Skip to content The Life That God Requires May 19 · 54 min ...more
The Life That God Requires
May 19, 2025 · 54 min
Pastor Jeff emphasized the transformative power of the Gospel and the importance of living a life that pleases God.
Series Faithful Followers May 19, 2025 · 54 min · Faithful Followers
Pastor Jeff emphasized the transformative power of the Gospel and the importance of living a life that pleases God. ...more Show the full description Show less Pastor Jeff emphasized the transformative power of the Gospel and the importance of living a life that pleases God.
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139K followers
Pastor Jeff Schwarzentraub serves as president of Pastor Jeff Ministries, a national and global ministry designed to equip believers and challenge them to take
139K followers
In this video 0:00 The Life God Requires
The Life God Requires 0:02 Well, good morning, everybody. Would you help me welcome all of our brave campuses who are worshiping me with us today? So good to have you all. It is always good to be in the house of the Lord,0:14 but today is a special day. Across our campuses today, we are baptizing 78 people, and we give God all the glory and praise for that. So we'll be doing that later in our service today. And0:26 as we continue our worship today, let's pray. Let's prepare our hearts to hear God's living and active word among us. Would you pray with me? Our Father in heaven, we give you all the glory because you and you0:37 alone are the only 1 who is worthy. We give you all the honor and we submit ourselves afresh to you again, and we praise your holy name because your name is the name that is above0:49 every single name. Lord, we thank you that we get together as your saints to worship your great name, to celebrate you, to honor you. And, Lord, we are very excited this morning to get to hear directly from you,1:01 from your living and active word because, God, we as a people believe every time your word is faithfully and accurately proclaimed that you are speaking. So, Lord, our prayer this morning is speak for we are1:13 ready to hear. And so now, for all those who have gathered, who desire to hear the Lord Jesus Christ speak directly to you, who will believe what he tells you, and who will by faith put into practice what he shows you.1:24 Will you agree with me very loudly this morning by saying the word, amen. Amen. This morning I want to talk to you about the life God requires. The life that God requires.1:36 So often we hear this question in church, what is God's will for my life? What is God's will? What should I be doing? And we know when we tell the story of the gospel, which is the greatest story that
1:48 could ever be told, that Jesus Christ loved us so much, that he came here and died in our place for our sins, rose from the dead, so that through repentance and faith, we could have life in his name. Not only is
1:59 that the greatest love message ever told, but that gospel is transformative. If you've truly repented and believed that Jesus is the Christ and the Holy Spirit has begun to indwell your life,
2:11 everything about you begins to change. Your life is no longer what it was. You were once dead and now you're alive. Every everything has been made new. And if everything's been made new, then the way in
2:23 which you progress is because of the transformed power of the Holy Spirit inside of you. And if you don't know Christ, God wants you to know him. You're gonna get to hear that today. But if you do know Christ, he
2:35 loves you enough right where you are that nothing you do makes him love you anymore or any less, but he also loves you enough not to let you stay there. And in the heart of every single believer, there is a
2:47 desire to grow more into the likeness of the Lord Jesus Christ. And so today, we're gonna talk about the life that God requires. What what does that look like? And we're gonna be back in the book of first Thessalonians,
2:59 and just to refresh your memory, in that first chapter, we talked about the power and transformative power of the the gospel. And then we talked about in chapter 2, the faith and the ministries that God blesses. And in
3:10 chapter 3, we took a look at the heart of the Apostle Paul, and the the heart we should have in shepherding God's people. And here's we get into chapter 4, things are gonna shift a little bit. We're gonna begin to hear
3:21 about God's desire for us as his followers, and what his expectations of us should look like. So you have a copy of the scripture today. I invite you to open up to the book of first Thessalonians chapter 4.
3:33 We're gonna read through the first 8 verses together, and then I'll unpack this, and I'll give you 4 truths about who God wants you to be, and how God wants you to live. He
3:45 says, finally then brethren, we request and exhort you in the Lord Jesus that as you received from us instruction as to how you ought to walk and please God, just as you actually do walk,
3:56 that you excel still more. For you know what commandments we gave you by the authority of the Lord Jesus. For this is the will of God, your sanctification, that is that you abstain from sexual immorality. That each of
4:05 you know how That each of you know how to possess his own vessel and sanctification and honor, not in lustful passion like the Gentiles who do not
4:17 know God. And that no man transgress and defraud his brother in the matter, because the Lord is the avenger in in all these things, just as we also told you before and solemnly warned you.
