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Beth Jones is a Bible teacher and founder of The Basics With Beth, a non-profit Christian teaching ministry dedicated to helping people learn the Bible basics.
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0:15 How's everybody doing this morning? Let's pray. Father, thank you so much for your faithfulness to us, Lord. Thank you for your love, thank you for your goodness, thank you for bringing all the VFCers back home safely0:26 from wherever ever they have gone, Lord, during spring break. All the students, give them an extra dose of energy and grace to finish the school year with strength. God, thank you for speaking to us this0:38 morning. Lord, we ask you for the spirit of wisdom and revelation. Open up the eyes of our heart to see things, to know things, to experience things afresh. Help us holy spirit to make a paradigm0:50 shift in our thinking and in our believing concerning your goodness and your love. In Jesus' mighty name we pray and everybody that agreed said, amen. Praise the Lord. So we're in a series called He Loves Us,1:01 He Loves Me and we're just, it is truly a paradigm shift and it's a it's a way of thinking that in many cases for us, we've just kind of overlooked it and we've defaulted to a certain way of thinking. For example,1:14 we have defaulted oftentimes to an if then mindset. In other words, if I do these things that please the Lord, if I pray, if I read my bible, if I serve, if I give, if I1:25 lead people to the Lord, if I don't sin, if I stop swearing, if if if I do all these things, then the Lord will be pleased with me, then the1:37 Lord will love me, then I will qualify for the Lord's blessings, then the Lord will be good to me. Now, all those things I mentioned are good things to do. But, where the paradigm shift is, is we make1:49 God's love towards us and then our experience of his goodness and his blessings and his favor and his healing and his open doors and all these things, we make the experience of those things2:01 contingent on the if. But really, as we're seeing in the word, really it's not an if then, it's a because then. Because he loves me,2:14 Because Jesus died on the cross for me. Because God demonstrates his love towards me. Because God is merciful and full of loving kindness. Because2:26 of the steadfast love of the Lord forever, then I do all kinds of things to live for the Lord, to please the Lord, to honor the Lord, to have2:38 my life be pleasing to him. But I do it because he loves me, not if I do these things he will love me. Do you all see that? And it's subtle.2:50 It's oh so subtle and it's a paradigm shift and it's a renewing of the mind to what the bible says about God's goodness. Because we end up slipping back into legalism and back into works. Which of course, we can never3:00 get good enough because then you have to say, where's the bar? Where's the bar on the if? Like, how do you know if you have succeeded? Because there's always another if. Well, it's good but if3:12 you just did a little more, if you just prayed a little longer, if you just had more faith. So, we really never arrive at the fulfillment of if and so it's always striving. Then the3:24 Christian life becomes a striving and actually in a lot of ways never obtaining. And then you get a lot of people mad at God, bitter, disappointed, resentful towards the Lord because3:36 they're not experiencing what the bible seems to tell us we should be experiencing. Y'all out there? But if we get a change of thinking, if it becomes a because then, because he loves me, because he's good, because he's3:48 faithful, because of all these things, then I can rest in that strive and walk in his love and that's what we're talking about in this series and we're talking about it just to get our minds renewed to it and then4:00 to talk about how to believe and receive it and experience it tangibly. Alright, so here's our verse. First John 4 10, in this is love, not that we loved4:12 God but that he loved us and sent his son to be the propitiation for our sins. So, huge huge verse. It's not that we love the Lord, it's that he loved us.4:23 Now, because he loved us, the bible says, because he first loved us, we do love him. But we weren't the initiators of it and the emphasis isn't on us. The emphasis and the glory and the attention and the focus is4:35 on him. It's not that we love the Lord, it's that he loved us. That if then thing. I'll give you an example. Years ago, my friend and I, Michelle, her and I were going to school in4:47 Boston in college and so we were home on break and getting ready to head back into Boston, packed up the car and we were gonna drive her 19 79 Cutlass. Who remembers the Oldsmobile Cutlass? Man,4:59 those were the days, weren't they? Those were some amazing cars, those Cutlass, Oldsmobile Cutlass, it was burnt orange and it was a sweet car and we were gonna drive from Lansing all the way through Canada5:11 to Boston, but on the way we were going stay with my aunt who lived in Rochester, New York. So, we get halfway through Canada, just past Toronto and then all of a sudden her car just comes to a complete stop.5:23 