Sermon Transcript
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Sun, May 05, 2024 10AM • 58:06SUMMARY KEYWORDSpeople, God, man, Jesus, selfish ambition, faith, Samuel, bible, Moses, timothy, qualities, obedience, called, good, lip service, church, read, Elijah, lord, word
Good morning.
If you're new here among us, my name is Gene I serve here at C3 church as your pastor.
And I heard a story about a pastor's wife, we told her story
I’m trying to stretch this one out.
Indeed, if you are not new here, you know that my wife shared her testimony last week, 10 years of sobriety. After like, over 20 years of living with me, how is that possible? I don't know.
But it speaks of commitment, doesn't it? Both of those angles commitment. So I heard a story …
about a young couple. And so they're they got engaged. And the man was kind of dragging his feet about it. Right. So it went on for a while. It's one of those things like, when is he finally going to pop the question? She's a whole lot better looking at him, right. So I know how that feels. So he waits and waits, and waits finally pops the question, she gets the ring. And you know, she's been waiting for this day for a long time. And then she says,
Actually, now that we're engaged, I'm kind of nervous. And the man says, I know, this is a really big commitment. Seven or eight years is a really long time.
There's like a lot of that going on. But anyway, we find ourselves in our twisted scripture series. So if you're just joining us, you kind of know, Christianity has or you may not know, if you're been here for a while, you know, you've heard it before. Christianity has kind of what I would call a verse of the day problem. So basically, we get this fortune cookie theology, right? So we go on our phones, it's whatever is fed to us. And we pop out the verse, and that's it. And we just take the verse and make it about whatever we want to make it about, right, whatever suits us. That's what we'll use. Right? So that's typical Christianity. And what you end up with in that case is a lot of twist as grifter. They're taking all these scriptures and they're just applying it to things. It's totally wrong. Right. So fortune cookie theology. So stick with that. I think it's pretty good. Anyway,
we'll see if that shows up again. So their phrases when we're looking at our phrases, sometimes there are parts of scripture there versus things that we say that are in the Bible, but we may be Miss applying them right. So today, we're going to look at a phrase that if you've been in church for a long time, you've heard man of God, you've heard man of God, I'm a man of God, or somebody is a metabolic. What does that really mean? That's what we're going to look at today. Now, maybe if you had never been in church before, you know, you've heard like a movie man of God, and that's okay. And sometimes it's not misapplied. But what I'm going to talk about today is the way it's typically applied, let's say in what we call prosperity, gospel churches, right. So there's one gospel, the gospel that we preach here in any Bible believing church preaches right, so the gospel of Jesus Christ, that's the correct gospel. The Bible tells us if anybody preaches another gospel, they're cursed in Greek, it actually means damned, right? So when someone goes, Oh, well, we preach a different gospel. I'm like,
right? So one of those, there is no different gospel. There's one, right? So what they'll do is, they'll preach and they'll say things like, Well, I'm a man of God. So I should be wealthy. I'm a man of God. So I should have a private jet, because men of God in the Bible have private jets.
Right?
If people aren't catching it, right, so they use it to say that a man of God is someone who's going to enrich themselves instead of the church. And so that's the problem. So what I want to do today is we're going to go through the Bible, and we're going to look at the people, the word of God calls men of God, and we're going to see how that phrase applies, and what those people were really like. And then we'll do a little bit of practical application here. So let's hop right in. So it actually the phrase appears quite a bit like 78 times and 72 verses, it applies to about 13 different people, depending on how you're counting, it gets tricky, because some of them are not named, some of them show up. And it's like a man of God came and so you just don't know whether it's one person we just talked about or so you can be unsure. So what I'm going to do is I'm going to look at the ones or I'll show you the ones that it's obvious, right? So it applies it directly to that name, the person so the first one was called the man of God, as Moses. It happens kind of later on in Deuteronomy, Moses called the man of God, but the only thing about Moses, so you have their Torah or so the first five books of the Bible, Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy. And so here you have Moses appearing right at the beginning of Exodus and so if you know the Exodus story, you kind of get it but leading up to that what happens Joseph right, so you get the 12 tribes of Israel coming in Egypt are taken care of there but then fast
Earl forgets all about what Joseph did. And they're enslaved, they're worried these people were going to outnumber us, essentially. And so Moses enters the story. They're trying to kill all of like the young male babies, he gets saved and then raised in Pharaoh's house by Pharaoh's daughter. So it's really interesting. So, but then he chooses to leave that behind. 40 or so years later, God appears to him the burning bush account, and then he is set to lead God's people out of Egypt. So the Israelites out of Egypt, and then they wander around a lot. And Moses has some interesting experiences, because people don't always listen to Moses. So it's a really frustrating story if you're trying to be in his shoes and watch it. Right. So read it, and kind of put it together. So kind of a frustrating life, he doesn't get into the promised land at all. But God says, Hey, check it out, look what you're not going to get. And then he dies.
It's a really kind of a rough existence. But he's calling me out. I've got interesting points here, if you're just kind of interested in this thing. He's the only person in the Torah called Man of God. And that's kind of weird, because Abraham, right father, Abraham, you read about him in the New Testament to they're always talking about him. But Moses is called the man of God. So that's a man of God. So if we continue, you get a couple more in these are like some unnamed people that come in here, you get like, if you know the Samson account, the angel of the Lord, and then she calls it a man of God later appears to Samson's mom, man who chastise the free stuff that Eli that his son's hockey and Phineas with a three prong fork. So there's a man of God there, but then we get second name person, Samuel. So basically, we're reading the story along so you can get the idea if you've been here for a while, you kind of know, the whole idea of the Old Testament here is right out the gate. The people reject God, they reject God, they reject paradise, they just keep rejecting everything, they reject the law. They reject the manner. They just keep rejecting the things of God over and over and over and over again. So God gives them prophets in those days, some judges or I'm sorry, judges. So in those days, right, there was no king. So everyone did whatever was right in there. And so here we have the judges, those are no good for them, either. So Samuel comes in, Joshua, Judges, Ruth, and then then you have for Samuel, he comes in to anoint the first kings of Israel, because now those judges aren't good enough, those profits aren't good enough. We want to King we want to be like everybody else. Right? And so Samuels, like, you know, the same thing. We're as Christians, you're looking for a theocracy here. You're not looking for a king or anything, but that's not good enough. God has to reassure Samuel that say, Moses and Samuel, Samuel, like, they're not rejecting you. They're rejecting me, they rejected God. So Samuel, and I saw a ninth David, right. So very committed guy.
It's kind of an interesting thing. Like we'll get there a little bit later. Really obedient to his tasks, right. So just a really, really strong character. Definitely not like it for the money, so to speak. So much like Moses in that sense, where it's a tough life, right? So, but he does his job. And this ties to David. David, we just recently talked about David King David, everybody knows that David is, you know, David Goliath, and we saw that there's way more to David than just that. Right. So David didn't always do the right thing. But a lot of us only just focus on that, like David and Goliath story that, but there's so much more to it. And we learned what about David that he was repentant, right. No matter what he did wrong, he was repentant. But second, technically king of Israel, you have King David, they're a named person she may have man from Judah. So you might know the story about
Jeroboam. So they split so you have Judah in the south. And then Israel in the north, and then Raya bones there. And so it's man of God prophesize against him, right? Alter, alter, right, and his hand gets weathered and stuff. But he predicts Josiah, much, much, much later. And so this man of God kind of gets duped by another prophet, into like, he's not supposed to eat when he's there. He doesn't obey and then he gets killed by a lion. That's kind of a strange story, but he's in there and he gets called Man of God a lot. This leads us Israel into Elijah and a lot of people know about Elijah Rhino. Probably the most famous story about him is this contest on Mount Carmel. Right, so the priests of veils are foreign to priests of Baal 400 Priests of Astra but the bill is the focus thing, right? So he has them killed. And then he's like, run in from Ahab, and specifically Jezebel, so he is a prophet and probably heard about Joseph L. Or Ahab. He's a prophet during that time. He's called Man of God. This leads up to
another amount of God in there. We're not sure who it is. But then Elijah, and Elijah is really interesting, because he's the one who wants to double portion of Elijah spirit and seems like he gets it because he does way more
miracles, a lot more miracles. Interestingly, he's called Man of God more than any one else in the Bible.
Hanan another unnamed guy, and that's the Old Testament, pretty much it. One person is called Man of God in the New Testament, and that is Timothy, if you don't know who Timothy is, you know, Paul, you might know who he is. But Paul writes 13 letters or books of the New Testament more than anybody else that's like, just, you know, simple math with 27 books. So half ish of the New Testament is written by Paul. And the context here. All Paul's letters are written to either churches or people operating churches, people working in churches, or some kind of position like that. And Timothy is one of those people. So he writes two letters to Timothy that we have first and second Timothy. And it's like kind of his protege. He's, they're leaving him in Ephesus, and he's saying, Hey, you be the what we think is like a pastor overseer there and FSS and he's giving them instruction. So a lot of people, if you're in a church, or church polity, and different things like that, you'll read those books, a lot of people kind of skip over them, because it's just a lot of instructions to the churches along with some excellent theology, so you shouldn't skip them. He's also named as a co author, I think of like Second Corinthians, first and second. Thessalonians, Paul, savannas and Timothy. So kind of like, you know, in that sense, like, he's a major player in there. He's called Man of God. So
that's, that's about it. And then we've seen in the past that all these people had their faults, none of these people are the hero of the story. None of these people are God, it's important to remember, only Jesus, right? So Jesus is the hero of the story here. But they're called Men of God, because they possess godly qualities. So what I want to do is I want to look at the qualities these people possess, and I want to choose, I want to use the word of God to give you those qualities, not my opinion. Alright, so we're going to look at what the Word of God says.