4:29 For God has not called us for the purpose of impurity, but in sanctification. So he who rejects this is not rejecting man, but the God who gives his
4:41 holy spirit to you. And here through the Apostle's words to us inspired by the Holy Spirit, we get understanding about the life that God requires and what God
4:53 wants for us. And as I mentioned, I'll give you 4 truths that God would have for you as a believer in Jesus that you should walk in. And the first is this, please God abundantly.
5:06 As a believer in Christ, you should please God abundantly. Notice what he says. He says, finally then brethren, now he's not done with his letter. He's not done with his sermon. He's kinda like
5:18 a preacher that says, okay, and to conclude, and then he goes on with 5 more points. He's saying, finally then, brethren, here's what we request. We request and exhort you in the Lord Jesus, that as you received
5:29 instruction as to how you ought to walk and please God, just as you actually do walk, that you excel all the more. We talk a lot in church about your walk with Jesus Christ. And what we mean by that is
5:41 that when you come into a relationship with Christ and he's your Lord, that everything you do, you begin to do together. The decisions you make, the conversations you're going to have, where you're gonna live, how you're
5:53 gonna do things, who you're gonna marry. The Lord is invited into everything that you do, and we call that a walk. Meaning that everywhere you walk and every everywhere you go, you're inviting Jesus into that. And so as
6:04 Paul was writing to the Thessalonian church, he was telling them, we gave you instructions as to how to walk and you're doing that. We we You know the commandments that we gave you. You know them. You're doing that. It's
6:16 interesting when Jesus gave the great commission, he said all authority in heaven and earth has been given to me. Therefore, go make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy
6:26 Spirit, and then what? And teaching them to obey all that I have commanded you. 1 of the requirements that Jesus had for all of his future followers would be that everything he taught and everything that he was
6:38 teaching would be lived out in his followers, lived out in his disciples. You say, what's that? That's everything in the bible. Everything in the bible, we're taught that this is how God wants us to live. And
6:50 he's telling the Thessalonians church, you're doing this. We we told you how to live, you're doing it. We told you how to do this, you're doing it. But notice that little phrase at the end of verse 1 that he also says,
7:01 in parenthesis he says, you're doing this, but he says, that you excel still more. You're doing it, but I want you to excel still more. You're doing it, but but let's keep
7:12 going. Excel means abundance. It means however much you're living for the Lord, let me tell you something, there's more. And here's the reality of being obedient to Jesus.
7:24 That's where you experience the greatest satisfaction when you go all in with Jesus, and that's where God gets the greatest glory. Now when I talk about satisfaction, I do not mean that if you go all in with Jesus, every
7:36 good thing's gonna happen to your life. There will be trials, there will be sufferings, there will be hardships, but even in the middle of all that, you'll still have great peace and joy, and God's still getting the most
7:45 glory. So the question we should be asking as believers should be this. Lord, how can I give you even more of my life? When it comes to each section of my life, my my my
7:57 finances, my job, my marriage, my singleness, my parenting, whatever it is where I take vacations, Lord, how can that area of my life more reflect you? How how can I
8:09 be more lavish and abundant in the way in which I honor you in this area of my life? And when you're walking that way and you're asking those questions, here's the reality. You wanna hear God speak to your life? Begin to
8:20 ask God, God, how can I be more obedient to you? How could I honor you more? What would it look like for me in this area for you to get more glory? He will tell you. He will never hold back. And yet in church
8:32 oftentimes, here's what we do. We tend to ask the question this way. What's the least amount I can do and have God still be happy with me? What's the least I can do and still be saved?
8:45 And the Bible doesn't answer that question. Because Jesus and the way he shared the gospel is very different than how we share the gospel today. I need to tell you this because you need to hear this in church, because
8:56 you don't often hear this in church. Nowhere in the New Testament or Old Testament does Jesus or any member of the Trinity say, in order to be a Christian, you need to make a decision.