It's just like, the engine cuts out and she pulls it over and we pull off and slide to the shoulder, get off, you know, to the side of the road and the car's just done. And so we're like, what is the deal? Because the5:34 gas tank says full, the car had just been serviced, gas tank says full, all the mechanics are good but the car just stops. So we pull over, now you need to know, we are people of faith. We are people5:46 that know the Lord. We are people that know how to pray and we know how to put into action our faith. We figured if5:58 we just pray properly, then we'd push the right buttons and the Lord could supernaturally start the car. So we said, well, let's pray because this is, you know, this is a dilemma. God6:09 is a very present help in time of need, so let's pray. So we started off praying and we prayed in Jesus' name because we know that's how you're supposed to pray. So we prayed in Jesus' name, father we ask you to start6:19 this car in Jesus' name. You're the God of miracles, you can do all things, we believe. And then she turned the key, nothing. So, we said, well, if if we pray a different prayer, we probably6:31 just picked the wrong prayer. Let's pray in agreement. Let's get into agreement. If 2 or more on earth agree, it's touching anything they shall ask, it shall be done for us. Let's do that. So, we prayed the prayer of6:43 agreement. We asked the Lord, we agree, do you agree, I agree, we both agree, are we in agreement, we're in agreement? Okay, Jesus name. So then she turned the thing to start the car, nothing. So then we're like,6:55 okay, no problem, there's more. So if we pray another way, so we said maybe what we should do is lay hands on the car. So, let's open up the hood. So we opened up the hood, laid hands on7:07 the car, laid hands on the engine or wherever we could get our hands, know. Laid hands on the engine, in Jesus name, you know, we command this engine to start up. She turns the key, nothing.7:19 So we're like, okay, know, sometimes a hindrance to prayer is if you have unforgiveness. So let's make sure our hearts are clear, do you have anything against me? Do I have anything against you? Do we have anything7:30 against anyone? Let's forgive everyone that we've ever met, ever known. Let's get it all clear on the table. I forgive, I love, we love the world. Jesus is Lord, we're all good now, no7:42 hindrances. Let's pray. So, we prayed and then we turned the key, nothing. So, it's getting a little discouraging because we're just pushing all the buttons we know to push. So, we're like, okay, what else, Lord? What7:54 are we missing? What is it we need to do? What is it we're not doing? Oh, the prayer of praise. God inhabits the praises of his people. We just need to spend some time8:05 praising the Lord. So we sat in the car and we began to sing some songs and we praised the Lord. Oh God, we praise you that you're the almighty God, nothing is impossible our God, we exalt8:17 thee oh God, we just praised it up and prayed. And as you turned the key, nothing. So we're a little discouraged. Now, you say, well, you know, you8:29 girls, that that's sweet. That's sweet that you girls did that for, you know, for a couple of minutes. No, do you know how long we were on the side of the road? Believing God? Doing things, pushing buttons to8:41 get God to love us by starting that car? 8 hours. Yeah. 8 hours. 8 hours. 8 of them.8:54 And we missed the connection with my aunt in Rochester because we were just gonna be these faith filled people and we're just believing God because all things are possible with God and 8 hours. Well, here's the thing, we9:06 were doing the if then, but had we been smart, we would have just paid attention and opened our eyes and noticed the because then. We would have noticed that the Lord in his mercy, love and goodness9:19 caused our car to roll to a stop 50 yards from an open way station. An open way station. There were people there that could help9:30 us. The Lord in his love and mercy was so gracious to have the car stop right within help. Because the9:42 Lord was so loving, he stopped our car right where we could get help. We should have paid attention to the because then. Because we stopped so close to a pay station or a way station, then9:54 we could have walked there and got help. But we were being spiritual and we were being full of faith and we were gonna do it, we were gonna push the buttons. So we walked up to the pay station before it closed,10:07 barely, and we met this little trucker lady, she had a truck called Giddy Up and Go. So she gave us a ride and we said, well we don't know what to do but maybe we should just try gas. Maybe we should just get10:19 some gas. So she had a gas tank thing, we brought brought some gas back, put it in the car and do you know miraculously, that car started. Miraculously, when you put10:30 gas in a car, it starts. So what's the point? The point is we are so geared towards if then. Now is there a place and is there a time to pray all the prayers I just mentioned? Absolutely.10:42 Had we not stopped in God's mercy, love and grace, not stopped 50 yards from a pay station, I do believe the Lord would have supernaturally somehow or another got that car started until we could get help. Or he10:54 would have sent some angel by way sooner than 8 hours to help us out. There's a place for obviously praying in faith. But do you get the point, do you get the idea that sometimes we just gotta get this shift in our11:06 thinking and recognize the because then, not the if then. And all the people said, let me give you some other examples here. We mentioned that often times, people,11:18 because of our our thinking when it comes to the Lord, often times we're dealing with with rejection, with isolation, with feeling alone, with being disappointed. We're we're so many Christians are disappointed11:30 in the Lord. Certain prayers didn't get prayed, certain things happened or didn't happen and then it causes us to feel as if God doesn't love us and that causes us to11:42 shut down and that causes us then to put up barriers to the Lord's love and then we stay in a place of isolation and rejection, but then there's this part of us that's like, but if I think if I just did something, I11:53 think I there's a doing I need to do but I don't know what it is. And then we just get in this cycle of trying to do, trying to do, trying to do and not experiencing his love. It's not12:05 that we love the Lord. You gotta get that in your brain and then in your spirit. It's not on us, it's that he loved us and we respond to that and we're gonna talk about today12:17 and next week, how is it then we respond? But first we have to get our minds renewed to the reality that he loves us. Alright. Go over to another verse here. Go over to first John12:29 4 16. And we have known and believed the love God has for us. We have known and believed the love God has for us. God is love. He who12:41 abides in love, abides in God and God in him. You say, how do I know if I know and believe? What's the litmus test? How do I know if I know and believe in the love that God has for me? The way12:53 you know is this, if we are still experiencing a large degree of discouragement, disappointment, depression, rejection, isolation, aloneness, hurt, anger, bitterness,13:05 resentment, if we're still experiencing a lot of that in our lives, if you say, boy, the truth be known if people only knew how discouraged I get, if people only knew13:16 how disappointed I was, if people only knew how rejected and alone I feel, if we are continuing to experience those kinds of things on a fairly regular13:28 basis, I mean all of us have our days, but on a regular basis, and I would venture to say a large percentage in this room are because most Christians are,13:40 because we have not known or believed the love God has for us and the way you know if you know and believe is how much of that are you experiencing or if you say, oh no, my life would13:51 mostly be defined by I experience mostly joy and peace and contentment and rest. Why? Because I know and I believe God loves14:03 me. There's a trust quotient there that brings great rest. I'm not striving, I'm not always feeling unworthy and feeling like somehow I'm missing and blowing it and God's mad and14:15 God hasn't helped me. Y'all out there, are you getting this? This is how you, this is how you discern and the good news is God wants to help us know and believe. Not just to know in our head, many of us know in our head,14:26 oh yeah, right, whatever, the bible says God loves me, I get it. It's not that kind of knowing, it's the experiential knowing. We know by experience and belief. Now, the belief part's our choice and this is something we14:38 we do have control over. We can just choose to believe, you can just choose to believe today. I'll give you an example, I was talking to someone and she said this, she said she was married to someone. She said, having14:48 spent my youth with a man who always wanted God's love but never got it. She just, he's just like, never got it. It was like playing catch with someone who15:00 has no arms. They don't really believe this love is obtainable. And she went on to say, but it's always only a choice to believe.15:12 If God's trying to throw his love towards us, but we're like people with no arms not receiving it, then we'll always experience the unobtainable. It'll always feel unobtainable. And in fact, if you've been15:24 through discouragement, and listen, I've dealt with a spirit of rejection in my life. Any of you that have come out of a divorced home have. Any of you that have been through a divorce, you've experienced it. Any of you15:34 that have gone through a very difficult divorce, you've experienced it. Any of you that were in an abusive relationship of any sort, you've experienced it. A spirit of rejection. And so what happens is you don't15:46 mean to, but what happens is because you're guarding yourself, the default is to put up barriers. The default is to put up barriers towards people and ultimately towards the Lord. And the Lord's trying15:58 to demonstrate his love toward us, which is what he always does, we are always the object of his love, always. And he's not just passive about it, he is demonstrating it all the time. But what we do is16:10 we don't believe