So
I've said it before, we've been here for a while, you know, this, the best commentary on the Old Testament is the New Testament, right? So it tells you a lot, you get a lot of clarification, even Jesus himself clarifies a lot of positions there. And he's the fulfillment of all this stuff in there. And so you want to look to that, right? When you're talking about these people in the Old Testament, and they give us a lot of information. One of my favorite books in the New Testament is Hebrews as it pertains to the Old Testament because it's like, essentially, a commentary on the Old Testament. Hebrews was written because you have Jewish Christians then. So this is the Jewish faith in the beginning of the Gentiles get welcomed. But these early Jewish believers are being persecuted for what they believe it's seen as a sect Christianity, and so they're going to get persecuted. And so the author, preacher, we're not really sure, who wrote it. Probably not Paul. But anyway, don't get stuck there. read Hebrews, right? Don't spend all your time speculating about who wrote Hebrews. Just read Hebrews, right? Anyway. So what's happening there, the people are being encouraged. Don't go back, don't go back to Judaism. Jesus fulfilled all of that, like, he's the fulfillment of everything. So basically, Jesus is superior. So just going through this list of different things, but a lot of people hang on the people of faith. Hebrews 11, oh, people of faith, and Moses is mentioned in there. So let's take a look at how it talks about him Hebrews 1124. It was by faith that Moses when he grew up, refused to be called the son of Pharaoh's daughter. He chose to share the oppression of God's people instead of enjoying the fleeting pleasures of sin. He thought it was better to suffer for the sake of Christ, than to own the treasures of Egypt for us looking ahead to his great reward. It was my faith that Moses left the land of Egypt, not fearing the Kings anger, he kept right on going because he kept his eyes on the one who is invisible. So these are lines about Moses that most Christians have never read. But it identifies what he was all about, doesn't it? What was his adjutant faith? Isn't that a great faith? Why, pray tell? Well, think about it. And this is something that people don't often think about when you think about Moses in the position he was in, right. So imagine you're raised in Pharaoh's household. You're basically like his child. Right? So well, like that's it. That's the most prominent position you that does Pharaoh, right. So he's really wealthy. And it says here, right, so we get it right from God's word. I don't have to speculate. It says it, that he left all these treasures. He left this wealthy position, right to suffer with Garfield, taking some pretty big chances. You're going to Pharaoh, right, Let my people go. So you have this whole thing going on and on. And then a very difficult life wandering for 40 years in the wilderness. Right? Why? Faith because he was looking not at the stuff here the immediate. He was looking at heavenly treasure he's looking for
Word to Christ. So pretty, pretty astounding, right? So this is a person so you have a faith quality here. And then no selfish ambition. So when you say altruistic I'm told don't use too many big words. But anyway, so no selfish ambition he's not selfish, right? So he's working for the Lord really important. So when we're talking about that, that prosperity gospel Bible one, prosperity gospel, zero, right, so there we go for keep
keeping score, you just read this. Alright, so he was willing to suffer to be poor, right? He's looking ahead because Moses had faced so let's face all about looking ahead, not here. Moses was also humble. A lot of people miss this two numbers. 12 three, Moses. Now Moses was very humble, more humble than any other person on the earth. Crazy. Alright, so we'll get to Samuel. Again. Samuel is again not greedy, kind of like Moses, He gives a farewell speech and you get this picture here. First Samuel 12 One then Samuel addressed all Israel. I've done as you asked and given you a king. So you see, like, really didn't want to do that. Your king is now your leader. I stand before you an old gray haired man and my son serve you. I have served you as your leader from the time it was avoided this very day now testify against me in the presence of the Lord, and before His anointed one. Who was Oxford donkey Have I stolen? ever cheated any of you have ever oppressed you have ever taken a bribe or perverted justice? Tell me and I'll make right whatever I've done wrong. No, they replied, You never cheated us or oppressed us, and you've never taken a single bribe. The Lord has anointed one of my witnesses today Samuel declared that my hands are clean. Yes, he is a witness. They reply.
Bible to prosperity gospel, zero.
First Samuel 1521 talking to so. But Samuel your plot was more pleasing to the Lord. You're burnt offerings and sacrifices, or your obedience to His voice. Listen, obedience is better than sacrifice and submission better than offering the fat of ramp. So big feature. I think I mentioned it before. Obedience with Samuel is a big key word for Samuels ministry obedience. Right? So if you're reading the text, you know that he was obedient. He did not want to anoint a king for Israel. He's like, so, but he did it anyway. Because it's what the Lord told him to do. Now when he goes to anoint David, you notice he's worried about getting killed. He's like, Oh, no, I'm going to get killed. If I got annoyed this other king by assault. He did it anyway. So he's obedient.
God's Will over his own. David I always smirk. So David, his key feature is repentance is why a lot of people can relate to it, right? I mess up, everybody mess up. We all do things wrong. Right. So but then we repent and the Lord's there he forgives us, right? And goodness, right. So he made a lot of mistakes. What is
worth noting out of any of the men of God? David has the most conveniences. So when you think about if you really know the story about Bathsheba and the adultery really well, you know why he got himself in that problem in the first place at a time when kings are normally out at war, like his evil general Joab. Rob, he's not so he's hanging out and he's like, on the rooftop of the palace kind of thing. And he's checking off the ladies. Right? So that's what gets he has too much free time on his hands. Alright, so that's a thing. So it's kind of just worth noting. Yes. So here's where the prosperity people are going to be like, No, us one your Bible to you're still losing. But anyway.
But I would add, yes, but those conveniences are part of what got him in a lot of trouble. Alright, so that's fine. Give him one and then we're going to blow it out of the water with the next three people. Right, Elijah. So clearly no selfish ambition like he's on the run from Desert Valley thinks he's going to get killed. Yes, he does. A sheriff complaining. He's a little afraid, the Bible says, but he's obedient. No selfish ambition. He's not in it for himself a lot of consequences. Also, he's willing new lord is going to take willing to pass on his ministry to his excessive right. So again, not like no selfish ambition here. Fine. Your here's the mantle, and brings us to it like Shep. very selfless. So I can think of like two different things, which really stand out about Elijah to me, aside from the miracles, of course, but the calling of His ministry, right? So when that mantle gets handed down, basically like, Alright, let's go and he's like, hold on a second. So, you know, he's out there with the oxen and everything, but he slaughters them and then feeds everybody else before he goes, right. So, but he leaves that line of work. He's called by the Lord into uncertain territory. And Elijah says, think about what I've done to you, right? So very uncertain, but he leaves it anyway. Then there's the thing that Jesus references name and the Syrian, who is healed. And so
he'll just name it the seat the serum. And he doesn't accept the gifts like so just think of it in modern terms. He wants to give him money, right? So he has silver and all that stuff. He wants to give him money. Elijah doesn't take it.
He refuses the money. But his wicked servant Gehazi takes the money. And then he breaks out with Naaman’s leprosy. So tells you a lot about what a man of God should be doing. He didn't care about the money again, like that. Then you get to Timothy, it's this is interesting because it becomes that's why the New Testament such a good commentary, the old it becomes like this culmination of all of these qualities here. So first Timothy, lot of warnings about false teachers, as we've seen in the New Testament. That's what's going on here. They're warning, Paul's warning Timothy about all the false teachers. He says this First Timothy six. But these people, the false teachers always cause trouble, their minds are corrupt, and they've turned their backs on the truth, then a show of godliness is just a way to become wealthy. Yet true godliness with contentment itself is great. Well, after all, he brought nothing with us when we came into the world, and we can't take anything with us when we leave it. So if we have enough food and clothing, let us be content. This is Paul writing to Timothy church leaders. But people along to be rich fall into temptation and are trapped by many foolish and harmful desires that plunge them into ruin and destruction. For the love of money is the root of all evil. It says in the Greek, and some people craving money have wandered from the true faith and pierced themselves with many sorrows. prosperity gospel has lost the game.
Have you get any idea that like, pastors and people like that should be enriching themselves off the church? You are not reading your Bible? And if you don't believe me, believe God's word because he continues. Here's Timothy 611. But you Timothy, are a man of God. So run from all these evil things. What did he just talk about? Your righteousness and pursue righteousness and a godly life along with faith, love, perseverance and gentleness, fight the good fight for the true face hold tightly to the eternal life which God has called you, which you have declared so well before many witnesses, and I charge before God who gives life to all and before Christ Jesus, who give a good testimony before Pontius Pilate, that you will obey this command without wavering, that no one can find fault with you from now on, until our Lord Jesus comes again. So the other thing were this selfish ambition, this greed, this pursuit of wealth, all kinds of Nope. All evil, like he's categorizing as an evil thing. Interesting, because a man of God does not concern himself with worldly things. That's not primary to a man of God. That's it. That's just interesting enough, this is where it ends, like is the final commentary on what a man of God is in the Bible. So we see a combination of these qualities, as I said before.
So the question arises for us today. Okay, what do we do with? Great now we know what a man of God is in the Bible. What does that mean to us? Well,
what is the man of God look like today, using these principles? Like how do we fit this? Well,
a man of God follows God in every possible way.
You'll Bayes Did you notice that word coming up? He obeys His commands, with joy. So obedient, does not live for the things of this world that for the things of eternity. That's even how what the first one was, Moses was described, right? Yeah, faith, because he was pursuing the things that are unseen. So from Moses to Timothy, there you go. That's what it's all about. serves God freely gives resources and is willing to accept suffering for his faith. That's a man of God. So faith. Let's take a look at that. Right. So faith shows the reality of what we hope for is the evidence of things unseen. That's how our Bible don't care how the world defines faith. That's how God's word defines faith, right? So it shows the reality of what we hope for the evidence of things we cannot see. So it's about the things we cannot see. Right? So the Bible tells you keep reading, heavenly things, that's what it's talking about here. But here's the thing, it's kind of interesting. faith and works go together. Two sides of the same coin. And we learned that if we keep reading you learn that and James, right. Faith without works is dead. Dead doesn't mean anything. Right. So and then people will point to Ephesians two, all right, yes, we are saved by grace right? So not by works great faith in Jesus Christ agreed. I believe that 100% But it also kept reading right so verses 910 Ephesians. Two where they say we're created anew in Christ Jesus for the purpose of doing good works that God prepared for us beforehand. You must
Keep reading. So both sides of the coin faith and works work together, right? So what we do says more about what we believe than anything we could possibly say. Important. So we look at Moses what happened? Right? It says he has faith that talks about all the things he did. He did something right so that you exercise your faith by the things that you do.
And this allowed him it says, What did it say about him? It allowed him to look beyond his comfort. Yeah, a lot of comfort. Like I don't know anybody that wealthy and we're in Naples too, right? So
no way this Pharaoh's house, he left his company had the faith to do that. obedience. Obedience, means your faith means nothing without obedience. Right? It's a part of working it out nothing. Right? So what did Samuel said, obedience is better than sacrifice, but his sacrifice in that context, worship.
So we read the Bible a lot, we started to learn about things called lip service.
