Bible Teaching

Calvary Temple Teaching Library

You've Heard It Said Pt.17

Let's turn to Matthew. We are going to finish this tonight. Easter is coming; praise God. We might want to get somebody raised on Sunday. There is nothing about that in these chapters. We will see if we can finish this, then go on from there. It has been a fun time, here, of just reviewing some of the fundamental principals the church is built on. As we have said, the main purpose of spending time in these verses is to contrast where the real church is [as compared] with the professed church, in our generation; then to try to contrast it with the popular message of the hour. It is very obvious that, if we will spend time meditating in these three chapters, we are going to be different from most folks. If this becomes the catalyst that holds us together, and it becomes the foundation we are building on, then we are going to have a different result; and that is what we are looking for in this generation.

So, let's see what we can do to finish, this evening. [There are] a couple of the highlights we want to look at, beginning at verse 7: "Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you: For every one that asketh receiveth; and he that seeketh findeth; and to him that knocketh it shall be opened. Or what man is there of you, whom if his son ask bread, will he give him a stone? Or if he ask a fish, will he give him a serpent? If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children, how much more shall your Father which is in heaven give good things to them that ask him? Therefore all things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them: for this is the law and the prophets" (Matthew 7:7-12).

There are two things he is emphasizing to us here, and we must make sure that, from the perspective of asking in prayer and believing God, we put them in the context of what is being addressed here and in the other references to this passage. One of the primary things Jesus is telling us to ask for, here, as we look at it in the parallel Gospels, is the gift of the Holy Spirit. He says that, when you ask Father for the Spirit of God, you are not going to get some type of a counterfeit. People are so afraid, when they are praying for the Holy Spirit, that possibly, "What if it's not the Holy Spirit?" When you ask your Father for the Holy Spirit, you are not going to get anything but the promise of God, for the Scripture says, "For the promise is unto you, and to your children, and to all that are afar off, even as many as the Lord our God shall call" (Acts 2:39). He tells us very clearly that it is His desire to give us the Kingdom, and with the giving of that Kingdom is the enabling--the Power--to effect the Kingdom principals on the earth. He says, "But ye shall receive power, after that the Holy Ghost is come upon you" (Acts 1:8). We have taught on this, and we are not going to get into an in-depth teaching on any of this, but the word received --Lambano--is really [better defined], "to take."

Jesus is encouraging us right here; He says, "Listen, you have not because you ask not. You need to get aggressive in your pursuit for the power of God, the promises of God, and the ability to effect the kingdom principals." Have we been praying that way? We are living in a time, right now, when things are being done through mechanics; they are being done through mass mailings; they are being done through personalities. "We are going to have little bouncy things; and we are going to give away free food, and all this." That is not what we are trusting in; we are trusting in the power of God! Amen? We are not trusting in the new color handouts--we have new prints--we are trusting in our prayer!

We have not because we ask not. We need to start praying for souls. We need to start praying for the visitation of the Holy Spirit. Many of you, whom I have watched, have done a tremendous job there, greeting the people and witnessing to them. It is a blessing to watch, and to see the ministry you are involved in at times like that. Let's not forget the major ingredient; amen? Prayer!--believing for the power of God. Believe, when you are sharing, for that unction of the Holy Ghost to rise up in you, and for them to encounter the resurrected Jesus. That is what the Easter celebration is about. He says, "Ask and it shall be given you." What are we asking for? We are asking for the infilling of the power of God. We are asking to be ambassadors. We are asking for the grace to be, as we studied earlier in the chapter, the light of the world, the salt of the earth.

"Ye have not, because ye ask not" (James 4:2). You know, we have been given a lot of things [to do] here that are pretty tough to pull off. We need to ask Father to give us the grace and the faith to do it. Amen?

