Judging Ourselves Rightly

Lord, thank you that we have a place where we can freely come. Lord, it pleases you to meet with us. Lord, that we would have a desire to know you more and more, that we could grow spiritually and come to know you in a new and living way.

In Jesus' name, Amen. Ephesians chapter 2. Those of us who come to know Jesus or rather be known by him. Ephesians 2 verse 1. And you he made alive who were dead in trespasses and sins.

In which you once walked according to the course of this world. According to the Prince of the power of the air. The spirit who now works in the sons of disobedience.

Among whom also we all once conducted ourselves in the lust of the flesh. Fulfilling the desire of the flesh and of the mind and were by nature children of wrath just as the others. But God who is rich in mercy because of his great love with which he loved us.

Even when we were dead in trespasses made us alive together with Christ by grace. You have been saved and raised us up together and made us sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus. That in the ages to come he might show the exceeding riches of his grace in his kindness toward us in Christ Jesus.

For by grace you have been saved through faith. And that not of yourselves. It is the gift of God not of works lest anyone should boast for we are his workmanship created in Christ Jesus for good works, which Christ prepared beforehand that we should walk in them.

Before the Lord called us before we had an encounter with him before we had a revelation of Jesus Christ before we had our own born-again experience. We by nature were children of wrath. We were living for the flesh.

We were living for self. We got joy out of doing wickedness. We sought to corrupt everything we touched.

It gave us joy to corrupt others. Because we had the spirit of the devil in us. The spirit that works in the son to disobedience.

But then something changed something happened God met with us. We had a revelation of Jesus Christ repentance happened in the inward man brokenness resulted. We knew that we were no good.

We knew that Jesus paid it all all to him. I owe. For by grace you have been saved through faith this not of yourselves.

It wasn't by any good deed. You had done wasn't by any kind of special serving that you did that caused you to earn this kind of mercy. It was grace imputed to you through faith in Christ when he reached out to us in the state that we were in.

When we knew that we were deserving of destruction yet. It just pleased him to take us like a firebrand out of the fire. And to give us an opportunity to serve the Lord.

What love it produced in us for the Lord. What a first love what a desire to know him. What a desire to please him to serve him to give our life for him.

But it can happen that after we begin in the spirit. We forget that we were saved from dead works. We forget that we were saved from our past sins in our past lifestyles and we then begin to come into what some would call Liberty in the spirit, but it's actually Liberty in the flesh.

God gives us all things richly to enjoy happy as the man who doesn't condemn himself and what he approves. But what is not of faith is sin. And just because you can justify yourself the peace of God has to rule in your heart.

And so brothers sisters, we spent enough of our past lifetime living for the lust of the flesh living for the world and the things in it. There's a big difference between God giving you everything richly to enjoy and living for those things. Those are two different universes.

One is a spiritual sense where Jesus is everything. He's your all-in-all and all things are of him and through him and to him. And he gives you all things richly to enjoy.

But we don't live for those things. We used to live for those things and those things didn't bring us lasting joy and peace. They brought us temporary happiness joy and peace, but it left us empty and wanting but when we found the Lord we found something that satisfies.

So we began in the spirit, but you know like men. They gravitate to religion. They seem to love religion because it's a safe comfortable place.

It's a place where we can have a form of godliness outwardly. We can be doing things better than most and what's the result of religion? What's the fruit of it pride, right? We boast in the things that we've done and what do we do just like in the world we compete with the other brothers. How am I doing compared to my brother? I'm doing a little better doing a little better spiritually doing a little better.

Naturally. I doing a little better with my children and do a little better with my material possessions do a little better with my knowledge doing a little better in my preaching doing a little better in my prophesying. It is a deception.

This is religion with religion comes pride self-righteousness, but what the scripture says here by grace. You have been saved through faith this not of yourself. It is a gift from God.

Lest any man should boast so boasting manifests when we judge one another. Let's look at Romans in chapter 14. I understand.

We need to judge fruit that those who are approved. We would know those who are born again and those who are not but when we start to become proud and we start to look down upon. Then we've we've crossed the line.

And we've gone the way of pride and religion becomes very prominent. But with religion, there's all these kinds of manifestations of the flesh. Because the flesh is not crucified in religion and justification is not by our religious works or our Bible reading or our prayers or how good of a person we are or what people in town say about us.

