In this sermon, the preacher emphasizes the importance of understanding and seeking God. He refers to Psalm 14:2, where it is stated that the Lord looks down from heaven to see if there are any who understand and seek Him. The preacher then uses the story of the woman at the well in John 4 as an example of how understanding and seeking God can lead to life transformation and the ability to impact others for Christ. He also mentions another illustration in John 8, highlighting the need to understand how to set people free and bring them to Jesus. The sermon concludes with a challenge to examine one's own heart and cultivate the spirit of understanding in order to minister effectively to those around us.

Hast thou not known? Hast thou not heard? That the everlasting God, the Lord, the Creator of the ends of the earth fainteth not, neither is weary. There's no searching of his understanding. He giveth power to the faint, and to them that have no might he increases strength. Even the youth shall faint and be weary, and the young men shall utterly fall. But they that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength. They shall mount up with wings as eagles. They shall run and not be weary, and they shall walk and not faint. Heavenly Father, we bow before you this morning, confessing with David that we're poor and needy. As Paul said, though I be nothing, you are everything. Father, we thank you that you've revealed us, to us, yourself in the Lord Jesus Christ. He that's seen the Father, the Lord Jesus told us, he that's seen me has seen the Father. Thank you, Father, for revealing to us. We ask that the Holy Spirit would open up the eyes of our understanding this morning, that we could understand what you want us to know. Father, I yield myself to you. Thank you, Lord. We thank you that you're going to work. We thank you that you are working. Thank you that I could be here today. We praise you in Jesus' name. Amen. Well, I'm glad to be here with you live. As you know, I try to get down here sometimes, and I just can't make it. I've been really busy the last few weeks in the church that I'm in. We've been waiting for two years for God to do the things that he's doing now. We've been working and praying, and it's really sort of exciting to see some things develop that you've been waiting a long time for. Waiting's not one of the virtues of the flesh, you know. We have to do that in the Spirit. And when we don't wait on the Lord, many times we get ahead of him, and we mess things up. But when we wait, it's really good to see the fruit. We're in a farming country, and the farmer has to patiently wait for that harvest. And then at the right time, he goes out after the harvest. You don't get it too soon, and you don't get it too late, or things happen. I have really been having a good time. Wherever I go, I try to have a good time. And last couple weeks ago, I was down in Colorado, and had a wonderful opportunity to spend a little time with Major Ian Thomas at a small Bible college that he has up there at Estes Park. And it was really interesting for me and the two other preachers that went with me, the two other pastors that I work with. We went there, and we observed the students, and it was really interesting. You had from one gamut, those that would fall asleep, to those that were just hanging on the edge of their seat as this man of God explained the cross to us. And it was really intriguing for us to have this old godly man open up the scriptures to us. We just went away there, thrilled that God would let us even receive from him, the Lord Jesus Christ, what he had to show us. It was, what I was talking about here, those, so many times we get into situations and places, and we don't understand what God is doing. As I'm sure many of those students did not understand the nature of God revealing himself to them that morning through Major Ian Thomas. Many times we are not aware of what's going on around us, and many times our perception, our mental perception is not accurate. So I want to talk with you this morning about understanding. We need wisdom. I've been going through the book of Proverbs the last few weeks in the area of understanding. I took the whole month of February, and in the mornings I'd go through the book of Proverbs with my children. We would get up in the morning and have what we call a wisdom search, searching from God's word for wisdom. And so we took the subject of understanding. I don't think I'll have time this morning to share with you what God has revealed to us in the book of Proverbs, but I have some things I want to share with you about understanding. You know, our mental perception of things and the way they are in reality is not always accurate. And I had this illustrated to me about three weeks ago when I took my kids up into the Black Hills to go skiing. We met up there about 300 other homeschoolers, and we went skiing. Now, it was really interesting to me to be there because, see, I'd gone skiing before. I was experienced. In my mind, I was experienced because I'd gone skiing about 20 years ago out in Colorado. So here we go, and they're going to teach everybody how to ski, and you're supposed to get in line, all these little kids lining up and everything to learn how. And I'm just sort of drifting along thinking that I know how to ski because I've skied before. But let me tell you something. What I had experienced 20 years ago and what was in my mind was not in my body. I found out, and after a little bit of flopping around and stuff, I went back and got in line with the