If you're not just that's what it means. Your obedience is better than all this. And Amos five, Isaiah, one noise. That's what God's word calls it when you're not obedient. And we do that God's word not me, calls it noise levels, five, take away the noise of your songs from me. Right? So righteous living, I want site, that kind of thing. So it's what Samuel is saying to obedience is better than worship, right? If it's lip service, it makes me think of Matthew 21. So Jesus tells the parable, the two sons, and it's very, very simple parable about obedience, but furthermore, about this righteous religious leadership, right? We're going to get in, he's like, Okay, here's this parable for you. There are two sons, right? Father asked him to work paraphrasing here, right? One of them's like, Yeah, I'll go do it. And then doesn't do it. The other one's like, No, I won't do it. Then goes and does it. Jesus says, who was obedient?
The one who didn't give the lip service, the one who went and did it, no matter what he said,
obedience, it's important.
That brings us to repentance. Repentance is very, very important. And I think it needs minor explanation. Today, so David, repentant attorney who got but again, that that lip service, it's not lip service. So I hear a lot of lip service insurance, right? And we do counseling or two people are having an argument or whatever, and you hear somebody say, Sorry.
All right. And then they go out, and they talk about the trash about that person right? There. You're not? Yeah, so repentance kind of puts it all together. Repentance is the act of like, you know, saying you're sorry, but then doing something about it. See how this works. So we repent. We're called to repent a lot in the Bible. But it's an action. It's an action, it means you're doing something about it. So repentance is the action of like being sorry, it means you're sorry. And we know you are because you're acting on it, right? So it's an action, action commandment. The Lord calls us to commitment. And if you're listening to Jesus carefully, he calls for unwavering commitment, who puts a hand to the plow and looks back? not worthy of the kingdom of heaven?
What? Like, no, no, you quit this mission? You're done.
Wow, commitment. Was he serious commitment from you. Again, lack of worldly desires, Hope in the Unseen amount of God's going to be putting us out in the unseen. So you got to think about this.
It's the very definition of faith itself.
But you have people out there saying, Well, if you have faith, you're going to be rich.
What
if it makes no sense at all? It's just literally that ridiculous, right? You have enough faith, you will get this. That's that means you don't have to if you want those, it yes, it's that crazy. But we are taught so much crazy in church that it becomes reality. Right? We start saying things that just don't make sense. Like my wife and I call it Jabberwocky talk. Maybe you're not old enough to remember what somebody's laughing right. You know, like, Okay, we've got a bunch of old people here.
Right? So Alice in Wonderland, but so Jabberwocky. It's nonsense. It's not the Bible definition for I think Colossians high sounding nonsense. Sounds good, right? That's confusing. There. Have anyone do that till you save on some crazy and just like,
you don't even know how to respond, right? And then they're like, I've seen debates. This is real. I've seen that guy's a genius. Like this guy knows the word of God. Like really, really smart debating someone who doesn't like one of these
features, right? And you just make something up, you just flat out made something up and the guy's like, I don't know what you're talking about. He's like, see, and made him look stupid. But then later found out, he's like, he just made it up. And he had to go and confront this guy, but it was too late. So that happens a lot. So they'll get up here. And they'll just say a bunch of nonsense. But it sounds really good or makes you feel good. But it's not really biblical, right? It's like a cut and paste version of what's in the Bible. It's not put together correctly. So this is what happens. And it's just ridiculous. When you really start Step back. And a lot of you are recovering from some of this teaching. But you step back and you start like, Wait, that's not even the definition of faith. That means we have no faith, if we're pursuing all these things. We're a bunch of faceless people. Exactly. Right. So we learned that it's the exact opposite. So when we look at Timothy, we're looking at what the New Testament says, we see that a man of God flees from sin has recently flees from sin, think about that. flees from all those things, fleeing from that, so I mean, run, run, like turn your back, flee from it. Right? leaves from sin does not have anything to do with that right? No sin, a man of God pursues godly character that's important to a man of God, you pursue godly character. And then when they say, Pursue righteousness, a godly life along with faith, love, perseverance and gentleness.
That's interesting.
So amount of guys that forcing these things a man of God is leading by example, gently bringing other people along. I'm sorry, I raised my voice when I said gentleness. Was that ironic? Maybe? All right. That's,
that's hard. You don't always get it right.
A man of God takes hold of eternal life with you see these words fully from these things take hold of eternal life. And it's not just like, oh, yeah, you know, that's cool. No, no, take hold of it. Right? You see the word pursue a lot. Go after that, like, get it? Right. Those are the words being used. There's an urgency there. There's importance. There's something you What do there do things to
men of God intimately knows God, he's a man of prayer. He's checking with God, he doesn't concern himself so much. And Paul's big on this in Galatians, right? Like, the loves lost interest in me, and I've lost interest in it. And not so concerned about what everybody else says, Don't care about this. So many people get here, and they're just so worried about what everyone's going to think you need to erase that.
No, no, no. I love all of you. But I can't be concerned about what's going to upset you right now. That's not a man of God.
I'm concerned with what I have to I'm going to die. A lot of you cry every time I say that.
Stop it.
You know who you are.
But I'm going to die. Very, very aware of this. Right? That's it. And I have to face Jesus. Right? So no offense, but he's a little more important than you, right?
Just that, right. So it doesn't matter if people come and go, you will die too. Right? I have to preach for him. So that's a man of God. Not worried about that. Right? So here's the thing,
a root of all these qualities, and again, if I haven't made this perfectly clear, please, you know, or you haven't figured it out because of my bad jokes. I'm not perfect. Or it's I'm not standing here saying like, be like me or anything like that, I suppose to lead by example, right? Maybe a little ahead of some people but not perfect and mess up all the time. Ask my wife, right. So but not pretty. I'm personally what do you say pursue? Right? pursue those that that's what I'm doing. I'm trying to pursue those things, correcting mistakes every day, like trying to like, Okay, got to stop doing that. Pursue what's good. What's getting in the way of my pursuit of God. That's really what's important. But the common denominator here, selflessness,
selflessness, so the world teaches self right self confidence, right self, this self that from the martial arts industry. It was like self everything right? You know what I mean? self self, self, self, self. So the Bible is the opposite.
Bible teaches exactly the opposite thing. First thing God. selflessness, not about you. Bible says that, too. You're not that important. People don't read that. So your faith, what's real faith about cyber Self Reliance has faith about self reliance.
That makes sense, right. So another thing it's about selflessness like I just I'm relying on him and everything that I do. It's not about self that's true faith, obedience. It's not about your selfish plan.
It's about his
divesting self repentance getting out of yourself.
I was right. No, you aren't right. selflessness, commitment, not what you want. What God wants you to do.
A lack of worldly I mean, that's obvious right? Lack of selfish ambition, big word altruistic, this common denominator. And what happens when a man of God starts to get a little selfish ambition.
Like David got 70,000 people killed for his selfish ambition. Now good. So none of that. But when we look to the ultimate example, we must look at Jesus. That's what it all boils down to here.
He's the one who doesn't make any mistakes.
And so if you go to John 13, and this has been studied and talked about a lot, so basically, you have Jesus is washing feet. And it talks about Judas a little bit, because he knows who's going to betray him. So he knows his hours come, right. He knows his time is coming. And what does he decide to do? He decides to wash the disciples feet.
You got to think about there's a little bit of debate whether Judas is there or not, but the way I read it, he's probably there. But okay, if he's not Peter
Peters going to deny what happens in our relationships, when a friend does like this much wrong to us. Right? No, I'm not talking to them again. Block them or whatever, it's in Facebook, or I'm not taking their call, you would have right we like shun them, we're done with them. I'm done with them, right? That kind of thing. Peter denied Jesus, after claiming to be faithful.
Betrayal. That's what that's called. So even if it wasn't Judas, fine, Peters there. How do we know they have a conversation and tries to watch, here's these, whoa, you can't do that. For me, Jesus paraphrase. You can't do that for me.
You know, you're not clean. Well, then watch me all over. Now you just need to wash the feet.
Not all of your clean and goes into the Judas thing again. So there, he's washing feet. It's unbelievable. And then he says this, John 1312. After washing their feet, he put his robe on again, he sat down at us, you understand what I was doing? You call me Teacher and Lord, and you are right, because that's what I am. And since I your Lord and Teacher have washed your feet, you want to wash each other's feet. I have given you an example to follow. Do
as I have done for you. I tell you the truth slaves are not greater than their master. Nor is the messenger more important than the one who sends a message. Now that you know these things, God will bless you for doing them.
Do as Jesus is not like you're good. Okay, I'm going to get on that cross. There's nothing you have to do. said Jesus never
do. Get to the feet washing people. Do as I've done for you. I mean, just think about it. Even if Jesus isn't washing the feet of people who will betray him. He's God.
washing feet.
Take a look at your feet again.
Oh, about you. My or gross.
washing feet. God I mean, does it? I don't think it contrasts anymore except God dying on a cross for you.
Example, and by the way, well, we'll get to it, ruin another one for you.
So Mark eight, Mark's gospel account the first of the three times that Jesus predicts his suffering and his death, right? So he begins to tell him that, famously, Peter takes him upside right? And he tries to rebuke him stop saying that like, well, that's not going to happen to you. Jesus is like, Get behind Me, Satan. You're thinking about, like, worldly or man's plans? Not gods. Who is that? There it is, again.
You're being selfish, right?
Mark 834 then calling the crowd to join his disciples. So check that out. He just imagine you just get rebuked by me or is it not that important?
But anyway, but somebody you really respect, right? So you get rebuked? Right?
Right, that should be bad enough. Then Mark 834, calling the crowd to join his disciples, Hey, come here.
Just told this guy then calling the crowd to join disciple. He said, If any of you wants to be my father, so this isn't a lot of people be like let's just as disciples wrong. If any of you wants to be my follower, you must give up your own way. Literally deny yourself. Oh, there goes that self again. Take up your cross. She's not the only
Namaskar do it and follow me. If you try to hang on your life, you will lose it. But if you give up your life for my sake and the sake of the Good News, the Gospel, you will save it. And once you have benefited you gain the whole world, but lose your soul eternal life. Is anything worth more than your soul?
I would say no, right? No. So here we have, like what I would call a baptismal prerequisite. So if you know the way I baptized, you know, it's like I make sure you like you go through everything. I say the things that Jesus said, are you aware of this? thing, no fine print. Jesus is not like a fine print teacher. The big bold print. See what he said? It's not the only time he said it either.
