Rick Warren - Building My Life on the Bible—Part One

This is Pastor Rick's Daily Hope, the audio broadcast ministry

of Pastor Rick Warren. Today we begin a series called

forty Days in the Word. In these messages, Pastor Rick

shares practical Bible study tools that will reignite your passion

for God's Word and revolutionize your life as you grow

closer to Jesus. First, we're excited to let you know

that very generous friends of Daily Hope have stepped forward

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Word Daily to eight hundred, six hundred, five thousand and four.

Right now, here's Pastor Rick Warren with part one of

a message called Building My Life on the Bible.

Jesus ended the Sermon on the Mound, the most famous

sermon in the Bible, by telling a story, and he

says this, There was two guys who went out and

they both built homes, and they built them on different foundations.

One guy went out and built his house on solid

rock on that foundation, and the other guy went out

and he built his house on sand. His foundation was sand.

He said, Then unexpected rogue winds came, the trials in

the storms of life, and a tsunami hit those homes,

and the winds came, and the floods rose, and the

winds beat against it, and the rains came down, and

the house that was built on the shifting foundation of

sand collapsed. But the house that was built on solid

rock was able to withstand the storms of life, Jesus

says in this After saying this story, he says this

in Matthew seven thirty four twenty four. Everyone who hears

these words of mine, that's the word of God, that's

the Bible. Everyone who hears these words of mine and

puts them into practice, and we're going to teach you

how to do that, is like that wise man who

built his house on the rock. So this weekend, to

start us off, before we get into forty days, I

want us to look at how do you do that?

How do you build your life on the Bible so

that you're building on solid rock, so that when the

storms and trials and difficulties of your life come inevitably,

that you'll be able to handle it. If you are

not built on solid rock, on the foundation of something

that doesn't shift, you're gonna crumble. You can't build your

life on the opinions of others. You can't build your

life on popular opinion. You can't build your life on culture.

You must build on unchanging truth. If you have a Bible,

I want you to open to James chapter one, the

Book of James.

Chapter one.

We're going to look at verses nineteen down to verse

twenty five, and I want to as we prepare for

forty days in the world, to look at this subject

on how do I build my life on the Bible.

The answer to that is to look at the way

that God wired you and shaped you.

God gave you.

Five senses here smell, see, taste, and touch everything you know.

Everything you experience in life comes through one of those

five senses. That's how you encounter life, and God wants

you to learn to encounter the Bible with every one

of your senses.

We're going to look at this today.

And these are all found in James chapter one, verses

nineteen to twenty five.

Now, if you're.

Taking notes, the first way that I build my life

on the Bible is this, I receive it with my ears.

I receive it with my ears.

We're talking about hearing the Bible, hearing the word of God,

hearing God speak to you. The Bible tells us in

Romans ten seventeen. Faith comes from hearing the message, and

the message.

Is heard through the Word of Christ.

Every time you hear your pastor teach a message, you

hear a Bible teacher, you hear a study on the radio.

When you're hearing the word, your faith is being built.

You're doing this first one right now. You're listening to

the Word of God being taught, and that builds your faith.

Faith comes by hearing the message, and the message comes

through the Word of Christ. Now let's look and see

what James says about this. James, Chapter one, verse nineteen.

Everyone should be quick to listen. Circle that quick to listen,

slow to speak, and slow to become angry. For man's

anger does not bring about the righteous life that God desires. Therefore,

get rid of all moral filth and evil that is

so prevalent, and humbly accept. Circle that accept the word

planted in you, which can save you. It is the

word of God that saves us. If you don't hear

the good news. You can't be saved. Now, he says,

be quick to listen. That's using my ears, and he

says accept the word. So in this passage, it's teaching

us that I must receive it with my ears. Now,

this interesting word, accept the word. The word in Greek

decam i literally is a hospitality term. It means to

welcome a stranger. It means to welcome the word. We

welcome you, Lord, we welcome your word. Come on in.

I'm wide open. It is an attitude of acceptance. And

if you're going to get the Bible in your life,

you've got to start with.

Hey, I'm wide open.

I got an attitude of acceptance. I welcome the word.