kids, humbling for me. Oh, it was good, but I wanted it after I found out that my body did not cooperate with my mind, and my body had to be retrained. My understanding was not accurate. Now, I want to talk to you today about something that's very, very important, and that is that we would have the right mental perception of what's going on around us. This only comes as we are enabled by the Holy Spirit to understand. Ephesians 5.17, God has told us, Wherefore be ye not unwise, but understanding what the will of the Lord is. And how is that done? Well, the next verse, he tells us, to be filled with the Spirit. You know, sometimes it's very difficult to know the will of the Lord for your life. We have to pray and be discerning and seek God. It's very difficult sometimes to know exactly what God wants us to do, because we're in a spiritual world, we're in a spiritual warfare, and there are forces of evil that will try to get us off track from the will of God. So it's difficult to know the will of the Lord for your life. But let me tell you this. It is dangerous and extremely difficult to try to know the will of the Lord for other people's lives. And if we're not careful, we'll move into the area of playing Holy Spirit over other people's lives. I'm just giving that to you, a caution that's been passed on to me, that by experience I've learned that is true. We have to be careful in knowing and understanding the will of God for other people's lives. Now, there's one who does understand. There's one who does understand all things. He has all knowledge, and he is always aware of what's going on. And, of course, this is God. Let me share with you something about the Lord Jesus Christ. I'm going to be reading some verses to you, quite a few verses this morning. In Isaiah 11, verses 1 through 5, there's a tremendous passage on the description of the Lord Jesus Christ. And I want to read this to you, and if you can follow along in your Bibles, fine. I'm glad to be here with you, by the way. Today we're live, and I'll be in the area this morning sharing with some folks. If you'd like to talk with me afterwards, then you give a call. I'll be around here. As long as the phone rings, I'll stay around. And, by the way, they've changed the box number. It's box 211. Box 211. So you put that on your correspondence. Change that. I'm having to do that on mine when I'm mailing my tapes, when I can't make it here. Box 211 instead of 1100 here at the radio station. Now, do you have Isaiah chapter 11? Verse 1. And there shall come forth a rod out of the stem of Jesse, and a branch shall grow out of his roots. This is referring to the Lord Jesus Christ. And the Spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him, the Spirit of wisdom and understanding, the Spirit of counsel and might, the Spirit of knowledge and of the fear of the Lord, and shall make him of quick understanding in the fear of the Lord. He shall not judge after the sight of his eyes. Now, note that part very carefully. He shall not judge after the sight of his eyes, neither reprove after the hearing of his ears. But with righteousness shall he judge the poor, and reprove with equity for the meek of the earth. And he shall smite the earth with the rod of his mouth, and with the breath of his lips shall he slay the wicked. And righteousness shall be the girdle of his lines, and faithfulness the girdle of his reins. Now, the point I want you to note is that he will not judge after the sight of his eyes, neither reprove after the hearing of his ears. If we are not careful, we do things in the flesh. And that is always destructive. All the way from Adam and Eve in the garden, when they made a decision in the flesh, all the way up to today. It's always destructive. So I say it's easy for us to see another man's fault according to the sight and according to our ears. But it takes much wisdom and understanding to know how to reach out and set that person free. You know, the Bible says in Matthew 7, verses 1 through 5, that we have to have our own act cleaned up. We have to have the beam out of our own eye before we can see clearly how to take the splinter out of our brother's eye. One of the things that's mentioned is that we can see clearly. He said, Why beholdest thou the mote that is in thy brother's eye? But considerest not the beam that is in thine own eye? Or how wilt thou say to thy brother, Let me pull out the mote out of thine eye? And behold, a beam is in thine own eye. Thou hypocrite, first cast out the beam out of thine own eye, and then shalt thou see clearly to cast out the mote out of thy brother's eye. You know, we don't understand sometimes how deadly pride is and how much pride blinds our eyes to our own needs. We're aware of all these people around us. We're aware of their fallings and their shortcomings and their inadequacies and their mistakes and their false doctrine. But we don't see ourself. When we see ourself, we will move into the mode of being a humble person. A humble person is one who recognizes that he is needy continually before God. He is needy. So it's a warning to us from God to be very careful in trying to minister to others. Remember the woman at the well? The Lord Jesus had perfect perception of her where she was. He knew that she was a sinner, but he also knew that she was a seeker. And he took her through these sequences of questions to draw her out so that he could minister to us. I want to take you through some things today with as much time as we have in the area of understanding. First of all, I want to read to you a verse back over in