Mike Bickle emphasizes the importance of abounding in love as articulated in Paul's prayer for the Philippians. He encourages believers to seek a deeper understanding of God's love, knowledge of His truths, and discernment in their lives, especially in the face of cultural pressures and criticism. Bickle highlights that true love is demonstrated through sincere actions and a commitment to righteousness, which ultimately prepares believers for the day they stand before the Lord. He warns against the confusion of societal norms that can lead to compromise and urges the church to promote what God calls excellent. The sermon serves as a call to cultivate a life of faithfulness and love amidst challenges, ensuring that believers have no regrets on that glorious day of evaluation.

Philippians chapter 1 verse 9 to 11 the very well-known prayer that Paul prayed for the church at Philippi that they would abound in love. Now this is one of the most used prayers at the prayer room down the road, probably second only to Ephesians chapter 1. I hear Philippians 1 many many times over the years. It's really a practical prayer to pray for your own spiritual life, to pray for your spouse, family members, children, siblings, ministries down the road, whatever. I've prayed this prayer for many years. It's one of my favorite ones that love would abound in my own heart and so I want you just to note this prayer and really take you make use of it. Again it's a very easy prayer to follow and to pray for those that you're committed to praying for. At the very heart of this prayer Paul is crying out that God would teach them and help them and instruct them so they would live so they would have no regrets on the last day when they stand before the Lord. That's really the core of what he's praying. They're in the midst of a city where there's persecution against the church throughout the whole Roman Empire it was happening and Philippi was a Roman city. And some believers were backing away from their boldness. Others were yielding to offense. Others were giving in to fear and intimidation. Others were yielding to compromise in the culture. And Paul said I'm praying that the Lord would strengthen you in love and release greater knowledge so that when you stand before the Lord on that day you will have no regrets but you will have a testimony of a long life of faithfulness to the Lord. Now another thing about Philippians 1 verse 9 to 11 this is a real concise overview of the nature of Christianity. I mean the primary truths of the gospel are right here. What it would mean to disciple a believer or to be a disciple. There's ten different phrases and each one of them have many implications but I mean it's just like a snapshot of the overview of what Christianity is really about. Well the larger thought in Paul's mind is the day when a believer will stand before the Lord. Every believer will stand before the Lord after this life. It won't be an issue of heaven or hell. You're a believer. You're in the family of God and the Lord will evaluate our lives. It's the most important appointment of your life. So the most important appointment of your life for every one of us is yet future. But beloved that's a glorious day. That day is not meant to be like oh no the great evaluation but it's oh yes the great evaluation because the one that evaluates us the judge is so generous and he pays so well. I mean for real. We give somebody a cup of cold water 30 years ago and he remembers it and he rewards you surely on that day. His evaluation is filled with generosity. That he sees the cry of our heart to obey him and the the sincere setting of our heart to be wholehearted before him. So Paul is praying that they would make life choices so when they stand before the Lord on that glorious day it would be in fact all glorious to them. Paul is praying for believers in a church that is experiencing fierce persecution. Now when the Roman Empire would persecute the gospel I mean all through society there was a there was a ripple effect because if there's a stigma against obeying Jesus and wholeheartedness that that stigma would be expressed in family circles, friendship circles, in the workplace and so people were really tempted to draw back and not be bold about who Jesus is and not just who he is his claims of wholehearted obedience. Today we have in our culture a stigma even amongst the church. I'm talking about in the church, the body of Christ, across the whole Western world and more. Wholeheartedness, the pursuit of wholehearted obedience has a stigma in the church. There's a tremendous amount of energy even among believers to dumb down the gospel to where we are presenting a just half the truth or a portion of it or validating compromise and but the glory of the gospel is our ability to walk in wholeheartedness before him because he loves us with all of his heart and then out of gratitude our place of liberty and greatness is in seeking to love him with all of our heart. But there's a tremendous resistance and stigma related to that subject even in the church. Well let's read the prayer. Again there's about 10 different phrases that each have quite a few implications each one of them. I mean what a glorious power packed passage of Scripture. Well verse 9 is the prayer itself and there's three requests. Verse 10 and 11 is actually the result of what happens in our life if those three prayer requests are answered in our life. But we put it together as one big prayer but again it's one prayer in verse 9 with three requests and then the implications the result of what happens in our life in this age and the age to come if in fact those three requests are increasingly answered in our life over time. Let's read it. Paul says here's the prayer request. Verse 9 there's three requests there. I pray that your love may abound still more and more. Number one. I pray that your love would abound in knowledge that you would have knowledge of gospel truths. With particular knowledge on the personality of God Himself. The very central focus of gospel truths but this knowledge is more than just knowledge of God's heart. It's all of who we are in Christ and what happened at the cross and our authority as a believer and all that's involved in the grace of God. Verse 9 Paul says I pray your love would abound still more and more. Request one. That your love would abound in knowledge. Request number two. That your love would abound with all discernment. That's request number three. Then as those three prayers are answered progressively here's what happens. Verse 10 and 11. Then you would be able to approve. You would be able to recognize. Take a stand for. Promote the things that God calls excellent. Even though in the culture there's resistance and criticism and stigma to those things God calls excellent. You would be able to approve those things. You'd be able to recognize them. Stand for them. Promote them. Rejoice in them. Not reluctantly think well I guess I have to do this. No these are the excellent things. These are the portion of our life. This is our glory to embrace this lifestyle of wholeheartedness before the most beautiful glorious God. Well not only that. That you would then if you abound in love with knowledge and discernment those three things. Verse 10 you would be able to walk in godly sincerity without any offense. Can you imagine living free of offense in your life? Here it is until the day. This is the ultimate destination. The great day. The greatest appointment of your life. The glorious day. The day of Christ. Where Jesus the bridegroom King stands face to face with every individual believer. His eternal companion. His bride. The body of Christ. And Paul goes on in verse 11 and says if you abound in love and you grow in knowledge and discernment. Verse 11 you'll be filled with the fruits of righteousness. He says now these this ability to walk in righteousness it's from Jesus. He provides the free gift of righteousness and then by encountering him by the Holy Spirit his presence empowers us to live in a lifestyle of righteousness. And he says this is to the ultimate glorious cosmic drama. To the glory of the praise of God. Because what's happening I mean the backdrop of the human story is God the Father is expressing his excellency and his grandeur and his virtue and his power and his beauty. But he's expressing it through his people in a dark world. And we get to be a part of that. Paul says that's a remarkable thing in this age even in the age to come. But even in this age in a dark world people can see glimpses of the excellency of God as you live consistent lifestyles. Responding to mistreatment. Responding to temptation. Responding to difficulty with love. Glimpses of the excellency of God are made known in a dark world. Now beloved there are no super saints. That display that glimpse of God's excellency through our broken lives it's not perfect. And and even in our weakness and brokenness still there are glimpses of the glory of God. And Jesus said that's my mandate to make the Father known. And I'm going to lead you and together we will make the Father known in the earth. Of course eventually after he returns the whole earth is filled with the glory of the knowledge of the Father through Jesus and his body his bride. Well the context the real challenging context we know it well it was true in Paul's day and it's very true today is that there's a fog of confusion in the culture as to what is right and what is wrong from God's point of view. And Paul says you want to have the ability to approve, to recognize, and stand for, rejoice in the things God calls excellent. But there's so much confusion what does God call excellent? This is more than what God requires but what is God rejoicing and call excellent? I mean what does God want? What's the very best that God has planned for us? And of course it's to walk in wholeheartedness and obedience with Him and that deep sense of partnership with Him. I'm not content to just get into the kingdom. I mean I want to be I want to resurrect the body and live forever. I love that but I'm not content. I want to walk in excellence because that's what God is offering us the ability to walk in that. Well in Paul's day there was tremendous resistance against obeying Jesus and his lordship and a lifestyle that that lived under his lordship but today it's the same thing and in the context of social media there are so many sources of information in these last years through social media and so many images and opinions and so many views expressed even among the body of Christ. There's all kinds of confusion and distortion and many people are being discipled by social media and not discipled by the Word of God. They're taking the loudest and the most popular views of what God calls excellent and many of them are very distorted. They're not at all what God calls excellent. It's what God says that's not excellent but because they're popular many embrace them who name the name of Christ. Many people are being discipled by social media not the Word of God. Paul says when you stand before Him on that day that won't be good. I mean yes you can be saved but your life will have been wasted so much of it by having confidence to embrace various things in your life that the Lord says you should never have embraced those. Well everybody else was doing it and Bible teachers said it was okay but the Lord says it was never in my Word. Well they use Bible verses. Beloved you can find validation for almost any practice you want if you will cut and paste and take out of context Bible verses you can validate any compromise you want and you can salt it with biblical language and you can get an audience across the world through social media. But on the last day it will be of no benefit to you at all. And Paul is saying you don't want to go there. You don't want to get lost in the fog of confusion but rather you want confidence and clarity about what's excellent. So you'll have fruits of righteousness and you'll have a life to show of faithfulness. Yes in the midst of our weakness and stumbling but through the grace of God in that sincere desire to be wholehearted and the generosity of Jesus we present to Him a life of long-term life of faithfulness and the Lord is delighted on that day and it's the most