I accept the word planted in me. Now, it says planet.

It's interesting.

Often through the Bible, the scripture is compared to a seed,

and the seed is the Word of God, and the

soil is our hearts. The parable of the soler that

Jesus told teaches this story, and he says that receiving

the word is actually the seed being planted in your life.

Now, I'm a gardener.

In fact, you could call me a farmer, because I

garden massive scale. And what I do is I've learned

that you can take the exact same seed and plant

it in three different locations, and in one you're going

to get giant tomatoes, In another you're going to get

little tomatoes, and others you're not going to get anything.

What's the difference. The difference is not the seed. The

difference is the soil. The soil must be prepared for

the seed. You got to mulch it, you got to

break it up, you got to put some fertilizer in there,

maybe a little miracle grow if you want to do that.

You got to get it. The soil has to be prepared.

This is the same thing for you here to hear God,

your heart has to be prepared. You see, if you

come to church and you've got up late, and you

rushed in and you couldn't find a parking spot, and

you were all frustrated and it was raining, and you

got in and you were just really in an irritating mood,

and they said, okay, God, I'm ready for you.

Talk to me.

You're not gonna hear God's voice. You're not in a

receptive mood. That's why you can take two people to church.

Sit them side by side, want to walk on and

goes man, that was powerful. I really that that gave

me a lot to think about. And the other person going,

I didn't get anything out of that. What's the difference?

Heart preparation? Now, for good reception, this passage teaches you

have to have four attitudes. You remember when televisions used

to have antenna's on them and you would kind of

move the antenna's around to get good reception.

We don't do that anymore now we do. Can you

hear me? Now? Can you hear me? Now? Can you

hear me now? Okay?

And you're looking for good reception in order for you

to hear God. Now you got to have good reception,

and the Bible says that's a matter of your herd attitude.

Write down these four attitudes. First, it says, I must

be quiet for good reception. To hear God speak to me,

I've got to be quiet. It says, be quick to

listen and slow to speak. Now, you know, Kay has

told me many times, Rick, when you're talking, you're not listening.

At least I think that's what she said. You gotta

be quiet. You can't hear God if you're talking Okay,

number two, I gotta be calm, it says, and slow

to become angry, be quick to listen to slow to speak,

slow to become angry.

Why in the world is it talking about anger?

We're going to talking about the Bible here because you

don't hear much when you're angry.

You're listening to Pastor Rick's Daily Hope. Rick will be

back in just a moment with the rest of today's lesson.

If you've missed any part of today's teaching, you can

listen online anytime at pastorick dot com. That's pastorick dot com.

Pastor Rick says the Bible isn't meant to just inform us,

It's meant to transform us. That's why it's so important

to study God's Word. Maybe you've never studied the Bible

and you don't even know where to start, or maybe

read the Bible every day, but you're not getting all

God has for you out of the time you spend

with him. That's why Pastor Rick created a very special

Bible study called forty Days in the Word. This life

changing resource will ignite your past for God's Word and

revolutionize your relationship with Jesus. The forty Days in the

Word Study Kid includes six video sessions on DVD and

a two hundred and six page, two color workbook. In

the workbook, you'll find six easy to learn methods for

reading and meditating on Scripture. These are the very methods

Pastor Rick uses in his own personal daily quiet time.

You'll also find interactive journaling pages and Bible verse cards

with the twenty Bible versus every believer should memorize. There's

even a special section called how can we know the

Bible Came from God? And a guide for choosing which

translation of the Bible is right for you. Will send

you a copy of the Forty Days in the Word

Study Kid to say thanks for your gift to help

more people learn, love and live God's Word through Daily Hope.

By the way, right now, when you give a gift

to Daily Hope to help take the Hope of Jesus

to a hurting world, generous friends of Daily Hope are

going to match your gift up to fifty thousand dollars.

But you only have till midnight on June thirtieth to

make your gift go twice as far. Go to Pastor

Rick dot com or call eight hundred six hundred at

five zero zero four, and as a special thank you,

we'll send you the forty days in the word Bible

steady Kit. Again, that's Pastor Rick dot com or call

eight hundred and six hundred at five zero zero four.