It's what God says about us a justification by faith a believing God and going on your account for righteousness a living by faith that just shall live by their faith a righteousness which comes out of believing God in Romans 14 verse 9 for to this and Christ died and rose and lived again that he might be Lord of both the dead and the living. But why do you judge your brother? Why do you judge your brother? Or why do you show contempt for your brother for we all shall stand before the judgment seat of Christ for it is written as I live says the Lord every knee shall bow to me and every tongue shall confess to God. So then each of us shall give an account of himself to God.

Therefore, let us not judge one another anymore or any longer. But rather resolve this not to put a stumbling block or a cause to fall in your brother's way. We see things in one another.

We think a brother should overcome in a certain area or a sister needs to overcome in a certain area and this and that but yet we ourselves are full of pride in all kinds of other regards that if we would ask a brother a list and you would prepare a list for your brother each one would have more than one page to give to the other and if we're truly honest most of the things would be true. But if we spend our time judging one another and pointing out one another's faults, you're not going to spend any time judging yourself. And if you don't judge yourself, then you're going to have and have lots to answer for when you stand before the Lord.

That's why this word is like a mirror when we look in the perfect law of Liberty the Holy Spirit speaks through his word showing us that this word isn't for uncle John. This word is written from for my instruction and as a body for our instruction. Now if we see a brother sending a sin unto death, we can go and we can exhort that brother and say listen, you're sending a sin unto death.

You're committing sexual sin here or you're doing some other you're lying here and you're doing certain things that lead to death like Ananias and Sapphira did and we can say this you're playing with fire here, but there's a thousand things sins that people are ignorant of even yourself are having them that you don't know and you don't see and so we need to pray for people who are committing sins not unto death. And we need to believe that the Holy Spirit can change people just as he has changed us in some areas for by grace. We are being saved through faith that as we are being sanctified.

The Holy Spirit is giving us light on ourselves. It becomes a lasting work when God does the work. But if I go and I take my scissors and I perform a circumcision on my brother, I'm just going to cause him pain and I could even cause him to stumble but the Holy Spirit through the preaching through the anointed word through exhortation through teaching through prophecy brings conviction then the person can get light on himself and he has or she has to take her own step of faith.

To overcome because if we put our tools on them, then we will make twice the sons of hell. But if the Holy Spirit does the work, it will bring salvation unto them. And it can be the very same thing that a person needs to turn from which we see is not good, but they themselves have justified and we try to help him out a little bit.

We try to help him out a little bit. This is where this kind of division starts to manifest and what happens is we're not walking in love, right? We're just beating one another up. It says no one ever hated his own flesh, right? No one ever hated his own flesh.

So, you know, sometimes we could come to church. We got both our spouses here. We got our family here, right? And we do everything that we can all week to provide for them.

But we don't hate them. We exhort them. Sometimes we say hurtful things, then we have to make it right because we have to live together.

But you know what in a church is very much the same and in the body of Christ is very much the same. We nourish and cherish it. So whatever is done from genuine love, this is what the Lord is looking for.

And when we've been put in trusted into a position of leadership, we have to give an answer or give an account of those who are under us in the church. And so we want to use careful instruction, you know, as Paul says, as a nursing mother with an infant was gentle among you and then there was others where he was. He said, shall I come with a rod or in a spirit of gentleness? You tell me how you want me to exhort you because being gentle is not working here.

And so we need the Holy Spirit to help us lead the Church of God. And you as parents need the Holy Spirit's help to help lead your children. So you don't exasperate them and wear them down by being too hard on them.

How many of you parents remember them being too hard on them? I think I was too hard on my children at different times. I think our parents were a little too hard on us at different times, but you know, they did what they thought best, but you know what the Lord disciplines us. He corrects us.

He exhorts us. He comforts us perfectly, even if sometimes it seems very hard. He knows what's needed to bring us to repentance and bring us back to believing and putting our faith in him.

But if we get bitter and angry at the one who can save us, well, we have problems with the Lord. We have problems with the Lord, but I'm going to say this religion is not a comfortable place to serve Jesus. If you find a comfortable place in religion to serve Jesus when you stand before him, he will say I do not know you.