glorious day of your life. Well paragraph B let's look at just a few of these phrases we won't have time to look in detail at more than just a couple of them. Paul's the first request of the three that your love would abound. Now when he says that your love would abound that is can be applied several ways. Number one I'll tell you how I pray this for myself. Lord that my knowledge of your love for me would abound in my heart. I want the knowledge of how you love me. I want to feel it. I want to see it more clearly. I want love, your love for me, the knowledge of it to abound in my heart. Number one I don't want to stop there. I want it to inspire me. I want it to tenderize me. I want to abound in love back to you. Love God with all of your heart, all of your strength. That's the first commandment, the first priority to God. Lord I want wholeheartedness to be my first priority. I don't want my first priority to be my ministry growing or my reputation or my influence or blessed circumstances. I like those things. But I want love abounding for the Son of God to be the primary life goal that I realign my heart to over and over and over. See that's Paul's prayer because they're in a city with lots of persecution, lots of stigma, lots of intimidation against the gospel. Paul is saying you know I would have thought the great Apostle Paul would have prayed Lord release, lift, I mean not release, lift the persecution, lessen the persecution. Paul said no, let them abound in love. Let them respond in love in the midst of the pressure. Well Paul you're an anointed Apostle. Surely you should use your prayer life to lift the persecution. Paul goes no, I'm praying that the love, your response in love would abound. Oh well pray and lift the persecution at least second. I mean put it on the prayer list. Well beloved I want to abound in love not just the knowledge of His love for me. I want my heart tenderized and energized so I love Him as number one. But then I want it to overflow in love people because you can't love Him with all of your heart without it overflowing. I get asked the question regularly what's the difference between the two? I said it's one reality. It's two sides of one coin. You love Him. It will inspire you to love the people He loves. That's the whole world. I mean I love you Jesus and Jesus goes I really like this guy. I go oh he's criticizing me. He's against me. Lord says but I really like him. Are you sure? Check again Lord. Yes I really do love Him. I love you and He goes but I love Him. Okay, okay, okay. Lord I want to abound in love even against I mean the Roman persecutors that were standing against. I mean some of them were martyred for the cause. Let's go to paragraph C. Paul says I pray that love would abound still more and more. Now we know there's a process and sometimes that process of growing in love is three steps forward, two steps back. At least that's been my story. Three steps forward, two steps back. I look over the years I keep making progress but I can't always measure the progress in weeks and months. But over the years the Lord's faithful that in our weakness we can keep making progress. Now notice this phrase still more and more. It's a very important phrase because there's a tension in this phrase. There's a tension that we are to be, Paul acknowledges the evidences of the Spirit, the work of the Spirit in them. Love is in you is what he's saying. He's not saying Lord I ask that love would begin. He says no, let it grow more and more. He goes I see the evidence of real love in you. The evidence, I mean the evidences of the Holy Spirit, the presence of real love in you. But I want to see a greater measure. So the tension is we're grateful for the measure that we've experienced but we're hungry for yet an increased measure. Because sometimes we get so focused on the increased measure that we don't appreciate and recognize the work of the Spirit in our weak frame for the fact that we love Him and we're not entrapped in the things we used to be entrapped in. We're not fully liberated from everything in our mind and emotions that we want to be but we're not as entrapped as we were before. And the Lord says I've worked love in you. Well it's not just the way you view your own life, it's the way you view other believers. We look at other believers, God give them some love. And the Lord says well there's love working in them. Well I don't see it. The Lord says look again. So there's that recognition and gratitude for the low, for the smaller measure while hungry for the greater measure. It's the both and, not the either or. Discontentedly content. I'm grateful and content in one sense. What you've done in me and what you've done in them Lord. But Lord I want more, I want more, I'm hungry for more. But thank you for what you've done. And when you pray for the church that way, you pray for even relationships you're in conflict, then when you pray through Paul's paradigm you actually still see love in the ones that you want more love to grow in. That prodigal believer in your family, there's still love working in them, but we want to see more love. It's the both and, not the either or. Paragraph D. Well it's not only request one that we'd abound in love, that we would abound in love request number two in knowledge, and request number three with all discernment. Now this knowledge is in the most general sense, it's general gospel truths, salvation truths, who we are in Christ, what God did, what Jesus did before the Father on the cross, what happened in the resurrection, what happened, how the kingdom operates, and so many truths related to our redemption. So when we grow in knowledge, Jesus said in John 8 32, when you know the truth the truth liberates you. The truth about redemption creates liberty in our heart. You'll know the truth and the truth progressively frees you, John 8 32. But this is more than just general gospel truths, though that is very very important. There specifically, I mean the pinnacle of this is the truth about God's heart, His personality, the way He thinks, and the way He feels in His passion for His weak and broken people. I mean, it's so glorious. Now