Psalms, chapter 14 and verse 2. Listen. It says, Would you do me a favor right now? Would you pray with me? Father, I just pray that you would give us understanding. We seek you. We ask that you would teach us. Lord, I pray that we would open up our hearts to you. That you would be able to teach us this morning something about ourselves that maybe we don't see. I pray that you would give us wisdom to understand how to know to minister to others. That the Spirit of the Lord would rest upon us like it did the Lord Jesus Christ. In his name we pray. Now, over in Mark, chapter 12, I'm going to take you through several scriptures. I'm going to give you this verse for, I'm going to give you a little bit of introduction here. Then I want to share with you three things, three or four things about understanding. But in Mark, chapter 12, you remember the scribes came to Jesus. And this one scribe was asking the Lord about, let's see if I can get over here to Mark, chapter 12. You might beat me there. Mark, chapter 12. I didn't have this one marked, but it's in verse 28. It says one of the scribes came to him and they had been reasoning together. And it says he's perceiving that he had answered them well. This one scribe was sharp. He was sharp. He was noticing things. And he perceived that the Lord had answered them well. Then he came to him and he said, which is the first of all the commandments? Which is the first commandment of all? And the Lord Jesus, you know how he answered him. The first commandment is, Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God is one Lord. Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, with all thy soul. And listen, and with all thy mind. Now, what is the mind? You do some studying on the mind. You do that on your own. And with all thy strength. In the first commandment, the second is like this. Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. Then the scribe came back and answered the Lord. In verse 32, the scribe said unto him, Well, master, thou hast said the truth. For there is one God and there is none other but he. But to love him with all the heart and with all the understanding. And with all the soul and with all the strength. And the Lord didn't correct him. And these are two different words in the Greek. And I don't have time to go into it right now. But this scribe was sharp. He was aware of what was going on around him. And this is what the Spirit of God will do. It will make you sharp and aware. He was aware of the Lord Jesus Christ and what he was doing and saying. And so he had some perception. He was moving into the area of understanding. And when the Lord got through with him, you know what he said? He said, Thou art not far from the kingdom of God. He didn't say you've now entered into the kingdom of God. But he said you're not far. Let me say this to you. Many of us are not far from the kingdom of God. But you have not entered in. And one of the things I see so much around us in the churches today is there's so many. Especially our young people now. They're not far from the kingdom of God. They've been brought up in the church. We've sang the songs. They've heard the gospel. But the kingdom of God has never entered into their heart. You know what Romans said? I just thought of this verse about the kingdom of God. It's righteousness. One of the characteristics of righteousness, of the kingdom of God, is righteousness and peace. If you know the Lord, really know him, then you will have a characteristic in your life of righteousness. You are wanting to be righteous. You're striving to be righteous and holy. And when anyone points out something to you that you realize is not right in your life and they realize it, you receive it gratefully. Because you want to be like the Lord Jesus Christ. But many of us are not far from the kingdom of God. But we've never entered in because the spirit of God has never moved into our lives to bring us to the point where we're born again. Born by the spirit of God. We have so much knowledge. We think that our knowledge is the same as the real thing. But no, it's not. Knowing about God. Knowing about eternal life. Knowing about Christ dying on the cross for your sins. Knowing that he rose again from the dead. Knowing that you must be filled with the spirit. Knowing all these things does not mean that you have it in your life. And this is why the Lord said, many will say to him, we've done all these things. And he said, depart from me because I know you not. You see, one of the things that we have believed is that eternal life is just receiving Christ as your Savior and you get to go to heaven. That is not true. Heaven is a side benefit. The main thing is being brought back into a relationship with God through the Lord Jesus Christ. Eternal life is knowing God personally. It's a personal relationship where he moves into your life and he becomes your life. That is eternal life. Heaven is just a side benefit of that. Many of us, we've prayed so that we can go to heaven. If that's your motive for praying, you're not going to get it. Your motive of praying is you're broken because of your sin. You realize that you are lost, that there's something wrong, that you're not in right relationship with your God. And you come to a point of being repentant. And then you receive Christ as your life. But as many as received him, to them he gave the right to become the sons of God. You become a son of God. It's a relationship. And heaven is just the side benefit of it. I'm going to share some things later on with that with the folks this