School House - Week 4

Amen Sega Timothy chapter two. Second Timothy Chapter two. Going

to continue our series school House today the academic side

of discipleship. We put a lot of emphasis here on

the serving part of discipleship because we believe that's the

primary uh the primary thing that we see in scripture

is that disciples served.

When we really bear down in scripture.

In the Book of Acts, this is what this is

what they said about Jesus disciples.

It says they.

Looked upon them and saw that they were unlearned men.

They looked up, they looked upon them and saw that

they were unlearned men. But the established was threatened. The

establishment was threatened because of the level of service and

commitment and dedication. So the biggest part of discipleship is serving.

It's what we do. I won't just be hearers of

the Word, but be doers also. But we also have

to understand that handling the word of God, there is

a mastery to that, and a disciple knows how to

handle and use God's word because it is his love letter,

it's his instruct however you want to say it from

God to humanity. So we need to understand how to

use and work with God's scripture. So in secon Timothy

chapter two, starting in verse fourteen Sego Timothy two fourteen,

say Amen, let's read remind them of these things, charging

them before the Lord not to strive about words to

no profit to the ruin of the hearers. Be diligent

to present yourself a proof to God, a worker who

does not need to be a shamed rightly dividing the

word of truth. But shun profane and idle babblings, for

they will increase more ungodliness, and their message will spread

like cancer. Hymenaeus and Philatus, or of this sort, who

have strayed concerning the truth, saying that the resurrection is

already passed, and they overthrow the faith of some. Let's pray, Father,

I thank you for your word. It's the only change

agent on the face of the planet. And today I

pray that your word the seeds of life are planeted

deep with the fabric of our soul. They bring a

harvest of abundance, that we would become operational and functional

in your word, or to ask it in Jesus' name.

Amen.

You know it's not a lot of times that we

see people called out in scripture.

Amen, But Paul goes out of his way.

To call out these people and say, hey, listen, those guys,

their bad news, their trouble.

They're deceiving some people.

Even some people have fallen from the faith because of

what they're doing. Some people have backslid, some people have

walked away from Jesus because of the things they're teaching.

And basically what they were teaching, they were teaching and

in errentive that they were teaching some heresy concerning the resurrection.

They said, the resurrections already happened. But now, remember when

we read this, here's the context that this is set in.

That this is set in, it's set on the foundation

the context.

Here is the word of truth.

He says, listen, learn to rightly divide the word of truth.

And they're going around and they're teaching that the resurrections

already happened. It's already happened. It's already happened. And here's

the reality that that was a partial truth. You're looking

at me like what it was a partial truth because

Jesus had already been resurrected, So there had already been

a resurrection. I mean back up, even before that, and

I mean Lazarus had already been resurrected. Back up before that,

there were a couple of resurrections in the Old Testament

that we see that the resurrection had happened, and they

were teaching that it was already done because they weren't

rightly dividing the word of truth.

They were mixing in just enough truth with.

The deception that it confused people and made people fall.

Now we live in the we live in the.

Greatest of times, and we live in the worst of times.

We live in the best and the worst all at

the same time because of our access to teaching about

the Word of God.

It doesn't matter where you are.

You were a mouse click or a or just touching

your phone away from hearing teaching about anything you want

to hear it. Amen, If you say you don't you

don't have access to the Word of God, you're wrong.

You do you do?

I mean, there's four or five Christian television channels. Now,

there's websites, there's podcasts, there's books.

You have access to the Word of God.

And it's good that we have access to the Word

of God. But it's also bad that we have access

to everything. Because there's a lot of teaching out there

that's not true, and it's deceptive, either on purpose or

out of ignorance. And it's not my job to make

the distinction. Amen, That's not my job to decide whether

the person is doing it on purpose or whether they're

doing it out of ignorance. But the reality is there

is some false teaching and some heresies, some things that.

Are out there, and we are.

Responsible for knowing what is right and what is not right.

Let me say that again.

We you me, are responsible for what we receive into

our spirit, and we must know how to divide the

Word of truth. And the only way to know what's

true is to know it.

Amen.

You ever heard that saying you don't know what you

don't know until you know it. Sometimes we need to

look at the Word of God and we need to

break away from this whole fast food mentality that we

have with everything. You know, I went to one of

the new restaurants in Oakwood, one of the new fast

fooded restaurants. It's been a few weeks ago and they

were probably still training whatever, But I went through the

drive through and I was expecting, you know, fast food.

There's some things you expect, right First of all, you

don't expect high quality, amen, but you do expect fast.