9:09 There's nowhere in the Bible that says you need to pray a prayer. There's nowhere in the Bible where it says to ask Jesus into your heart. There's nowhere in the Bible that says to invite him into your life. These
9:21 are statements that we use to, crystalize the gospel, make it more understandable, but that's not how Jesus invited people In Matthew chapter 4, he called his disciples. He said this,
9:32 follow me. I'll make you fishers of men. In other words, I want your full allegiance, and I'll I'll turn you into something. Or in Matthew chapter 16, here's how Jesus said you'll be saved. If anyone would come after me,
9:45 he must deny himself, take up his cross, and follow me. Here's what he was saying. If you wanna be my follower, if you wanna have eternal life, if you wanna go my way, here's what it means. You
9:56 give up all rights to yourself, you deny yourself, you take up your cross, which means in the 1 that you rebelled against, which was me, now you're willing to go public with me even if it costs you your life,
10:08 and follow me. So in everything I teach, you do everything I say. That's the gospel. The gospel is, do you wanna go all in with Jesus or not? Because here's what we tend to do in America.
10:21 We think this, I wanna be saved from my shame, but I don't want Jesus. I I wanna be shay saved from my pain, but I don't want Jesus. I wanna be saved from hell,
10:33 but I don't want Jesus. Right? You won't find that anywhere in the bible. There there's no benefit to the gospel without the 1 who's giving the gospel, which is Jesus himself. He is the way. He is
10:45 the truth. He is the life. And Jesus doesn't mince words with anybody. I mean, Jesus is always calling us to a higher standard. In John chapter 8 verses 30
10:57 and 31, it says, if you continue in my word, then you are truly my disciples. Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free. Or how about in Luke chapter 14? In Luke
11:09 chapter 14 in verse 25, there were large crowds gathering around Jesus, and he turned and said to them. So you would think, like, Jesus, you got all these crowds of people. All these people wanna know how to
11:21 get saved, all these people wanna know what's your message. This would be the opportunity to make it the most palatable you possibly could. And here's what Jesus says. If anyone comes to me and does not hate his own
11:32 father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters, yes, and even his own life, he cannot be my disciple. Whoever does not carry his own cross and come after me cannot
11:44 be my disciple. I mean, how much more clear can he make it? Here's what he's saying. There is no such thing as professing Jesus with your mouth and not repenting and believing in him as
11:56 Lord. There's a big difference. There's a lot of people that come to church every week that would profess, I believe in Jesus, I believe he's God, I believe he died on the cross, I believe he rose from the dead, I
12:08 believe all that stuff. Friends, I wanna tell you, the demons believe all that and tremble. Believing that means nothing. Surrendering to that means everything.
12:20 How do I do that? You repent of your sin. You turn from Well, I don't wanna turn from my sin. That's because you're not a Christian. Non Christians do not want to turn from their sin. Non Christians
12:32 want to live in their sin. So there's a lot of people that even come to church, they would call themselves a Christian, but they live in their sin. And by their lifestyle, they demonstrate for sure they're not Christian,
12:43 they're just Christian in name only. They're Christian by mouthing the words. Right? And we see that see this all throughout the New Testament when Jesus visited with the Pharisees who
12:55 proclaimed that they knew God, who proclaimed that they knew the scriptures, And Jesus said, yeah. You you know them all, because you think that in them you have life. Yet, here I am before you, yet you refuse to come to
13:04 me to have life. I'm the 1 the scriptures testify about. Here I am, yet you refuse to come to me. Or the rich young ruler when he says, I've kept all the commandments since I was a boy. I'm a pretty good guy. I've done
13:16 all the right things. Jesus said, yeah. 1 thing you lack, go give up all your possessions to the poor, then come follow me. And the man went away sad. Why? Because he didn't want to give allegiance to Jesus. He just
13:25 wanted to show that he was a good person. Friends, I'm here to tell you something sober in the church. There's too many people that come to church week in and week out that claim that they're
13:37 Christian, that talk that they're Christian, that believe that Jesus died, that believe that Jesus rose, that are not Christian. How do you know if they're Christian? Well, a Christian has repented of their sin, hates
13:48 their sin, and wants Jesus, and wants to listen to Jesus, and wants to follow Jesus. Here's the evidence that you're born again. There's a hunger and a thirst for righteousness.