morning. Now, let me get back. I'm not going to get very far. I can see already. I hadn't even got out of my introduction here. But let me take you over to Ephesians. After I finish up next week, maybe. These preachers were always long-winded. I shared this the other night at my house. Well, I didn't share this, but I shared the stuff I must be sharing with the folks this morning. And it's like an airplane pilot that's a little bit nervous about the field. He'll keep circling the field several times before he gets down. And we were laughing about how many times I circled the field and had one more verse to share. One more verse to share. We'd been having a birthday party at the house. And before I'd known, I was just going to share a couple of things. And I'd gone a half hour with the folks. And I was sharing things about Christ. I'm going to be sharing that this morning with the folks where I'll be meeting at the church. And if we get to talking about Christ, the Lord Jesus, the hours can just fly away. Think about it. For all eternity, we're going to be involved with the Lord Jesus Christ. What a thrilling thing. Now, let me share this with you. Ephesians 1, 17 through 20. Paul was very concerned. If you notice in his epistles how much he was concerned that they would understand. In Colossians 1, 9, he prayed that they'd have knowledge of his will and all wisdom and understanding. Ephesians 1, 17, he said that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give unto you the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of him. The eyes of your understanding being enlightened that you may know what is the hope of his calling and what the riches of his glory of his inheritance in the saints. And what is the exceeding greatness of his power to us who believe according to the working of his mighty power, which he wrought in Christ when he raised him from the dead and set him on his right hand in the heavenly places. He wants us to know. He wants us to know him. I had a verse I found when I was reading over in Jeremiah. If I could find this without too much trouble. I don't know if I can or not. Jeremiah 9 and verse 24. Thought I had it marked, but I don't. Let me share this with you though. God says this. Let me share verse 23 also with you. God says this. Thus saith the Lord, let not the wise man glory in his wisdom, neither let the mighty man glory in his might, let not the rich man glory in his riches, but let him that glorieth glory in this, that he understandeth and knoweth me, that I am the Lord which exerciseth lovingkindness, judgment, and righteousness in the earth. For in these things I delight, saith the Lord. Do you understand and know God? One of the things that God has shown me, that the more I come to understand him and knoweth him, the more gentle I will be with people. Let me share with you some things. I have three things, and I don't know how many of these things I'll get out. May not even get out of the first one. But three things about understanding. First of all, we need to understand what those around us need. The second one is, in case I don't get to it today, is we need to understand how to minister to those around us. And then the third thing is we need to understand who to minister to. But first of all, we need to understand what those people around us need. Now, you remember the woman at the well? When Jesus came along, he understood what this woman needed. Have you grown in such a relationship with the Lord that when you come into a room of people, and you're fellowshipping with the Lord, you're in the Spirit, you're abiding in the Lord Jesus Christ, you're talking with him, you're praying without ceasing, the Spirit of God will give you understanding of those people around you. He will give you understanding of what they need. Like this woman at the well, the Lord Jesus had to go there. You know, the Scripture says he must need to go through Samaria. He knew what she needed. So he made some appeals. This is one thing God is trying to teach me right now, is to learn how to ask questions. Because I'm sort of sometimes just sort of blunt, and I'll just come out and say what I think somebody needs. And it's a lot more gentler and kinder and wiser for me to ask them a few questions. And this is one of the giftings of an exhorter. He knows how to ask the right questions. My friend Wes, who was down here with me almost two months ago, and I wanted you to get to visit with Wes on the radio, but it just didn't work out. He's an exhorter. He listens. The Spirit of God talks to him, and so when he sees some things, he comes around and just asks some questions. And they just sort of rip you apart as you see that, boy, he's been listening. And he knows what's going on. And then you have a little revival as you confess your sin, and you're brought back in relationship. You know, the body is to minister one to another. And once we move out of the mode of not ministering one to another, we miss out on having a healthy body. If just one member of the body does all the ministering, we miss out on the other parts of the body. And we've sort of missed this today in the church. Somehow or another, we've gone away from the body ministering one to another, and we get into this mode where one part of the body ministers his gift, and we get sort of lopsided. And what happens when you get off-center? Different parts of the body get slung off when you get out of balance. Balance is very crucial in a body. You know how medically the body needs to be balanced physically. It's a very intricate, delicate thing. The