So I pull up and I'm there, and I'm sitting there,

and I'm sitting there, and I'm sitting there, and I'm thinking, Wow,

this is not fast.

This is this is slow.

As a matter of fact, this is this is slow.

And I sat there and I sat there and I

sat there, and then the person looks out there say hey,

can you pull up?

Can you pull up into.

That parking place because you're blocking everybody else. And I'm thinking, whoa,

what do you mean I'm blocking everybody else. They've got

their food. Why don't I have my food? And I'm

sitting there and I'm getting madder and madder and madder

because it took twenty three minutes. And you're all looking

around like, oh my gosh, it was twenty three minutes.

That's not a great amount of time, amen. And I'm

sitting there thinking I could have went and got a steak.

I could have went and caught I could have went

and caught a chicken in my backyard, plucked it and

cooked it and had it faster than this sandwich is

coming to my truck right now.

And I got madder and madder because we have been

trained that everything is immediate.

We've been trained that everything is convenient, and everything.

Is right now, right now, right now. But when it.

Comes to proper discipleship and mastery of God's word, it

is not.

A fast food process.

You have to sit down and you have to dig

it out, and you have.

To learn it.

In Genesis chapter three, verse two, we have one of

my favorite passages of scripture. It's a heartbreaking passage of scripture,

but there is so much truth and so much teaching here.

Genesis chapter three, verse two. It says, and the woman

said to the serpent, we may eat the fruit of

the trees of the garden, but of the fruit of

the tree which is in the midst of the garden.

But of the fruit of the tree.

Which is in the midst of the garden, God has said,

you shall not eat it, nor shall you touch it.

Lest you die.

Then the serpent said to the woman, you won't surely die,

for God knows that in the day you eat of it,

your eyes will be open, and you'll be like God,

knowing good and evil. So when the woman saw that

the tree was good for food, that it was pleasant

to the eye and a tree desirable to make one wise.

She took of its fruit and ate.

She also gave to her husband with her and he ate.

You know, this is this is humanity's first interaction.

With the old devil. You know.

He he comes up and he says, let's hey, hey, hey,

what God say about that tree right there? She's like, well,

God said a lot of things about that tree, but

this is what he said. He said, we shouldn't eat

from it. If we eat from it, we'll die. He said, no, no, no, no, no, no, no

no no.

No, that's not real. That's not real.

Here's what's gonna happen. Now watch what he does. He says,

you're gonna become like God. You're gonna become like God.

You're gonna become like God. What she heard was I'm

going to be like God. And then he qualifies and

he says, here's what you're This is how you're gonna

be like God.

You're gonna know good from evil.

You're not gonna you're not gonna snap your finger and

elephants are going to appear. You're gonna know good from evil.

There's a part of God you're gonna be like. But

you're also gonna be a lot less like God. That's

what he didn't tell her. And she got confused, and

she said, listen, no, he said, we can't eat from it.

And this is how he knew. This is when he

set the hook. He said, because she said. He said

we couldn't touch it or eat from it. And the

enemy said, oh, yeah, we got her now, because once

I can get her to pick it and she doesn't die,

Come on, somebody, once I can get her to pull

it off the tree and she doesn't die because she

thinks and when she touches it, she's gonna die. I'm

going to desensitize the bad thing that's gonna happen, because

the moment she touches it, nothing's gonna happen. Let's see

what God actually said. Let's see what God actually said.

Genesis chapter two, verse fifteen. Then the Lord God took

the man and put him in the garden of Eden

to tend and to keep it.

And the Lord God.

Commanded the man, saying, of every tree of the garden

you may freely eat, But of the tree of the

knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for

in the day that you eat it, you shall surely die.

And the Lord God said, it's not good that man

should be alone. I'll make a helper comparable to him.

He said, listen, you can't eat the tree. You can't

eat the fruit off that tree. He didn't say that

he couldn't pick it and throw it across the river.

He didn't say he couldn't pick it and put it

in his pocket. He said, you can't eat the tree

from that garden. But here's the thing, here's where, here's

where the academic decide. The side of discipleship comes back

to your personal responsibility. Eve was not there to hear

what God said. Eve had not yet been created. Eve

was still a rib in Adam's side. And then God

caused a deep sleep to fall upon Adam. He took

his bony, he made woman from from the rib of Adam.

And Eve stands up, and now adversity comes. I'm sure

at some point Adam looked at Eve and said, oh,

we can't eat that fruit. We can't eat that fruit.

That's God said, we shouldn't eat that fruit or we'll die.