"Ye have not, because ye ask not." Many people want to take that, and apply it to cars, and houses, and finances. We have already read what Jesus had to say about all that, didn't we? He did not say that you don't have a new house because you are not praying and believing God for it, and you don't have more money because you just need to pray and believe God. He has already talked about all that; He said, "But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and His righteousness: and [what?] all these [other] things will be added unto you" (Matthew 6:33). What He is talking about, here, is the presence of God, and the grace--the gifts of God. So He says, when you ask God, to expect the promise to be fulfilled. "You shall receive power, after that the Holy Ghost has come upon you." This is Father's good pleasure, to put the kingdom into our hands, to fill us with His power and His grace; to be able to pray the prayer of faith, see the hick--the sick healed (or, the hick sealed, either way), to see demons cast out, to be able to move, and see all of the promises of God really begin to manifest in our midst. Let's not get into the machinery, and lose our faith. Let it be fresh. Let it be exciting. Let it be the Holy Ghost who is moving in our lives, in our prayer lives. He said, "Whatsoever ye shall ask the Father in My name..." (John 16:23). The asking in His name is not just tacking the name of Jesus on, as an addendum. We are asking for His glory. We are asking by His authority. We have talked about that before: the endorsement, the signing of the check. We have been given the power of attorney; when we pray in the name of Jesus, we are representing Him. We are coming with the power of attorney and saying, "He has entrusted to me the authority, the power, to make this draw--this demand--on the promises of God! We are not bossing God around. We are just withdrawing from what God said He has already deposited; we have that ability, and that right, to come in. The faith comes from Him, and the grace comes from Him, and even the unction (as we talked about prayer earlier) comes from God. Before we speak, He hears us. As we taught on prayer just recently: He comes for the words that are spoken. "[My Word] shall not return unto Me void, but it shall accomplish that which I please, and it shall prosper in the thing whereunto I sent it" (Isaiah 55:11). It comes from God first--the faith, the promise--but it is all at the discretion of God.

I got a very interesting email; it came the other day. A man wrote, "I'm not looking for a fight, but I just read your book, Ye Are Gods. Do you still hold to that teaching?" I responded to him and said, "I hold to all the principles of the authority of the believer, but I apply it much more, today, with an understanding of the sovereignty of God." This is as we have grown, and understand that, as the children of God, the ambassadors of God, we are not given free course to go and do whatever we want. It is initiated and consummated in God. It is done by Him, and for Him. The thing I would change in that book, Ye Are Gods, is the emphasis on the creature. I think it is the typical response of the immature when dealing with authority and power. As you grow in grace and understanding, and you mature, the responsibility and the application sometimes varies. These are the things you trust in; it is about the glory of God. It is by Him; it is for Him. As it pertains to this prayer aspect, which Jesus is teaching here, remember that it is all part of this principal of asking, of seeking, of knocking, and the very promise that it will be opened to us.

He then [speaks of] another principal for the kingdom: "Therefore all things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them: for this is the law and the prophets" (Matthew 7:12). We call this the Golden Rule. Jesus says it is the fulfillment of the law and the prophets: God's original intention for the Law. "You have heard it said, but I say unto you..." Do you remember how we started the teaching? People see the Law as being harsh and restrictive, but it is really that which teaches us how to respond to those who are in the same circumstances we are: with God's grace, and the instruction of God's morality, and the revelation of God's eternal purposes for us. So we learn, then, of our need for each other, and each member being fit together. We learn how to show the mercy of God, and how to apply justice, in bringing about motivation, chastisement, correction, and instruction in righteousness. We see, then, the heart of God, and our need to season everything that is being applied in these chapters we have studied with grace. I think it interesting that this is placed in this portion of Chapter  7, following the passage about remembering the judgment and the justice of God, which keeps us free from hypocrisy when bringing forth judgments concerning others. We need to learn to respond that way: Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.

"Enter ye in at the strait gate: [This is a principal we talked about this morning. It is very obvious here] for wide is the gate, and broad is the way, that leadeth to destruction, and many there be which go in thereat." We talked about the fact that this is not [speaking of] the World, [but of] professed Christians, people who are living in their own morality, the broad way of creature worship, which we have talked about in these last years. As He is speaking to us here, He is making it very clear that there is only one way: it is straight (verse 14), and it is narrow; that is the only path to life. Then, I think we need to get this--and this is one of the things I want to emphasize tonight, and I know it is all relative--but listen: "...and few there be that find it." We are being told, today, that everybody is going to get saved: "There is going to be a world-wide revival--praise God!--that's going to break out, and the masses are going to embrace the lordship of Jesus." That is not what the Scripture teaches. The Scripture teaches us that, in the last days, there will be what? "...a falling away" (2 Thessalonians 2:3), and "...the love of many shall wax cold" (Matthew 42:12). The Scripture teaches that, in the last days, the vileness and hatred for God that, even after the Millennial Reign, with Jesus Himself ruling this planet in absolute peace, and Satan bound for a thousand years, when Satan is loosed, the influence on Man, the wickedness of Man, the propensity of Man, [will cause them] to turn on Him; they are going to hate Him. And because they hate Him, He said that they are going to hate us. That same spirit is in the world today. Think about that. What is it that is causing us to teach this [other] doctrine? It is Creature worship. We always need to find a way for Man to turn out all right.