Now let's get back to today's lesson. Here on Pastor

Rick's Daily Hope.

You see, if you come to church and you've got

up late, and you rushed in and you couldn't find

a parking spot, and you were all frustrated and it

was raining, and you got in and you were just

really in an irritating mood. They said, Okay, God, I'm

ready for you talk to me. You're not gonna hear

God's voice. You're not in a receptive mood. That's why

you can take two people to church, them side by side,

want to walk on and goes man. That was powerful.

I really that gave me a lot to think about.

And the other person going, I didn't get anything out

of that. What's the difference? Heart preparation? Now for good reception,

this passage teaches you have to have four attitudes. You

remember when televisions used to have antenna's on them and

you would kind of move the antenna's around to get

good reception. We don't do that anymore now we do.

Can you hear me now? Can you hear me?

Now? Can you hear me now? Okay?

And you're looking for good reception in order for you

to hear God. Now, you got to have good reception,

and the Bible says that's a matter of your heart attitude.

Write down these four attitudes. First, it says, I must

be quiet for good reception to hear God speak to me,

I've got to be quiet. It says, be quick to

listen and slow to speak.

Now.

You know, Kay has told me many times, Rick, when

you're talking, you're not listening at least I think that's

what she said. You gotta be quiet. You can't hear

God if you're talking.

Okay.

Number two, I gotta be calm, it says, and slow

to become angry. Be quick to listen to to speak

slow to become angry. Why the world is it talking

about anger? We're going to talking about the Bible here,

because you don't hear much when you're angry. We don't

hear much when we're upset, we don't hear. We can't

really hear what somebody else is saying. When we are irritated,

when we're angry, when we're uptight, When you are emotionally upset,

you're defensive. On the other hand, when you are emotionally relaxed,

you're quiet and you're calm, you can really hear what

the other person is saying. And the same thing is

true in getting into the Bible. You got to be

quiet and you got to be calm. If you're going

to let God speak to you in the Bible, you

can be God. I got five minutes here, talk to

me really quick.

D d da da da.

I gotta go see you later. Frantic, you're gonna you're

not gonna hear God speak to you. The Bible says,

be still and know that I am God. My translation

to that is sit down and shut up, be quiet,

and be calm. By the way, I read this week

that listening actually lowers your blood pressure and speaking raises

your blood pressure. So if you need to lower your

blood pressure, you ought to do a little bit more listening.

I need to be calm and I need to be quiet.

The third thing is I need to be clean. In

other words, I can't have any junk in my life.

And he's sin piled up if I expect to hear

God speak to me. The third thing he says is

get rid of all moral filth and the evil that

is so prevalent. He's saying, here, before you do the seeding,

you gotta do some weeding. In other words, when I

go out to plant a garden. But I don't just

go out and start planting seeds. The first thing, I

break up the soil. I get out all the dirt

clods and ate all the rocks. I pull out all

the weeds. I get that soil really ready, so it's clean,

it's not full of junk. And I get it all

ready for the soil. And he says, get rid of

two things. Get rid of filth and get rid of evil.

That's interesting this word filth in the Greek riperion. You

know what it is, The word for earwax. Yeah, that's

the stuff on the end of that que tip. That's gross.

He says, get rid of all the earwacks. You know

what he's saying here. The point is, I can't hear

God If I got junk in my ear, I mentally blocked.

I can't Is it God never speaks to me?

Well, you probably got ear wax, emotional, spiritual, mental, ethical earwax.

You can't hear God because you got junk in your life.

It plugs up the sound. He says.

Get rid of the filth, get rid of the evil,

which is anything we know in our lives that is wrong.

He says, you get rid of that before you come

to me. Going back to this gardening thing, I really

when I garden, I get dirty. I really actually like

being in the mud, and I like getting muddy all over.

And the crazy thing is is, after a day of

you know, gardening and stuff like that and being totally muddy,

I'll come up and Key goes, you take off all

those clothes where you're going to come in the house.

You're not bringing those filthy clothes in my house. Now,

I think this is totally unreasonable, okay, But she doesn't

want me tracking across the carpet manure. I don't know why, okay.

