Day 20 (2011)

It's All About Love: Receiving His Love & Becoming Love

➡ 3:00 - We are going into love this morning. That is why we are Christians.

5:30 - Prayer for healing - kidneys

➡ 6:35 - I’m thinking we are going to be talking about becoming love because it’s where everything flows from. REVIEW - We’ve talked about a lot of things in this school so far. We’ve jumped around a good bit. When I look at the flow - really establishing righteousness - God’s heart towards us - the statement of the cross - who we are because of Christ - that’s really where we camped a long time in the beginning.

7:30 - 1 Timothy 1:5 - the goal of our instruction is love

7:40 - v.1-4 reading - Paul, an apostle of Jesus Christ by the commandment of God our Saviour, and Lord Jesus Christ, which is our hope; Unto Timothy, my own son in the faith: Grace, mercy, and peace, from God our Father and Jesus Christ our Lord. As I besought thee to abide still at Ephesus, when I went into Macedonia, that thou mightest charge some that they teach no other doctrine, Neither give heed to fables and endless genealogies, which minister questions, rather than godly edifying which is in faith: so do. - Paul saying - my life is the will of God - God purposed. Teach no other doctrine. There must have been other stuff floating around. This book written about 64 AD and there is already other doctrine. He talked to the Galatians, Philippians like that. Paul could only send Timothy because every one else had other motives. Only 30 years into church history.

10:40 - v.5 - Now the end of the commandment is charity out of a pure heart, and of a good conscience, and of faith unfeigned: -

The goal of our instruction is love - Everything flows from love - the whole goal - the object, aim. The whole purpose of God in giving us the word and sending Christ is love. So we better camp there and become that. And everything will flow from there - from love. That's amazing. We better stay there - camp there. And everything will flow from that.

12:00 - Affirmation should not come from ministry results - But from knowing Him - We get that backwards sometimes. We push into ministry, gifting, we want to be used by God - then that touches you wrong.

13:00 - Got call this morning - God had given this person an impression for somebody and it was right. And they talked about how pumped they were and how assured in salvation it made them feel. That’s a dangerous place. You don’t need God to move through you to find assurance or you turn into a Christian experience drug addict. It's the same compulsion. It's not good. Every time He uses you, your salvation is affirmed. No, He uses you because your salvation is affirmed. It can become a twisted thing - needing people to see God in you, to affirm God in you. Then you are driven by something that’s not established in your life.

14:45 - Reason for addiction - shattered esteem - not knowing who they are - people don’t see the value of their life.

15:05 - Identity should be established first - Before ministry - It’s the same thing. If our identity isn’t established. We have a need to feed something that should already be established through the message of His Son.

15:30 - Push to get into full time ministry to feel better about self. They have arrived. No, you’ve arrived when you believe the love of God in Jesus Christ. You've arrived when you've come home. Adds to esteem. People are going to esteem me better. That's only a need because you don't already see yourself that way.

16:15 - Your ability to love others flows from receiving His love - Many people don’t feel good about themselves. I need to love you as I love myself. The way I see me is the way I am going to see you. Love neighbor as self. Hard to love others when you don’t love yourself.

17:30 - Our need to be loved should be fulfilled by His love - Instead of putting expectations on others - We are still needing to be loved. When we have been so loved. God is the source of all love. Human love - self serving love - it's feeding a need in us that is missing. It's not pure love. God’s love is pure love.

18:40 - Expectations on others - We look for satisfaction and completion from others instead of receiving that from God. So when someone treats you wrong. “You broke my trust. I don’t think I can trust you again. That really hurt me.”

21:00 - [Satirical example of talking to God after doing something wrong] That language sounds ridiculous in God’s mouth. But that language is normal to us. If it sounds ridiculous in God’s mouth it ought to be equally ridiculous in our mouths because we were made for His image. So that language isn't kingdom expression.

22:50 - Our mindsets / our perspectives have to change so that we are relying on God as our source of love - That mindset is not the kingdom. That’s what the fall of man taught us. Rights. Expectations. Broken trust. Hurt, offended, angry. Why? Because your life depends on them. We've lived that way. We accept it as normal.