There was a tragic death in drag racing last week. A young man was killed in a "funny car". It was a very unique thing, actually: he was shaken to death, literally. The G-forces of the vibration of the car literally shook him to pieces, and destroyed his brain; it was not the collision with the wall. I am just saying all that to say this: There is some indication that this guy might have been a Christian. The Chaplain said that he thought he was. Out of that whole group, he is the only man we had seen in the chapel services. I am just saying all that to say this: All these heathen now are mourning for him. Every one of these heathen, being interviewed, was saying, "Yes, Eric's looking down, and he's drag racing in Heaven, and Eric's looking down. I think Eric helped me..." If Eric is in Heaven, he isn't thinking about you, Jack! Amen? [They have the wrong] concept of heaven, of eternal reward, of self-righteousness. "He was a good guy." It is not about being a good guy: it is about Jesus being Lord. Amen?

What are we proclaiming, in our generation? What is the standard? "Strait is the gate...narrow is the way." This is not only the life we live, it is the message we bring. It runs across the grain of everybody we will run into, including--and especially--professed Christians. They are going to be the greatest enemies of this message, because they all want to feel that they are right. Get ready, in this day we are coming into. If we are going to bring the message Jesus brought, we are going to receive the same response He received. They are going to hate us. Realize this one thing: Whatever the masses are embracing has to be wrong. "Few there be that find it." The majority is always wrong. What the majority embraces is contrary to the Spirit of God; you can find it throughout the Word of God in principal after principal after principal. "Few there be that find it."

We see it in the days of the children of Israel, when the majority wanted to go back to Egypt. Of course, you know their remembrance of Egypt was changing. It is amazing how, when we get into trials, the other way didn't seem that bad. We lose perspective of what it really was like. We lose perspective of the time when we had to make bricks without straw. We lose perspective of the fact that we had lost our covenant privileges as the people of God. We can remember only a few good things to hold onto: the leeks and the onions. But, thank God, there were three (Amen?) who said, "Let us go up at once, and possess [this land]; for we are well able to overcome it" (Numbers 13:30). Thank God that, in every generation, there are Joshuas and there are Calebs, who will stand and proclaim, "We are well able!" If you put it to a vote, it would be three million against three, and the three were right.

Don't be ashamed to stand up and be the only person who says, "All of you are wrong, and I am right." They will think that is arrogance; they will accuse you of self-righteousness; but, in the spirit of humility, we have to deal with it, as we shared this morning, and say, "I am not giving you my opinion; I am giving you the Word of God. You can do with it whatever you want. ‘Let God be true, but every man a liar.' ‘Heaven and earth will pass away, but [this Word] shall not pass away.' Praise God!" (Romans 3:4, Mark 13:31). So, we stand boldly in our generation, and we bring judgment, and we bring a message of the straight and narrow path to God. "For there is none other name under heaven given among men, whereby we must be saved" (Acts 4:12). I know you don't now; I know you don't, at this moment, compromise that name of Jesus, but I want you to know something: We are going to come into pressure like you have never known before. We are coming into a time like we have never experienced. Though people might not [bring] you before them and make you actually speak the words, "Deny the name of Jesus," they are going to ask you to deny Him every day. They are going to put pressure on you from so many different methods. They are going to tell us that we cannot pray in public. They are going to tell us that we cannot share the Gospel in such-and-such a place. They are going to tell us that we cannot discipline our children in a certain way. They are going to start telling us what we can and cannot teach our children. We are going to have decisions to make, and those who are going to be the "few that find it" are the ones who are going to be like Daniel, who are going to say, after they have heard the King's decree, "King, you can say whatever you want, "...his windows being open...he kneeled...and prayed...before his God, as he did aforetime" (Daniel 6:10). Amen?