But Eve never took the time to ask God God

if it was true or not. She was working on

the revelation of Man, not the revelation of God.

I want to tell you something.

When I say something from this poolpit, when I preach

something to you, the first thing you do is you

should go home and open your Bible and see if

what I said was true.

Let me give let me let me give you one big.

Thing that that a lot of people don't understand.

Now, whether it shapes salvation or not, probably not. But

there is.

Something that every single one of us in here either

believe or we.

Have believed at one time in our lives.

The story of Samson, Oh Samson and Delilah long hair,

flowing locks. Samson Samson. He mixes up with this this woman.

She was putting up to no good. She was working

for the other side. And she kept trying to find

out the source of Samson's strength because Samson was supernaturally strong,

which probably meant he wasn't very muscul He probably looked

like Jeremy. He wasn't real muscled up. He just kind of,

you know, just plaining ordinary looking. But he had this

supernatural strength, so they knew strength was coming from somewhere, right,

And she keeps talking to him and tell you said, oh, listen, Okay,

here's where it's. If you cut my hair, I lose

my strength. Cut my hair, I lose my strength. So

she lulled him to sleep. They cut his hair, and

he lost his strength. Right, say, amen, it's not what

the Bible says. It's not what the Bible says. The

Bible says, she cut his hair, and she tormented and

vexed him until his strength left him. His strength had

nothing to do with his hair. But yet we all

believe that Samson lost his strength because they cut his hair.

And now you're saying, oh, but the Bible says when

it started growing back, he got his strength.

That's not what the Bible says.

The Bible said, Samson's hair began to grow back. Then

he asked God, and God gave him his strength back.

Why does that matter because it's not what the Bible says.

So the enemy will look at you and he'll say, listen,

your strength comes from your husband. Your strength comes from

your wife. Your strength comes from your title, Your strength

comes from this, your strength comes from that. But the

reality is is your strength comes from the Lord. But

if he can make you believe it about him, which

is false and in error and in scripture, he'll make

you believe it about something else.

So learning to rightly divide the word of.

God is vitally important to us as believers, because you

can't stand on what I know or what I believe.

You can only stand on what you know and what

you believe, or you'll end up being like Eve and

you'll create some theology that causes problems. We see movements

in scripture that add things to scripture. We see things

in society that add things to scripture to try to

build a theology around She said, oh, we can't touch it.

There's a do you know that. There's a lot of

Christians that believe they have to help God keep people

from sin. They have to They have to put other

safeguards in place besides what scripture says. And that's what

she was doing. She would say, lit, I don't put

my hands on it. I'm probably not gonna bump into

it with my teeth. If I don't touch it, I'm

gonna be okay. And we do that. We say, oh, listen,

if I don't do this, I'm not gonna do that.

But God doesn't need our help to keep us from sin.

He needs our obedience and our dedication and our absolute, reckless,

abandoned love for him.

That's what he needs.

And we bring these things into God's word, and we

put an extra filter on God's word, and then it

becomes man made and not God delivered. And we need

to be very careful and understand that rightly dividing the word.

And how do I rightly divide? Read it? Read it?

Let me tell you why you believe that Samson lost

his strength when he got his haircut. Because when you

were a kid, somebody told you the story. When you

were a kid, somebody told you that story. And that

makes really good Sunday school kids, church teaching, Oh, because

they can understand it. Right, Oh, Jean, it's a good illustration.

Carry the mop in there, put on somebody saying, pull

them mop off now they're weak, makes good teaching, makes

a good illustration.

And we heard it, but we didn't read it.

Let me tell you why I saw that in scripture

because I got so I got saved so late in

life that I missed Sunday school, I missed all those

kids' stories. It's why I question everything, because I haven't

been preconceived about I don't have any predetermined ideas about anything.

When I read the Bible for the first time, I

was I was more than twenty years old, and I

came to it reading it, trying to understand it. I

would hear something, and then I would go read it

and I would dig, and I would try to find

the answers to the questions that I had. Because nobody,

nobody that ever preached on television or in this pulpit

or anywhere else, answered all the questions I have.

They just uncovered more.

Everything that we do here in this place should start

you on a journey somewhere. I should never answer all

the questions you have. As a matter of fact, I

should awaken some questions you didn't even know you.

Had about scripture.

And then we go home and we poured through the

Word of God, and we invest time in the Word

of God, and we try to figure out what those

things say. And then the Holy Spirit comes alongside, and

the Holy Spirit whispers in our ear. Oh, no, you

shouldn't need from the You should need from the fruit

in the center of the garden. God revealed, God revealed

God experience. The enemy can never talk you out of

I don't care how many sermons I hear that says

speaking in tongues is not real. I believe that it is,

and I know that it is because I've experienced it.