there's a relationship to knowledge and love, because the more that we grow in knowledge of gospel truths, and particularly the knowledge of God's heart, the more we're awakened in love. That's the ideal. That's the ideal of God. That's what Paul had in his mind. But Paul wants them to be equipped to avoid two common truths, I mean two common errors. There's two common errors that are easily observed in the body of Christ. There's one person who loves the Lord, who's pursuing biblical knowledge. I mean they're just, I mean they're just fierce in their appetite to gain more biblical knowledge. But they're approaching the acquiring of knowledge in a way that doesn't inspire greater love in them. They, when their arguments they're far more articulate. I mean they can really defend their case way better than they ever used to be, because they've studied diligently. And they use their vast growing knowledge to showcase their intelligence. And, and Paul said, no, no, he goes, you want knowledge so that it inspires love. Then we got the other error. We have people that embrace all various forms of humanistic, sentimental love, but it's not defined or formed by the knowledge of truth. It's love on our terms. But beloved, there's only love, love is only real on God's terms. I mean he is love. He's the only one qualified. Jesus is the only man qualified to define love. All of his commandments come from love. All of them. No matter how costly and demanding some of them are, they're all motivated by love. And they all produce love in us and through us if we embrace them. None of his commands are burdensome or contrary to love. But there's another view of love that's out in the culture. It's a humanistic view of love that's quite opposite from love on God's terms. And so there's many in the body of Christ that they pursue love. I'm saying love, I mean the humanistic love. They pursue love, but not defined by truth, not formed by truth. So one guy pursues truth to win an argument, to show how smart he is, but he doesn't grow in love. It doesn't inspire love. Another guy goes for love, but it doesn't express truth. And Paul says, you want to walk the way with love and the knowledge of truth. Now the devil will get you in either ditch, either side of the road, as long as he gets you in one. You know the popular argument of our culture has made love, has so defined up to where it's almost as though love is God. Any form you want, that's the chief opinion. I mean that's the chief ruling truth of the day. Love is God. That's not true. God is love, but it doesn't go the other way around. Humanistic love is not God. Matter of fact, some of it is in absolute contrary and opposition to what God calls as love. Well there's a, again there's this fog of confusion that's in the culture, as the voices rise up in hostility against Jesus's leadership and the definitions of what of truth and love according to His Word. Well paragraph D, not only do we number one abound in love, not only two do we abound in knowledge, and the two go together, number three we grow in all discernment. That's the third prayer request in verse 9. And all three requests are right there. Now all discernment means the ability to apply the knowledge and the love in a way that is excellent in God's eyes. I mean we have thousands of real-life situations from some really major life decisions, but most of our life decisions are very small. How we use our time throughout the day, how we use even small bits of our money, how we carry our emotions, how we steward our feelings towards someone who doesn't treat us right, how we're posturing ourselves to present ourselves, to see the things we want come to pass. We have thousands of little life situations of which we're going for love and we're going for the knowledge of the Word of God, but we need to have spiritual discernment on how to apply them in the thousands of ways in the course of 70 years of walking with the Lord somebody, some of you might have. All the nuances of life. I mean blessed is the man or woman that has clarity and confidence, that the way they have confidence, the way they're spending their money, the way they're spending the time, the way they speak about their friends and their enemies, the way they pursue their ministry, the way they carry their heart and emotions, the way they do entertainment, that it has, it's in the pursuit of the excellence, that which God calls excellence. That's called spiritual discernment. So Lord I want three things. I want three things for this spiritual family. I want three things for the body of Christ. I mean a thousand congregations in our city and for a thousand cities of the earth where the body of Christ is. We want them to abound in love. We want them to grow in knowledge of the Word of God, but knowledge that inspires love and love that expresses the knowledge of truth. We want them to have discernment, the ability to apply it in the, not just the big situations, but many of the small life situations. They're not stuck in a quandary of confusion. They're just, you know, a slave whose ever opinion is loudest on the internet. But they actually have confidence. And somebody says, oh I want that. The Lord says, pray for love, pray for knowledge, pray for discernment. You'll get all three of them progressively over time. Stay with it. Don't take an easy out. I mean some people say, how should I spend my time this way and that way? I'll go, I said, I can give you some principles, but you need to know for you, because you're the one that's going to answer for you. Well I don't know right now. Well wrestle a little bit. You know the caterpillar in the cocoon. Wrestle a little bit and you'll get wings and fly. Stay with it. But I don't really know what to do with my time and money. Well you got the Holy Spirit. He's the teacher. He's in you. You got an open Bible. Go for it. Start talking to it. Just tell me, what am I supposed to do? No, no, no, no, no, no. You got an open Bible and you got the indwelling Spirit. Talk to him. Wrestle. You'll get wings like that caterpillar and you'll fly like the butterfly. Stay with it. Well he says in, let's go