Is that who you are? When we are threatened with the fiery furnace, there are a few, only a few, who are going to stand up and say, "[King], our God whom we serve is able to deliver us...but if not,...we will not serve thy gods" (Daniel 3:16-18). As the intensity grows, they will become fewer and fewer, and many of those who name the name of Jesus today, and base their faith upon all of these other teachings, and programs, and political ties, and abundance, and prosperity, and ease, and comfort, when the day comes to embrace the spirit of those in Hebrews 11, to wander about, and live in caves, and dress ourselves with animals skins--and that is not mink--a people that not only endures, but boasts in the glory of God in the midst of it! The earth is not worthy of those people who have gone before us. And we are of them. Praise God! We are numbered with them. I know what you are thinking. You are thinking the same thing I am about myself: There is no way I can be compared with these people. But that is how God sees us. Amen? That is what He has said about us, and (do you know what?) when we come to the test, He will give us the grace to be one of them. Praise God. But we have to find it on this path. It is something that we are pursuing on a daily basis, making right decisions for the glory of God.

"Beware [in these last days (verse 15 says)] of false prophets, which come to you in sheep's clothing but inwardly they are ravening wolves. Ye shall know them by their fruits." If you will read Timothy, if you will check out Titus, and parts of Thessalonians, you will see what the message is: These are people who are trying to make merchandise of the people of God.

I could not believe it. I turned on the TV the other day: Peter Popoff is back. People get up in arms every once in a while: "These charlatans are taking these people's money!" They deserve to have their money taken. If you are that stupid. These are the same people who are buying, "And that's not all! For $19.95 we'll give you $7,000 worth of free...And that's not all!" Then you deserve to get beat out of your $39.95. You haven't figured it out yet? There are no free lunches. If it's too good to be true, it's... When your Peter Popoffs get on, and for only a $1,000 offering you get this holy water. He just got it from Perrier. No; he is too cheap for that. He got it out of his faucet. And I don't want to tell you what that strange color is that makes it look like it came from the Jordan; you imagine your own source.

Why not go to the Word of God? We don't need special holy water, we need the prayer of faith. "Faith comes by hearing and hearing by the Word of God" (Romans 10:17). We need brothers and sisters who will lay hands on us in the name of Jesus, and take authority over principalities and powers. We need to be anointed with oil and prayed for by the elders. We need to follow the Biblical pattern, not all this nonsense. "There shall be false teachers among you [in the last days] who...shall with feigned words make merchandise of you: [the church]" (2 Peter 2:1-3). When you see, in these last days, these voices rising up, and people coming to prominence, and people rubbing shoulders with Presidents and heads of state, and they begin to be the conscience and the voice of the church, beware! When you hear of all these special things that are happening--"Behold! Christ is here"--and people are running to and fro to this need and that need, it is the spirit of antichrist; it is the false prophets of our generation that are going to rise. "Ye shall know them by their fruits. Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles? Even so every good tree bringeth forth good fruit; [we have spent a lot of time on this, so I won't tonight] but a corrupt tree bringeth forth evil fruit. A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can a corrupt tree bring forth good fruit. Every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit is hewn down, and cast into the fire. Wherefore by their fruits ye shall know them."

We are coming into a day when there is a lot of promotion going on of personalities and of certain ministries. They have different [means of influence], which appeal to different segments of the masses. We have seen it in the last number of years. You find the laughing thing going on in Canada, and the activities that were going on down in Brownsville. People flocked down there, and that is usually just what the wacky charismatic people do. Then, we find over here, many of the fundamentalists: they are not all whacked out, looking for some kind of supernatural visitation. They are people who are established on the Word and intellectualism. They get caught up in humanism and secularism, and they begin to try to, through politics, science, and sociology, address the issues. So, you have one group that is flaked out over here, and the other group, over there, trusting in the arm of the flesh, and in politics, and finances, and intellect.

