Bible Teaching

Calvary Temple Teaching Library

Walk, Sit, Stand Pt.1

Let's turn for this evening--I want to look at a couple of practical things. We've been talking about that life of embracing the cross and we've been dealing with the fruit of sanctification, that crucified life. I want to talk about some of the practical aspects of it. We understand what it is to do; how are we supposed to do it? Practically, what would be a good way to get ourselves up on the cross and stay there? How is it that we can begin to learn the principles of temperate living, lives that are under control? I think one of the things that we make a mistake in, is that so often we're in prayer, we're studying the Word, we see the principles which are pure, perfect, we look at different lives, and even though the Scripture reveals the feet of clay of the men and women of God, the end product is what we see so often and we see the victories that are won. It's important for us to understand, then, how people get there. How do they get to those places of victory and making quality decisions that can last for a lifetime? You'll see that it's really a process in every one of our lives. The first thing is, don't get in a hurry, don't get discouraged in this journey that we're on, because regardless of what you achieve tomorrow, you're never going to be finished. You may make some quantum leap tomorrow out of the miry clay up onto the mountain top and all of sudden you hear an audible voice from heaven and it changes your life, praise God, and you're transformed, and the Spirit of God comes upon you and you become a psalmist and you begin to prophesy and you lay hands on the sick and they recover and you walk on water and you're not done! It's going to go on from there, every day a process of conforming into the image of Jesus.

So often we get discouraged, so many times we get discouraged because we judge ourselves by ourselves. Somebody's having, it appears, an easier go at it than we are. You don't know what's going on inside of them. They may look like they're doing better on the outside, but the fact is we're all warring the same war. Amen? We're all in the same mess, and every one of us here falls short. Those of us that might appear to one another to be doing better than others, and in fact some of us are more mature, and some of us are more disciplined, and some of are more Christlike. Those among us that are, are warring some of the greatest battles because they have clearer glimpse of how ugly they really are and have to deal with that every day.

It's this process that we're looking at, so how do we get this thing together? Well, one of the things that is clear is that we need one another, amen? We can't--no man lives to himself and no man dies to himself. We need one another, the body of Christ, so that when I'm weak and you're strong, you can lift my hands up. I need brothers and sisters because there is wisdom in the multitude of counselors. We need the iron that sharpens iron. We need people to rub up against us and cause sparks to fly periodically because we're not headed in the right direction. We want to look at some of the practical aspects of how to get our hearts there, so turn to the book of Psalms and let's look at Psalm 1.

One of the things that will help you most in getting on the cross and staying there is being very careful in who you pick to hang out with. Frankly, some of us pick the people to hang out with that we conform to in our flesh. They like the same hobbies, they like to shop, they like to play golf, and they like to go to the movies, whatever it is. You say, "Well, I just have so much in common with this person." Common is the right term because what you're doing is common, fleshly, and temporal. How about stepping back for just a moment and coming to the realization who the real you is--the spirit man. "Well, you know I have so much in..." Who is I? I is not the carnal man, the flesh-man, I is the spirit man. If you don't believe that, then go back and read Romans, Chapter 7 and identify the I, who we really are, and once that's done, then we have to come back and ask ourselves if I'm going to evaluate truly who I am in the spirit man, I who can do all things through Christ which strengthens me; then we need to realize that we have to pick those that we have in common with, the pursuit of Christlikeness. It is a choice and I want you to see that it is available to you tonight. It's something that we want to emphasize. We're going to talk about different aspects: who you hang out with, things that we all learn about as kids, where are you hanging out? It's important that we analyze that.

You know, many of us are not real communicative when it comes to these areas, especially the men. We have to laugh. I saw--it's so natural, I saw it on--I was flipping through the channels and I saw this one segment, it flipped up on the movie on the a--what was it called?--the old, Greek wedding--My Big, Fat, Greek Wedding. I was going to say old. It's tough to be old and fat. My Big, Fat, Greek Wedding, and the part that was funny is the boy walks into the kitchen and the family's doing their family thing and so the mom says, "Where'd you go?" "Nowhere." "Who'd you see?" "Nobody." "What'd you do?" "Nothing" Guys talk like that.