down to paragraph E. Paul says, well here's what happens in verse 10. You get abounding love, growing knowledge of the truth of salvation truths, and you get growing spiritual discernment. It's all progressive. Paragraph E, you'll be able to approve the things that God calls excellent. You'll be able to recognize them. You'll have confidence and clarity. You won't be to quandary all the time about what to do and where to stand. You won't be a slave of whatever opinion is the loudest and the boldest on the internet. You can actually know by the Spirit in your own heart with an open Bible. He says the things that God calls excellent, the things that are best, God's best for your life. Beloved, I want more than my name in the Lamb's Book of Life. I want to live and have him say well done on that day. I mean we're all racing towards that glorious great appointment. I want to bring a testimony of faithfulness in the midst of weakness, but a testimony of keep signing back up to obey him, and that's what you want to do. Now this issue of what God calls excellent, I mean that's the debate. That's at the very center of the storm of debate in the body of Christ. What God calls excellent. What does God want us focusing our time and energy on? What does God want us to have as the as the primary dream of our life? Now the enemy wants us to be confused and deceived and deluded so we embrace wrong things and call them excellent. Because then after 10-20 years of walking with the Lord, we've been walking in that, we stand before the Lord and as Paul the Apostle said, he goes, you can stand before him and your life is wasted. You're saved as though by fire. You have nothing to bring with you. Yes, you have your salvation, but nothing more. That's what the enemy wants. He wants you to embrace things even that the body of Christ will give you a biblical argument for them, but they will dull your spirit and weaken your spiritual life. He wants you to embrace those. That's what the enemy wants. Well, if he can't get you to embrace wrong things and be confused about them, he'll try to get you to make secondary things primary. To say, okay, I can't get you overtly to embrace the wrong things. I'm going to get you consumed and entrenched in secondary things. Paul said, take this prayer. Pray. You'll abound in love. Now, remember the way you abound in love. You know how you abound in love? It's not just enjoying your friends more. You abound in love in the context of pressure and having godly choices for love in pressure. That's how love grows and grows. That's the optimum environment for love to grow. It's not just enjoying people that you enjoy. I like that part of love. I mean, that's fun. And it still takes the Spirit of God, but there's a bigger storyline going on here. I want to prove the things that are excellent. I want to know what God wants me to focus on. I want to know what God says, this isn't what's required. This is what I call excellent. Oh, that's what I want. I want excellence over my life when I stand before the Lord. Not just on the last day, throughout my days. Beloved, he wants us to not just recognize, approve, not just stand for. He wants us to promote what he calls excellence. The problem is, there's stigma with that. I mean, in the body of Christ, you promote wholeheartedness? What it means to actually walk out diligence? Now, it's different for everybody, so exactly what you do and what he does won't be the same. But I mean, the value of diligence, many in the body of Christ know they will cry, foul! Legalism! I mean, legalism is often code word for, I don't want to press in that way. Because if you say legalism, even the stoutest believers will back away. Not legalism! The L word! I'm sorry! And they'll bow down and back away from everything. Beloved, wholeheartedness is our glory. It's our privilege. We want to approve it. We want to promote it. We want to stand for it. We want to stand for what God says is good. Again, all the arguments, they'll use Bible language and, like I said, salt it with all kinds of Bible verses, but they're out of context. And there's a hundred versions of that. I'm not thinking of this camp or that camp. There's so many camps. The devil's very crafty. There's many different camps and diversions and distortions out there. You got the indwelling spirit. You got an open Bible. You got fellowship with believers of like mind. Let's go after this thing together in our fellowship with the body of Christ. I mean, around the world, there's wholehearted believers all over the earth. And we can learn from each other and go hard. But when we stand for truth, we need to be bold. We need to be clear. But we need to be tender. Because bold doesn't mean you're in their face, pointing your finger, raising your voice. Bold doesn't mean obnoxious or rude. You can be bold, but tender and be clear. I want us as a spiritual family to be bold, clear, and tender about what God calls excellent, and to not be apologetic about it at all. I have here in the end of paragraph E. You know, the studies tell us that the Millennials, you know, the under 30 crowd, they'll tell you, I mean, real bold, many studies, they say, the Millennials, they're different. You know, this last 20 years is different. And it actually is. So, I mean, it's actually, there's accuracy in it. Although there's some stereotypes that, you know, that some debate one way or the other. But the Millennials, they're different than every other generation. They determine truth based on what they feel. If they feel it, and their friends feel it, it is now truth. That's how Millennials determine truth. They don't get truth from the Word of God, they get truth from their feelings, and by the affirmation of their friends that have the same feelings. And it bolsters them to now determine that's truth. They follow their feelings, not the Word of God. But I got good news for you. God is raising up a mighty army of Millennials across the earth that are more loyal to the Word of God than the feelings of their entire generation. They're more loyal to Jesus and what He says as the one who is love than what all the voices in the culture