Three Ways of Answering the Call – Purity 1088

To see today's photo, go to mt4christ.org or follow me, M.t. Clark, on Facebook or Twitter. Good morning. Today's photo of missionaries huddled around a campfire at dusk comes to us from Tommy Malo, who shared this scene on social media back on June 26th, reporting that he had witnessed 3 churches being planted and hundreds of people putting their faith in Jesus in the past month. And was thankful for how God put these teams of missionaries exactly where his people needed them. And I thank God for faithful men and women like Tommy who are— who have decided to step out in faith and go, uh, to go and work for the kingdom, uh, of God far from home. Well, it's Friday, and although I have been called to go on a few short-term mission trips, I am content with my current calling to encourage others to trust God with their hurts, habits, and hangups, uh, stateside. After being born again in 2010 via chance encounter with a gospel radio message, the Holy Spirit impressed upon me the need to know God more and to be authentic in my newfound faith, and I have been answering the call to seek the Lord ever since. On those early days of my faith, my first steps were to: 1. Read the Bible, uh, 2, find a church that preached and lived according to what it said, and 3, do something for the Lord's kingdom to serve him somehow. Although I had been a practicing Buddhist for 5 years when I got saved, I did have a liturgical church background from my childhood and when I started a family with my ex. I was raised Catholic and have been genuinely fun— and have some genuinely fond memories of going to church and growing up Catholic. But understood that tradition's mixed message of grace and works caused me to doubt my relationship with God and made me feel like I was a condemned sinner, which I was in fact, and that I would never make the grade and would probably go to hell because I thought I had to earn my salvation. After meeting my ex, a nominal Episcopalian, and we decided to get married and have children, I gave church a second chance and loved its Catholic-lite relaxed liturgical services. While it didn't cause me to repent of my sin or give me any sense of absolute assurance of salvation, my liberal congregation with gay clergy made me feel at ease and less condemned. Hey, the reverends were gay, so they weren't exactly judgmental, and the liturgical liturgy contained a prayer that would forgive me of my sin each week. So even though I was a drunk and a sex addict, I had a sense that I was okay with God. I really earnestly prayed for those 5 to 10 minutes before services, so I hoped God would forgive me. But I would still— but I was still a rebel and occasionally would have contempt for it all and would get up and go take a walk out in the surrounding streets much to my ex's shock and embarrassment because I was a mess and was just going through the motions. After my infant son died, my occasional contempt and heartbreak, uh, you know, resulted in a full rejection of my nominal faith and the church game mentality. I guess I thought the deal was that I would go to church and God would bless me. When I lost my son, God reneged on the deal, and so I was angry and left. It was more of the practical atheist that I actually was than an Episcopalian, which eventually led me to embracing Buddhism because of its teachings on suffering, which I knew so well. So after getting pulled out of the darkness and being shown the light of the gospel of grace, of faith alone in Christ alone, I knew I couldn't go back to the Catholic Church or the Episcopalian Church with its gay gay reverends. I didn't know much about biblical morality, but after being born again and reading the Bible, um, that the Episcopalians gave me when I was confirmed, I knew that if I wanted to be a real Christian, I couldn't go to a church with gay clergy. Hey, they were nice guys, but the Bible is pretty clear about sexual immorality, and I couldn't sit in a church where it was accepted in its leadership. So I did the ch— did some church seeking for a time, but eventually settled on a non-denominational church that had lively worship, believed in the gifts of the Spirit, and was big on reading and living according to the Bible. Rock Solid Church in Hudson, New York provided me with a place where I could seek the Lord in earnest, and it provided me with the opportunities to learn and grow in my faith experientially. So when I decided that it was my church, I immediately expressed my desire to serve. And went from being an usher to an audiovisual tech and a teacher and leader at Celebrate Freedom in 2015 when I went into recovery. I was encouraged and helped along the way by countless brothers and sisters in Christ, but I have to— but I have come to understand that ultimately it was up to me to answer the Lord's call on my life, to