14:00 There's a desire for more of Jesus. There's a hatred of what you used to be and a growing love for what you can become. That's what it looks like. And so just because you stood to
14:12 your feet at Easter, just because you prayed some prayer, filled out a card, or joined a small group, or you give money to the church, what difference does that make if you've never repented of your sin and trusted
14:24 Christ? See I don't know what you consider your biggest problem right now. Some of you would come in and say it's my singleness. Some of you would come in and say it's your marriage. Some of you would come in and say
14:33 it's my money. Some of you would come and say it's interpersonal relationships. Some would come in and say it's where I live. I'm having a heart. That's not your biggest problem. Your biggest problem is your sin. Your
14:43 sin is your depravity. It's what you're born in. And here's what you may understand about sin. You may understand, yeah, I've done some bad things. Everybody's done bad things. That's not sin. Sin is
14:55 this. From the time you took your first first breath, you're as vile as any human being that's ever walked the planet, and that's how God sees you. And you're an object of his wrath.
15:07 And if you don't see think that you're as bad as somebody else, you do not understand sin. If you think you're lucky because you were born in the United States, so you get free privilege into heaven, you do not
15:17 understand your sin. If you think you're a good person, you do not understand your sin. The Bible says there is no 1 good. No, not 1. There is not 1 that seeks and seeks after the Lord. There's nobody that gets out of
15:28 their mother's womb. It's like, I'm a pretty good person, and I'm gonna find out who got nobody does that. We all live for ourselves. So Jesus was calling people, stop living for yourself. Turn from your sin. Give me
15:40 full allegiance. That's how you know you're my disciple. And here's what people say in our culture. They'll say stuff like this. Well, I know I I know Jesus as my savior. I'm just not ready to make him Lord yet.
15:52 Friends, if you don't know him as Lord, you don't know him as savior either. There's no such thing. There's no such thing as somebody that's steeped in their sin, that's unwilling to turn from their sin, that's unwilling
16:03 to rush to Jesus, who's the only 1 that can forgive your sin, because he's the only 1 who's God, who died on a cross for all the sin, for anyone who would repent. He's the only answer, and yet you wanna live in your
16:15 sin and refuse to come to him. That's not salvation. And here would be the biggest tragedy. The biggest tragedy is that you would attend a church your whole life, or worse yet, you would come to Brave, thinking that
16:25 you're going to heaven because you've mouthed some words or prayed some prayer or you tell people that you're Christian or you think you're a good person. And meet Jesus someday and hear these awful words, depart from me
16:36 you worker of iniquity, I never knew you. Be tragic. And this is why we have to talk about this. So when Paul is writing to the Thessalonians, and he's telling them, hey, keep walking the faith. You're doing it,
16:47 but excel all the more. That's that's evidence. Why? Because in the Bible, in in John chapter 15, for every believer, what do they produce? Fruit, more fruit, much fruit. The parable of the soils. When the word of
16:59 God hits good soil, what does it produce? 30, 60, a hundred. Why? Because anybody who's born again grows in righteousness. Anybody who's born again hungers and thirsts more for God.
17:11 And it's not you that's doing it, it's Christ in you doing it. And if you say, oh, I've been a Christian for a long time, and that's never happened to me. Tell me why you're a Christian. Like, what makes you a Christian?
17:23 That you mouthed something? That you went to a religious service? That you jumped through some hoops? When was it that you repented of your sin that was killing you? Tell Jesus I want nothing to do with that, and thank
17:34 you Jesus for dying on the cross, because I wanna do whatever you want me to do. That's salvation. And the evidence shows up in that you want to walk with Jesus. That's what it looks like. And so as he's writing the
17:45 Thessalonians, he's saying, hey. Continue to walk out your faith and even do it more abundantly. Friends, this is so important. I'm here to tell you. I'm telling you very, very soberly because
17:57 there are too many people that profess Jesus that aren't saved. Some of you here profess Jesus and you're not saved. I mean, in Matthew chapter 7, when Jesus is telling the
18:08 people this, he says this. Matthew chapter 7 verse 21. Not everyone who says to me, 'Lord, Lord' will enter the kingdom of heaven. So profession of faith doesn't save you. Not everyone who says that goes to
18:20 heaven. But he who does the will of my father who is in heaven will enter. In other words, if God's work is walking through you, that's evidence that you belong there. Many, not some, not a few, many, a lot of
18:32 people will say to me on that day, Lord, Lord, do we not prophesy in your name? In other words, Lord, do we not preach? Did I not pastor a church? Was it not behind a pulpit? Lord, did we not cast out demons?
18:45 In other words, we saw miraculous works, and in your name perform many miracles. In other words, there's a lot of people doing ministry that are gonna say, Lord, Lord, what's the problem here? And then I will declare to
18:56 them, I never knew you. Depart from me, you who practice lawlessness. You never walked with me. You never repented of your sin. We never had a relationship. You did a bunch of religious activity, which means this.