We need to ask ourselves then where are we going? Where do we spend our time? Who are we hanging around with? What are we doing? We need to answer those questions directly, truthfully and it'll show you where your treasure is, where your heart is. That's why David, by the Holy Spirit, wrote these words, Psalm 1, verse 1, "Blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor standeth in the way [Where have you been?] of sinners, nor sitteth in the seat of the scornful" [Blessed is the man that does not do these things. Ok, so I don't do those things, but what do I do?] But his delight is in the law of the Lord; and in his law doth he meditate day and night." It's not about what we don't do, it's about what we do when we're not doing that, because abstinence isn't enough. It's the pursuit of holiness, the partaking of the bread of life, feeding ourselves the Word of truth. "And he [this man] shall be like a tree planted by the rivers of water, that bringeth forth his fruit in his season..." We talked about being patient, not getting discouraged, but the fact of the matter is we should all be growing and there should be fruit in all our lives and there is a season of harvest, of victory, a season where we can discern in each of our lives, "I am growing praise God! [Not!] Well, you know I'm just standing in patience believing God, haven't changed for thirty years!" No, there is a season, Amen?--of fruit bearing. It should be seasonal. All of our lives should be increasing constantly. We're not going to be on a constant plane, it's going to be on a cycle, but we should be cycling upward, Amen? This is what God's looking for in our lives and it's going to come from what we don't do and what we do instead of entertaining the lust of flesh, feeding our natural appetites.

There's an interesting word in 2 Timothy. Keep your finger here and turn over to 2 Timothy,  2, for just a moment. In 2 Timothy 2, there's an interesting phrase here. I want you to get the principle. 2 Timothy, Chapter 2, verse 22, well you can actually look up at 21, "If a man therefore purge himself from these [things, the carnal things, the secular things], he shall be a vessel unto honour, sanctified, and meet for the master's use, and prepared unto every good work. [Then look at this phrase]. Flee also youthful [immature, child-like behavior or] lusts: [and] follow righteousness, faith, [love], peace, [look at the next phrase] with them that call on the Lord out of a pure heart." You see, all of the ingredients are here, flee; follow. Flee and follow; flee the carnal, follow with the company those that are calling upon the Lord out of a pure heart. He begins to set these principles to us. This is the ingredient for a successful life, for spiritual growth, and there's no other way. You're not going to take any shortcuts. It's not going to be done with the infomercial: "Buy these twelve tapes, super saint, deluxe package" that so many of the evangelists of our day offer us. The quick fix for righteousness, "How to Be More Than a Conqueror in Seventy-Two Hours", "Able to Leap Tall Trials in a Single Bound; Faster than Speeding Fiery Dart."

Here we are. The fact of the matter is its just hard work. It's not glamorous; it is every day disciplining ourselves to do the little things, preferring others. It's not enough to abstain from the selfishness of going and playing golf and take a nap on the couch. That's when you serve your wife and you serve your children, or you come and you serve the body, or you abstain from going to play golf and you come out witnessing, or you decide to come up to the fellowship and pull weeds in spring time. It's all about the destruction, as we've shared about in the last sessions, the crucifixion of the self-man, the selfish man.

You know, we're coming out of the "I" generation some. I was sharing--Chuck was reading an article and it was very interesting that even the secularists are beginning to see that the "I" generation, the self-esteem generation, isn't working. Many of the big corporate managers and their in-house, and also the educational, the institutions' psychologists and their psychiatrists and stuff, are realizing the mess that we have on our hands. The kids are coming in and have never had to deal with reality and have never been told that the world doesn't revolve around them and that their work isn't acceptable. That grading a grammar paper is not somebody's opinion, there are laws to grammar. I've never discovered them but there are! I've been told.

You realize then that this is a generation that has--the homes today are full of the Wall of Gaylord. For those of you who haven't seen the Meet the Fockers movie--they go into the--the people came to visit this other home and they've got this big wall, the Wall of Gaylord--that was their son's name--and all of his accomplishments. On there was the ninth place ribbon in this, and the guy was being sarcastic--the guy visiting said, "Well, I didn't even know they gave ninth place. Are there tenth place ribbons? He said, "Oh yes, they're over here with the participation plaques." You get trophies for showing up! All of this stuff that's bred the wrong perception of who people really are and the fact that you have to come to grips with the fact that if everybody's special, nobody is.