24:00 - So we don't just ignore wrong behavior. Correcting. Setting people straight for my sake. No grace on that. Should be done from motivation of love. We miss love in that.

Pure Heart - Good Conscience - Sincere Faith

26:10 - v.5 - Pure heart - love comes from pure heart - communion. Not talking about always looking inside for what is dirty.

26:50 - Desire for pure heart - Father, I don't want the way that seems right to man. My life is Yours. And I thank You, Holy Spirit, for aligning me to Your thoughts and Your understanding. And as I read the word, I thank You that I see Your heart and the way You think and the way You are. God, my heart is for You. I want to manifest You in my life. I want to respond like You - receive like You - hear like You. I want to be like my Dad...

27:20 - If it doesn’t come from a pure heart, love is not going to be the result. There will be another motivation.

27:30 - Living from hurt needs to be replaced by living from love - Motives - the “why” behind your life - that’s your ceiling. Motives other than love: hurt...

28:15 - Get a grip on your own life so that you are not so hurt by others. I am here to love you. And you are not under the pressure of my expectation / need.

29:15 - Counseling others - A lot of times counsel is just how they would feel if they were in that position. Instead of Jesus, His love, His response. Just comforting, stroking, sympathizing… We are being defined by one another constantly.

30:30 - We try to avoid hurt by avoiding certain people, staying in our circle of friends… It means that we are vulnerable. There are other motives in our lives. We're trying to get needs met that only the gospel can meet.

31:20 - Everyone is not going to behave perfectly towards you.

31:50 - Why is it so easy to cry because of someone instead of crying for someone. We live with self-interest.

33:15 - Living in insecurity needs to be replaced with living knowing that we are loved - We’ve lived insecure - in survival mode - our whole lives. Shows up in different ways in different people but it’s still the same need driving every person.

34:15 - Needing affirmation from others - I don’t want to be only as strong as you are to my life. That makes me a sitting duck waiting to fall.

Counseling Sexually Active Couples

34:40 - v.5 - Pure heart -

Love comes from a pure heart - the pure in heart shall see God - to the pure all things are pure. We can walk in a heart that believes the best, sees the best until it gets obvious that it is something else.

35:30 - Counseling sexually active couples - Judging is not the same thing as just seeing the fruit that is plainly on the tree - don’t assume, don’t presume without knowing the truth. Assessing from a distance - forming a belief. Not the same as seeing the fruit that hangs from their tree. Don’t judge me. You are not judging them when you are talking about the issue because it is already revealed.

38:15 - Eg. sexually active couples - it’s rare to find couples that aren’t messing around. We tell them, “That’s wrong.” instead of teaching them the beauty of sex and their value, rather that it’s unprofitable, how it affects others. You are part of a family and what you do and say does matter. Selflessness says, "There's another way." Selfishness says, “Whatever.” But it’s a bigger picture than you.

39:45 - Don’t judge us - I’m not judging. You already have apples on the tree. I’m not assuming this. This has happened. I just want to deal with it.

40:15 - You're responsible for your life lived - Not your intentions - God knows our heart - But your life lived is your heart. You will be judged for your life lived. Answer for the works done - good or bad - not your heart - or confession - or intention.

40:55 - Good intentions are not the same thing as a pure heart - A pure heart gets alone with God and finds grace - Good intentions - have strung a lot of people along. Good intentions is not the same thing as a pure heart - not even close. Here’s what makes your heart pure - when you have good intentions and you face the dilemma and get alone with God and find grace and strength there. That reveals a pure heart. Your good intentions can be a weak fleshy cop out.

41:45 - "God knows our heart" can be a justification for the flesh to remain the same - means, God knows if I could do better I would do better. You are justifying the weakness of your flesh. Flesh has a pass to remain the same. You have excused yourself.

42:00 - "Don’t judge us" is trying to hide and remain the same. Don’t let them remain the same.