know him and to seek his will. Churches are filled with nice people, uh, for the most part, but And to be honest, there are very few disciples who take the Word of God seriously, have learned to apply it to their lives, and who feel convicted to find their purpose for God's kingdom. Any lack of freedom, victory, or peace in a Christian's— quote-unquote Christian's— life, I believe, can be attributed to ignorance, selfishness, or compromise. If you don't trust the Lord, really believe his word, and follow His call completely, you won't see the fruit of the Spirit grow in your life. So as we move through this Friday, and we will be seeking to take it easy as we move towards the weekend, let me encourage you to never take it easy when it comes to your faith and seeking to know and serve the Lord. Now relax, I am not necessarily telling you to press in hard and burn out for Christ. When we seek to walk in the Spirit, we have to take it one day at a time and build our capacity for living the Christian life. Life by renewing our minds and changing our hearts through repentance, little by little, bit by bit. While we could make great progress in our faith by making pronouncements to live for God and setting our intentions to do everything for God's kingdom, uh, we have to learn to walk before we run. So take it easy on yourself, give yourself periods of rest and vast quantities of grace so you can follow the Lord in his peace, and so you won't suffer from the culture shock of going from the world to the Lord too much. Authentic Christianity is a whole new world, and it's not necessarily running rampant even in those church buildings. So be content with slow and steady progress on this path of Christian discipleship. But if you want to make sure you are going in the right direction Make sure you read the Bible, apply what it says, find a church where it is taught and encouraged to be practiced, and make a decision to serve God's kingdom in some way. Whether it's in the local church, your local community, or in the foreign mission field, do something to demonstrate that you are pursuing the Lord's purpose for your life and trying to represent his kingdom on earth. Today's Bible verse comes— verses come to us from the Quick Scripture Reference, uh, for Counseling by John G. Cruis. This morning's meditation verses come from the section on adultery, and today's verses are 2 Samuel 11:2-3. And the word of God says, now when the evening came, David arose from his bed and walked around the roof of the king's house, and And from the roof he saw a woman bathing, and the woman was very beautiful in appearance. So David sent and inquired about the woman, and one said, "Is this not Bathsheba, the daughter of Eliam and the wife of Uriah the Hittite?" Today's verses fall under the 8th point of our Counseling Reference Guide's resource section on adultery, number 8: David fed the flame. How did David feed the flame of adultery? It's not shared here, but verse 1 tells us that this took place during the time when kings go out to battle, but David stayed at Jerusalem, which indicates that David may have, have gotten a little soft in his commitment to lead and was taking it easy, hanging around the royal palace, shirking his responsibilities and not pursuing his purpose. In short, David wasn't doing what was right for a king. And because he made that compromise, the inclination to compromise in other areas was an option, and sin was waiting at the door. David wasn't where he was supposed to be, and his eyes wandered where they shouldn't look. David was married, and even if he wasn't, he shouldn't have let his gaze linger on a woman who was bathing, and he certainly shouldn't have been inquiring about the naked woman that he was staring at, or arrange for his servants to bring, bring her, uh, bring her to the palace to have sex with her. Uh, the inherent lesson from David's feed the flame, from David's feeding the flame of adultery, is to not do that. We should not shirk our responsibilities because idle hands are the devil's playthings, and men and women shouldn't look at others with lingering lust because our desires can lead us into sin. So do what you should be doing and avert your eyes from things that will cause you to feed the flame that will cause destruction. As always, we invite you all to go to mtforchrist.org where we always share insights from prominent Christian theologians and counselors to assist our brothers and sisters in Christ with their walk. Today we continue sharing from A.W. Pink's The Holy Spirit, and we're in chapter 12 still, The Spirit Enlightening. And today's topic is Enlightenment Follows Quickening. So, um, if you want to see what A.W. Pink has to say about the Holy Spirit coming into your life and quickening you and enlightening you, uh, go to mtforchrist.org and you'll find that research. Resource at