And so she says, you know, you clean this up

before you can meet with God. You need to take

out some emotional garbage. You need to take out some

spiritual garbage. You need to get rid of the stuff

that stinks in your life. You're not going to hear God.

If it's if your mind's filled with pornography, or resentment,

or jealousy or any other junk.

In your life, you can't hear God.

Now, how do I take out the garbage?

Spiritually?

The Bible calls it confession. Confession simply means to agree

with God that was wrong. God, You're right and I

was wrong. When you say that, that's confession. When you

look at something, Lord, it was wrong for me to

say that to my kids. It was wrong for me

to act that way toward those people.

It was wrong.

That's called confession. Confession means to speak the same God.

I just agree with you. You're right and I'm wrong.

And that's how you clean out the garbage. So I

get calm, I get quiet, and I get clean. The

fourth thing I need is I need to be humble. Humble,

That's the fourth thing he says. He says, humbly accept

the word planted in you, which can save you.

And what does it mean? To be humble?

Means say ready to do whatever God tells me from

his word. If I come with a prideful attitude, God,

you tell me what you want me to do, and

then I'll decide whether I'm going to do it or not.

That ain't going to work. I come humbly.

Now, these are the spiritual hearing aids for the first

way to get God's word in your life. I receive,

I accept. I receive God's word through my ears. I

hear it, and I hear it by being calm and

quiet and clean and humble. Now, that's a good way

to get the Word of God in your life. But

if that's the only way, you're not growing very much

because you forget ninety five percent of what you hear

within seventy two hours. That's why I always encourage you

to write take notes, because by Wednesday you would have

forgotten everything I've said. Basically, So, hearing is a good

way to get the Word of God in your life,

but you forget ninety five percent of it. So you've

got to move to the deeper ways.

Now.

The second way to build my life on the Bible

is to read it with my eyes. I receive it

with my ears, but I read it with my eyes.

I read the Bible.

You cannot grow without reading the Bible. James Chapter one,

verse twenty two says this down to verse twenty five,

don't merely listen to the word. In other words, y'ant

to listen, but don't merely listen to the word, and

so deceive yourselves, because you're going to forget it.

Do what it says. Anyone who listens to the word.

Of God but doesn't do what it says is like

a man who looks at his face in a mirror.

Now notice this mirror analogy.

He says, he looks at his face the reflection in

a mirror, and after looking himself, he goes away and

immediately forgets what he looks like. That's what happens a

lot of times on Sunday. You're here a message, and

by the time you get to the parking lot, you've

already forgotten it. He looks in a mirror, looks at himself,

but then he goes away and immediately forgets what he

looks like.

But here's the opposite.

The man who looks intently into the perfect law that

gives freedom, the Bible sets us free, and continues to

do this, not forgetting what he has heard, but doing it.

He will be blessed in what he does. Now, I

want you to be blessed. I want you to be

blessed in ear of your life. I want God's blessing

on your family, on your work, on your finances, on

your health. Now, the Bible says, if you will do

these five things, you will be blessed. So let's go

back and circle him. Okay, you know we talked about

the first one. He said listen, but here he says,

don't merely listen. He says, the man who looks intently.

Circle looks intently. That's one of the ways you get blessed.

That's reading the Bible. Then he says and continues to

do this circle the word continue. That's reviewing the Bible.

And then he says, not forgetting what he's heard, that's

remembering the Bible. Circle that one, not forgetting but doing it.

That's responding to the Bible. He will be blessed in

what he does. To be blessed, you got to do

all these So we're going to look at all of

them today, and we're going to cover him in more

detail during forty days in the world. But let's look

at him one at a time. First, it says, the

person who looks intently, what's he talking about there? He's

talking about reading the Bible. But when I read it,

I don't read it speed read it. When I read

the Bible, I read it and I reflect on it,

I think about it, I ponder it, I look intently,

and it says that the person who does this is

it's like looking in a mirror. You know, many times

the Bible is compared to a mirror. In scripture, the

Bible compares itself to a mirror. What's the purpose of

a mirror? The purpose of a mirror is to evaluate ourselves.

This is Pastor Rick's Daily Hope. If you've missed any

part of this message, or if you'd like to find

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