Pure Heart - Good Conscience - Sincere Faith (cont.)

43:00 - v.5 - Good conscience -

A pure heart and a good conscience are essential - Deal with convictions before they force you into hiding from God - like the wellspring where love flows from. God has a pure heart and good conscience. The two go hand in hand. If you violate your conscience it will shipwreck your faith.

44:10 - Violate you conscience - Shipwreck your faith - It will muddy up your clear, unveiled approach to God until you get that resolved. Your pure heart will keep this thing in order. If your heart has other motives your conscience will become aware of it. If you don’t deal with conviction you will slip into low levels of condemnation - go into hiding.

44:40 - Conviction - shine light upon - knowing this is not the best - conscience violated - we cut off the love thing with God.

45:10 - Is your conscience always a safe guide?

Your conscience can be twisted - Truth straightens out your conscience and purifies your heart - It’s a real safe guide when your heart is pure. It’s not conscience that is the answer. Truth is the answer. Some people’s consciences are full of the influence of “rights.” It’s the truth that straightens out your conscience and purifies your heart. It’s the truth that makes you free.

46:05 - Conscience of the non-Christian - So a man that isn’t born again wouldn’t have the same conscience as a Christian. His conscience would actually validate certain things (that aren’t the truth). Like vengeance, payback, hostility because you have crossed a line. The reason we teach is to bring the conscience back into alignment with truth so that we get the clearest expression of Christ.

46:40 - Christians abandon conscience - turn to flesh - weeping - they have departed from the faith. Were they ever born again? Let’s not go there.

47:05 - "Once saved always saved" shouldn't even be a question - Run well - the only reason that we talk about once saved always saved - can you lose your salvation? is men have decided to back slide and not run the race. Hot topic. The question gets asked for all the wrong reasons. It shouldn’t even be a question. You’re born again. Run well. Finish. The only reason we have the question is because of the mistakes we've made and the lives we've lived.

48:00 - Keeping a pure heart helps to produce a good conscience so that we can be close with Him - pure heart - a pure heart will breed a good conscience. With unveiled face we come to Him. Wedding day - unveils bride. Until then she was under his covering, under his fathering. In the Christian unveiling we were slave to a taskmaster, bondage. Unveiled through Christ. Released from unrighteousness, sin to another.

50:05 - v.5 - Sincere faith - unhypocritical - uncontaminated - genuine. Everything is going to flow out of this pure heart.

Work Out Your Salvation - Becoming Love

➡ 51:00 - A pure heart is cultivated by spending time alone with God - REVIEW: We spent a lot of time in the beginning of this school talking about communing with God. And how grace and faith go hand in hand - how as you release faith in truth, grace meets you and begins to shape your life. That is where a pure heart is cultivated. When you get alone and nobody is looking saying, “I don’t want to live like I was taught to live.” Just be real with Him in the secret place.

51:30 - Communing - I don’t want to live like I was taught to live...

52:00 - You "work out your salvation" as you spend time in faith with Him and receive His grace - That’s how you work out your salvation - Phil. 2:12. “Work out your salvation” doesn’t mean by works. You are saved by grace through faith. But you work it out, you walk it out with a reverence toward God. Knowing that His way is the way.

52:45 - Be right with God instead of insisting on your rights in life - Don't live offended - Offended - a lie allows you to stay offended because they shouldn’t have done that. And your mind is trained to live in “rightness” instead of righteousness.

53:15 - righteousness - God saying, “Stand before me and be right. I know who you were created to be. I love you. There is more to who you are than your past actions. Stand before me and be accepted. My blood pays the price. You are my child.”

53:50 - Abraham - accounted as righteous through faith. Promise. Years go by. Let’s help God along with the promise. Sleeps with Hagar. Reaffirms covenant. God came and gave the promise. Even though Abraham had messed up - Ishmael - God still said, “Stand before me and be righteous.” Then God reaffirms the promise and the covenant in the face of that wrong. [Extended discussion]

56:20 - God doesn’t change - but He changes men.