it, so we put up a barrier. Nope. I'm disappointed, I'm hurt, don't it's too good to be true. Why would he do that? Why would he even do that anyways? Why would God even love somebody like me anyways?16:21 You've been through so much hurt and so much rejection and so much disappointment, you your default is to put up the barriers. And so God's trying to throw his love to you but we are oftentimes like people with no arms.16:32 But the but the simple reality is it's just a choice. You can choose to have arms today. You can choose to receive his love today and you can choose to believe it. We know and believe.16:44 Come on, how many believers do we have out here? Say it with me, say I know and I believe the love God has for me. Come on, say it again, I choose to16:56 believe the love God has for me. Amen. So, what is it, what happens to us then when we know and when we believe? Well,17:08 a couple of things. You'll begin to have you'll begin to have an awareness, little things to big things. You'll recognize God's love being demonstrated towards you in little things and big things, relationships, favor on17:20 your life, open doors, physically, spirit, soul and body within you. I had a situation that happened on Friday, I was, I've been meditating on this for quite some time, obviously, you know, getting ready to share it with17:32 you guys, but but even prior to that for for quite some time, just have been meditating on these things and and again, it's such a paradigm shift that it's not my performance and it's not my love, it's his love towards17:42 me. So, I've had my eyes opened paying attention to his love. So, on Friday, I'm going to get my nails done and then I stopped at Big B's and to get an Americano. I pulled through the drive in window, 1 of our EC guys17:54 was there, Andrew, and so he handed me my Americano, he goes, hey, today this one's on me. I said, oh, Andrew, you're so nice to me, thank you so much. And inside my heart, was like, God, you love me. Thank you. Like,18:06 I'm on purpose recognizing that. I've had free coffees before, but that day it was different. That day, God was loving me. So then I go to the place to get my nails done and I get a mani pedi and I'm getting my manicure18:17 done and this lady that I saw in the salon, and you may be here today and if you are, thank you, God bless you, she was there with her daughter and she goes, hi Beth. And I go, hi, how you doing? And we just chatted for18:27 a couple of seconds really, but then as she checked out, she says, hey, today's manicure's on me. I said, oh, you are so sweet, thank you so much. And the guy doing my nails and the guy next to him, he's they said, is it18:38 your birthday? I said, no, it's not my birthday. Well, it a special occasion? I said, no. Not no special occasion, God just loves me. So then I went to check out and I remembered I had a18:50 gift certificate that my daughter Megan had given me to this nail place at Christmas, so I paid for the whole rest of the thing, the pedicure part, with my gift certificate and the tip and all I had to kick in extra was19:00 5 dollars for the tip, extra 5 dollars. What's that? I know and believe. God loves me. That's a simple little mundane thing, you gentlemen could care less19:12 about that, but you ladies know that was a good day. You know that was a good day. But, what I'm trying to say is, you begin to get aware of the ways God is demonstrating his love towards you. When you begin to get19:24 your mind renewed to this knowing and believing. Alright, go over to Romans 8. We're gonna take a little bath in God's word. The bible says that it's by the washing of water by the19:35 word that our minds get renewed and we move out the rejection and all the disappointment and we move in his love. So, we're gonna look at a lot of verses, know, kinda go through some quickly and a few others we'll drill19:46 into but, you know, verses like this that you begin to go, wow, God, it's amazing. Jesus said it's your Father's good pleasure to give you the kingdom. Verses like the Lord takes19:58 pleasure in the prosperity of his servants. Verses like that, you begin to go, holy smokes, he sent his word to heal us. All these different20:09 verses, you begin to go, God, you are so good and you're just always trying to get love and goodness to us. So in Romans, what kind of things is he trying to get to us? Romans 8 verse 3120:23 says, what then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? But he who did not spare his own son but delivered him up for us all, how shall20:35 he not with him also freely give us all things? He who did not spare his own son, now we read that but we have to stop just for a minute and understand20:47 that to the father, Jesus was his only begotten son. There were no other sons, it was just Jesus. And Ephesians tells us that Jesus sits on a throne in deep20:59 heaven, governing everything from galaxies to governments. The person of most value in all of the universe is Jesus.21:11 The person with the highest value is Jesus himself and his spotless blood and his mighty name. And this verse says, God did21:22 not spare his own son. He could have sent Moses, he