The Crucified Life - You must Commit to Jesus You can't die to self without commitment

Welcome to episode 301, and since I've kicked my intro guy to the bench for a few episodes, I want to jump right into our topic, and that is one of the biggest things I believe that's holding the Western church, which is where I'm in right now. It is the Western Christian church, what is holding it back. And I believe that number one thing is commitment. I believe that most of the people that I come in contact with are not fully committed. And that's why this episode and why the crucified with Christ and why learning how to die— I want to say that that's one of the most important things that you can learn and why I believe God puts that on the front end. And I have been in sales most of my adult life. I've been in real estate for over 30 years, and I know what it takes to sell somebody. I know that you have to motivate somebody to do something. That may— they may or may not want to do. And really, in all honesty, in real estate, I really don't motivate anybody to do something they don't want to do. What I do is I show them how to get what they want to get. But as I look at the church, the modern church today, I see a lack of commitment. And I believe it all stems back to this ability to die to self and this inability to put God first. And this commitment to God, and God's ways are not our ways. And I would say that God is a terrible salesperson, but God doesn't have to be a salesperson because he is the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords. And this Western civilization, and I'm part of it, we are used to what we thought was a democracy. That has nothing to do with the kingdom of God. The kingdom of God has zip to do with democracy. It is all about God's kingdom, and he is a king. Now, you are a king as well, but he is the ultimate king, and it's his kingdom, it's his glory. We are put here to give him glory and to build his kingdom, and the sooner that we can figure that out, the better we're going to be in this life and the life to come. But I want to get into this dying to self, and I think we need to go to Romans 6. To really get a good picture of what Paul's talking about. And I know we've talked about Romans 12:1, which I love that scripture, and Galatians 2:20. If you want to hear those two scriptures, I want to encourage you to listen to episode 299. And we're going to start in Romans 6:3. Or do you not know that as many of us as were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? Therefore we were buried with him through baptism into death, that just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life. For if we've been united together in the likeness of his death, certainly we also shall be in the likeness of his resurrection, knowing this, that our old man was crucified with him, that the body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves of sin. For he who has died has been freed from sin. Now if we died with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with him, knowing that Christ, having been raised from the dead, dies no more; death no longer has dominion over him. For the death that he died, he died to sin once for all; but the life that he lives, he lives to God. Likewise you also, Reckon yourself to be dead indeed to sin, but alive to God in Christ Jesus our Lord. Therefore do not let sin reign in your mortal body, that you should obey it in its lusts. And I'm going to stop there. I know I could go on and on, and we already know that I have superior reading skills. We must learn to die to live, and we've talked about this numerous times on multiple episodes, that we have to do things God's way. We cannot continue to do things the world's way. We cannot do the things our way. God's way is the only way that you and I need to be doing it. And that's why I want to get into the word of God and allow the word of God to get into us, because I want to remind you that we have 3 enemies. And the first enemy is the biggest enemy, and that's the punk. We like to call him the punk because that's what he is. He comes only to steal, to kill, and destroy. Now, he is very good at what he does. He deceives all of us. He deceives the world, and he uses the world system. He uses people in the world. He uses people in your family. He actually uses people in the church. And I'm sure he uses me to irritate you. I don't mean to be used by Satan, but even the Apostle Peter, where Jesus told him, "Get behind me, Satan," you know, so to think that you and I are never going to be used by the punk, that is arrogant and prideful. And we just need to get over ourselves but we need to get into the truth. Because when we get into the truth and allow to get the truth into us, that's where freedom comes. That's where Jesus says, 'And you shall know the truth, and the truth shall set you free.' It is not the truth that you don't know, it is the truth that you do know that sets you free. And that's why I'm here, that's why we're here today, that's why we're digging into this word. We've got to get death right. I am an imperfect being going after a perfect example. I don't do it perfectly. I'm not even trying. That's not even my job. My job is to get into this word and to see how God did it. If God were going to be here on Earth, how would God do it? And that's what I try to do. That's why I'm here. We need to figure out this death thing, and we need to see the end from the beginning, because in Matthew 6:33 it says, seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added unto