But "by their fruits ye shall know them." He is the Vine; we are the branches. The fruit must be this: it cannot be anything else. "I have meat to eat that ye know not of." What is it? What is it? "My meat is to do the will of Him that sent me, and to finish His work" (John 4:32-34). We saw it in the teaching this morning. "I do nothing of Myself; but as My Father hath taught Me, I speak of these things" (John 8:28). This is the fruit we are looking for in people's lives. Personalities vary, the emphases of different ministries vary, but the true body of Christ is about, doing Father's business Father's way: through the Word of God, through the supernatural, by faith, for the glory of God, in harmony and unity in the body. That is how we begin to identify whether something is of God or not. It is not about men. It is not about personalities. It is about the glory of God. It is about making the body strong. You see, most ministries today are just like everything in the secular realm: the government wants to make everybody dependent on them. In false ministries, the leadership wants to make everybody dependent on them. [When taken] to extremes, they become cults. The church is about making individuals strong, having them knit together, letting ministry gifts care for one another, and letting the ministry be one of healing and delivering brothers and sisters in the area of prayer and in the area of the gifts of the Spirit. It is the body becoming strong, the body being edified, because the body is the body of Christ. We are living stones being made into this dwelling place of Almighty God. The emphasis is on cleaning our lives up and being made strong, so that God may dwell in us. That is where you will see contrasts and emphases in these days.

"Wherefore by their fruits ye shall know them." The one thing that was very evident about Jesus was that He always pointed to Father. He did not take the glory for Himself: He pointed to Father. By their fruits: "not my will, but Thine, be done" (Luke 22:42). It is the fruit of absolute surrender to the will of God, and the eternal purposes of God. The ultimate, whole duty of Man: "fear God, and keep His commandments" (Ecclesiastes 12:13). We keep that in proper perspective, and we press towards that. Do not listen to what people are saying. Do not listen to how well their organization flows. But [look at] the fruit of the glory of the Lord, the fruit of the Lordship of Jesus, the fruit of the community of the believers.

Those are the things we are looking for, and, of course, there are a lot of different aspects of this teaching we could talk about; we have done it in the past: "Wherefore by their fruits ye shall know them;" "Not everyone that saith unto Me, ‘Lord, Lord,' shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he that doeth the will of My Father which is in heaven. Many will say to me in that day, ‘Lord, Lord, have we not [then they talk about the things they have done "in His name"] prophesied in Thy name? and in Thy name have cast out devils? and in Thy name done many wonderful [miracles]?' And then will I profess unto them, ‘I never knew you..." Ginosko is the Greek word, here. "I was never intimate with you; we were never joined together." He is talking about those who were building their own kingdoms in His name. Those who tried to, as Paul said, preach this Gospel out of spite, for gain, for the different unholy reasons that they were putting themselves forth as the representatives of God (Philippians 1:15-16). He is going to say, "I never knew you: I never approved of what you did, because it was done for your glory in My name."

I don't want to get caught up here, but the Lord is concerned with the needs of individuals, and it does not matter what the vessel is. The vessel can appear to be something glamorous, or it can be the vessels of clay. God can use donkeys to speak. Some of us are proof of that, aren't we? You will notice that I included myself: I said "we." (I was really thinking about you, but...) So, we realize that you can work for God, but He says, "Without me, ye can do nothing" (John 15:5). If it was not done by God--we can do it in His name, but in our strength. We can do it in His name, but our motives are for our own glory and our own gain. We can do it in His name out of guilt, fear, and condemnation. Then these things become the wood, hay, and stubble, in our lives. Many of us are at least still in relationship with Him, even though things we have done might not stand. But, there are those who have been ministering in the name of Jesus, who have never been accepted of Him, who are going to go to Hell. They have apparently done great things. I want to tell you something: When some man stands up and says, "In the name of Jesus, be healed," and the person is healed, it is the faith of that individual, it is the goodness of God, it is the mercy of God, if they are healed while this individual happens to be an enemy of God. There are times when the servants of God can stand and minister in faith, and there is no faith on the part of the recipient; we know how all of this works. But, the point I am making is that unacceptable things can be evidenced as great miracles, can, in fact, bring about supernatural results, and not be accepted of God. So, in this last day, do not be fooled by this stuff. "By their [what?] fruits ye shall know them," not by their works. There is a distinction between works and fruit: that distinction is character and its source. Works, I do; fruit comes from the Vine, through the branches. God is the source.