19:06 There's a number of people preaching in churches that will go to hell. There's a number of ministers that are doing things where you see miraculous they're going to hell. Why? Because they're bad people? No. Because
19:15 they're dead in their sin and they never repented and believed that Jesus was the Christ. This is sobering, isn't it? Because we don't talk enough like this in church. And then we think that church is here designed to
19:27 help us live a better life. Jesus didn't die on the cross so that you would just live a better life. And hear a TED talk on Sundays and learn how to have a better marriage. No. No. No. Jesus
19:39 came so you could repent of your sin that's killing you, and avoid the wrath of God that's to come, and give your heart and life completely to the Lord Jesus Christ. And by being in Christ, then you
19:51 have a new identity in your life that you can walk with, that gives you a hunger and thirst for Christ, so that you grow, not perfectly, but progressively. Not perfectly, but increasingly.
20:08 Christian, this is how you should be praying. Lord, how can I please you even more than I am? Lord, what would it look like in my life to give you more glory and honor? I mean, we think about holiness as, oh, that's what
20:19 the Nazarenes do. They're like a holiness church. Now, holiness is me as a believer desiring what God wants. I wanna do it best for you, God. Most of us we think of
20:31 holiness. Okay. What do I have to give up now? Now that I'm a Christian, what do I gotta give up? Tell me the fun I gotta give up. No. No. No. That's not a Christian. Christian is, hey, now that I'm in you, Jesus, and
20:41 you saved me from all the wrath that was to come, and I have peace and joy regardless of my circumstances, show me, Jesus, what decisions I can make, what behaviors I can have, what actions I can do that bring you the
20:52 greatest glory. That's how I'm praying. You begin to pray like that, your life will begin to change. Because you can't make changes. You couldn't even save yourself. You can't make changes after you're saved. It's God in
21:04 you that does all the work. So please God abundantly. When Paul wrote to the Philippians, he was writing to them the same way, that they would continue to grow in in knowledge and grace and all these.
21:16 I mean, no matter where you are, there's there's more that you can do. So please God abundantly. Second is this. You wanna know the will of God for your life? You wanna know the life he requires? Pursue purity
21:27 proactively. Pursue purity proactively. It's very interesting. He says, you know what the commandments we gave you by the authority of the Lord Jesus. Here's the commandments that the Lord Jesus gives
21:39 us, and they're not burdensome for the believer. He gives these to us because he wants us to walk in his grace and in his fullness. But notice what he ties that to. He says in verse 3, for this is the will of God. You
21:50 wanna know the will of God? Here it is. Your sanctification. Your holiness. Your your growth in him. That's God's will for your life. That is that you abstain from sexual immorality. Isn't it
22:02 interesting that he ties holiness to your sexual immorality? Isn't it interesting because we've already been through this, that God is the 1 who gives you gender based upon Psalm 1 39 in Genesis 1. He's the 1 that
22:14 gave you your gender as male or female. And through that, God is the 1 that designed sexuality. Sex is bad. Sex is bad. It's not
22:25 bad. It's like awesome good. Okay. It is. It's so good that God had to give a container for it that's called covenant marriage,
22:37 because anything that comes shy of covenant marriage with sexuality will hurt you and the person that you're with if you're with somebody else. Always. Because sexuality is a way of connecting. It's a
22:49 way of procreation. It's a way of recreation. It's a way of relaxation. It's all these different things, but you connect to the person that you're with. Right? And so we could get up here. I could give you a list of a
22:59 hundred and 50 type of sexual moral behaviors, and then we could still come up with even more because people are always inventing new ones. Here's what you need to know. If it's not a husband and a wife in covenant
23:10 marriage serving 1 another in love to build the other 1 up, it's sinful. That's it. And when I say husband
23:22 and wife, I gotta be clear. I mean a man and a woman under the authority of God. Amen? That's what I'm talking about. Everything else, either together, in a group, or
23:34 by yourself is sinful. And it's detrimental to you. It's detrimental to your life, and it falls short of what God intended your sexuality to be.