In our spiritual walk we have to kill that guy and it's done by preferring others, consciously. This is what I want you to get tonight--Conscious decisions and preparation to abstain from what you prefer for the good of somebody else. Now, some of you are saying, "Can you give me an example?" because you've never really spent any time thinking about how this could be done. It's become so foreign to people that we don't really understand how to do these things. I want to talk a little bit about that. If you really stop and think, that's what prayer time prior to service is all about. We come to pray early to prepare ourselves to worship, so we don't have to be worked up into the presence of God. We come so that we're here and ready. We still have a late section. There are extreme reasons periodically why you would be late: beltway, different things. If you're late "just because," you're selfish, and that's why most people are late habitually. Occasional lateness is circumstantial. Habitual lateness is selfishness. "I'm more important than everybody else. What I'm doing is more important than what anybody else is doing." I'm trying to give you some practical--what would I do then? I would make sure that I abstain from my self-preference to make sure that I'm where I'm going early. To make sure that since I'm there early I can tend to and wait on other people and see what their needs might be. "Can I help you take your child to the nursery? Can I wash your car just before service starts? Here, I happened to bring a meal. Let me feed you on you way into church because I know you come directly from work." Some of you are going, "You know, I was wondering when somebody would do that, praise God! I've been believing God." Different aspects that you have to look--now, where in your life are you lacking?

Here's what the Spirit goes on and says, this man, the man that will do this will be unmovable. (Psalm 1, verse 3) "[He'll] be like a tree planted by the rivers of water, that bringeth forth his fruit in his season; his leaf also shall not wither..." How many of you feel like you get a great run at things and then you just dry up? Your life is up and down and up and down and you're always wondering if you're going to finish this thing or not. This tree doesn't whither, it's immovable. Its roots have dug deep into the soil near the rivers of living water, his leaf not withering; "...and whatsoever he doeth shall prosper. The ungodly are not so: but are like the chaff which the wind driveth away. Therefore the ungodly shall not stand in the [day of] judgment [or trial or afflictions], nor sinners in the congregation of the righteous. For the Lord knoweth the way of the righteous: but the way of the ungodly shall perish." What are you doing to get settled, to get established in your life? Let's ask a couple of questions; who am I hanging out with? Turn over to Psalm 119. There's one of my favorite passages here in verse 63, not only in who you hang with, who's your hero? Who do you emulate?

I've just recently started getting--and I've got to guard myself because I'm one of those people that does stuff to excess and I realize that. I started just recently collecting a little bit of sports memorabilia. It's amazing, all the stuff that's out there. I've already seen everything I want and I figure you could easily do it for six figures. No, I'm kidding, probably not though, if you stopped to think about it. I've got some cool stuff! Guys that I remember as a kid that played ball, that I really looked up to. One of the things I have is I have an autographed helmet of Dick Butkus. Dick Butkus was the greatest linebacker that ever lived. I played linebacker. I liked him because he was voted the Most Feared Man in the NFL every year he played. The man just delighted in doing you physical harm, invented "stripping the ball" basically. It was hardly known as an art form until he came to do it. That's cool, and he's a guy that I like! I know that some of the young people today, that some of the young stars, Michael Jordon and some of these things and the different stars--I have at home one of my favorite players--I was a Dodger fan when they were in Brooklyn--Duke Snider, an then I have a Yogi Berra ball. (He's the guy from Jellystone Park.) These different things--you see these different folks and guys that accomplished things that as a young person you'd like to aspire to. Now, things have changed. When I got born again in 1967 and I was no longer pursuing a professional athletic career, my heroes changed. My hero was no longer Dick Butkus, but a little five-foot, two-hundred pound, Scottish lady called Ethel Hook, that I admired and thought, "Dear Lord, I've never known anybody that's known God like this!" I've shared stories with you about Hooky; this woman prayed at least eight hours a day. People were afraid to be around her; she could read your mail, man! Now, she wasn't like--you felt like she could read your mind. She couldn't, it was God speaking to her words of knowledge and it didn't work a hundred percent of the time and it didn't work as often as you thought, but it was so precise and so supernatural when it did, you were aware you were in the presence of somebody that hung out with God. I got to spend a lot of hours with her and watch her. I thought, "I want to be like that!" As a young man that inspires you to watch the teaching ministry of a Kenny Schmidt, the Arnie Vicks, to see the pulpiteers of a generation of some of the great preachers, C.M. Ward, what a kick he was! You look at these people and you think, "That's what I want!" Can I ask you, some of you young people, some of you not so young people, the psalmist said "I am a companion [Psalm 116, verse 63] of all them that fear [God], and of them that keep [His commandments]." That's who I want to hang out with. Who in our midst fears God, is in pursuit of God?