You have to have genuine saving faith. You can't just be a worshiper some of the time and just live for self the rest of the time. That's religion.

We have to love the Lord with all of our heart soul mind and strength and out of that will have love for others. It is a journey. But we have to grow in faith grow in grace and in the knowledge of Jesus Christ without faith.

It is impossible to please God. Sean and I were talking as we left yesterday or our company together and we were talking about Abram. While Abram was a long ways off still in Mesopotamia when the Lord had called him to leave his father's house to go to a land that God would show him.

Abram had not yet even though he had heard the voice had a conversion experience. He had not yet entered into covenant with Almighty. He had not yet come into the glorious understanding and knowledge of Jesus Christ, but it says he believed God by faith.

And that faith went on to his account for righteousness. And so by faith, he left his father's house by faith. He went to a place.

He did not know where he was going and by faith as he began to go and as he continued to walk and as he persevered through the trials and he got to get light on himself that he sought to save his life when he said his sister his wife was his sister and all these different things and then like brother Dan shared he had to go back from Egypt, you know, sometimes we start in faith and then we end up finding ourselves in Egypt and we thinking that you know, we got a we got another way worked out when we're not hearing from God, but you need to wait on the Lord when we get into dark times. We don't light our own fires and walk in our own light. We have to trust in the Lord and wait on the Lord.

They that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength Abram and that point in time did not wait upon the Lord. He had gone because he had heard that it was good in Egypt faith comes by what by hearing so he had heard that it was going to be far better in Egypt than where he was. So he went to Egypt because he put his faith in what he heard.

We can hear things that are not truth and put our faith in what we hear, you know, all of a sudden I'm sitting at the table at a restaurant. I'm eating I hear some guys talking about a hot tip on a stock and I start to put my ear tunes into their wisdom and I start to put my faith in what I hear and it can lead me to Egypt. I get in with my old friends and they talk about the properties.

They're buying and the developments that they're doing and the apartments and the great things that they're doing and how their their net income is going up while mine is staying the same or going down and I start to tune my ear to their wisdom and I start to put my faith in what I hear but that's not putting your faith in God. We have to put our faith in the word of God, which is Jesus faith comes by hearing and hearing by the word of God genuine saving faith doesn't come by hearing what men say but by hearing what God says Abram repented I believe because when he left there he got his wife back the Lord had mercy on him. He fought for him.

He delivered him out of that bad decision brought him back to that place at Bethel. I believe is where he offered again. He rebuilt that altar again and he offered again sacrifice to the Lord.

He got back on the right track some of us we get out of faith and we start believing other things and we get confused and we start getting comfortable with religion, but religion is not relationship with Jesus. We want to come to hear his voice. We want to come to follow him Abram did hear his voice in the beginning, but you know what? He only made covenant with him in chapter maybe 15 somewhere.

He made covenant with him later on when God put him in a deep sleep and he himself walked through the the pieces of and he made covenant and change his name from Abram to Abraham. He made him a father of many nations and gave him many promises. By faith.

He offered his son Isaac on the altar by faith. He believed that God was a not could not lie and that he would receive his son back from the dead by faith. He became the father of many nations and by faith.

He saw a city far off which has Foundations. Whose builder and maker is God we can come to see these things through the eyes of faith. When you come to see him you come to know him.

Job says I have heard of you with the hearing of the ear, but after he went through many difficult situations with his children passing with his wife speaking against the things of God and with him even confronting God contending with the Lord and getting light on himself. He saw that he was vile that he was a religious man that he had self-righteousness that he was dotting every I and crossing every T doing everything that he knew to be right and he had heard of him with the ear, but he came into glorious relationship with the father and he said now my eyes sees you. Did he see him with a natural? I know.

But he came into a knowing him that Paul speaks about that. He had no revelation of when he was one Saul of Tarsus. Once all of Tarsus he had heard about him.

He had heard about God, but he didn't have any interest in Jesus Christ until he met him on the Damascus Road and he saw a great light. And he heard the voice and that great light blinded him. Some of us we need to have an encounter with the Holy Ghost.

We need to meet Jesus full stop on the way and realize that we've been religious that we thought we were doing God's service and all the while we were serving self serving pride this one Saul of Tarsus according to the law that guy had more Bible memorized than you. He read more scriptures a day than you. He made more prayers a day than you.