23:46 Okay? I got I got to say this because it's in my heart. Some of you didn't have the the choice because it was taken from you at a young age. And, it's created anger, confusion, and also I wanna I
23:58 wanna tell you something, the authority of God's word. There's healing for you. Jesus can heal and redeem and restores the years that the locusts have eaten. He can teach you how to forgive and move on. He doesn't he
24:09 doesn't champion that. He's not for it. He wasn't God's will for you, but I just need to tell you that because I feel so hard to tell somebody that today. But pursue purity proactively. We need to do
24:21 this because we live in a culture I mean, to talk to Americans about, sexual immorality is like talking to a fish about what it feels like to be wet. Like, you have
24:33 no clue how immoral our culture is. From the time you wake up till the time you go to bed, every commercial you see, every posting on social media, I mean, so many of them are just laced with
24:45 lust and immorality and all this. You you don't even realize what God's standard is because it's been made so low for us. We we swim in the in the garbage. We swim in the junk, and then
24:56 we have hierarchies of it. So then we think like, well, you gotta understand, homosexuality is really, really bad, but if it's like 2 teenagers sleeping together, that's not as bad. It's all bad. It's all
25:08 bad, and it kills you, And it kills your future. And it kills those around you. It's bad. Sex, the way God designed, good.
25:20 Very good. I feel like I need to say this. I said this in the first service, especially for some of you young people here. I got a lot to say today. Okay. I got a lot to say. Listen, we'll start
25:32 in the Bible, and then I'll start on my rant a little bit. Paul, when he wrote to the Corinthians, he he used these words, or do you not know? In other words, have you not figured this out yet? Do do you not realize
25:44 this? Listen to what he says. Or do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do you not know that? Unrighteous people don't inherit the kingdom of God. Do you not know that? Do you not know
25:56 that? Jesus said, unrighteous people do not inherit the kingdom of God. If you're not walking in righteousness, you're not going to heaven. What's your what's your entrance into heaven? It's walking in the righteousness
26:04 of Jesus. It's being clothed in his righteousness. Now as a pastor, I've officiated many funerals. I've told you this. I've never been to a funeral with somebody that was unsaved where people are like, oh, no. He's in
26:12 hell. Everybody thinks they're going to heaven. I've been at plenty of funerals where I'm like, I know they're in hell if God's word is true. Because what we tend to do is we we make up for people. Yeah. You know, he had
26:24 many affairs, and he was a drunk, and he beat his kids and stuff. But when he was, like, 8, I remember he was at a camp, and he, like, prayed to receive Jesus. So I'm sure he's in heaven. I'm sure he's not based upon the
26:35 authority of the word, because unrighteous people do not inherit the kingdom of God. They don't. Now there's forgiveness for every sin. There's nobody here that's gone too far. There's nobody here that will be like, oh,
26:46 I've sinned too much and there's no hope. Anybody who comes to Christ by repenting of their sin and coming to the cross can be completely forgiven. That's the good news. But if you choose to live in your sin, there is no
26:56 hope for you. Have you not heard this? Unrighteous people do not inherit the kingdom of heaven. And then he begins to give a list. It's not an exhaustive list, but he begins to list some. Do not be deceived. Neither
27:08 fornicators. Let's stop there. Because when we when we keep going on, it's like, okay. Idolaters and adulterers and effeminate and homosexual and covetous and drunkards and I'm not really many of them. Listen.
27:17 Fornicators. Young people. This is what I wanna talk to you about. There's a number of you here that are fornicating right now, that call yourself a Christian. I'm a Christian. I'm a Christian. But when you
27:29 date, you're not acting like a Christian, because you're really not a Christian. You're just a Christian in name only. You don't love the Lord, you love your flesh, and you love the desires that you have for your flesh.
27:39 And so for some of you that are young, some of you in high school, you're sleeping around thinking it's no big deal, God forgives me no matter what. Some of you are older, you're doing the same thing, you're in college.