could have sent an angel, he could have sent Gabriel, he could have sent Michael, but God did not spare because you and I were so valuable.21:34 God sent the most valuable 1 in all of creation. He was delivered up for for, keyword for, for us, all21:46 of us. That was a demonstration of God's love and so then it goes on to say, how shall he not with him freely give us all other things? Listen, he already gave you the most21:58 valuable thing in the universe. He already delivered up and did not spare the most valuable person and thing in all of the universe. How will He not with Him freely22:10 give you all other things? What else could there be? What else could there be that he wouldn't give you because if there was anything else that he wouldn't give you, it would mean that thing was more22:21 valuable than his son who he already gave. He would give you healing because if he didn't give you healing, healing would be more valuable than his son. He will give you wisdom because22:33 if he didn't give you wisdom, that would be more valuable than his son. He will freely give you all things and he'll give you the wisdom to walk out all those things. So, let me give you a couple of illustrations22:45 here. Did any of you see the movie, longest longest ride? It was a movie about a bull bull rider named Luke and his girlfriend Sophie. So, in this movie, I'm gonna be a spoiler,22:57 so just you're gonna hear the end of it here. So, in this movie, Luke and Sophie are dating and Sophie becomes friends with this older gentleman in like the recovery rehab23:09 hospital, his name is Ira. Ira was married to Ruth. Ira and Ruth were paint collectors. They collected all kinds of paintings and masterpieces and had just an amazing collection of paint of23:20 paintings. And 1 of the paintings they had was done by a student that Ruth taught when she was a teacher in school and this student painted a picture of Ruth. And, now they've23:32 aged and they've got this whole collection of masterpiece paintings and Ruth has died. And now Ira is telling Sophie and Luke about all their masterpieces and about Ruth who he dearly23:43 loved and the whole deal. Now, Ira is to the end of his life and Ira dies. And so now they're gonna have an auction for all of the paintings. So Luke and Sophie go to the auction23:55 and the auctioneer starts off, okay, we're gonna start the bidding, we have this masterpiece of hundreds of pieces of amazing, priceless art and we're gonna start the bidding with this portrait of Ruth. And it24:07 wasn't the greatest portrait, it was done by 1 of her students. But it was very important to Ira. We're gonna start the auction off with this painting of Ruth. Do I have any opening bids? Do I have a bid? Can I get And24:18 he begins to give some amounts and nobody bids on it? The room is silent. Nobody bids. Well, Sophie and Luke knew how much Ira loved Ruth, so eventually Luke pipes up and he bids a certain amount for24:30 it. I'll bid this amount for that picture. And the auctioneers, do we have any other bids? Are there any other bidders? Yeah, going once, going twice, going 3 times, sold to Luke. And everybody's you know, clapping24:42 and now they're waiting for the rest of the auction, for all this other amazing, really well known art. And all of a sudden, the auctioneer slams the gavel down and says, okay, slam down, this24:54 concludes today's auction. And everybody's like, Wait, you haven't even started. There's all the rest of this. There's all these other things to be auctioned off. And he said, no, it was Ira's wish25:05 that whoever valued the portrait of his wife would receive freely all the other pieces of art. Luke, they're all yours. Listen, that's a picture of this25:17 verse. Will he not with him, with the portrait, with Jesus give us freely all other things? What are we talking about? We're talking about God's love towards you. God's love towards25:29 me, he loves us. Go over to another verse. John 17, you gotta get this, this is so good. Jesus said this, he said, I in them, you in me,25:41 that they may be made perfect in 1 and that the world may know that you have sent me and, I get this, and have loved them as you have loved25:52 me. Keyword, as. Father, Jesus is praying, this is the prayer in John 17 to his father, father I pray that they would know, that the world would know that you have loved them, my26:04 followers, that you have loved them as you have loved me, exactly as, the same as. Do you ever question the Father's love for Jesus?26:16 When you see Jesus praying prayers, he says things like, Father, I know you always hear me. When you see Jesus relating to the Father, do you ever question the Father's love for his son? Never once.26:29 And Jesus is his father, they need to know that you love them as, just as you love me. If Jesus asked the father for something, would the father ever say no? He would always say yes. Meaning, he would say yes26:41 to you. He loves you as he loves his son, the same as. We'll get to it here in in just a bit. Well, let me let me do it now. You know, we'll see it26:52 throughout the rest of the series and many of you know it, but we are in him, we are in