He had a testimony among his brethren as being blameless a better testimony than you yet. He was dead in trespasses. But he didn't know anything against himself, but it wasn't justification by faith was justification by works.

And by the works of the law, no flesh will be justified because if you break one point, you're guilty of it all and then he realized the fruit of it was that he hated Jesus. That's what the manifestation was. He hated the anointed one.

He hated those who were the anointed ones. He sought to imprison the anointed ones. He loved to hear other people speak.

He loved to hear Gaiaphas and all these other people speak. He liked to hear the high priest speak. He liked to hear the Pharisees boast and speak.

But when he heard Stephen speak, he hated Stephen. He was consenting to Stephen's death and he had to get light on himself on the Damascus Road when he realized that he was persecuting Jesus. Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me? Who are you Lord? I am Jesus whom you're persecuting Jesus.

And then he was blind. He had to have a dramatic experience where his natural eyesight left him that he could see that he was spiritually blind. He had to see that he was spiritually blind when his natural eyesight was taken from him.

Someone had to lead him by the hand. Unless you've allowed the Lord to take control of your life and lead you by the hand, you've not encountered the living God. The Holy Spirit comes to Ananias and says Ananias, this one Saul, I want you.

He's in such-and-such street called straight. You go put your hands on him and he will receive his sight and pray and the Holy Spirit will come upon him and I have a mighty work for him. Lord, this is a man speaking with Jesus.

Lord, don't you know all the harm this man has done to the believers? Don't you know how much grief this guy's caused the people of God? Don't you know? Of course, Jesus knows. Ananias had to make a decision by faith to be obedient to the call. He had to overcome fear by faith.

We have to overcome our fears through faith. You say, well, if I go this and this might happen to me or you might know this and this will happen to you. But if Jesus calls you to go, you've given your life as a ransom because he's given his life as a ransom for us.

Ananias goes, he finds it just as he said, there was Paul blind who was then Saul. The Lord changed his name there. He went from being this one Saul to becoming this one brother Paul.

Why did his name change? Because his nature so radically changed. Yet he didn't learn more scripture yet. He hadn't prayed more yet.

He hadn't done anything more righteous. Except he had a revelation of Jesus Christ. Everything changes when you have a revelation of Jesus Christ and by faith, he immediately preached the gospel.

He immediately preached Jesus is the Christ immediately. Saul becomes Paul. He preaches the gospel goes back to his brothers who respect him who who he loves and who love him that his comrades is his brother and his countrymen according to the flesh and immediately their heart turns against him because he's preaching the Christ and because Christ is in him.

They hate him. They go from loving him to hating him overnight. Because he's preaching the truth in love and he had to flee in a basket out of the city because they were seeking to kill him.

People can turn from loving you and thinking you're the best guy in all of Abbotsford to hating you overnight. Because you've come to saving faith in Jesus Christ. Woe to you when all men speak well of you when you have such a an impeccable reputation.

All that does is feed your ego and your pride. Do you know Jesus? Rejected indeed by men but chosen by God and precious. The chief cornerstone whom the builders rejected this stone grew into a great mountain and it's glorious in our eyes.

Are you part of the living Christ? Have you become bone of his bone? Are you flesh of his flesh? Have you become one with Christ? It says they are no longer two but one. You know, how do you feel husbands when you come home from work working hard for the family? You found out your wife racked up the visa and put 20 grand on there. She did her own thing and she did what she thought best didn't even ask you about it.

That can produce a lot of strife between the two. But if the two are one then they should we should all you know, have this kind of relationship where we communicate before we take decisions. These these wise choices and great decisions that we we think the Lord's leading us in.

Do you hear from the Lord or do you want the Lord to get happy with your choices? Can you imagine you come home? You just bought a big property and everything and say Lord, you know, I hope you're impressed with what I've all done here. What did you do? Well, I bought it on credit. You know, you're going to pay for it.

You know, you own the cattle on a thousand Hills, right? Then he has to bail us out and make payments for us. Guys. We want to come into that kind of Union with with Christ.

That as we hear we speak Jesus gave us that example that Union. He was in with the father. He never spoke unless he heard as we grow spiritually as we grew up into the head, which is Christ is Christ your head or is he your head sometimes and you do your own thing most of the time and you take decisions the more you grow up spiritually the more you become mature the more you will be slower to speak and quicker to hear quicker to listen.