27:49 Some of you are a little older, and you're cohabitating. And you're living together, and you think, that's okay. I know I know the Lord, but this is okay. It's so not okay. Like, do you not know that if you behave like
28:00 that, you don't enter the kingdom? Like, where do you get this mindset? Well, God will just forgive me. Not if you're not repentant. He'll forgive anything, but you gotta wanna change. We got too many people in our
28:12 culture that thinks it's totally normal to have as many partners as you want, and then 1 day you get married, and then you'll stop. And there's a lot of you that have been lied to so much by the devil that you're like,
28:22 well, I'm young. I'm fun. I'm gonna have all the sex I want, because I know when I get married, it's gonna get get boring. Let me just tell you on the authority of God's word and by experience, sex gets better and better
28:30 and better over time if you're in covenant marriage with somebody. I said this in the first service. I love talking to the men that are in their seventies and eighties and tell me, Jeff, it's great. I
28:43 had some guy amen me in the first service down there, and his wife turned about 10 shades of red. God designed sex to be good. We shouldn't be apologetic for what God designed. He actually wrote a whole
28:55 book in the old testament called the Song of Solomon, 8 chapters about how great sex is within the balance of marriage. It's good. But if it falls shy of that, it's bad. And what it should do if you're truly a believer,
29:07 it should bring so much conviction to your heart, like, I don't wanna live this way. Oh, by the way, so for some of you, they're like, wait, but we're not really having sex. We do other things, but it's not really it
29:15 doesn't end in sex. Okay. Listen. Listen. Listen. Listen. Listen. All of you, if you found out that I was having an affair, would be bothered by that. I should be removed from my position and you're totally right. And,
29:26 I'm not having an affair. I'm not with anybody else. And, I'm just but I'm giving that as an example. But, you'd also be bothered if you found out that I was with somebody else, but I'm like, well we didn't have sex. Why
29:37 would you be bothered about that? Because she's not my wife. When you date, that girl is not your wife. That man is not your husband. And there's a strong possibility if you're just
29:49 starting to they may not be. So treat them as if they're not until they are. Amen?
30:02 Amen. About 6 weeks before Kim and I got married, we we bought our first house together, and we were trying to figure out who should live there. And as we were having discussions, we came to the conclusion neither 1 of
30:12 us should live there because their temptation is too high. Like, we can't do this. I was fine dating her at her parents' house, and I was fine having her over with my parents because it was cool then, but we didn't wanna
30:23 have our own place. Because you know how it works. You start making these agreements with yourself. I can handle this. I can handle you can't handle this. Which, by the way, young people, we're just gonna watch a movie.
30:34 If it's after 9 o'clock in a dark basement, you're not watching the movie. I mean, you're lying to yourself. You have to proactively set boundaries. So we did. We didn't move into the house
30:46 till after we got married. So we're paying for a house for 6 weeks with money we really didn't have, and it was okay because we wanted to honor the Lord. Amen? You have to make those kinds of decisions before you get in
30:57 the moment, because in the moment that your flesh will take over and you'll lose every time. You'll lose every time. You have to make God honoring decisions in the light so that you can handle it when it's dark. I
31:09 mean, as a pastor, I do not meet 1 on 1 with women in our church. Only person I meet 1 on 1 with is my wife. I met 1 on 1 with my mom, my mother-in-law, my daughters. That's about it. Anybody else? My wife will
31:21 probably be there or 1 of our pastors will be there. Now you're saying, well, Pastor Jeff, are you just scared something happened? No. I'm proactively honoring my wife and honoring the Lord because there's too many
31:31 people in my position that don't. Amen? And this is what the Lord wants to do. Think about it. And there's this part of our flesh that, well, I don't need to do that. I can handle it. I can handle. When you
31:43 start making those agreements, I can handle it, you're wrong a hundred percent of the time. Friends, I got married at 34. My my my younger brother at the time was like 17. I took him on our dates with us
31:55 because I knew nothing would happen if he was there. I bring Kim up onto the platform with me every service that she's here as a way of describing. This is my covenant life partner. I'm with her. I'm not with anybody
32:06 else. It's just her. She's the 1 that builds into me. It's a visual for everybody to know. I mean, those are the proactive things we need to do because if we don't, we find ourselves in situations that aren't good.
32:18 I'm here to tell you, I love you enough. I'm not I'm not mad at you. I'm not saying, oh, you're a horrible person. I'm saying, if you're living together, stop. If you love Jesus, stop. 1 of you move out immediately. If
32:30 you can't figure it out, guy, you're out. Just just just move and by the way, ladies, let me just tell you. If you guys are sleeping together and you're not married, he does
32:42 not love you. He can tell you all that. He just loves you. He doesn't love you. He'll love you when he's willing to come before God and a group of people, make a covenant before God and that group of people that no
32:53 matter what, I'll provide for you, I'll protect you, I'll be your covering. No matter what, even if you treat me bad, I'll love you. If he does that, then he loves you.