say that are against Jesus. They say, you can't be too strong with the Millennials about absolutes. They don't like absolutes. Well, they love Jesus, and Jesus is absolute about many, many things. And I said, I think the Holy Spirit is going to surprise a whole lot of the social scientists in the nations when He raises up a whole army across the nations that love Jesus more than that trend of this generation. Beloved, determine which one you're going to be. Don't draw back from the stigma of wholeheartedness. And it is a stigma in the church and outside the church. Well, let's go ahead and turn to page two. Turn to page two. Well, I have the verse written again, so you can look at it again. Paragraph F, for this I pray, that your love will abound. Then he goes on in verse 10. He goes, that you will prove the things that God calls excellent, more than what God requires, what God really rejoices in. The fog is lifted. You're not caught in the fog of the confusion of what's right or wrong. You get it. You get it. Now he goes on, he says, so that you may be sincere and without offense, as you are preparing your life for that great day, the day of Christ. And the day of Christ for you is the time after this life when you stand before Him. Now, historically and eschatologically, which is a big word for means in times, historically and eschatologically, the day of the Lord is when the Lord appears in the sky. But for an individual believer, in Paul's day, the day of Christ was the day their natural life was over on the earth and they stood before the Lord. That's the culmination of it. And Paul says, here's the goal. In your years of walking with the Lord, you want to have cultivated sincerity in a life without any offense. And you want to stick with it, not just for a summer, not just for a semester, not for three years, you know, when you were with a certain group of people. You want to stick with it all the way to the end of your life, not just one season in Bible school. Tell the day when you meet Him. All the way to the end is the idea. Now notice these two phrases, that you would be sincere and without offense. Now here's what Paul is saying. Paul is saying, determine in your heart with deep sincerity that you are, your quest is for the truth of what God calls excellent. Meaning, Paul's argument, his point, his premise is this. If you're sincere, I mean you don't care what the answer is. You want to know what the Bible says and the Holy Spirit says. You're not trying to win an argument. You're not predisposed to validate a compromised lifestyle. You really want to know the real answer, Paul says, if you cultivate that sincerity. He says, that will be your gift. That will be your safety. Because there's another group of people that have a predisposed heart, not a sincere heart. They're looking for Bible verses to validate and affirm things that are in compromise, for various reasons. Paul says, but if you will establish that you sincerely want the truth, you'll find the truth easily. If you're predisposed to look for your own argument, you can find that easily. You can find error and back it up easily by Bible verses out of context. You can find either argument very easily. Paul says, make sure. You're not predisposed to try to prop up a little immorality, a little compromise, and you know, get salted with a little Bible language, and just get a popular following on the internet. Make sure there's sincerity you've cultivated, and you'll be safe. It will be your glory. Then he goes on, and he says that when you stand before the Lord, you want a lifestyle over years where you walked free from being entrenched in offense. The enemy wants you offended. The enemy will do anything to get you offended, because if you get offended, then you can't grow in the Spirit. If you get offended, your whole internal conversation changes. Instead of being focused on abounding in love with godly responses, you're focused on managing your own popularity, and profile, and reputation, and agenda, and who did it, and how you're gonna pay them back, and how you're gonna squeeze around the corner, and manipulate something. The whole internal conversation shifts if you get offended. The enemy wants you offended. Number one, he wants you to live in a way where you disregard the Holy Spirit's leadership, and he lives quench, that you're actually offending the Holy Spirit as your lifestyle. That's the most dramatic. He can't get you there. He'll try to get you offended at God's leadership. He wants you offended at Jesus's leadership by what Jesus did in your life, or what he didn't do. Why didn't you heal that friend and family member? Why didn't you give me the breakthrough? Why didn't I get the appointment of the position that I believed you promised me? The enemy wants you offended at Jesus. Well, the enemy wants you offended at people, believers and unbelievers, family members and not family members. He wants you offended. He wants you offended at yourself. That's called condemnation. To just stay in offense at yourself. If you stay offended, you don't grow. And if you don't grow, that's what the enemy wants. He wants to shut you down with offense. Paul says, verse 9, abound in love. Grow in knowledge of the truth of the Word of God. Grow in spiritual discernment, how to apply it. He says, have a sincere cultivate a, I mean, a real honest heart of sincerity to really know what God, the Holy Spirit wants. And God, and the written Word says, and then reject and resist offense as it merge, as it swells up in your heart. Resist it and grow in love instead. He goes on to say, paragraph G, well now let's go to, let's go to paragraph 2 under F. I love this verse. Just for one moment. Paragraph 2 under paragraph F here. Matthew 5, verse 19. Jesus makes one of the most dramatic statements here. Whoever breaks one of the least of these commandments and teaches men to do so, to break them, he'll be called least of the kingdom. But, if he does the commands and teaches others, he'll be called great in the kingdom. Now, notice both groups are in the kingdom. He's talking to Bible-believing Bible teachers, or not necessarily Bible