So nobody can talk me out of my experience. Amen, Never.

Listen.

Somebody can. Somebody can come up to me and tell

me what a terrible kid LEXI is. But my experience

is different than that, and I don't believe it because

I have an experience living it out in relationship. I

have an experience that people can't talk me out of.

You need to have an experience with God's word in

your living room, in your bedroom, in your.

Bathroom, wherever it is.

You need to have an experience with God's word that

so burns it down deep in your soul that nobody

can ever talk you out of what.

You believe in what you know.

Now, let me just to make sure that we balance

this thing out a little bit. I don't want you

leave them with the warps tire thinking that pastor said, oh, yeah,

you know, you can get as close to sin as

you want to. I will tell you what that that did.

It is convinced the church that we need to be isolationists.

We say that again, that concept I just talked about

has convinced the church that we need to be isolationists.

We can't go anywhere where sin may be because I

might fall into it. Now, there are some places you

shouldn't go, Amen. Grocery stores not one of them. If

your coworker invites you to come over to his house

for a barbecue, but you know, but you know he

drinks way too much beer and uses too many cuss words,

and you know all those things, go on, Listen, go

over there. Chances are he's not going to tackle you

and pour Budweiser down your throat.

Amen.

If he does, just keep your mouth closed, let it

run off the sides.

You need to go.

Invest in him because you're not gonna go to hell

because you went to a barbecue where somebody said the

F bomb?

Am I gonna say it? I can't even think.

I don't think i'd get mad enough to say it.

I'm not gonna partake in those things. But you know what,

I'm gonna build relationship. But when we can't touch it,

when you can't even touch it, that means you can't

go invest in his life. Jesus went into the home

of sinners and he ate dinner with them because he

needed to express his love for them.

Amen. Until I mastered this.

Until I learned this, it would stress me out to

go to dinner with my dad because I knew when

I was going to dinner with.

Dad, he was gonna order beer. And I thought, oh,

my gosh.

If I'm sitting here and there's a beer at the

table and one of our church people come up and

there's a beer sitting at the table, they're gonna think, oh,

passiondeve drinking beer. Twelve people sitting at the table, one beer,

and they're gonna assume it's mine, even though it's on

the other end of the table.

And it caused a problem. Caused a problem. Let me

tell you what. Let me tell you what solved it.

We went one day and Lexi was sitting there and

Dad they set this beer down, set the beer down

on the table. Lexi was maybe three years old, she

was little, and you know, it was like it was

yellow and bubbly, and I mean, you know, it is

appealing looking. It looks like dessert. And before anybody could

do anything, Lexi took her finger and she stuck it

in that beer and she went.

And I went and guess what, no lightning bolt came

from heaven and struck her down.

And then everybody started laughing, and I started laughing, and

I realized, you know what, It's better that we're here,

maybe making a mistake, than for him to be here

by himself, wondering whether his family loves him or not.

The blood of Jesus is stronger than any sin. And

when we read Scripture, he rolled up his sleeves and

he touched the leper.

He reached into the.

Lives of people and he touched them because he wasn't

an isolationist, he was an inclusionist. In Romans chapter six,

verse one, I want you to think, though, that I'm

just saying, oh, go do whatever you want to do,

because we talk about that too. You know, there's this

hyper grace movement now that we worry about it. It

was made to compensate for the failures of the holiness movement.

Now we have this hyper grace movement because now it

doesn't matter whatever you want to do, whatever you want

to do, just go, go, go, go, go to where

you want to do.

Jesus loves you, man, Just go.

Romans chapter six, verse one, it says, what shall we say?

Then shall we continue in sin? That grace may abound,

and we love the grace of God. But do we

just go live in sin because we know grace is there?

This is what the apostle Paul says. He says, certainly not,

how shall we who died to sin live any longer

in it?

Or do you not know.

That as many of us as were baptized into Christ,

Jesus were baptized into his death. Therefore we were buried

with him through baptism into death. That just as Jesus

Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of

the Father, even so we also should walk in newness

of life, for we have been united together.

In the likeness of his death.

Certainly we also shall be in the likeness of his resurrection.

Knowing this that our old man was crucified with him.

Jesus crucified our old man with him, that the body

of sin might be done away with, that we should

no longer be slaves of sin.

He says.