He calls for selflessness. Go back to John 13.
selflessness, and he displays selflessness.
If we keep reading Mark, James and John still not getting it. Right. So your kingdom Can we sit at your right and your left?
Right, so Mark 1041. And the 10. Other disciples heard with James and John, as you were indignant, so they want like places of honor around Jesus. So Jesus called them together and said, you know that the rulers of this world, lord it over their people, in officials flaunt their authority over those under them, but among you, it will be different. Whoever wants to be a leader among you must be a servant. And whoever wants to be first among you must be the slave of everyone else.
For even the Son of Man cannot to be served, but to serve others and to give his life as a ransom for many. If you're new Solomon, he's talking about himself.
If you want to be a man of God,
you must be a servant of everyone else.
That's it.
You must be different from the leaders of this world. How many preachers are not different? How many people are running churches that are trying to look more and more like the world? If we do this like they do at rock concerts, we'll have tons of people said the world. If I make you feel good, like a comedian, I did a horrible job at that, or a motivational speaker, a horrible job at that will get more butts in the seats.
How many churches are doing that? says no man of God, ever.
That's the truth. No selfish ambition. I am here to enrich the church. And enriching that has been done to me happened long before I got called into this. It's about the church. I'm not here. To enrich myself, right? shouldn't be like that.
So as we draw closer to a close a little bit of practical steps for us here today, right? So practically, how do we do this? Right? So how do we do this? How do we get there? Well, again,
it's about living for hope. In that kingdom, right? In eternity, this light is very, very, very short compared to eternity. Correct? Right for doing math time. Eternity is forever. This is finite. This is very, very short. And it kind of makes me laugh. Because as you look at we talked about saving so you look at Second Timothy and when you read Second Timothy Paul's really kind of convinced he's at the end of his life so he's going to get murdered right so he's going to get killed that's what's in his mind. And so Second Timothy it's very much more than First Timothy emotional right it's very common emotional letter you can you get that kind of tone and they're talking a lot about family and being moved to tears when they partied all kinds of stuff, but good calls on it right so you're just getting theology you're just getting good stuff there politic finish the fight right? finish the race strong like all this stuff. There's one line I believe it's second Timothy 413 If I'm not right on here, where there's one line he says look, you know, basically get my stuff so I need you to get the cloak I left with carpus at Troas right and then get my books and parchments he says books so this is like my favorite verse of the day, right? Like get the cloak I love with carpet show us and my books in parchment. So as he's telling Timothy, get my stuff, right. And so I'm like, I have used this as verse of the day for myself to buy as many books as possible. And, and the way I juke my wife isn't like their Bibles who can criticize me for buying Bibles. She's like, that one was $200 or whatever, right?
So I've run with this one, too. Right. Paul had a lot of
lotto she's like not the whole bedroom now. But anyway, it's literally like that. But funny thing, right. So here's the thing just to frame this right. Paul had stopped
And I will tell you he's more a man of God, a man of faith. And I think I can ever hope to be like, the stuff this guy went through. Please, Lord, right. Crazy life. But even he had stuff. Yeah, he did. And he's like telling Timothy I mean, which is really funny because like, I'm going to die. Give me my books, right?
On the clock, I don't know. But anyway, it just always strikes me as a little funny. He had stuff, right. And he kind of like this stuff. But here's what a man of God is doing. Paul spends everything but that one verse, everything that one was talking about the things of heaven in the church, right? She's talking about the things of the church, the things of heaven. And it's just like wondering, oh, yeah, by the way, get some of my stuff.
That's putting God first. That's what that is. Whereas a lot of people are preaching all their stuff. Oh, and by the way, God, right, so it's just that one verse is God, right? But the rest of it is about all the stuff. It's flipped. It's backwards. Right? So a lot of people have this weird idea what putting God first is you ever hear he'll talk like this? Like, like, they'll say, like, I put God first. So they'll say like something like, like, Yeah, because in the morning, as soon as they get up, I pray, right. And then I get to go and do a bunch of sin. That's not putting God first. So they talk about so what most people think in putting God first that phrase, they've put really what they've done is they put God in a little checkbox,
as they've done. That ain't putting God first. Sorry. putting God first is like you are pursuing God and all that you do. And then by the way, my books, their Bibles, okay.
Right, you know, my clothes, my clothes or my stuff, right? It's a by the way, things are a man of God. So it's the kind of thing, okay,
oh, look at that, you know, think about that for a minute. But then get back to God, that's putting God first. It's not a checkbox. So here's the thing. Practically, can we have nice things? Yes. Yes, we can have nice things. It's okay. But we need to be putting God first. And that means more time thinking about investing in heavenly things. Jesus says darker treasures, and Heaven.
A big thing I see with people. And this is very practical as well. Best way to get out of your own head is to serve others.
Serve others, not the way you want to be served, not what you want to do. But what the person you're serving watts. That's important to me a long time to learn that, right. So people don't always receive love the same way. So your spouse might need something done. Don't do what you need done and say, I got all the work in the house done. You got your work and the house done, right? Go do the work they need done. That serving you in the stuff you want to do is not serving it's a hobby, right.
It's not serving anyone but your self.
Role. Being a servant is doing the things that the people you're loving, need done.
But it's a great way to get out of yourself. It's great way to get out of your own head. Too many people too wrapped up in here. not that important. Go serve somebody else. And all of a sudden it's magical. Your problems start going away.
There are too many people with too much free time.
Go serve somebody, you'll have less problems. It's the key.
You must exercise that daily.
Practical, important thing Well Rich, the spiritual here in the moment.
We must look to what this says the word not what the world teaches us. But what the word a man of God is in God's word.
The man of God obeys what God's Word says. This is important. This is God's love letter to us. We cannot say we love God and not read his love letter to us. It's impossible. It's lip service. It's live so this
my way every year, not going to cry. But every year around her sobriety, she writes me a beautiful card right about her sobriety. I hang on every word of that card. Because I love her.
Imagine I get that like 10 year anniversary card with her love letter to me and I'm like, are she finds it unopened for a week?
What is she going to think? Does he love me?
It would be a good question. I think it'd be a pretty good question. So what does God think when we don't read his love letter to us?
Yeah, we need to read his love letter to us and be obedient to it. So this is the practical, the ultimate How do we do this comes by God's power, not our own. That's the key here. Man of God is filled with God. A man of God is submitted to God and that is the key in receiving His Spirit. That's the key. What is it something
Mission is better than sacrament submit to God. People come at me with all these ideas. I'm just
I'm trying to listen to God, right? That's really important. But it's the key to having a spirit enter in and do the work. So think about these people again, Moses numbers 11, for example, right says he's filled with the Spirit of God, Samuel as a prophet. He's filled with the Spirit of God. Jesus affirms David, even by saying, He's speaking by the Spirit when he's writing the song, Elijah and Elijah, that's what the conversation is about right double portion of their spirits, Timothy, clearly a Christian baptized in the Spirit, like, they all have the Spirit of God in them. We see in these examples, a man of God is not always perfect. Right? Not always perfect knows that God is. But a man of God will more consistently display the fruit of the Spirit. And I will tell you this, relying on the power of the Holy Spirit, is one really good way to make sure you're not getting the credit for any of it.
It's all him. I just got a lot of contents to your time, but just a little bit of testimony here. I grew up with dyslexia.
Does it look like I have dyslexia?
No, it's gone. All
you said it, right. Praise God, not me. It has nothing to do with me. I'm perfected right? In my weakness by Christ by the Holy Spirit, right. So that's what makes me be able to do good things. I'm not perfect.
Right? But you get almost paraphrasing scripture. But you get my point, right? So that's the key. I would be nothing without the power of God in me. It's not me. I'm just being used by him. And so we will display this fruit. If we're walking God you can tell right? The quacks like a duck has a duck. So if you're displaying more of the fruit, and Jesus says, Judge a tree by its fruit, so in Galatians, Paul talks about this the sin of the flesh and the fruit of the Spirit, they're against one another Galatians 519. When you follow the desires of your sinful nature, the results are very clear. Sexual immorality, impurity. lustful pleasures, idolatry, sorcery, hostility, quarreling, jealousy, outbursts of anger, selfish ambition,
to ascension division, and V, drunkenness, wild parties and other sins like these. Let me tell you again, as I have before that anyone, that sort of life will not inherit the kingdom of God, can you think of anything scarier?
What you do,
seems to matter.
But the Holy Spirit produces this kind of fruit in our lives love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self control. There's no law against these things. Does that sound exactly like all of the qualities we saw in a man of God? Yes, God's Word comes together here.
Remember, Samuel that obedience and submission, importance to receiving the Holy Spirit so that we can bear the fruit of God.
This submission means that we crucify the flesh.
We crucify the flesh.
We live submitted and according to God's will, not our own
clothes, these are qualities, we really shouldn't be looking for our leaders. These are the things we should be and just think about them again. Right? So when you think about leaders, right? Love, joy, peace, peace, how many leaders is advocating for something other than that?
peace, patience,
kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self control.
Wow.
Those are anything like what we're seeing a lot of
leaders in churches, fathers,
husbands, this is the way you lead. This is the way God's word says you lead. That's it? No, but and no. That way. And it's not exclusive. And I know some of you thinking I keep saying man of God, because it's what the Bible says. It's not exclusive to men. It's exclusive, not to men, but it's also open to women, right? Women of God, I would say,
in your homes and your ministries, this is the way you lead.
And it's important to say with so many women out there looking for men and doing all these other things. These are the qualities if you are a Christian woman, and you are not married, these are the qualities you must look for in your man
And
if your man does not have these qualities, you will not have a good nurse.
You won't have a godly manners, you won't be in a good relationship, best to say you're in a relationship with the Lord.
And call it a day. Because not going to be worth the headache and the drama that you're going to have to deal with.
So to the women, you want to look for a man of God, check those qualities that they're not displaying more of, and again, I mess up on the pastor. But more often than not, my wife will tell you I'm trying and pursuing those things. So you don't have to be perfect, but at least someone who's really trying.
That's the key.
So my prayer today
in a world of so much godlessness, so much godless that more men and women of God would rise up
to God's call and rise up with faith. Rise up with True obedience, not lip service, nothing under the rug, nothing in this in the closet, right? True obedience, true commitment. This world needs so much more commitment. So what is right That's my prayer. A more advise up with these qualities just selflessly following God's plan.