➡ 57:45 - We need to understand what love is and not let it be mixed with our old ways of thinking - Giving permission to our flesh to be less than love - I am going slow on purpose - teaching in more detail. We don’t need to teach love out aggressively and passionately and still miss the significance of it - misunderstand it. I’m giving examples of how you and I grew up that were totally normal (to the world) but it's not your created value and it’s not God (not how the kingdom thinks or feels). I don’t want permission for the flesh is what I am saying. And I don’t want to teach in a way where I skip over all that (permission for the flesh) and just call you to something (becoming love) that we don’t really understand or see.

58:25 - 1 Corinthians 13 - The Bible defining love. You can have good Christian people who don’t really understand love - who let the way that seems right to man be integrated into their life.  The whole reason you are born again is to be restored back to love - restored back to the beginning - restored back to His image and God is love.

59:30 - We hang on to our self-centered thinking - Self-centered gospel - We're in it for what He can do for us - We’ve made Christianity a lot of other things - to get out of a jam, for blessing, to go to heaven one day. We’ve put self-interest behind our gospel preaching and made it about people, to attract them, instead of transformation.

100:00 - When adversity hits, we are disappointed in God. We justify our views toward God when they are not healthy. "Well, where were you when..."

101:00 - He’s not a genie in a bottle. And the promises of God are not the same as “Abracadabra.”

101:20 - And we're disappointed in God when the gospel doesn't work for us like we think it should - Disappointment toward God - Mad at God. Shows that we are in it for me. It’s not the truth. We are in a war. Life is full of circumstantial stuff and demonic stuff and sometimes accidents just happen. It doesn't mean a devil did it. It doesn't mean that God did it.

103:30 - We accuse God. “Where were you, God?” Dying on the cross. Sitting at the right hand of God interceding for mercy. Nothing but good the whole time.

104:10 - We need to be rooted and grounded in God's love - to understand and align ourselves with His purpose in restoring us to love - Rooted and grounded in love - if you are you will never misread God again.

104:30 - Mark 4 - Parable of the Sower - Out in the heat of the day - the circumstances of life, trials and adversity - what shot up so quickly soon withers. Why? Because they were not rooted in God’s love. They were in it for what God can do for them instead of how He can make them more like Him.

105:45 - Don't make self-serving selections of preachers and counselors - Listening only to what you want to hear - gathering preachers to us who say the “right things” to us.

106:10 - Self serving selection counselors - going to 10 counselors and choosing the advice I like the most. The one that tells us what we want to hear becomes our counselor.

106:20 - Counseling Advice - Don’t give them advice, give them Jesus. If you can’t find Jesus in your advice don’t give them anything. Don’t give them your feelings and opinions - the way we would respond. Some give advice so that they can feel good about themselves. A pure heart settles all of that.

107:40 - It's all about love - So Let's understand this topic - Love never fails - doesn’t change it’s mind - doesn’t seek its own - takes no account of a suffered wrong. If God loves me and I love God, that is an amazing relationship. If I love you and you love me that is an amazing relationship.

108:10 - Love in human relationships - I get what I need from God. Then I am free to love others.

➡ 109:10 - If the goal of our instruction is love (1 Tim. 1:5), we need to understand this topic - love - if I am a Christian to become love - if it’s all about love. If God loved us this way ought we not love one another? 1 John 4:11 You be imitators of God as dear children, walk in love just as Jesus loved and gave Himself for us. Eph 5:1  Love is selfless - it gives of itself. For God so loved the world that He gave… Jesus says, You too, deny yourself, walk through every injustice and follow me.

110:15 - So He is reproducing Himself through the cross. He is the seed that is going into the ground and springing up bearing much fruit. And here we are. We better understand why we are here.

110:35 - We are here to become love - Not to just be loved - Why we are here. Out of Adam’s fall and into the kingdom of the Son of His love.  Why? So that we are loved? Yes. But so that we become that love. It doesn’t stop with being loved. If I don’t see the Father’s first love, I won’t love Him.