teachers, because he didn't think in one category. He's talking to believers who talk to other people about the Bible. He says, one group of guys, they look at the command of God. They find out ways to dismiss them. They dismiss them, but they're not content to dismiss them. They want to get other people bolstered in their confidence, so they dismiss them too. The Lord says, that man will be in the kingdom. He doesn't lose his salvation, but he will be called least in the kingdom. Someone says, what does that mean? I said, that means that you're called least in the kingdom. That's in the resurrection. There's the greatest and the least, literally in the family of God. Now, the other guy, he does the commandments, and he doesn't do them perfectly. But, when he fails, he signs back up. When he fails, he signs back up. When he sins, he calls it sin. And, beloved, you know biblical confession. I've said this a number of times. Biblical confession requires the renouncing of the sin, not just the admitting of the sin. The admitting is important, the verbalizing, but the declaring war against that character trait, or that activity, is part of biblical confession. So, he's talking about the man or woman who does it and teaches. Now, I love the word whosoever. This could be a man, let's make it, let's make the most ridiculous extreme example you can. Here's a guy. He has no giftings whatsoever. He has no Bible training, no education, no money, no friends, no influence, no anything. He's still a whosoever, though. And, he, in the secrecy of his little lonely life, is trying to obey the Sermon on the Mount. He's trying to bless his enemies. He's trying to seek purity and hunger for righteousness. And then, he only influences two people in his whole life, but both of them. He's trying to convince them to obey. When that man stands before the Lord, that hypothetical disaster lifestyle, I mean, in the natural, that man stands no money, no gifting, no influence, no friends, no anything. But, he did that, the Lord will say, your life was great in my sight. Your life choices were great. No one ever knew you. You had no opportunity. But, in my eyes, he will pronounce with his mouth, your life choices were great in my esteem. Beloved, the whosoever, this is powerful. This isn't about famous teachers in the body of Christ, or worship leaders, or prophets. This is a whosoever gets this one. Well, paragraph G, let's bring this to an end. Paragraph G, Paul goes on to say, when you approve these things are excellent, and you have a sincere heart response, you've cultivated a sincere heart response, and you've resisted offense. He goes, what happens, progressively, paragraph G, your life is increasingly filled with the fruits of righteousness. The idea of fruit means it's being outwardly displayed. It's, it's, it's evident in your life. Now, the word righteousness, I'm just going to end with this point. The word righteousness is one of the most politically incorrect words in the body of Christ today. The body of Christ will talk about love, but we don't really want to talk about the fear of God or righteousness, because that gets a little more intense. That's a little bit more demanding. But, you do know, righteousness and love are identical. They are exactly the same subject. Holiness, love, humility, righteousness is all different facets of one diamond. They're, they're not separate realities. You can, you can break them down to define them, but it's one reality. God wants us filled with righteousness. That doesn't mean we don't have weakness and failure. Beloved, today, I mean, there is such an allowance and a tolerance of unrighteousness in the body of Christ today, and there's a tolerance and allowance of, of errors and deceptions under the banner of the grace of God, and under the banner of Christian language. Today, there's, I mean, there is just widespread immorality in the body of Christ. Widespread. I mean, it's, it's, it's widespread amongst the prayer movement. It's widespread among the church. I mean, the worship movement. It's all over the body of Christ. And one reason it's widespread because, of course, the culture, the whole media is just filling, dumping, just filth and perversion on the culture. But the absence of the voice for righteousness in the church worldwide. I mean, there are thousands of groups that are being faithful, but thousands of groups that are not being faithful. And I don't know the numbers. There's several million churches. I don't, I wouldn't have a chance of any knowledge of the numbers of who is and who isn't. But God has His men and women that are faithful all over the earth. Beloved, we need to take a stand against unrighteousness in our personal lives. I don't mean a mean- spirited Pharisee stand. Beloved, righteousness is our glory. Righteousness is our liberty. This isn't just the gift of righteousness. This is a lifestyle of righteousness in a weak and broken person that's progressively increasing. Yes, it comes out of the gift of righteousness. Pornography that is so widespread in the church. Beloved, we understand pornography is immorality. Right? We understand that is grievous to the Holy Spirit. It's not like, well, you know, boys will be boys. I don't do it much. Not, that is immorality. That's like, that will defile your spiritual life. It will be impossible to grow in the things of the Holy Spirit, dabbling in pornography. I mean, you can still be saved, but you can't go forward. You can't experience the liberty of love and the glory of what God has for you, even in this age. All sexual activity outside of the covenant marriage, the covenant union of the marriage of one man and one woman, all of it is immorality. That is our liberty. That is our safety to take a hold of that. You know, I talked to the couple. They said, well, we're getting married, you know, next spring, next fall, whatever. We're kind of crossing the lines a little bit now, and I said, why? I mean, I get why. I mean, that's not the real question, but my point being, I say, but you know what? Why do you want to go to your wedding day with six months of compromise leading up to the most glorious