I pray more would rise up and pursue righteousness, gentleness, love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, gentleness, faithfulness, and self control.
In a way, set forth by our ultimate example, our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, Amen.
Good morning.
If you're new here among us, my name is Gene I serve here at C3 church as your pastor.
And I heard a story about a pastor's wife, we told her story
I’m trying to stretch this one out.
Indeed, if you are not new here, you know that my wife shared her testimony last week, 10 years of sobriety. After like, over 20 years of living with me, how is that possible? I don't know.
But it speaks of commitment, doesn't it? Both of those angles commitment. So I heard a story …
about a young couple. And so they're they got engaged. And the man was kind of dragging his feet about it. Right. So it went on for a while. It's one of those things like, when is he finally going to pop the question? She's a whole lot better looking at him, right. So I know how that feels. So he waits and waits, and waits finally pops the question, she gets the ring. And you know, she's been waiting for this day for a long time. And then she says,
Actually, now that we're engaged, I'm kind of nervous. And the man says, I know, this is a really big commitment. Seven or eight years is a really long time.
There's like a lot of that going on. But anyway, we find ourselves in our twisted scripture series. So if you're just joining us, you kind of know, Christianity has or you may not know, if you're been here for a while, you know, you've heard it before. Christianity has kind of what I would call a verse of the day problem. So basically, we get this fortune cookie theology, right? So we go on our phones, it's whatever is fed to us. And we pop out the verse, and that's it. And we just take the verse and make it about whatever we want to make it about, right, whatever suits us. That's what we'll use. Right? So that's typical Christianity. And what you end up with in that case is a lot of twist as grifter. They're taking all these scriptures and they're just applying it to things. It's totally wrong. Right. So fortune cookie theology. So stick with that. I think it's pretty good. Anyway,
we'll see if that shows up again. So their phrases when we're looking at our phrases, sometimes there are parts of scripture there versus things that we say that are in the Bible, but we may be Miss applying them right. So today, we're going to look at a phrase that if you've been in church for a long time, you've heard man of God, you've heard man of God, I'm a man of God, or somebody is a metabolic. What does that really mean? That's what we're going to look at today. Now, maybe if you had never been in church before, you know, you've heard like a movie man of God, and that's okay. And sometimes it's not misapplied. But what I'm going to talk about today is the way it's typically applied, let's say in what we call prosperity, gospel churches, right. So there's one gospel, the gospel that we preach here in any Bible believing church preaches right, so the gospel of Jesus Christ, that's the correct gospel. The Bible tells us if anybody preaches another gospel, they're cursed in Greek, it actually means damned, right? So when someone goes, Oh, well, we preach a different gospel. I'm like,
right? So one of those, there is no different gospel. There's one, right? So what they'll do is, they'll preach and they'll say things like, Well, I'm a man of God. So I should be wealthy. I'm a man of God. So I should have a private jet, because men of God in the Bible have private jets.
Right?
If people aren't catching it, right, so they use it to say that a man of God is someone who's going to enrich themselves instead of the church. And so that's the problem. So what I want to do today is we're going to go through the Bible, and we're going to look at the people, the word of God calls men of God, and we're going to see how that phrase applies, and what those people were really like. And then we'll do a little bit of practical application here. So let's hop right in. So it actually the phrase appears quite a bit like 78 times and 72 verses, it applies to about 13 different people, depending on how you're counting, it gets tricky, because some of them are not named, some of them show up. And it's like a man of God came and so you just don't know whether it's one person we just talked about or so you can be unsure. So what I'm going to do is I'm going to look at the ones or I'll show you the ones that it's obvious, right? So it applies it directly to that name, the person so the first one was called the man of God, as Moses. It happens kind of later on in Deuteronomy, Moses called the man of God, but the only thing about Moses, so you have their Torah or so the first five books of the Bible, Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy. And so here you have Moses appearing right at the beginning of Exodus and so if you know the Exodus story, you kind of get it but leading up to that what happens Joseph right, so you get the 12 tribes of Israel coming in Egypt are taken care of there but then fast
Earl forgets all about what Joseph did. And they're enslaved, they're worried these people were going to outnumber us, essentially. And so Moses enters the story. They're trying to kill all of like the young male babies, he gets saved and then raised in Pharaoh's house by Pharaoh's daughter. So it's really interesting. So, but then he chooses to leave that behind. 40 or so years later, God appears to him the burning bush account, and then he is set to lead God's people out of Egypt. So the Israelites out of Egypt, and then they wander around a lot. And Moses has some interesting experiences, because people don't always listen to Moses. So it's a really frustrating story if you're trying to be in his shoes and watch it. Right. So read it, and kind of put it together. So kind of a frustrating life, he doesn't get into the promised land at all. But God says, Hey, check it out, look what you're not going to get. And then he dies.
It's a really kind of a rough existence. But he's calling me out. I've got interesting points here, if you're just kind of interested in this thing. He's the only person in the Torah called Man of God. And that's kind of weird, because Abraham, right father, Abraham, you read about him in the New Testament to they're always talking about him. But Moses is called the man of God. So that's a man of God. So if we continue, you get a couple more in these are like some unnamed people that come in here, you get like, if you know the Samson account, the angel of the Lord, and then she calls it a man of God later appears to Samson's mom, man who chastise the free stuff that Eli that his son's hockey and Phineas with a three prong fork. So there's a man of God there, but then we get second name person, Samuel. So basically, we're reading the story along so you can get the idea if you've been here for a while, you kind of know, the whole idea of the Old Testament here is right out the gate. The people reject God, they reject God, they reject paradise, they just keep rejecting everything, they reject the law. They reject the manner. They just keep rejecting the things of God over and over and over and over again. So God gives them prophets in those days, some judges or I'm sorry, judges. So in those days, right, there was no king. So everyone did whatever was right in there. And so here we have the judges, those are no good for them, either. So Samuel comes in, Joshua, Judges, Ruth, and then then you have for Samuel, he comes in to anoint the first kings of Israel, because now those judges aren't good enough, those profits aren't good enough. We want to King we want to be like everybody else. Right? And so Samuels, like, you know, the same thing. We're as Christians, you're looking for a theocracy here. You're not looking for a king or anything, but that's not good enough. God has to reassure Samuel that say, Moses and Samuel, Samuel, like, they're not rejecting you. They're rejecting me, they rejected God. So Samuel, and I saw a ninth David, right. So very committed guy.
It's kind of an interesting thing. Like we'll get there a little bit later. Really obedient to his tasks, right. So just a really, really strong character. Definitely not like it for the money, so to speak. So much like Moses in that sense, where it's a tough life, right? So, but he does his job. And this ties to David. David, we just recently talked about David King David, everybody knows that David is, you know, David Goliath, and we saw that there's way more to David than just that. Right. So David didn't always do the right thing. But a lot of us only just focus on that, like David and Goliath story that, but there's so much more to it. And we learned what about David that he was repentant, right. No matter what he did wrong, he was repentant. But second, technically king of Israel, you have King David, they're a named person she may have man from Judah. So you might know the story about
Jeroboam. So they split so you have Judah in the south. And then Israel in the north, and then Raya bones there. And so it's man of God prophesize against him, right? Alter, alter, right, and his hand gets weathered and stuff. But he predicts Josiah, much, much, much later. And so this man of God kind of gets duped by another prophet, into like, he's not supposed to eat when he's there. He doesn't obey and then he gets killed by a lion. That's kind of a strange story, but he's in there and he gets called Man of God a lot. This leads us Israel into Elijah and a lot of people know about Elijah Rhino. Probably the most famous story about him is this contest on Mount Carmel. Right, so the priests of veils are foreign to priests of Baal 400 Priests of Astra but the bill is the focus thing, right? So he has them killed. And then he's like, run in from Ahab, and specifically Jezebel, so he is a prophet and probably heard about Joseph L. Or Ahab. He's a prophet during that time. He's called Man of God. This leads up to
another amount of God in there. We're not sure who it is. But then Elijah, and Elijah is really interesting, because he's the one who wants to double portion of Elijah spirit and seems like he gets it because he does way more
miracles, a lot more miracles. Interestingly, he's called Man of God more than any one else in the Bible.
Hanan another unnamed guy, and that's the Old Testament, pretty much it. One person is called Man of God in the New Testament, and that is Timothy, if you don't know who Timothy is, you know, Paul, you might know who he is. But Paul writes 13 letters or books of the New Testament more than anybody else that's like, just, you know, simple math with 27 books. So half ish of the New Testament is written by Paul. And the context here. All Paul's letters are written to either churches or people operating churches, people working in churches, or some kind of position like that. And Timothy is one of those people. So he writes two letters to Timothy that we have first and second Timothy. And it's like kind of his protege. He's, they're leaving him in Ephesus, and he's saying, Hey, you be the what we think is like a pastor overseer there and FSS and he's giving them instruction. So a lot of people, if you're in a church, or church polity, and different things like that, you'll read those books, a lot of people kind of skip over them, because it's just a lot of instructions to the churches along with some excellent theology, so you shouldn't skip them. He's also named as a co author, I think of like Second Corinthians, first and second. Thessalonians, Paul, savannas and Timothy. So kind of like, you know, in that sense, like, he's a major player in there. He's called Man of God. So
that's, that's about it. And then we've seen in the past that all these people had their faults, none of these people are the hero of the story. None of these people are God, it's important to remember, only Jesus, right? So Jesus is the hero of the story here. But they're called Men of God, because they possess godly qualities. So what I want to do is I want to look at the qualities these people possess, and I want to choose, I want to use the word of God to give you those qualities, not my opinion. Alright, so we're going to look at what the Word of God says.