And your faith will grow and grow and your roots will become deeper and firmly established in the Lord. You know, we quote this thing from first John and Chapter 2 and verse 6 everyone who desires to come after him being Jesus. Must also walk just as Jesus walked.

And most people don't actually believe that something that the Lord is actually asking us to do. They don't believe it's possible. They say it's impossible in this lifetime.

But God is not asking us to do that, which is impossible with his help with man. These things are impossible, but not with God look at the nature of this one song how overnight it changed. How then he had to spend maybe three years in Damascus relearning everything that he already knew.

And apply it to how this relates to Jesus as the Christ. Immediately preaching the good news of Jesus as the Christ when you meet someone is the first thing you think of telling them of how your stocks are doing or telling them the wonderful works that Jesus has done in your life. Guys.

When you first got married and you just newly married and you run into an old friend and you say, oh, hey, did you hear I got married? Oh, who did you marry? Oh, and then you out comes the wallet and the pictures and you want to talk about the one whom you love. I remember like I just could not stop talking about Jesus wherever I went people were getting sick of it. I could not stop talking about Jesus because he did so much for me.

What did he do for you? They say he picked it me up out of the mirey clay out of the mirey muck. He washed me off. He shed his own blood for me.

I thought that I I knew God but I had no clue. He took my burden. He took my shame.

I have peace with God and I'm starting to read things and it's jumping out the page at me and I never understood and I sat in church most of my life. I never knew him. I knew about him, but now I'm starting to see him.

I have heard of you with the ear, but now I see you. Most Job had a revelation. I am vile.

You are holy. Are you holy? And others are more vile than you or are you vile and God is holy. This is the way that we need to look at things when we approach sharing the good news with our brothers.

So when Paul comes to his brothers his countrymen according to the flesh, he has such love for them. He meets them on their level. He doesn't talk down to them.

He doesn't judge them in a bad way. He speaks truth to them in love because he wants to see them saved and even if he could pluck out his eyes, he would do it. Even if he could give his life or go to hell as it says in Romans in chapter 9 he or can rather than he would rather be a curse from Christ if that were possible.

So his brothers could be saved. You have that kind of love for people who are still enemies of the cross of Christ. For the religious people who seem should know better.

But yet Paul himself was exceedingly zealous for things that he did not know and there's a lot of people who are exceedingly zealous regarding things. They do not know and so when Paul says if I'm going to preach I'm not going to profess to know anything among you. Except Jesus Christ and him crucified and what I'm going to proclaim to you is something I experienced on the Damascus Road the power of his resurrection and I just like Ananias told or Jesus told Ananias.

He said I am going to show this one Paul how many things he's going to suffer for my name because he persecuted the Church of God. And Paul began to say not only am I going to proclaim to you the power of resurrection, but the fellowship of his sufferings because they go hand in hand. If we suffer with him, we'll reign with him brothers sisters.

Are you prepared to suffer with him because you love Jesus you say well, I believe in God good. So do the demons. Do you believe in Jesus? You'll never know God if you don't come to know Jesus.

Paul when he was Saul, he never knew God because he didn't know Jesus. Unless you get a revelation of Jesus is the Christ. You'll never know God.

In fact to see him is to is to know him. He told the brothers have I been with you this long Thomas. To see me is to see the father because Jesus on the earth in the natural the person of Jesus is the exact image of the invisible God.

And the Holy Spirit the indwelling presence of the Holy Spirit is the nature the indwelling nature of the father and the son manifested in our flesh. That we might be one as as I am in the father the father and me I am you and you and me we would come into this glorious mystery of Christ in the church him being our head and he being his hands and feet was reading something in Isaiah 63. For those of us who want to chew on a few deeper things.

Isaiah and 63 Isaiah 63 verse 5. I looked but there was no one to help. That's the Lord speaking. I look but there was no one to help and I wondered that there was no one to uphold therefore.

My own arm brought salvation for me and my own fury. It sustained me. The Lord looked he didn't find one who could bring salvation for him.

There was none righteous. If we look in Isaiah 64. We look in Isaiah 64 verse 6, but we all like an unclean thing.