body is very strong and very tough. But if you get it off balance, and many of you listening, and myself also, when we have health problems, we know how vital it is. Well, the Lord Jesus Christ knew how to bring people back into balance. Because of the Spirit of God, He was anointed with the Spirit. When this woman came to Him, He made some appeals to her. He said, give me to drink. He made an appeal to her kindness. And then He moved on through, and He made an appeal to her curiosity. He said, if thou knewest, He said, if you knew the gift of God and who it is that said to thee, give me to drink, thou wouldest ask of Him, and He would have given thee living water. In the wisdom that the Spirit of God had filled him with, He knew how to ask these questions. He made an appeal to her desire. And Jesus answered and said in verse 13, Whosoever drinketh of this water, you'll be thirsty again. But if you drink of the water that I'll give you, you'll never thirst. He was making appeals to her. The Spirit of God will give you understanding to know how to appeal to people. He made an appeal to her moral condition. Because He confronted her, He moved her on, step by step by step. He said, go call your husband. When she wanted that water, He moved now to the point, He said, the woman said, give me this water. And Jesus said, go call your husband and come here. Well, now He's making an appeal to her moral condition. Are you willing, woman, to face up to your moral condition? Before you can receive eternal life, you must come to the point where you realize that you are in sin. That you are a sinner. You see, many times we get people to pray and receive Christ before we bring them to the point to see how they need Christ as their Savior. Well, I need to be closing down. See, I'm not even getting anywhere close to the end on this thing. You can laugh, I'm laughing in my spirit. The Lord is good. He is so good. We love the Lord. We praise Him. Let me take you over to another one. We've got a few minutes left. And by the way, you go get into John 4 and you see how it turned out. How this woman was brought by the wisdom and the understanding of Christ to a point to where she was changed. And then when she was changed, her life changed others. That's one of the clues where you can tell that somebody has really met Christ. Their life makes an impact on others' lives. If you think you're a Christian and you've been born again, but yet you are not impacting other people for Jesus Christ, you're not talking about Jesus Christ to other people, then you've got a problem. You're either really sick spiritually or you've never really been born again. Over in John chapter 8, another illustration of this, of needing to understand what those around us need. Remember when the scribes and the Pharisees, they brought this woman that was taken in adultery. They brought this woman and laid her out before the Lord Jesus Christ. The Lord understood what was going on. He understood that this woman needed forgiveness. The scribes and the Pharisees, they couldn't give this woman forgiveness. You know why? It's because they were proud. Let me say something to you about the proud man. The proud man puts others down so that he will look good. And we can know a lot of Scripture. We can be very knowledgeable. We can be filled with the Spirit. But in one moment, because of this one area in our life, we can move over into the realm of the flesh when we begin to criticize and put other people down. The proud man is very touchy and hard to get close to. Do you understand how to minister to people? The Lord Jesus understood also that these scribes and these Pharisees, they needed to be exposed about their sin. O.J. Vernon McGee, many years ago, I remember him teaching how, when he got down and he wrote in the dirt, he said maybe he was writing their sins out and their affairs that they'd have with women. And they went over and looked at that in the dirt and said, uh-oh, I've got problems. And so the wisest man from the oldest, they begin to peel off. And, oh, I've got an appointment. I've got to get out of here and go away. The Lord Jesus Christ, in His wisdom, knew how to handle that situation. It could have been a touchy, explosive situation. But when He was done, this woman had been brought to the cross and she had been set free. Are you free? Are you free yourself? And do you know how to set other people free? Do you know how to bring people to the Lord Jesus Christ? Has He given you the spirit of understanding? I'm going to have to finish up this message with you next week. Our time's gone. Let me just challenge you, in the last minute or so here, let me just challenge you to examine your heart right now. Quit looking around at other people. Quit looking around at other people. Even when you get into church this morning, don't be looking around at other people, but let the spirit of God speak to your own heart. Let Him have some time in your own heart. Do you really have the spirit that Christ had, the spirit of understanding? That's a tremendous passage. The spirit of the Lord shall rest upon Him. Do you know that the spirit that rested upon Him will be the same spirit that rests upon you? The spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel and might, the spirit of knowledge and of the fear of the Lord. And He shall make Him of quick understanding. The spirit also will make you of quick understanding also. Well, I've got to go. Until next time, remember, the Lord Jesus Christ is all you need, but is He all you want? May God bless you, my friend.