Any of you see the Daytona 500? Any of you watch NASCAR? I don't watch NASCAR that much. There's got to be something to it because a lot of people are watching it. It's not just the rednecks anymore, so it doesn't have anything to do with moonshine. In racing, NASCAR, whether it's the IRL (the Indy Racing League), whatever, there's a phenomenon called drafting. What happens when a car is traveling and it's breaking the wind at a certain place as the wind comes over that car, the vortex, it creates a vacuum, and if you get close enough to that thing, you can pull up into that and it'll actually drag you along and the two of you can go faster than one. The further you bring that thing back, the less resistance there is, so if you can get three, four cars, you're going to go faster than two cars. Now, there's a limit to when it stops, but the point that I'm making is, who are you drafting off of? If you pull in behind somebody, if you get somebody's who in hot pursuit, running wide open, has a lot of horsepower and can run in the front, you need to jump on with those people, and begin to let their lives, practical things that you may never have thought of, and go, "That's how they do that! I've never thought of that. That's interesting!"

"I am a companion of [those] that fear [God], and of them that keep [His] precepts". That's the thing that we need to ask ourselves. Look over at the seventy-ninth verse, "Let those that fear thee turn unto me, and those that have known thy testimonies. [He continues on over in the hundred and fifteenth verse]. Depart from me, ye [that are evil]: for I will keep the commandments of my God"--the people that are going to become a drain on us, the evil. You see, evilness isn't just perverted living. It's not just people that are on drugs and involving themselves in sexual promiscuity. Evilness is self-will, self-exaltation, secular thinking, the fruit of good and evil. It was the same fruit. Good outside of God is evil. What we're looking at is, who we're going to hang with, what are we doing?

Look what Proverbs 13:20 says. There's an admonition that each one of us needs to grab a hold of, "He that walketh with wise men shall be wise: but a companion of fools shall be destroyed." Do you put that to practice? Many of us here know that verse. "Well, this person's wiser, moving in the spirit, their life is bringing forth fruit; but, you know, these people are more fun. I like hanging out with these guys." These are the ones that like to go to yard sales on Saturday. This is the motorcycle group over here. These are the tea drinkers. These are the mall rats. We all have different things we enjoy doing in the natural and in the secular. What about those people appeals to you, because in all those groups I just mentioned, there's people that are hot after God. What is it that's enticing you? We're seeing that the admonition has to do with finding out who it is in our midst that's wise. Who are the people that are beginning to bring forth fruit that remains? He that walks with wise men shall be wise.

Back to the first Psalm again. We see that as the psalmist, writing by the Spirit, "Blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the [unwise] ungodly, nor standeth in the way of sinners, nor sitteth in the seat of the scornful." Watchman Nee wrote an interesting book, "Sit, Walk, Stand." That's kind of what we're calling this evening's study: "Walk, Sit, Stand." The path that we're on, the steps, the Bible says, of the good man, are ordered by the Lord. The righteous man's steps and feet are established so that they don't slide in the time of adversity, so here we are being admonished.