And all our righteousness are like filthy rags before the Lord. We all fade as a leaf and our iniquities like the wind have taken us away and there is no one who calls on your name who stirs himself up to take hold of you for you have hidden your face from us and we have and you have consumed us because of our iniquities, but now Oh Lord, you are our father. So the Lord saw that there was no man that all had sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.

And so he sent his own right arm to save us. He sent his own son. Who was the exact image of the invisible God manifested in flesh.

He himself bore our iniquities on the tree that he might reconcile us back to God through the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ that in him is life and that life is the light of men. If we look in Isaiah 63 in verse 8 for he said surely they are my people children who will not lie. So he became their Savior.

He became their Savior in all their affliction. He was afflicted. And the angel of his presence saved them.

That's the Holy Ghost my friend in his love and in his pity he redeemed them and he bore them and he carried them. If we get into Isaiah and chapter 56 57, we can see that he bore all our iniquities. He bore all of our sin and our shame in his own body.

He carried them because we could not carry them so that we could be free. We could be justified by faith the righteousness of God in Christ not because of anything good that we have done but according to his mercy. He saved us while we were yet sinners while we were still proud while we were stinking in our righteousness and our filthy rags.

He still had pity on us and he sent his own son to do us a solid and he saved us while we were yet sinners. He bore them and he carried them in the days of old but like the nature that we possess when we're not abiding in the spirit when we're not living by faith when we're not trusting in the Lord when we get some bright ideas and we want to head down to Egypt and see if we can get some help over there. They rebelled and grieved his Holy Spirit.

Brother sister, you can grieve the Holy Spirit. The scripture says do not grieve the Holy Spirit when you get in unbelief when you start trusting in your righteousness. You start trusting in your in your that you're a good person and you start doing your own thing.

You grieve the Holy Spirit. So he turned himself against them as an enemy and he fought against them. Then he remembered the days of old Moses and his people saying where is he who brought them up out of the sea? Now you notice that word he is God himself.

Where is he who brought them up out of the sea? It wasn't Moses who brought them through the sea. It was God who brought them through the sea. But something interesting here with the shepherd of his flock.

Where is he who put his Holy Spirit within them? He put the spirit within them who led them by the right hand of Moses. Look at this year with his glorious arm Moses. He lifted up his staff.

God used Moses as his right hand, but Jesus was there. That word was spoken and that sea parted. God brought a deliverance for his people and he used his hands and his feet.

Will you be God's hands and feet in this hour? Will you be of his body? Will you be of his bride? Will you be of his church? If you're down in Egypt doing your own thing, you will never become his hands and feet useful to see the deliverance of the people of God who have rebelled. You'll never see the wonderful works of God. You'll never see God use you to bring forth a mighty deliverance for his name's sake.

Moses was faithful in all his house, but I'm telling you one thing one greater than Moses manifested himself. His name is Jesus. Jesus as a high priest, according to the order of the Gizdek.

He's seated in the heavens making intercession for us and he appeared not without blood but by his own shed blood. He himself has redeemed us as a church as a bride as a people for his great name and for his Glory and so he who has begun a good work in us is able also to complete it. If we continue to believe if you remain faithful, if you repent for your Egypt trips and you get on with God and get back to Bethel and offer to God those sacrifices and rebuild those altars and those promises that you made to him Lord.

If you bring me back to this place, like Jacob said, then you'll be my God. God will perform his end. God will do his miracles, but will you remain faithful after you receive your blessing? May the Lord help us to stand fast and firm in the faith, not swavering, not double-minded, not unbelieving.

You know, what happens is a wind comes, a tree falls down, our power goes out and we say Lord, don't you care about us? We're so fair weather. I'm telling you the God of the mountain. He's the God in the valley and the God of the good times.

He's still God in the bad. He's not shaken by the wind in whichever way it's blowing. And if your favorite brother, your brother that you've leaned on to be a spiritual guide for you falls as a tree falls, there it lies.

You go with God, get your eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith and you will find a glorious inheritance in him, not your own righteousness, but a righteousness which is found in Christ through the shed blood of the cross, through the glorious regeneration, being filled with the spirit and a washing of the water by the word. Let it sanctify you completely spirit, soul, and body in Jesus name.