Verse 24: "Therefore whosoever heareth these sayings of Mine, and doeth them, [this is the whole message, here, of the chapters we have been studying--all of them] I will liken him unto a wise man, which built his house upon a rock: And the rains descended, and the floods came, and the winds blew, [parallel passage:] and it beat vehemently upon the house; and it fell not: [it was not even shaken] for it was founded upon a rock. And every one that heareth these sayings of Mine, and doeth them not, shall be likened unto a foolish man, which built his house upon the sand: And the rain descended, and the floods came, the winds blew, and beat upon that house; and it fell: and great was the fall of it." This is talking about lives. It is talking about families. It is talking about ministries. A couple of the principals that we really need to be aware of, as it relates to this, are that there has to be a digging deep into the rock. This is not easy digging. The digging into this rock, the laying of an immovable foundation, is a lifelong process. You are not going to get it done in a week. That is why it has always amazed me: young believers come in and (praise God) they have had an experience, they have read a couple of chapters, and they have this thing put together. This is a life process (Amen?) in which we continue to grow and come to understand different things.

This man [recently] wrote concerning the book Ye Are Gods. It is a very interesting thing: when you put what you believe into print, it is going to be around [for a long time]. The difficulty people get into, many times, is the pride of thinking [they need to defend themselves] when somebody asks that question: Do you still hold to these things? If I did, then, without question, I would say, "Yes, I do." But, you know, I hope that, in fifteen years, I have learned something. Amen? That is why we have problems with denominations. I have spoken with men who were famous, nationally known, non-spirit filled, who had taught against the baptism of the Holy Spirit, who had to wrestle, having been filled with the Spirit, with now [wondering], "What do I say?" Say, "I was wrong." Say, "I have changed." Say, "I have come to further understanding." But don't lose God's best because of your own pride.

We are seeing, concerning the digging into a rock, that it is a lifelong processes. Illumination continues to come and unfold. The major emphases, and the truths, don't change, but our understanding, and the wisdom, and the ability to apply them in certain [circumstances] can change. We need to, then, find that rock, Jesus, to dig into, constantly trying to make the foundation of our lives secure in every area. Who is the foolish man who builds on the sand? What is the sand? The sand is the path of least resistance. The sand is the prayerless life, the life without study, the life without self-sacrifice, laying our lives down to care for others, to minister the grace of God to others. I am talking about bringing spiritual counsel, reproof, rebuke; I am not talking about just--and I am not minimizing this; this is part of it too, but don't limit your ministry to a Martha ministry: "Well, praise God, my job is just baking cakes for people when they are sick." That ministry of helps is great, but that is not all we are called to do. There is the better part (amen?) of sitting at the feet of Jesus. Don't leave the other undone, but let's make sure we are preparing ourselves to care for people and their souls, not just our natural provision. It is important for us to see this.

So, this man, the fool, is the individual of short-cuts, short-sightedness, losing sight of the eternal, making the quick buck, the easy decisions. [Jesus] says, "I want you to dig deep." We have done a survey here: dig deep into the rock of these spiritual principles. I want to tell you something: You can build your life on these three chapters. We could teach on these three chapters for the next ten years, and basically we do; we are always bringing principles out of this sermon, as it relates to needs, here, in the fellowship. So, spend your time digging into the rock, studying to show yourselves approved unto God. Great--tragic--is the fall of the unprepared life. Are you prepared for the war that is at hand? Do you have the proper image of yourself, or are you an individual who has been wearied by the footmen? The pressures of life, to this day, have gotten you down. We faint under the fact that we don't have as many friends as somebody else, we don't drive as nice an automobile as somebody else, we don't--"My life's dreams have not been met, and God has forsaken me" We faint under all of that. "If thou hast run with the footmen, and they have wearied thee, then how canst thou contend with horses [and chariots that are to come]?" (Jeremiah 12:5). Step back, and ask yourself, "Am I making my boast in the Lord? Is my trust--my hope--in God's promises and the goodness of God, and not in my own strength and my own understanding? If not, then begin to do whatever is necessary to start digging into that rock, and make preparation.

"And it came to pass, when Jesus had ended these sayings, the people were astonished at his doctrine." They had heard a lot of preachers. They had heard the prophets of old. Many of these were people who had grown up in the Synagogue, yet it says they were astounded by this doctrine. Why? "For he taught them as one having authority, and not as the scribes." That is what people have seen in our lives. We are not religious; we don't just talk about this: we live it. We not only teach it, but it is more than a teaching. Our doctrine is a doctrine of doing, of living; for, if you hear the Word and don't do it, what is the consequence? Self-deception. So they were astonished. "Do you mean to tell me that you really expect us to live this way? You are demanding this of us?" "Yes. I am here as the Word of God, the authority of God. "Don't you think about calling me Lord, and then not keeping my commandments" (Luke 6:46). The mandate has been handed down; this is the church order: "Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done, in earth as it is in heaven" (Matthew 6:10).