you. God's way of doing things is a kingdom. God has a kingdom. He has kings, but he is the king. And if we're going to learn to do it, we need to learn to do it his way. And one of his ways is to see the end from the beginning. Jesus came here to die. He is our example, and we're to imitate Christ. We also need to die, and we need to understand that there is a second death. And the only reason I'm talking about it is because Jesus has conquered death and the grave. So we have really nothing to fear when we talk about death. We are never going to die again if you've accepted Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior. You are never gonna die again. You are an eternal being, and your spirit and your soul will never die. If you have not accepted Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior, what are you waiting for? That's all I can say is we need to do that. You need to die to live. God's ways are not our ways. God doesn't do it the way you want him to do it. God does it the way he does it, and we need to learn how God does it, and then we just need to fall in line. That's what you do in a kingdom. You don't vote on it. You just do what the king tells you to do. And I've been slow to this. God is not surprised by me not getting in line with his kingdom all at once. And it's a learned behavior when— especially when you see the world system or our democracy doing it one way and then God's way this way. But God's way is the best way. Let's go to Revelation 20:11. This is called the Great White Throne Judgment. We're going to see that Father God sits down on the Great White Throne and things just start happening and It's not good. Then I saw a great white throne and him who sat on it, from whose face the earth and the heavens fled away, and there was found no place for them. And I saw the dead, small and great, standing before God, and books were opened. And another book was opened, which is the Book of Life. And the dead were judged according to their works by the things which were written in the books. The sea gave up the dead who were in it, and Death and Hades delivered up the dead who were in them, and they were judged, each one according to his works. Then Death and Hades were cast into the lake of fire. This is the second death. And anyone not found written in the book of life was cast into the lake of fire. Now I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and there was no more sea. Then I, John, saw the holy city, New Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. And I heard a loud voice from heaven saying, Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men, and he will dwell with them, and they shall be his people. God himself will be with them and be their God. And God will wipe away every tear from their eyes. There shall be no more death, nor sorrow nor crying, there shall be no more pain, for the former things have passed away. 21:5 Then he who sat on the throne said, Behold, I make all things new. 21:6 And he said to me, Write, for these words are true and faithful. And he said to me, It is done! 21:7 I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end. I will give of the fountain of the water of life freely to him who thirsts. He who overcomes shall inherit all things, and I will be his God, and he shall be my son. But the cowardly, unbelieving, abominable, murderers, sexually immoral, sorcerers, idolaters, and all liars shall have their part in the lake which burns with fire and brimstone, which is the second death. And I want to stop there. We have got to understand that there is going to be an end to all of this. There's an end and there's a beginning. God is the beginning and the end. He is the Alpha and the Omega. God sees things from the end to the beginning. God is never caught off guard. He is telling you and I exactly how this thing's going to end. He's telling it in his book, and it's our job to tell other people, if you don't accept Jesus as your Lord and Savior, this thing is not going to end well for you. I'm here to tell you that this Bible, God's Word, has changed my life. And if it's changed my life, it will change your life. But we need to understand that we have to humble ourselves. We have to die to our way of doing things. We have to die to self. We have to understand that it is impossible to please God without faith. And by faith you are saved. You are saved by faith. Faith comes by hearing, hearing by the word of God. God sent his word, and his word is Jesus. We need to be more like Jesus. Jesus came to die, and then he was resurrected. We are to die, and we will be resurrected, and we are resurrected immediately. I don't know how it all works. I just know that I died, and now I live forever. If you do not know Jesus as your Lord and Savior, I want to encourage you to ask God to reveal himself to you. God is real. Read the Bible, get into the word, and ask the Holy Spirit to reveal that truth to you. It's not difficult, but you have to humble yourself. You have to commit. I feel myself rambling on and I need to close this down. Let's pray real quick. God, thank you so much for your word. God, thank you for encouraging us to commit to your kingdom. God, help us to be more like your Son Jesus. Help us to be more like you. Holy Spirit, lead us into all truth. Lord, we thank you, we love you. We ask it all in Jesus' name. Amen. Well, thank you for being a part of this, and I look forward to visiting with you in the next episode. Thanks for listening to the No Doubt, No Fear, Only Believe podcast at www.nodoubtonlybelieve.com.