Christ. He loves us as he loves his son because we are in Christ. When Jesus becomes the Lord of your life, God puts you in Christ.27:05 The way I picture it is, it's like a burrito or like a sleeping bag. Okay, that's how I picture it, I know it's not the best illustration but it does help me. I picture myself in Christ like a burrito. He's all around27:17 me, like a sleeping bag, I'm zipped up in him. So anything Jesus would ask the father for, any question Jesus had, any need Jesus had, any blessing Jesus needed, any favor Jesus27:29 needed, the father would say yes. The father did say yes. Did the father require Jesus to exercise patience? Yes, us too. Did the father help Jesus when he was persecuted? Yes,27:41 like he will help us when we are persecuted. Did the father answer Jesus' prayers and do miracles, signs and wonders? Yes. And you and I are zipped up in him. We are in the burrito, if you will. We are in the sleeping27:52 bag. We are in Christ and Jesus says, father, help them to get it that you love them as you loved me, just as. But28:04 see, we default, we go back to if then. Well, no, that can't be true because I'm not worthy. I'm I miss it. Jesus was perfect. I'm not perfect. No, that's the whole point. Jesus made you perfect.28:16 Jesus qualified you. Jesus completed you. We so often identify, don't we? We so often identify with Adam, with the sin nature, with the fact that we're sinners, that we miss28:28 it, we blow it, we're not perfect. We so identify with Adam all the time, even after you become a Christian. You still have this unworthy mindset and we identify with Adam but the truth is,28:40 we're supposed to, according to the New Testament, we are supposed to identify with Christ. And when we identify with Christ and see ourselves zipped in him, so to28:52 speak, then all of a sudden you start going, oh my goodness, this is bigger than I thought. This is incredible. He loves me as he loves his son. Let's see another29:04 thing, how did the father love the son? Mark 1 verses 9 through 11. It came to pass in those days that Jesus came from Nazareth of Galilee and was baptized by John in the Jordan and immediately coming29:16 up from the water, he saw the heavens parting and the spirit descending upon him like a dove. Then a voice came from heaven, you are my beloved son in whom I am well pleased.29:28 Jesus was being water baptized by John the Baptist and he comes up out of the water and God so loves his son and so has to part the heavens to29:39 declare something, to profess something over his son. He says, what does he say? He says, you are my beloved, beloved son. He could have just said son. He made an29:51 emphasis, you are my loved son. Actually, word beloved means fond of, to love dearly, to have a preference for. You are my beloved son, I am fond of you, I have a preference for you, you are30:03 my beloved son. Now listen, Jesus hadn't done anything yet. He'd been born, he'd been in the temple at 12 years of age arguing with the priests30:15 and leaders, hadn't done anything yet, hadn't performed any miracles, hadn't been to the cross, didn't walk on water, didn't multiply loaves and fish, had not performed anything.30:27 And the father says, you are my beloved son in whom I am well pleased. The father was well pleased before he did anything. And what he's trying to say to us is, Jesus says, father, help them to know that you love them30:39 just like that. That you would part the ceiling of the sanctuary and say, you are my beloved sons and daughters and in you I am well pleased. And then if you're like some30:51 people, you'd be, ah, no, no, you can't say that, no. I reject that. Don't reject it. Receive it. Don't be like the guy with no arms. Be like the person with arms that says, God, I31:02 know and believe it. It's too good to be true, but I believe it. Jesus said it. You love me, can hardly stand it, can hardly even imagine it, but you love me just like you loved your son. In31:14 me, you are well pleased. And you're like, but I know myself and he does too. That's why we're zipped in Christ. Amen?31:27 I know your wheels are spinning because you're like, yeah, but there's there's a catch. There's gotta be a catch. Aren't there levers to pull? Aren't there buttons to punch? Aren't there what do I have to do? That's the31:38 whole point. You have to receive and believe. And then the Holy Spirit will guide you and lead you and show you the things that go with whatever it is31:50 you're receiving from the Lord. Usually it's patience, usually it's rest. Takes away all the striving. Alright, our time's32:02 wrapping up, let me take you to another verse here, a couple more to just wrap you up. Ephesians 1 verses 3 through 6, blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ who has blessed us, already blessed32:14 us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ, zipped up in Christ, you're already blessed. Just as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world that we should be holy and32:26 without blame before him in love. How is it that you are holy and without blame? Is it by your performance? No, it's because he delivered up his son to take our