Proverbs 2, look over there for just a second just to drive this principle home to us. Verse 20, "That thou mayest walk in the way of good men, and keep the paths of the righteous. For the upright shall dwell in the land, and the perfect shall remain in it." You see, this is what we're talking about, we're talking about getting there and staying victorious, staying consistently on top of your flesh so that you're not living your lives in Romans 7, just always lamenting "The things that I don't want to do I find myself doing, the things that I want to do I can't, whoa! Oh, wretched man that I am who shall deliver me from the body of this death?" Is that how you feel a lot of the time? You don't have to live there. Sin doesn't have dominion over us. Don't you know that to whom you yield your members servants to obey, his servant you are? There's choices to be made, there's a lifestyle that can be developed through habitual doing righteousness, but you're going to need some help. There are very few of us that have the ability to consistently work out by ourselves to the point that we need to, to be beneficial. If we are consistently disciplining and preparing ourselves, it's because there's a goal. There has to be a reason, a motivation that's driving us. We're going to talk about that as we look at these principles again. I'm talking about seriously now! You know the right answer, but I want you to answer this one question: I'm a companion of those, I count myself among them, I seek them out, I want to be with these people that fear God and keep His percepts. Who do you really admire? Your employer, the guy that just got the new Mercedes, the guy that just got the new house, the movie star, the athlete? You need to redirect your eyes and begin to see. We talked about the need to set a new value system, see what's really important and what is to be a treasure in your life, because where your treasure is, that's where your heart is. This is a process that God is calling us to and we need to pursue these men of wisdom.

Look over at 2 Corinthians and then we're going to look at one more phase here in just a minute. 2 Corinthians, Chapter 6, we're going to--a passage that we're all familiar with, verse 14, "Be ye not unequally yoked together with unbelievers: for what fellowship hath righteousness with unrighteousness? and what communion hath light with darkness? [Verse 16] And what agreement hath the temple of God with idols? for ye are the temple of the living God; as God hath said, I will dwell in them, and walk in them; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people. Wherefore come out from among them, and be ye separate, saith the Lord, and touch not the unclean thing; and I will receive you. And will be a Father unto you, and ye shall be my sons and daughters, saith the Lord Almighty." Come out from among them, follow righteousness, and flee youthful lusts. It's all about direction.

There's a fellow in one of the other satellite churches that--they were in the meeting yesterday--somebody told me, and he said that this fellow's gotten out into sin and some different areas and the pastor told me, "Well, we heard that he's really making some preparation to be restored, making some preparations to repent and to be restored." I said, "You don't make preparation to repent. Repentance is the initiation of the whole process. You don't prepare to repent you repent to prepare. You change the course and then you repair the damages. Then you prepare yourself not to sin again, and you discipline yourself. Repentance is the volition, that choice that I am now going to go this direction. I'm sick and tired of going this way!" "Well, you know I'm going to prepare myself, and I'm just going to try to tie this situation up and I'm going to try--and then once I get everything ready then I'm going to repent and I'm going to really get serious with God." It doesn't work that way! Your heart's convicted when you know the truth. You see, what's God saying to you, right now? What choices are you going to make, right now? What areas are out of order, right now? What do you know needs to be done, right now? You make the choice, and then you make the preparation to obey.

Then, what I want to end with this evening is, as you begin to start out, be patient, it's a life process! So many of us say, "Oh, man, I just haven't been praying enough, so bless God; starting tomorrow, I'm praying eight hours a day and I'm going to fast and I'm just." It doesn't work that way. "You know, the problem I have is that I watch too much television, so I'm going home tonight and I'm throwing the television out in the back yard." Well, about one o'clock in the morning you'll be hauling it back in the house. Just turn it off thirty minutes earlier, habitually. You know, whatever your favorite movie is, fast that some time, whatever your favorite program is, or whatever. There are too many channels. I can't even think of one that might apply to anybody. There's a channel in there for all of us. If it's not television, whatever it is your hobby, as we shared earlier, just cut one of the Saturdays out of the month of running around to the yard sales and get involved in evangelism. Start, repent, change the course, and begin with something you can do and repeat it and make it a habit as part of your life and then you can add something else on. Some of us can multi-task, we can do more than one thing at a time, but what normally happens is we're overwhelmed. We see the mess we're in and we want to deal with it right now. Dieting is one of the greatest things! "Oh, man! Okay, I'm tired of this, bless God!" There's some new fad and so here I am and I'm going to eat six hundred calories a day. So I'm eating six hundred calories a day and all this weight's falling off and I'm losing weight. I can hardly move. I don't have any energy and stuff, and I'm mad at everybody, and things are going on but I'm losing this weight, and finally, I've reached my goal. I've lost fifty pounds. Here I am, and all fifty pounds of the muscle I did have is gone now. I lost forty pounds of muscle and ten pounds of fat. Here I am, I've reached my goal, I get on the scale and everything's jiggling back and forth, and I'm happy because the number is the number I'm looking for. I'm fatter than when I started. I weigh less but I have more percentage of fat. I keep it off for a whole ninety days and the next thing you know, I've gained five pounds. "Well, it's only five pounds. I'm still--it's better than it was." Next thing you know, you turn around a year later, and instead of weighing two thirty, you weigh two forty. Everybody talks about it. It's a syndrome that people deal with. Why? It's not about losing weight; it's about changing your lifestyle. If your lifestyle doesn't change, you will be back under the power of that thing. Lifestyle changes take time and they're not done with fads and they're not done in crash attempts. It's done consistently, patiently, to where you think differently, you act differently, and that's the same process it's going to take in the spirit.

