to follow in Believer's Baptism.

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Father, if there are those here who are looking for a place to worship, and they would want to come and speak to the pastor concerning that matter, they have the freedom to do so.

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And if there is one here who has never known what it means to be lost, and then to turn to God, and ask for forgiveness of sins, confessing their life, and repenting of that life, and receiving, accepting, taking, responding to, placing their trust upon, putting their commitment in Jesus Christ to take care of their sins, and accepting

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His payment on the cross for them, if there's never been that moment in their life, I pray that they might just come quickly and say,

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Pastor, I'm not a Christian. I've never really been born again. I've never been saved. I've never trusted Christ in my life.

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I've never had this kind of an experience with Him. There's never been a time in my life when I personally, in my own words, my own personality, responded to Him, and gave my life to Him, and took

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His payment for my sins. But tonight I want to do that. Is there someone who could take the Word of God and show me?

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And we have those who would take the Bible and show them what the Bible says about becoming a believer in Jesus Christ.

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Father, whatever you have for the people, they are thine. They have always been yours, and these are their moments with their

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Holy God. I pray that we'll use them wisely while we wait upon the Holy Spirit to speak, to move, to draw, to implore, to approach, to probe very deeply, and to pry apart from our lives that which displeases you, so that you may implant within us that which pleases you, that would glorify your name, and magnify your

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Son, and thrill our hearts, and make us an effective, faithful Christian as we walk through this planet

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Earth. Father, until we reach that place, when we shall be perfected forever in the presence of our

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Lord. Father, bless these people while they speak to you, and while they pray, and while they do as you will, and we'll praise you for the privilege of these moments together because of Christ Jesus, our