day of your life, your wedding day? Why not go to your wedding day having fought for righteousness? Because it is unrighteousness what you're doing together, though you're going to get married. It is sin. You know, sin. Oh, absolutely, yeah. I mean, he loves you, but your life is being defiled. Why not take the testimony as that we contended for the lordship of Jesus those last three months? Let's take that into our marriage, and let's begin that way. Another thing, of course, in the internet age, and I'm not talking about the last couple months. I'm talking about the last ten years. There is such a liberty, I mean, a wicked liberty of slandering one another through the internet and the Facebook, the way that people cruelly violate the Word of God one to another. I mean, family members, friends, and again, I'm talking about something far bigger than anything in our little world in the last short amount of time, but immorality, and the way people talk to each other because they're far away that's on Facebook, and because everyone else is doing it, quote-unquote, the Holy Spirit says, I have nothing to do with this. Nothing. I will have none of this in my house. Someone says, hey, you got to do this and do that. I go, I want the Lord's leadership in my life, and the issue of finances. Well, we're just cheating a little here, a little there. I just sort of cheating. No, we don't want to do that. Well, I'm, you know, have these negative emotions that I'm sharing with people against people. No, we don't want to do that either. We want to do this thing in abounding love, and in that day, I tell you, the greatest day of your life, the most generous man you will ever stand before, he will pay you so greatly for doing so little. And what I mean is, the simplest movements of our heart, the giving of a cup of cold water, he is so generous. He says, surely I will reward you for loving me and showing love, even in those simple ways. Because his rewards are not payback. I just used that term just as tongue-in-cheek. His rewards are him expressing how he feels about the way we loved him in this age. That's what eternal rewards are. He's saying, this is how I feel about you giving that cup of cold water. Here, take this. We go, wow, you were really moved by that. He goes, oh, I'm really rich. I'm really generous, and I got a great memory. I saw every single one of them. Here you go. Well, beloved, this is the kind of community we want to be a part of. I'm going to be a part of a people that have a sense of belonging together, but in context to biblical discipleship. We're going all out for Jesus. We're in our weakness. We have confidence that in our weakness, He'll give us a new beginning every day, but we're fiercely contending against the things that are outside of His leadership. Amen and amen. Let's stand. I want us just across the room, just as the worship team's coming, I just want to lead you in a prayer for 90 seconds. I just want to pray this prayer over you, and I want to encourage you to pray this for your spouse, your children, your siblings, just everyone. This is a great prayer, but let's just go before the Lord for our own life and our own family right now for a moment. Then I'm going to invite anybody that wants to come forward to receive prayer related to the prayer, or you need healing in your body, or you have a life circumstance, you want someone to just stand with you in prayer. But Father, here we come in the name of Jesus. I ask you, God, we abound in love. I want to abound in the knowledge of your love for me. I want to feel it. I want to abound in love for your Son. I want to love Him as the first commandment. I want to love people, the people who like me, the people who don't. I want to love people. I want to respond in love. Father, I ask you that I would grow in knowledge. Give me living understanding of your Word, particularly your heart. Lord, give me spiritual discernment. Let me know how to apply it today, throughout the afternoon, tomorrow. Give me discernment. God, I ask you that I would be able to approve, to recognize and promote the things that you call excellent. Lord, that I would cultivate a sincere heart response. That I would not camp down in offense. I would resist offense at every level. That I'd be filled with the fruits of righteousness. That come through your gift of righteousness and the activity of your Spirit, that I would participate in the praise of the glory of God. That I would reflect in part the glory of your Father through my responses to you. And we ask that on that final day, Lord, that you would say, well done, good and faithful. That is my prayer, Lord, for me. That's my prayer for this body. That's my prayer, Lord, for other ministries in this city. That's my prayer for my enemies and my critics. That's my prayer for ministries all over the earth. God, that's what we ask for. For my grandchildren, for my sisters, for my in-laws, for my mother-in-law. Lord, I ask you for these things for them and their families. Any of you that would like prayer, according to this or for any other subject, for healing, anything, just go ahead and come on down. The worship team is going to lead us. Oh, we love your leadership, Jesus. We love your leadership. Again, we need about a 50th of you from around the room, all over the room, to come down and pray for folks. If you're a local or a visitor and you love Jesus, you're welcome to come pray for folks. Lord, we want to abound in love. Lord, release your glory right now in this room. Release your power. Lord, I ask you for your manifest glory. Release your fire and your power in this room we ask. Lord, I ask you for a seal of righteousness. Release abounding love in this family, Lord. Release your glory. I ask you for physical healing in this room right now. Let your spirit, Lord, feel for righteousness, Lord. And for you, for the things that are excellent. Lord, unleash it still without offense. Lord, we ask that we're going to abound in love. Let us feel and let our hearts overflow. Let our hearts overflow with love, abound in love. With all the Germany. We ask you for mercy, Lord. Seal for your righteousness.