So
I've said it before, we've been here for a while, you know, this, the best commentary on the Old Testament is the New Testament, right? So it tells you a lot, you get a lot of clarification, even Jesus himself clarifies a lot of positions there. And he's the fulfillment of all this stuff in there. And so you want to look to that, right? When you're talking about these people in the Old Testament, and they give us a lot of information. One of my favorite books in the New Testament is Hebrews as it pertains to the Old Testament because it's like, essentially, a commentary on the Old Testament. Hebrews was written because you have Jewish Christians then. So this is the Jewish faith in the beginning of the Gentiles get welcomed. But these early Jewish believers are being persecuted for what they believe it's seen as a sect Christianity, and so they're going to get persecuted. And so the author, preacher, we're not really sure, who wrote it. Probably not Paul. But anyway, don't get stuck there. read Hebrews, right? Don't spend all your time speculating about who wrote Hebrews. Just read Hebrews, right? Anyway. So what's happening there, the people are being encouraged. Don't go back, don't go back to Judaism. Jesus fulfilled all of that, like, he's the fulfillment of everything. So basically, Jesus is superior. So just going through this list of different things, but a lot of people hang on the people of faith. Hebrews 11, oh, people of faith, and Moses is mentioned in there. So let's take a look at how it talks about him Hebrews 1124. It was by faith that Moses when he grew up, refused to be called the son of Pharaoh's daughter. He chose to share the oppression of God's people instead of enjoying the fleeting pleasures of sin. He thought it was better to suffer for the sake of Christ, than to own the treasures of Egypt for us looking ahead to his great reward. It was my faith that Moses left the land of Egypt, not fearing the Kings anger, he kept right on going because he kept his eyes on the one who is invisible. So these are lines about Moses that most Christians have never read. But it identifies what he was all about, doesn't it? What was his adjutant faith? Isn't that a great faith? Why, pray tell? Well, think about it. And this is something that people don't often think about when you think about Moses in the position he was in, right. So imagine you're raised in Pharaoh's household. You're basically like his child. Right? So well, like that's it. That's the most prominent position you that does Pharaoh, right. So he's really wealthy. And it says here, right, so we get it right from God's word. I don't have to speculate. It says it, that he left all these treasures. He left this wealthy position, right to suffer with Garfield, taking some pretty big chances. You're going to Pharaoh, right, Let my people go. So you have this whole thing going on and on. And then a very difficult life wandering for 40 years in the wilderness. Right? Why? Faith because he was looking not at the stuff here the immediate. He was looking at heavenly treasure he's looking for
Word to Christ. So pretty, pretty astounding, right? So this is a person so you have a faith quality here. And then no selfish ambition. So when you say altruistic I'm told don't use too many big words. But anyway, so no selfish ambition he's not selfish, right? So he's working for the Lord really important. So when we're talking about that, that prosperity gospel Bible one, prosperity gospel, zero, right, so there we go for keep
keeping score, you just read this. Alright, so he was willing to suffer to be poor, right? He's looking ahead because Moses had faced so let's face all about looking ahead, not here. Moses was also humble. A lot of people miss this two numbers. 12 three, Moses. Now Moses was very humble, more humble than any other person on the earth. Crazy. Alright, so we'll get to Samuel. Again. Samuel is again not greedy, kind of like Moses, He gives a farewell speech and you get this picture here. First Samuel 12 One then Samuel addressed all Israel. I've done as you asked and given you a king. So you see, like, really didn't want to do that. Your king is now your leader. I stand before you an old gray haired man and my son serve you. I have served you as your leader from the time it was avoided this very day now testify against me in the presence of the Lord, and before His anointed one. Who was Oxford donkey Have I stolen? ever cheated any of you have ever oppressed you have ever taken a bribe or perverted justice? Tell me and I'll make right whatever I've done wrong. No, they replied, You never cheated us or oppressed us, and you've never taken a single bribe. The Lord has anointed one of my witnesses today Samuel declared that my hands are clean. Yes, he is a witness. They reply.
Bible to prosperity gospel, zero.
First Samuel 1521 talking to so. But Samuel your plot was more pleasing to the Lord. You're burnt offerings and sacrifices, or your obedience to His voice. Listen, obedience is better than sacrifice and submission better than offering the fat of ramp. So big feature. I think I mentioned it before. Obedience with Samuel is a big key word for Samuels ministry obedience. Right? So if you're reading the text, you know that he was obedient. He did not want to anoint a king for Israel. He's like, so, but he did it anyway. Because it's what the Lord told him to do. Now when he goes to anoint David, you notice he's worried about getting killed. He's like, Oh, no, I'm going to get killed. If I got annoyed this other king by assault. He did it anyway. So he's obedient.
God's Will over his own. David I always smirk. So David, his key feature is repentance is why a lot of people can relate to it, right? I mess up, everybody mess up. We all do things wrong. Right. So but then we repent and the Lord's there he forgives us, right? And goodness, right. So he made a lot of mistakes. What is
worth noting out of any of the men of God? David has the most conveniences. So when you think about if you really know the story about Bathsheba and the adultery really well, you know why he got himself in that problem in the first place at a time when kings are normally out at war, like his evil general Joab. Rob, he's not so he's hanging out and he's like, on the rooftop of the palace kind of thing. And he's checking off the ladies. Right? So that's what gets he has too much free time on his hands. Alright, so that's a thing. So it's kind of just worth noting. Yes. So here's where the prosperity people are going to be like, No, us one your Bible to you're still losing. But anyway.
But I would add, yes, but those conveniences are part of what got him in a lot of trouble. Alright, so that's fine. Give him one and then we're going to blow it out of the water with the next three people. Right, Elijah. So clearly no selfish ambition like he's on the run from Desert Valley thinks he's going to get killed. Yes, he does. A sheriff complaining. He's a little afraid, the Bible says, but he's obedient. No selfish ambition. He's not in it for himself a lot of consequences. Also, he's willing new lord is going to take willing to pass on his ministry to his excessive right. So again, not like no selfish ambition here. Fine. Your here's the mantle, and brings us to it like Shep. very selfless. So I can think of like two different things, which really stand out about Elijah to me, aside from the miracles, of course, but the calling of His ministry, right? So when that mantle gets handed down, basically like, Alright, let's go and he's like, hold on a second. So, you know, he's out there with the oxen and everything, but he slaughters them and then feeds everybody else before he goes, right. So, but he leaves that line of work. He's called by the Lord into uncertain territory. And Elijah says, think about what I've done to you, right? So very uncertain, but he leaves it anyway. Then there's the thing that Jesus references name and the Syrian, who is healed. And so
he'll just name it the seat the serum. And he doesn't accept the gifts like so just think of it in modern terms. He wants to give him money, right? So he has silver and all that stuff. He wants to give him money. Elijah doesn't take it.
He refuses the money. But his wicked servant Gehazi takes the money. And then he breaks out with Naaman’s leprosy. So tells you a lot about what a man of God should be doing. He didn't care about the money again, like that. Then you get to Timothy, it's this is interesting because it becomes that's why the New Testament such a good commentary, the old it becomes like this culmination of all of these qualities here. So first Timothy, lot of warnings about false teachers, as we've seen in the New Testament. That's what's going on here. They're warning, Paul's warning Timothy about all the false teachers. He says this First Timothy six. But these people, the false teachers always cause trouble, their minds are corrupt, and they've turned their backs on the truth, then a show of godliness is just a way to become wealthy. Yet true godliness with contentment itself is great. Well, after all, he brought nothing with us when we came into the world, and we can't take anything with us when we leave it. So if we have enough food and clothing, let us be content. This is Paul writing to Timothy church leaders. But people along to be rich fall into temptation and are trapped by many foolish and harmful desires that plunge them into ruin and destruction. For the love of money is the root of all evil. It says in the Greek, and some people craving money have wandered from the true faith and pierced themselves with many sorrows. prosperity gospel has lost the game.
Have you get any idea that like, pastors and people like that should be enriching themselves off the church? You are not reading your Bible? And if you don't believe me, believe God's word because he continues. Here's Timothy 611. But you Timothy, are a man of God. So run from all these evil things. What did he just talk about? Your righteousness and pursue righteousness and a godly life along with faith, love, perseverance and gentleness, fight the good fight for the true face hold tightly to the eternal life which God has called you, which you have declared so well before many witnesses, and I charge before God who gives life to all and before Christ Jesus, who give a good testimony before Pontius Pilate, that you will obey this command without wavering, that no one can find fault with you from now on, until our Lord Jesus comes again. So the other thing were this selfish ambition, this greed, this pursuit of wealth, all kinds of Nope. All evil, like he's categorizing as an evil thing. Interesting, because a man of God does not concern himself with worldly things. That's not primary to a man of God. That's it. That's just interesting enough, this is where it ends, like is the final commentary on what a man of God is in the Bible. So we see a combination of these qualities, as I said before.
So the question arises for us today. Okay, what do we do with? Great now we know what a man of God is in the Bible. What does that mean to us? Well,
what is the man of God look like today, using these principles? Like how do we fit this? Well,
a man of God follows God in every possible way.
You'll Bayes Did you notice that word coming up? He obeys His commands, with joy. So obedient, does not live for the things of this world that for the things of eternity. That's even how what the first one was, Moses was described, right? Yeah, faith, because he was pursuing the things that are unseen. So from Moses to Timothy, there you go. That's what it's all about. serves God freely gives resources and is willing to accept suffering for his faith. That's a man of God. So faith. Let's take a look at that. Right. So faith shows the reality of what we hope for is the evidence of things unseen. That's how our Bible don't care how the world defines faith. That's how God's word defines faith, right? So it shows the reality of what we hope for the evidence of things we cannot see. So it's about the things we cannot see. Right? So the Bible tells you keep reading, heavenly things, that's what it's talking about here. But here's the thing, it's kind of interesting. faith and works go together. Two sides of the same coin. And we learned that if we keep reading you learn that and James, right. Faith without works is dead. Dead doesn't mean anything. Right. So and then people will point to Ephesians two, all right, yes, we are saved by grace right? So not by works great faith in Jesus Christ agreed. I believe that 100% But it also kept reading right so verses 910 Ephesians. Two where they say we're created anew in Christ Jesus for the purpose of doing good works that God prepared for us beforehand. You must
Keep reading. So both sides of the coin faith and works work together, right? So what we do says more about what we believe than anything we could possibly say. Important. So we look at Moses what happened? Right? It says he has faith that talks about all the things he did. He did something right so that you exercise your faith by the things that you do.
And this allowed him it says, What did it say about him? It allowed him to look beyond his comfort. Yeah, a lot of comfort. Like I don't know anybody that wealthy and we're in Naples too, right? So
no way this Pharaoh's house, he left his company had the faith to do that. obedience. Obedience, means your faith means nothing without obedience. Right? It's a part of working it out nothing. Right? So what did Samuel said, obedience is better than sacrifice, but his sacrifice in that context, worship.
So we read the Bible a lot, we started to learn about things called lip service.