the end of today's blog post. And as always, we encourage a life of Christian discipleship. When I heard that gospel message for the first time about the gospel of grace, you know, after being in two churches that, you know, were nice but never really gave me the— gave me the gospel where I— if I accept Jesus, I would be saved and forgiven. You know, without having to earn it. You know, it wasn't very clear, or my eyes were blinded to it. Um, but after I heard it, I, I was convicted. I was filled with the Holy Spirit, and I was drawn to do those three things: read the Bible, uh, to know what it says, to know God more. And then I was convicted that I couldn't go back to the church I was because it was sort of morally compromised.— and not that I was against Episcopalianism necessarily. I actually ended up going to an Episcopalian— a different Episcopalian church without gay clergy after that period, and eventually found a rock-solid church. And then I was convicted that, you know, I not only find a church but to serve the church, to serve God's kingdom in some way. I went on to serve, like I said, in the post here as an usher, audiovisual tech, and teacher and leader of a Christian recovery ministry. But that's not all I did, you know, not that I'm tooting my own horn, but I also went on mission trips and, you know, basically I did community service for American— the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention. And was just sort of an advocate for Christian Recovery in my community, going to local recovery meetings and stuff like that. And it was— why did I do all that? To be approved? Well, no, I did it to represent God's kingdom and try to encourage people to put their faith in Jesus, to follow me as I follow Christ. And that's— I'm not perfect, so don't take every step I took. The reason I teach is to help people avoid my mistakes. Took me years and years and years to get it right. Lots of mistakes throughout my life, and after— not for nothing— after I put my faith in Jesus, you know, I wasn't perfect and had a lot of— a lot to learn and a lot of things to change. But the Lord was faithful to help me because I kept seeking him and seeking to learn about his ways and his kingdom. So that's why we do the blog, blog and podcast, to encourage others to do that, not to necessarily follow me, but to seek the Lord as a general instruction and to press into your faith through spiritual practice. Is like reading the Bible and praying and seeking a community of saints and serving them. That's what Christians do. So I encourage you to do that. Um, but it is Friday, so take it easy on yourself. Um, you know, there's no condemnation for those in Christ Jesus. You should never be beating yourself up or worried about your performance. This is a walk of the Spirit and of grace. And so if you're not— if you don't have peace, you got to recalculate and, you know, find a way to walk in the spirit of peace and joy, uh, on this path. It's not about beating yourself up or whipping yourself into shape, but it is paradoxically about surrendering to God's will and answering his commands to repent, you know, to not play, you know, nice with your sin. It's not about just believing, it's about applying, um, what God taught. That's what being a disciple is. We are students of Jesus Christ and we apply his lessons to our life. Anyway, um, I have to work, so, um, I'm not gonna necessarily serve the kingdom of God. Not necessarily. I'll try to do a good job and represent, but, uh, yeah, we have that secular job to take care of. Um, so we gotta do our best, uh, to represent God's kingdom, and we're going to ask for his help in prayer. Lord God, Heavenly Father, thank you for another day in your kingdom. We thank you so much for how you took us out of the darkness and gave us that, that call on our life to seek you and know you more, and how you led us to read the Bible and find a church and serve it and serve the community and serve your kingdom. Lord, so we thank you for calling us and leading us and letting the fruit of the Spirit grow in our lives. And Lord, we thank you for anyone who's listening or reading this message today, that you would come along them in their, in their lives and their prayer requests and lead them in the way they should go. Um, Lord, we're not perfect people. Um, we're desperately, you know, before coming to you, we're desperately wicked. And since coming to you, we have to learn how to live by faith in the power of the Holy Spirit. We need your help. So Lord, we just pray for you to go before us today, open our eyes to the things you want us to see, and lead our steps in the way we should go, because all we want to do is represent you in your kingdom and to share the love of Christ. So, um, we thank you, we praise you, we love you, Lord, and we pray all these things in the mighty name of Jesus. Amen.