As we pray that, we are just saying, "Lord, we are going to do it Your way; we are going to do it for Your glory, we are going to do it by Your methods." It will cause us to stand separate and unique in our generation. Everyone is going to hate us; and professed Christians [will hate us] the most. Why? Because they have no more cloak for their sin, is what Jesus taught (John 15:22). Just prepare yourselves; that is what's coming; praise God! We [must] start digging deep into this rock; we [must] start building our foundation, because the winds are coming, the rains are coming, the floods are coming. We have all seen the damage that torrents of water can do. It is amazing! Look what happened in New Orleans, as that water came through. If you have ever had opportunity, watch the power. If you have stood there, and watched the falls--Niagara Falls: that is power! It is interesting, when you go under the falls, that you can feel the vibrations of that solid rock being moved by the water.

How deep are we embedded in this rock?--because the floods are coming. So, our whole purpose here is to just prepare one another, to not see any casualties, to not let anybody goof off. When you see somebody cheating on that last pushup, don't let them get away with it. Report them! First, address them, "Hey! That's cheating. No girl pushups. Come on: you owe one more." "That's all I can do." "No, you can do one more." There is nothing required of us (praise God), "there hath no temptation taken you but such as is common to man" (1 Corinthians 10:13). Amen? One more. "Why?" "I need you as strong as you can be, because, one of these days, you might have to carry me (Amen?), and I don't want to hear, ‘He's heavy! And I am thinking about no longer calling him brother.'" That is why we are building ourselves up, so we can have the same care one of another.

Father, we thank You for Your Word, tonight; and we just ask that these principles would become reality to us, that we would see how foreign they are in this hour. Father, many of us are aware of the different media ministries, the different super-churches. How many are talking about Your coming back? Almost everything is about hanging out here. Help us to prepare ourselves, because You are coming for a church. This is not our home; it is not about his life. You are coming for a church that is without spot or wrinkle. Help us to get ready, Lord. Help us to love Your appearing. Help us to conduct ourselves as though You will appear before our next breath. We have studied in this [passage] about treasures. There is no treasure outside of Your presence. What would a man give in exchange for his soul? Have we found the Pearl, or are we more comfortable with our friends? "Oh, I want to go to the mall and hang out." "Oh, I want to go to the sale with my friend, my shopping buddy." "I want to go out and play golf with my buddies." "I want to get some work done here in the shop." "I want to fix the house." I am going to primp, because I have a wedding; my Beloved is coming. Praise God! My treasure is not in playing with folks and running around with friends; it is in getting ready for my Lover, my Bridegroom. I am the Bride; He is my delight. I live for His look. "I am my Beloved's and my Beloved is mine...and His banner over me [is] love" (Song of Solomon 2:16, 4). Thank You for Your love, Father. Thank You for giving all for us. Help us to give all back, we ask, in Jesus' name. Amen.

Let's stand before the Lord. As Gary plays for us, we will take just a moment... "He taught them as one having authority." The scribes had a good religion going; everybody could work it into their schedules. Then Jesus brought a new gospel. Paul stated it very succinctly: "For me to live is Christ" (Philippians 1:21). For me to live is Christ. We are not our own, we have been bought with a price, the precious blood of Jesus (1 Corinthians 6:19-20, 1 Peter 1:18-19). You are our reason, Lord, for living. Without You we can do nothing. Let's just sing it together, and bless Him.

"Even So, Come Lord Jesus come...

Help us, Lord, to get our eyes on You. Lord, get us out of here. Thank You, Jesus. Hallelujah! Let's make it our prayer. Sing it one more time. Come quickly, Lord. Oh, Lord, we love You.

Hallelujah! Hallelujah! Lord, it is our hearts' desire. We just thank You for the privilege of being a part of Your family, Lord, and being Your lover. Strengthen us now. Prepare us for this hour. You have told us, "Let us not be weary in well doing: for in due season we shall reap, if we faint not" (Galatians 6:9). So, we ask You for that grace, that strength to stand, that You might be glorified in all things. For that reason we ask it, in Jesus' name. Amen.

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