If you're not just that's what it means. Your obedience is better than all this. And Amos five, Isaiah, one noise. That's what God's word calls it when you're not obedient. And we do that God's word not me, calls it noise levels, five, take away the noise of your songs from me. Right? So righteous living, I want site, that kind of thing. So it's what Samuel is saying to obedience is better than worship, right? If it's lip service, it makes me think of Matthew 21. So Jesus tells the parable, the two sons, and it's very, very simple parable about obedience, but furthermore, about this righteous religious leadership, right? We're going to get in, he's like, Okay, here's this parable for you. There are two sons, right? Father asked him to work paraphrasing here, right? One of them's like, Yeah, I'll go do it. And then doesn't do it. The other one's like, No, I won't do it. Then goes and does it. Jesus says, who was obedient?
The one who didn't give the lip service, the one who went and did it, no matter what he said,
obedience, it's important.
That brings us to repentance. Repentance is very, very important. And I think it needs minor explanation. Today, so David, repentant attorney who got but again, that that lip service, it's not lip service. So I hear a lot of lip service insurance, right? And we do counseling or two people are having an argument or whatever, and you hear somebody say, Sorry.
All right. And then they go out, and they talk about the trash about that person right? There. You're not? Yeah, so repentance kind of puts it all together. Repentance is the act of like, you know, saying you're sorry, but then doing something about it. See how this works. So we repent. We're called to repent a lot in the Bible. But it's an action. It's an action, it means you're doing something about it. So repentance is the action of like being sorry, it means you're sorry. And we know you are because you're acting on it, right? So it's an action, action commandment. The Lord calls us to commitment. And if you're listening to Jesus carefully, he calls for unwavering commitment, who puts a hand to the plow and looks back? not worthy of the kingdom of heaven?
What? Like, no, no, you quit this mission? You're done.
Wow, commitment. Was he serious commitment from you. Again, lack of worldly desires, Hope in the Unseen amount of God's going to be putting us out in the unseen. So you got to think about this.
It's the very definition of faith itself.
But you have people out there saying, Well, if you have faith, you're going to be rich.
What
if it makes no sense at all? It's just literally that ridiculous, right? You have enough faith, you will get this. That's that means you don't have to if you want those, it yes, it's that crazy. But we are taught so much crazy in church that it becomes reality. Right? We start saying things that just don't make sense. Like my wife and I call it Jabberwocky talk. Maybe you're not old enough to remember what somebody's laughing right. You know, like, Okay, we've got a bunch of old people here.
Right? So Alice in Wonderland, but so Jabberwocky. It's nonsense. It's not the Bible definition for I think Colossians high sounding nonsense. Sounds good, right? That's confusing. There. Have anyone do that till you save on some crazy and just like,
you don't even know how to respond, right? And then they're like, I've seen debates. This is real. I've seen that guy's a genius. Like this guy knows the word of God. Like really, really smart debating someone who doesn't like one of these
features, right? And you just make something up, you just flat out made something up and the guy's like, I don't know what you're talking about. He's like, see, and made him look stupid. But then later found out, he's like, he just made it up. And he had to go and confront this guy, but it was too late. So that happens a lot. So they'll get up here. And they'll just say a bunch of nonsense. But it sounds really good or makes you feel good. But it's not really biblical, right? It's like a cut and paste version of what's in the Bible. It's not put together correctly. So this is what happens. And it's just ridiculous. When you really start Step back. And a lot of you are recovering from some of this teaching. But you step back and you start like, Wait, that's not even the definition of faith. That means we have no faith, if we're pursuing all these things. We're a bunch of faceless people. Exactly. Right. So we learned that it's the exact opposite. So when we look at Timothy, we're looking at what the New Testament says, we see that a man of God flees from sin has recently flees from sin, think about that. flees from all those things, fleeing from that, so I mean, run, run, like turn your back, flee from it. Right? leaves from sin does not have anything to do with that right? No sin, a man of God pursues godly character that's important to a man of God, you pursue godly character. And then when they say, Pursue righteousness, a godly life along with faith, love, perseverance and gentleness.
That's interesting.
So amount of guys that forcing these things a man of God is leading by example, gently bringing other people along. I'm sorry, I raised my voice when I said gentleness. Was that ironic? Maybe? All right. That's,
that's hard. You don't always get it right.
A man of God takes hold of eternal life with you see these words fully from these things take hold of eternal life. And it's not just like, oh, yeah, you know, that's cool. No, no, take hold of it. Right? You see the word pursue a lot. Go after that, like, get it? Right. Those are the words being used. There's an urgency there. There's importance. There's something you What do there do things to
men of God intimately knows God, he's a man of prayer. He's checking with God, he doesn't concern himself so much. And Paul's big on this in Galatians, right? Like, the loves lost interest in me, and I've lost interest in it. And not so concerned about what everybody else says, Don't care about this. So many people get here, and they're just so worried about what everyone's going to think you need to erase that.
No, no, no. I love all of you. But I can't be concerned about what's going to upset you right now. That's not a man of God.
I'm concerned with what I have to I'm going to die. A lot of you cry every time I say that.
Stop it.
You know who you are.
But I'm going to die. Very, very aware of this. Right? That's it. And I have to face Jesus. Right? So no offense, but he's a little more important than you, right?
Just that, right. So it doesn't matter if people come and go, you will die too. Right? I have to preach for him. So that's a man of God. Not worried about that. Right? So here's the thing,
a root of all these qualities, and again, if I haven't made this perfectly clear, please, you know, or you haven't figured it out because of my bad jokes. I'm not perfect. Or it's I'm not standing here saying like, be like me or anything like that, I suppose to lead by example, right? Maybe a little ahead of some people but not perfect and mess up all the time. Ask my wife, right. So but not pretty. I'm personally what do you say pursue? Right? pursue those that that's what I'm doing. I'm trying to pursue those things, correcting mistakes every day, like trying to like, Okay, got to stop doing that. Pursue what's good. What's getting in the way of my pursuit of God. That's really what's important. But the common denominator here, selflessness,
selflessness, so the world teaches self right self confidence, right self, this self that from the martial arts industry. It was like self everything right? You know what I mean? self self, self, self, self. So the Bible is the opposite.
Bible teaches exactly the opposite thing. First thing God. selflessness, not about you. Bible says that, too. You're not that important. People don't read that. So your faith, what's real faith about cyber Self Reliance has faith about self reliance.
That makes sense, right. So another thing it's about selflessness like I just I'm relying on him and everything that I do. It's not about self that's true faith, obedience. It's not about your selfish plan.
It's about his
divesting self repentance getting out of yourself.
I was right. No, you aren't right. selflessness, commitment, not what you want. What God wants you to do.
A lack of worldly I mean, that's obvious right? Lack of selfish ambition, big word altruistic, this common denominator. And what happens when a man of God starts to get a little selfish ambition.
Like David got 70,000 people killed for his selfish ambition. Now good. So none of that. But when we look to the ultimate example, we must look at Jesus. That's what it all boils down to here.
He's the one who doesn't make any mistakes.
And so if you go to John 13, and this has been studied and talked about a lot, so basically, you have Jesus is washing feet. And it talks about Judas a little bit, because he knows who's going to betray him. So he knows his hours come, right. He knows his time is coming. And what does he decide to do? He decides to wash the disciples feet.
You got to think about there's a little bit of debate whether Judas is there or not, but the way I read it, he's probably there. But okay, if he's not Peter
Peters going to deny what happens in our relationships, when a friend does like this much wrong to us. Right? No, I'm not talking to them again. Block them or whatever, it's in Facebook, or I'm not taking their call, you would have right we like shun them, we're done with them. I'm done with them, right? That kind of thing. Peter denied Jesus, after claiming to be faithful.
Betrayal. That's what that's called. So even if it wasn't Judas, fine, Peters there. How do we know they have a conversation and tries to watch, here's these, whoa, you can't do that. For me, Jesus paraphrase. You can't do that for me.
You know, you're not clean. Well, then watch me all over. Now you just need to wash the feet.
Not all of your clean and goes into the Judas thing again. So there, he's washing feet. It's unbelievable. And then he says this, John 1312. After washing their feet, he put his robe on again, he sat down at us, you understand what I was doing? You call me Teacher and Lord, and you are right, because that's what I am. And since I your Lord and Teacher have washed your feet, you want to wash each other's feet. I have given you an example to follow. Do
as I have done for you. I tell you the truth slaves are not greater than their master. Nor is the messenger more important than the one who sends a message. Now that you know these things, God will bless you for doing them.
Do as Jesus is not like you're good. Okay, I'm going to get on that cross. There's nothing you have to do. said Jesus never
do. Get to the feet washing people. Do as I've done for you. I mean, just think about it. Even if Jesus isn't washing the feet of people who will betray him. He's God.
washing feet.
Take a look at your feet again.
Oh, about you. My or gross.
washing feet. God I mean, does it? I don't think it contrasts anymore except God dying on a cross for you.
Example, and by the way, well, we'll get to it, ruin another one for you.
So Mark eight, Mark's gospel account the first of the three times that Jesus predicts his suffering and his death, right? So he begins to tell him that, famously, Peter takes him upside right? And he tries to rebuke him stop saying that like, well, that's not going to happen to you. Jesus is like, Get behind Me, Satan. You're thinking about, like, worldly or man's plans? Not gods. Who is that? There it is, again.
You're being selfish, right?
Mark 834 then calling the crowd to join his disciples. So check that out. He just imagine you just get rebuked by me or is it not that important?
But anyway, but somebody you really respect, right? So you get rebuked? Right?
Right, that should be bad enough. Then Mark 834, calling the crowd to join his disciples, Hey, come here.
Just told this guy then calling the crowd to join disciple. He said, If any of you wants to be my father, so this isn't a lot of people be like let's just as disciples wrong. If any of you wants to be my follower, you must give up your own way. Literally deny yourself. Oh, there goes that self again. Take up your cross. She's not the only
Namaskar do it and follow me. If you try to hang on your life, you will lose it. But if you give up your life for my sake and the sake of the Good News, the Gospel, you will save it. And once you have benefited you gain the whole world, but lose your soul eternal life. Is anything worth more than your soul?
I would say no, right? No. So here we have, like what I would call a baptismal prerequisite. So if you know the way I baptized, you know, it's like I make sure you like you go through everything. I say the things that Jesus said, are you aware of this? thing, no fine print. Jesus is not like a fine print teacher. The big bold print. See what he said? It's not the only time he said it either.
He calls for selflessness. Go back to John 13.
selflessness, and he displays selflessness.