111:10 - Because I am truly loved by Him I can become that love towards you - God loves me. (I realize it.) I love Him. He loves me. I love Him. And all of the sudden - Oh my goodness, I love you.

111:25 - God loves me not just for my sake but for your sake too - That who God is (love) might be known in all the earth - It’s not: (Forget you) I love Him, He loves me. Who needs people anyway. I’ve got God and God loves me. I don’t care what you think because God loves me. No, the only way you have relationship with God is that it produce love for others. That’s why God made us in His image so that His glory would cover the earth. That we would be fruitful and multiply. It’s not a mist covering the earth but you and I knowing who we are and living it - the glory of God revealed. Christ in us the hope of glory.

112:15 - Moses in the wilderness - interceding for the people. But Moses, as surely as I live the whole earth will be filled with my glory. Num 14:21  He was prophesying redeemed people - His people born again - new heart.

God's Redeeming Love for Us

114:00 - Romans 5 - v.10 - For if, when we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, being reconciled, we shall be saved by his life. -

If we really get a hold of the nature of His love - We are in love in love with Him - We were yet enemies. We did nothing to qualify. God is love. Love doesn’t lose sight of who you are.

115:20 - The old man is gone. Can't even imagine you acting like that. Good, it's over.

115:50 - Love believes the best - hopes the best. That is rare in humans - even Christians.

117:00 - Typical Christianity - making it all about us, instead of becoming like Him. Congrats, you prayed the prayer - here's a Bible, read it every day - get hooked up in a good church - have a nice life. Not much love.

118:10 - The mercy of God purifies your heart. If you really get real with the mercy of God it will purify your heart just like that. There is a strategy set against us to keep it complicated because if we ever see God’s love clearly, we are in love. When you were at your worst, He brought you to your best.

118:45 - Abraham

119:00 - You don’t have to readjust your whole belief system. Don't make it complicated. Just get a hold of ttuth and let it make you free. The other stuff will just fall off.

121:35 - The gospel is simple. The gospel is a whole lot deeper than praying a prayer to go to heaven but that doesn't mean it's complicated. If it's not simple, it's probably not the clear gospel. We go for the deep knowledge message because of our former training in the fall. Don’t miss the simplicity of Christ. (Gospel in a nutshell.)

123:10 - We put expectations on those we say we love and get hurt by them - But love doesn't seek its own - We believe that the people closest to us can hurt us the most. But you say you love them. You put demands and expectations on them because of their closeness - you’re depending on them. You are set up for heartbreak. I love you doesn’t take account of a suffered wrong. It doesn’t seek its own.

124:05 - God did not fall apart when man rebelled against Him because He is love - And He made us to look like Him - God made man to be close to Him. With what we have done to Him, it should have trashed God. Why hasn’t God fallen apart because of man’s antics? Because He is love.

125:00 - We set ourselves up to be hurt by the way we think of the gospel - Love is the big deal of the gospel. We’ve made it going to heaven - God taking care of us and blessing us - protecting and providing. Why hasn't God fallen apart because of man's antics? Because He is love. God would be a broken mess if he reacted anything like we do.

125:00 - He calls us up hither - into Himself. I don't have to hurt because of you. I don't have to be disappointed because of you. I don't have to put the weight on your shoulders - as if you are the one who determines my day. I can be free from that through prayer. Love is the goal of the whole thing - the purpose of the Father. We've made it a prayer to go to heaven.

127:00 - We have set ourselves up for disappointment in our preaching of the gospel. And we have put God in the hot seat. And we’ve allowed men not to change and to have an opinion because we haven’t preached the gospel clearly.

128:55 - v.11 - And not only so, but we also joy in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom we have now received the atonement. -

The Fall - Born into Adam

129:10 - v.12 - Wherefore, as by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned: -

God wants to reproduce Himself through us - satan wants to reproduce himself through us - Gospel recap - Born into Adam (1 Cor 15 also) - When Adam sinned the image of God was completely perverted and shifted 180 degrees. And what was love became completely self-centered.