33:06 And I need to tell you this. If you want to honor the Lord, then do that. People tell me all the time, well, how can we do that? You know, Just just pass out condoms in high school and do all this. No. No. No. The fruit
33:18 of the spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, gentleness, faithfulness, and say it with me. Self control. The power of the spirit is what allows you to do what God wants. Right? And if you have the
33:30 power of the Spirit and you value marriage, you should be looking to get married a lot younger than some of you look to get married. Because if you're gonna wait till you're 30 and 40 and 50, there's bad things that are
33:37 gonna happen. I mean, I know what it was like to be a 17 year old boy. I know what it was like. There's no outlet, and we didn't have cold plunges back in the eighties. Take a cold plunge. You know
33:49 what I'm saying? I I get how hard it is, but with the power of the spirit, God can God can move. So pursue it proactively. If you're married, have boundaries proactively. If you're single, have boundaries
34:01 proactively. I tell all single people that are dating and get ready to get married, I'm like, don't be together alone after 7 o'clock at night. What? I can't be alone. You can, but why would you wanna be? What what
34:13 good's gonna come of that? I mean, you have to be saying, is it best to honor the Lord? And see, when you're in a situation because here's what people ask me all the time. Jeff, when it comes to dating, how far can we go
34:23 and still know that God loves us? Horrible question. Better question. Why don't you pray for what honors the Lord the most and ask Jesus in on all your dates and say, Lord, are you just as pleased
34:35 as I am right now? And if you're wanting to please him, then you got no problems. Because if it's Jesus just as excited about your dating experience, and Jesus is just as excited about your marriage, you got no problem.
34:46 Right? So be proactive about what you do. Let me give you a third 1. Possess your body honorably. This goes along with what we've just been reading. Possess your body honorably.
34:58 He says that each of you know how to possess his own vessel in sanctification and honor. That means you're responsible for what you do. You can't say, the devil made me do it. No. You chose.
35:10 It's your choice. You have power over your body. Not in lustful passion like the Gentiles who do not know God. When I look at our culture and I see all the ways in which people are
35:22 sinning immorally, I think, I'm not mad at them, that's what non believers do. If I didn't know Jesus, probably what I would do. No problem. Here's the problem. I did some study this week
35:34 on statistics between people that go to church and people that don't go to church, married people, unmarried people, when it comes to morality and immorality of people that are fornicating or people that are having
35:44 adultery or people that are looking at porn. Do you know what I discovered? It's not even worth showing you the stats. You know why? Because whether you go to church or don't go to church, the stats are exactly the same.
35:54 They're the same. Can we talk about pornography while we're on all these topics? I mean, you say, well, I'm not I'm not having sex with somebody. Okay. But when you're by yourself and you're looking at porn, you're doing
36:04 the same thing. It's wrong every single time. She doesn't know you. She doesn't like you. She's not thinking about you. Like, pornography is killing our
36:16 culture. Like, we have a bunch of people that will stand up and say sex trafficking is wrong. Just by applause, who knows sex trafficking is wrong? Okay. And sex trafficking
36:28 is like a really polite word if you really think about what's actually taking place. It's gross. It's disgusting. It's abominable, and God hates it. K? But do you know why we can't stop it?
36:40 Because we can't get churches to stand up and say porn's wrong. You know why we can't? Because we got too many guys in the church that are still into porn. And if you're into porn, you're complicit with the sex
36:48 trafficking industry. You are. That woman that you're fantasizing about or ladies, that man that you're fantasizing, that's not your
37:00 spouse. That's not your covenant partner. It's sin. It's abominable. It's gross and it's wrong. Every single time. Right? Don't don't don't participate in it.
37:12 Well, how do I change? I'm gonna work really hard. Most people wanna do like a 2 year bible study on it. You don't need a freaking 2 year bible study on it. You need to repent and come to Jesus and let him heal
37:24 you. Amen? If you walk in the spirit, you can defeat the flesh. You get to walk in 1
37:36 or the other. You can't walk in both. And God wants you to walk in purity. God wants you to walk in honor. And it is possible.
37:48 We live in a culture that says, well, that's just the way boys are. Nope. Not godly Christ filled, Holy Spirit filled boys that are becoming men. No, sir. No, sir.
38:01 God can redeem. God can change. But the way change comes is not your commitment to God and how hard you're gonna work. That doesn't work. It hasn't worked till now. It comes through this. I'm wrong. I'm repentant.Show more
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