If we keep reading Mark, James and John still not getting it. Right. So your kingdom Can we sit at your right and your left?
Right, so Mark 1041. And the 10. Other disciples heard with James and John, as you were indignant, so they want like places of honor around Jesus. So Jesus called them together and said, you know that the rulers of this world, lord it over their people, in officials flaunt their authority over those under them, but among you, it will be different. Whoever wants to be a leader among you must be a servant. And whoever wants to be first among you must be the slave of everyone else.
For even the Son of Man cannot to be served, but to serve others and to give his life as a ransom for many. If you're new Solomon, he's talking about himself.
If you want to be a man of God,
you must be a servant of everyone else.
That's it.
You must be different from the leaders of this world. How many preachers are not different? How many people are running churches that are trying to look more and more like the world? If we do this like they do at rock concerts, we'll have tons of people said the world. If I make you feel good, like a comedian, I did a horrible job at that, or a motivational speaker, a horrible job at that will get more butts in the seats.
How many churches are doing that? says no man of God, ever.
That's the truth. No selfish ambition. I am here to enrich the church. And enriching that has been done to me happened long before I got called into this. It's about the church. I'm not here. To enrich myself, right? shouldn't be like that.
So as we draw closer to a close a little bit of practical steps for us here today, right? So practically, how do we do this? Right? So how do we do this? How do we get there? Well, again,
it's about living for hope. In that kingdom, right? In eternity, this light is very, very, very short compared to eternity. Correct? Right for doing math time. Eternity is forever. This is finite. This is very, very short. And it kind of makes me laugh. Because as you look at we talked about saving so you look at Second Timothy and when you read Second Timothy Paul's really kind of convinced he's at the end of his life so he's going to get murdered right so he's going to get killed that's what's in his mind. And so Second Timothy it's very much more than First Timothy emotional right it's very common emotional letter you can you get that kind of tone and they're talking a lot about family and being moved to tears when they partied all kinds of stuff, but good calls on it right so you're just getting theology you're just getting good stuff there politic finish the fight right? finish the race strong like all this stuff. There's one line I believe it's second Timothy 413 If I'm not right on here, where there's one line he says look, you know, basically get my stuff so I need you to get the cloak I left with carpus at Troas right and then get my books and parchments he says books so this is like my favorite verse of the day, right? Like get the cloak I love with carpet show us and my books in parchment. So as he's telling Timothy, get my stuff, right. And so I'm like, I have used this as verse of the day for myself to buy as many books as possible. And, and the way I juke my wife isn't like their Bibles who can criticize me for buying Bibles. She's like, that one was $200 or whatever, right?
So I've run with this one, too. Right. Paul had a lot of
lotto she's like not the whole bedroom now. But anyway, it's literally like that. But funny thing, right. So here's the thing just to frame this right. Paul had stopped
And I will tell you he's more a man of God, a man of faith. And I think I can ever hope to be like, the stuff this guy went through. Please, Lord, right. Crazy life. But even he had stuff. Yeah, he did. And he's like telling Timothy I mean, which is really funny because like, I'm going to die. Give me my books, right?
On the clock, I don't know. But anyway, it just always strikes me as a little funny. He had stuff, right. And he kind of like this stuff. But here's what a man of God is doing. Paul spends everything but that one verse, everything that one was talking about the things of heaven in the church, right? She's talking about the things of the church, the things of heaven. And it's just like wondering, oh, yeah, by the way, get some of my stuff.
That's putting God first. That's what that is. Whereas a lot of people are preaching all their stuff. Oh, and by the way, God, right, so it's just that one verse is God, right? But the rest of it is about all the stuff. It's flipped. It's backwards. Right? So a lot of people have this weird idea what putting God first is you ever hear he'll talk like this? Like, like, they'll say, like, I put God first. So they'll say like something like, like, Yeah, because in the morning, as soon as they get up, I pray, right. And then I get to go and do a bunch of sin. That's not putting God first. So they talk about so what most people think in putting God first that phrase, they've put really what they've done is they put God in a little checkbox,
as they've done. That ain't putting God first. Sorry. putting God first is like you are pursuing God and all that you do. And then by the way, my books, their Bibles, okay.
Right, you know, my clothes, my clothes or my stuff, right? It's a by the way, things are a man of God. So it's the kind of thing, okay,
oh, look at that, you know, think about that for a minute. But then get back to God, that's putting God first. It's not a checkbox. So here's the thing. Practically, can we have nice things? Yes. Yes, we can have nice things. It's okay. But we need to be putting God first. And that means more time thinking about investing in heavenly things. Jesus says darker treasures, and Heaven.
A big thing I see with people. And this is very practical as well. Best way to get out of your own head is to serve others.
Serve others, not the way you want to be served, not what you want to do. But what the person you're serving watts. That's important to me a long time to learn that, right. So people don't always receive love the same way. So your spouse might need something done. Don't do what you need done and say, I got all the work in the house done. You got your work and the house done, right? Go do the work they need done. That serving you in the stuff you want to do is not serving it's a hobby, right.
It's not serving anyone but your self.
Role. Being a servant is doing the things that the people you're loving, need done.
But it's a great way to get out of yourself. It's great way to get out of your own head. Too many people too wrapped up in here. not that important. Go serve somebody else. And all of a sudden it's magical. Your problems start going away.
There are too many people with too much free time.
Go serve somebody, you'll have less problems. It's the key.
You must exercise that daily.
Practical, important thing Well Rich, the spiritual here in the moment.
We must look to what this says the word not what the world teaches us. But what the word a man of God is in God's word.
The man of God obeys what God's Word says. This is important. This is God's love letter to us. We cannot say we love God and not read his love letter to us. It's impossible. It's lip service. It's live so this
my way every year, not going to cry. But every year around her sobriety, she writes me a beautiful card right about her sobriety. I hang on every word of that card. Because I love her.
Imagine I get that like 10 year anniversary card with her love letter to me and I'm like, are she finds it unopened for a week?
What is she going to think? Does he love me?
It would be a good question. I think it'd be a pretty good question. So what does God think when we don't read his love letter to us?
Yeah, we need to read his love letter to us and be obedient to it. So this is the practical, the ultimate How do we do this comes by God's power, not our own. That's the key here. Man of God is filled with God. A man of God is submitted to God and that is the key in receiving His Spirit. That's the key. What is it something
Mission is better than sacrament submit to God. People come at me with all these ideas. I'm just
I'm trying to listen to God, right? That's really important. But it's the key to having a spirit enter in and do the work. So think about these people again, Moses numbers 11, for example, right says he's filled with the Spirit of God, Samuel as a prophet. He's filled with the Spirit of God. Jesus affirms David, even by saying, He's speaking by the Spirit when he's writing the song, Elijah and Elijah, that's what the conversation is about right double portion of their spirits, Timothy, clearly a Christian baptized in the Spirit, like, they all have the Spirit of God in them. We see in these examples, a man of God is not always perfect. Right? Not always perfect knows that God is. But a man of God will more consistently display the fruit of the Spirit. And I will tell you this, relying on the power of the Holy Spirit, is one really good way to make sure you're not getting the credit for any of it.
It's all him. I just got a lot of contents to your time, but just a little bit of testimony here. I grew up with dyslexia.
Does it look like I have dyslexia?
No, it's gone. All
you said it, right. Praise God, not me. It has nothing to do with me. I'm perfected right? In my weakness by Christ by the Holy Spirit, right. So that's what makes me be able to do good things. I'm not perfect.
Right? But you get almost paraphrasing scripture. But you get my point, right? So that's the key. I would be nothing without the power of God in me. It's not me. I'm just being used by him. And so we will display this fruit. If we're walking God you can tell right? The quacks like a duck has a duck. So if you're displaying more of the fruit, and Jesus says, Judge a tree by its fruit, so in Galatians, Paul talks about this the sin of the flesh and the fruit of the Spirit, they're against one another Galatians 519. When you follow the desires of your sinful nature, the results are very clear. Sexual immorality, impurity. lustful pleasures, idolatry, sorcery, hostility, quarreling, jealousy, outbursts of anger, selfish ambition,
to ascension division, and V, drunkenness, wild parties and other sins like these. Let me tell you again, as I have before that anyone, that sort of life will not inherit the kingdom of God, can you think of anything scarier?
What you do,
seems to matter.
But the Holy Spirit produces this kind of fruit in our lives love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self control. There's no law against these things. Does that sound exactly like all of the qualities we saw in a man of God? Yes, God's Word comes together here.
Remember, Samuel that obedience and submission, importance to receiving the Holy Spirit so that we can bear the fruit of God.
This submission means that we crucify the flesh.
We crucify the flesh.
We live submitted and according to God's will, not our own
clothes, these are qualities, we really shouldn't be looking for our leaders. These are the things we should be and just think about them again. Right? So when you think about leaders, right? Love, joy, peace, peace, how many leaders is advocating for something other than that?
peace, patience,
kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self control.
Wow.
Those are anything like what we're seeing a lot of
leaders in churches, fathers,
husbands, this is the way you lead. This is the way God's word says you lead. That's it? No, but and no. That way. And it's not exclusive. And I know some of you thinking I keep saying man of God, because it's what the Bible says. It's not exclusive to men. It's exclusive, not to men, but it's also open to women, right? Women of God, I would say,
in your homes and your ministries, this is the way you lead.
And it's important to say with so many women out there looking for men and doing all these other things. These are the qualities if you are a Christian woman, and you are not married, these are the qualities you must look for in your man
And
if your man does not have these qualities, you will not have a good nurse.
You won't have a godly manners, you won't be in a good relationship, best to say you're in a relationship with the Lord.
And call it a day. Because not going to be worth the headache and the drama that you're going to have to deal with.
So to the women, you want to look for a man of God, check those qualities that they're not displaying more of, and again, I mess up on the pastor. But more often than not, my wife will tell you I'm trying and pursuing those things. So you don't have to be perfect, but at least someone who's really trying.
That's the key.
So my prayer today
in a world of so much godlessness, so much godless that more men and women of God would rise up
to God's call and rise up with faith. Rise up with True obedience, not lip service, nothing under the rug, nothing in this in the closet, right? True obedience, true commitment. This world needs so much more commitment. So what is right That's my prayer. A more advise up with these qualities just selflessly following God's plan.
I pray more would rise up and pursue righteousness, gentleness, love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, gentleness, faithfulness, and self control.
In a way, set forth by our ultimate example, our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, Amen.