129:50 - Adam & Eve - [Story of Adam and Eve temptation and fall recap.] Adam followed her instead of God.

131:10 - God made you in His image and wants to reproduce Himself through you again and again. Satan wants to take what was made in the similitude of God, deceive it, and reproduce himself through what was intended for God again and again.

131:40 - The connection gets cut - The devil is trying to sow seed. He’s trying to reproduce. He said, the day you eat from the tree you will be a god - like God. They were the sons and daughters of God already. Already like God. It takes away the connectivity to God, the lifeline from God. Cutting that off and becoming a god unto yourself. Independence. Selfish. Self-preserving, self-justifying, self-concerned, self-pity, self-serving…

133:15 - Did you eat from the tree Adam? First effect of sin - It was the woman you gave me - self-defense, self-justification, self protection. It's a yes or no question. Standing there naked and ashamed trying to cover sin. Aware of what you did wrong.

133:50 - God's love - Removes sin garments - I’m taking off your sin garments and I’m clothing you myself. I’m making you right. You can't take care of your own sin. But I can love you.

134:22 - New garments - They weren’t made for fig leaves, they were made for God’s glory. God robed them in new garments. If they wake up every day seeing fig leaves, they are continually reminded of sin. But if they wake up with new garments they are conscious of the promise, a hope. He is still a Father. My sin hasn't changed Him. He still loves me. And He gives you integrity and hope to live differently. God is bigger than your mistakes.

135:50 - The price they were willing to pay to serve the flesh. What they had before the whole lust thing was about unspeakable.

136:10 - Fig leaves - constant conscious reminder ot the day they threw it all away. Dumb me. [Can you imagine the arguments?]

137:20 - Everything is everyone else’s fault. When you live in that mindset, it takes you out of the picture of dealing with your own heart. Christians can live that way - God, change those people. If they weren't that way, my life wouldn't be this way. It's all a lie.

138:50 - Eve deceived - Adam committed treason - Willful sin - The Bible says that Eve was deceived. It doesn’t say that Adam was deceived. It was Adam who committed high treason. Adam followed His wife.

140:00 - There is no indication that Adam had to follow Eve. But he followed after flesh (Eve) instead of God. Eve is not the guilty one. Adam didn’t have to do what he did. It’s called the transgression of Adam (not Eve).

141:35 - They had zero knowledge of good and evil.

142:00 - v.13 - (For until the law sin was in the world: but sin is not imputed when there is no law. - God sent the law to provoke a conscience in man. Before the law there was no consciousness of sin. Set a standard to bring conviction and tutor us back to God - to a Savior.

142:30 - v.14 - Willful sin - Nevertheless death reigned from Adam to Moses, even over them that had not sinned after the similitude of Adam's transgression, who is the figure of him that was to come. - Some don’t commit that same kind of sin - high treason. Willful sin. Following after flesh. We haven’t all done that. I don't have a memory of high treason. But we all miss the mark. It's all sin and needs to be dealt with.

145:30 - v.15+ - But not as the offence, so also is the free gift. For if through the offence of one many be dead, much more the grace of God, and the gift by grace, which is by one man, Jesus Christ, hath abounded unto many. -

Born into Adam - We must be born again - We must deny ourselves - Otherwise we will never be able to follow Him and have changed thinking and living - He’s saying we were all born into Adam and we were all reaping the fruit of his transgression. We were all reproduced after his own kind. That’s why we must all be born again.

146:10 - The fall of man was Love to selfishness. Jesus comes and models what we were before that fall and says follow me and love just as He loved. If you want to follow me the first thing you need to do is deny yourself. If you deny yourself you’ll have the ability to get through every injustice and unfairness just like me.

147:10 - That wasn’t what was taught to me. It was just you sinned and you need to repent and accept Him into your heart. That’s how we preach the gospel in this country. And that doesn’t transform our thinking or our lives. It actually puts a mandate on us that we have to live better now. Now we feel obligated to God and go through the Christian motions. But all the same things are still wrong with us.