Listen, when you rightly divide the word of truth, you

don't have to walk around being afraid that you're accidentally

gonna sin, that you're gonna fall over into something that's

gonna cause you to go to hell, pastor Clay, you

guys can come and get ready that you just slip

off the rock and somehow, Ah, that's.

Not the way it works.

We should be so hungry chasing after the things of

God that we don't have time to participate in the

things of the world. But we spend so much time

trying not to accidentally send that we forget who we're

trying to live holy for and enjoy a communion in

His presence on a daily basis, experience the transformation that's

in us and through us. When we master God's word,

we quit worrying about those things that we used to

worry about. Oh can I stay saved until the rapture comes?

Well? What if? What if? So and so?

What if I'm at this Listen, if you're in the

grocery store and you've done shopping. Lurid works in the

gross stores, So she's watching y'all when y'all.

Come through the line.

I make her look at she takes pictures of everybody's buggies.

It sends it to me. Make sure y'all ain't up

to no good. Listen, I don't care that's between you

and God. What's in your buggy? Not between you and me.

You get through shopping, you get ready to go to

the register.

If the shortest path is down the aisle where they

sell wine, just walk down through there.

It ain't gonna jump off and grab you.

Nobody's gonna think, Oh, I saw brooms going down to

wine ile.

What was he doing?

What was it dripping down his mouth or was it

in his buggy? And if it was in his buggy,

how do you know he wasn't going home to serve

communion to his wife. I'm not even gonna debate on

what the scripture actually says about the difference between drinking

and drunkenness. We wrestle with things that cause other people

to go to hell because we're so consumed because we

don't know the Word of God that we worry about it.

You shouldn't worry about the word of God. You should

know the Word of God, and it should be alive

and breathing on the inside of you and shape who

you are.

You don't need to check.

To see if it's sin. It just bubbles out of you.

Because you're so in love with Jesus and John chapter eight,

I'm closing altered team, Come and get ready. John Chapter eight,

verse thirty two. And you shall know the truth, and

the truth shall make you free. They answered him. Listen,

listen a statement about freedom. Here's their response to it.

They answered him, We're Abraham's descendants and have never been

in bondage to anyone.

How can you say you will be made free? Listen

when Jesus said this.

When Jesus said that to them, they were in bondage

when Jesus said it. There was an occupying army in

Jerusalem where he said it, and they weren't free.

And they said, oh, we're not bound. You know why.

They didn't know because they didn't know what God said.

They had a wrote memory of some things, but they

didn't have a working knowledge and understanding.

Because they never spent time with it.

They said, why do we need to be We've never been,

We never been in bondage to anybody.

And they were right at that moment captive.

Jesus answered them most assuredly, I say to you, whoever

commits sin is a slave of sin. And a slave

does not abide in the house forever, but a son

abides forever. Therefore, if the Sun makes you free, you

shall be free. Indeed, And listen, if you're here today

and you wake up every day and you're worried, You're

worried about whether God's pleased with you, You're worried about

whether you're going to heaven, You're worried about this, You're

worried about that.

That's bondage. And I want to tell you there's freedom.

There's freedom, and today with whatever you're paralyzed with, whatever

you're fixated on, whatever it is, Jesus will bring you freedom.

He'll bring you freedom, He'll shake the bondage off. And

then you go home and get in his word and

you'll find a path of freedom and liberty that you

never thought existed. But it starts right now by admitting, Hey,

number one, I've never given my life to Jesus, and

today I want to give my life to Jesus.

I want to go to heaven and not hell or

number two.

Because you have been conditioned to the word of man

and not the word of God. You're afraid of everything.

You're afraid of everything. Be the one of those is

going to count to three, and I want you to

stand up and may here. It's mattera everybody, Just go

ahead and stand up. It's gonna make it easier for

them to serve you to Communion is coming around. But

if you're here and you need an encounter with Jesus,

you need to experience freedom today. On the counter of three,

I want you to step out and make your way down.

You've never asked Jesus to forgive you of your sins.

Be the lord of your life, and we'll come down here.

You're afraid, you've backslidden, You're not where you need to

be with God. Come down here. You're afraid of everything

in the world, Come down here. I'm the count of three, one, two, three.

If that's you, step out and move. I just need

Jesus today. I just need Jesus today. I just need

Jesus today. I'm afraid of the word of God. I

need Jesus today. I'm afraid of sin. I need Jesus today.

I'm afraid of God, and you need Jesus today.

Amen. Amen. The band's gonna sing.

The altars open. They're coming around with the elements. I'm

gonna receive communion together in just a moment. Just worship together.

The altars are open. Aster Clay