place. In him, we32:38 stand before him holy and blameless already. Having predestined us to adoption as sons by Jesus Christ himself according to the good pleasure of his will to the praise of the glory of his grace by which32:50 he made us accepted in the beloved. We are in the beloved. Right there, tells you, we are in the beloved. So, when Jesus says words to his son and calls him beloved, listen, he's not just talking to Jesus, he's talking33:01 to you. You are accepted in the beloved. So, then what does he tell us about being accepted in the beloved? Third John 2, you guys know this verse but we'll close33:13 with this. You know this verse but I want you to see it in a different light. Third John 2, he says, beloved, he's talking about you and I and loves us as he loved his son. Beloved,33:25 I pray that you may prosper in all things and be in health just as your soul prospers. The King James version of this says, beloved, I wish above all things, above all things, beloved, beloved,33:37 this is my top priority. Above all other things, this is what I pray. This is what the Holy Spirit is conveying to us, it's the Father's heart to his beloved. Beloved, above all other33:49 things, this is what I pray. I pray that you may prosper, That it'll go well with you. That you may prosper and have success and increase and things are good for you. All of heaven is cheering you on.34:01 If God is for you, who can be against you? Beloved, above all things, I wish, I pray, I want you to prosper in all things. In all your34:12 relationships, on the job, with your children, in your marriage, in your physical health. I want you to prosper and let me emphasize it, be in health. Be in emotional health, mental34:24 health, physical health. Have health in your relationships. I want you to prosper and be in health even as your soul prospers, even as your mind is prospering, your34:36 soul, it's your mind, your emotions, your will, even as the whole rest of you is prospering. And listen, that's where most Christians have a problem. These days, it's in their soul. Their mind and their emotions are just34:47 so confused and messed up and discouraged and defeated, confused. And he's saying to us, no, God loves you and beloved, above all other things, I want you to34:59 prosper. I am for you, I'm not against you. I want you to be in health. I'll show you the pathway. Just believe just believe that because of my love, I want you healthy, spirit, soul and35:11 body. I'll show you the pathway to get there. The pathway might be surgery, The pathway might be medicine. The pathway might be physical therapy. The pathway might be just believing you receive by faith supernaturally.35:22 I'll show you the pathway. Just believe, beloved, just believe the finish line for you is healthy, healed, strong, whole and with long life, you will be satisfied.35:34 Amen? So, are you getting it? Are you getting are you getting the idea? He loves you, he loves me and he is demonstrating it all the35:45 time. Last verse, I'll just quote it for you because it's in Psalm, Psalm 36 from the message, it's just 1 line, but I want you to leave with this thought35:57 resonating. God's love is meteoric. God's love is meteoric. You say, what is that? I don't know, but36:09 it's huge. It's like a meteor shower. It's so expansive, it fills up the universe. God's love is meteoric. You're trying to think of like the biggest word you can come up with to36:21 describe his love towards you and I. Psalm 36 verse 5 from The Message Bible just paints such a beautiful picture. God's love is meteoric, beyond the stars, beyond the36:33 planets. God's love towards you and I. It's not that we love God, it's that he loved us and we have known and believed the love God has for us. He36:45 loves us even as he loved his son. Let's pray. Father, thank you so much. It's so simple, it's so basic, so good. Lord, your love for36:56 us, it's hard to take it in, it's hard to get our minds wrapped around it, but Lord you're not asking us to get our minds wrapped around it, you're asking us to get our hearts in a position just to receive it, to believe37:07 and to receive and Lord we do that today in Jesus name, Father, I pray for each and every person here, Lord that you give us grace and help just to37:19 simply receive it. We receive your love and I thank you Holy Spirit, you'll help us walk it out, help us experience it in a greater measure. Whatever it is that we have need of, all these things that you've37:31 freely given us in your son, or whatever it is your people have need of, whatever thing they have need of, Father, I speak your blessings over them, the love of God to come upon them37:43 in a fresh and powerful way, demonstrated toward them through your son Jesus Christ for his honor, for his glory. Lord, we thank you for it In Jesus' mighty name. And37:55 everybody that agreed said, amen. Praise the38:20 basics with Beth. That's com. That's thebasicswithbeth dot com. It's been great to be with you and I will look forward to seeing you next time right here on pray dot com.
Grip Serving: How To Be A Fisher Of Men Beth Jones
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