We'll end with this one where Paul's talking in 1 Corinthians, Chapter 9. He makes an interesting statement concerning this battle that we're talking about. He says in verse 27, "But I keep under my body, and bring it into subjection: lest that by any means, when I have preached to others, I myself should be a castaway." You have to go back up to verse 24, he said, "Know ye not that they which run in a race run all, but one receiveth the prize?" Unless it's Focker, there's a race to be run and there's a race to be won. Paul begins to speak the principles here of mastery. He said if you're going to be the winner, the champion, if you're going to be able to master something, you have to become temperate in the other areas. You have to focus on this thing, and you have to constantly prepare yourself. If that's the case, then doesn't it really come down to what we want to obtain in life, really? We can lie to ourselves all we want; but the reason that we're not more proficient spiritually is because we don't want to be, it's not that important to us. It's not for the glory of God, it's for the ease of self, whether it's for the ease of feeling good about ourselves, feeling that we're spiritual. All you've got to do--if I were God, and sometimes the Lord in His mercy will allow it--go home tonight and have your home in ashes--just have it burn clear to the ground--that'll get your attention! Get a call from the nursery that your baby just swallowed one of the toy ducks and is dead. That'll get your attention! Let the economy crash and somebody come and repossess everything you have--what's it take? You see, those crisis pursuits and crying out to God, that's selfishness! It does cause us to face reality and cause us to look at the condition of our heart. We're talking about pursuing a prize; we're talking about being motivated by the worth of God, because God is worthy to be pursued and to be emulated! Because He's my best friend, my Lover, I want to hang out with Him. He looks good, He smells good, He's my companion, my Friend that sticks closer than a brother. Now, how do we get this--this thing where you've got the other relationships--by hanging around, by spending time together.

We'll end with this; why don't you just give God a chance? You gave the other folks that occupy your life a chance and you've liked them; why don't you give God a chance? Find out what it's like. "Well, I'm a natural being and I can just relate more to the physical." It's like the little kid that was praying during the thunderstorm and mom came in and said, "Don't worry honey, the angels are here, and the Lord's here." The little girl said, "I know, Mommy, but I'd prefer somebody with skin!" We do prefer people with skin, don't we? We can relate to that. Well, then, let's start there; be a companion of those who fear God and keep His precepts.

Father, we thank You for Your Word tonight and we just long to know You. We live in a world with no value system, hopeless, living-for-the-moment, and we have before us stability, peace, strength, promises sure to a thousand generations, a God who will never leave us nor forsake us, and we don't taste of the Lord and know that goodness. We were talking about smells the other day. I'm not a big coffee drinker, but you walk into a place and smell the coffee. Many times it's just a captivating aroma, popcorn; the greatest of all, Cinna-Bon. That aroma can almost emulate that cartoon of the Waffle-Whiffer, it almost picks you up and draws you in there! There's a fragrance that comes from God, the Rose of Sharon, the Lily of the Valley, a fragrance of righteousness and holiness and pure love that will intoxicate you, and nothing else will ever satisfy you again. That's what keeps you on the cross. Father, we ask for that encounter, in Jesus' name, Amen.

Before you go, turn to somebody next to you and say, "I'm a follower of those that fear God." Amen! Go in peace, God's love go with you.

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