Bait or No Bait various Texts

Some say you're just a play, some say you're a cry, some say you are really brave, but I say you're a cry.

Some say you're just a play, some say you're a cry, some say you are just a man, but I say you're a god, you are my god.

And I will shout your name till the end, and I will lift your name all the time, and no one will know you're brave, and you are my god, I will shout your name.

I know that you're just a play, you don't like what we do, and I know you're the only way, Jesus you are god, you are my god.

And I will shout your name till the end, and I will lift your name all the time, and no one will know you're brave, and you are my god, Jesus.

And I will shout your name till the end, and I will lift your name all the time, and no one will know you're brave, and you are my god, Jesus.

And I live a life that shouts your name, and I live a life that shouts your name.

Jesus lives on the side of the hill, and he lives a life that shouts your name.

He's gonna start the slides a little bit,

But look, he's gonna shout it from high.

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Alright, alright. You know if I recovered from yesterday?

It was kinda like...

Meh. That's the thing, right? Well praise God, we get to be here to worship,

and learn. I'm a little excited. The worksheet is a little lighter

today than it normally is.

We'll do that shortly. The whacked out simple stuff. So tonight,

for whacked out simple stuff, we'll do something just a little bit different, a little bit simple, but a little bit easy.

And I'm gonna talk about tonight's service. It came up this week,

I was talking to somebody, and they said, well when I was growing up, we always had

a Wednesday

service. Why Wednesday or why Tuesday? Does anybody know why?

Because we're different.

A lot of people do Tuesday, that's true, right?

I mean a lot of people do Wednesday, actually, that's true.

Why would you do Wednesday? Middle of the week, right?

Okay, so you have Sunday, and then you get a couple days life, and it starts to get a hold of your mind,

things are going on, whatever, and then you have Wednesday, you go up to God, do Bible studies,

and then you go back Thursday, Friday, Saturday, and you're back on Sunday. So it breaks up

the week. And so whether it's Tuesday,

and that's only really Monday in between, and then we do it from Tuesday,

we've got from Tuesday to Sunday, that's kind of a long gap.

But there's nothing biblical about it. The truth is, how often

should you do your Bible? Every day.

That's an easy answer, right? So every day, and even when you're not reading it,

you should be living it, thinking about it, doing whatever it is

that you know to do from it, holding on to that which you've already attained, right?

And we do that by memorizing the Word and studying and all that kind of stuff.

How often should you be praying?

Lots, right? Second Corinthians 5 says, pray without ceasing,

and that's kind of hard to pray when you're sleeping, but you can go to

bed with a prayerful attitude, and wake up with a prayerful attitude,

and then kind of pray all day long. And actually you kind of can pray

all the time if you think about it. Like people, you're always having self-thoughts. You want doubt,

you want, oh I think I could do this, or I think I might do that, whatever. You're always having thoughts

running through your mind. You can train those thoughts to be aimed at or to

God, or asking God or talking to God, and just like that, suddenly, you're

praying all the time. How about giving in

service? How often should we be giving and serving?

A lot. A lot, okay, always.

You're going to say one of those two? Okay, yeah, so it's

a lot, right? Jesus said, the greatest amongst you shall be your servant.

So it's a great opportunity to serve when the body comes together.

There are people who will teach. There are people who work. People who prepare

desserts, like whatever, you know. People who pay to eat the lights on,

that's giving, right? That kind of thing. And so, we could get

together on Thursdays, although that would interfere with you,

on Friday, too. So we could do Tuesday and Thursday. We could do Tuesday

and Wednesday and Thursday, and if there ever was a time where we really needed to be

plugged into God for some reason, something amazing was happening in our country, or we were under a lot of persecution,

or there was a lot of trouble or difficulty, or that kind of thing, we might meet more often.

We've had a time where we had a service, had a break, and had another service.

So that could happen. You could come on a Sunday and we'd be like, hey, we're all getting together

again in another hour for more Bible, more Word, more God

working in us, right? So it's not just a matter of just

two days on Sunday. When we started this church, we said it was going to be an all

and every day, all week thing. And so I encourage you to go out and live with the Lord

all week long. So we do Tuesday nights, as Ardys said, because we're

a little bit different, okay? We could have done Wednesday, and sometime it might be

Wednesday, but it's been Tuesday for the last twenty years,

about fifteen years, so probably it's not going to change.

But it could. If you wanted to, it could. We decided as a church. And then why do we do it

the way we're doing it right now? Because we as a church decided to do it this way.

That's all. Not me. It's not one guy hiding in a corner

writing the checks, right? It's the church. We decided the church to do it

the way we're currently doing it. And so if we decide next month to do

Wednesday instead of Tuesday, as a church, then we switch into Wednesday.

Right? We make those decisions as a church. Alright, so let's pray together.

And then we'll do another song of worship, then release the kids, then a song, and then go to the next one.

Father in Heaven, I thank you for

this evening. But it's still Christmas to us.

Some of us are kind of shaking off

the sugar from yesterday, or retired, because we did a lot. We went around

to folks' houses, or we got together with our family, or we sat at home

with our

nuclear family, I guess you could say, or close family.

There was a lot of shopping in a lot of cases, and there was some crafting,

and there was just a lot going on.

But we want to be busy for you all the time.

We want to be focused on you all the time.

As we worship you now, even if it's only a couple songs.

It really isn't a real long time. I thank you for those who blocked out this time to be here

tonight to learn something more from you, and about you. And I ask you to work in

this place that you see fit. And I pray in Jesus' name. Amen.

Thank you.

Even though I'm all through the valley, got my shadow of you

Through perfect colors casting out the moon

Even when I'm hot in the middle of the storms of this night

Where the world turned back and I know you are here

I would fear no evil

For my God is with me

And if my God is with me

No blame shall I feel

No blame shall I pay

Oh no, never let go, through the coming through the storm

Oh no, never let go, never having every love

Oh no, never let go, Lord, you never let go of me

I can't believe it's night, that it's coming

Through the hot black holes, the glorious land beyond all the air

The air being run, through these struggles, but until that day comes

I'm meant to know you here on this earth

I would fear no evil

For my God is with me

And if my God is with me

No blame shall I pay

No blame shall I pay

Oh no, never let go, through the coming through the storm

Oh no, never let go, never having every love

Oh no, never let go, Lord, you never let go of me

I can't believe it's night, that it's coming

Through the hot black holes, the glorious land beyond all the air

The air being run, through these struggles, but until that day comes

Still I will praise you, still I will praise you

I can't believe it's night, that it's coming

Through the hot black holes, the glorious land beyond all the air

The air being run, through these struggles, but until that day comes

Still I will praise you, still I will praise you

Oh no, never let go, through the coming through the storm

Oh no, never let go, never having every love

Oh no, never let go, Lord, you never let go of me

No blame for me, to be a sanctuary

Pure and holy, child and child

With thanks to me, I'll be however

A sanctuary for you

No blame for me, to be a sanctuary

Pure and holy, child and child

With thanks to me, I'll be however

A sanctuary for you

No blame for me, to be a sanctuary

Pure and holy, child and child

With thanks to me, I'll be however

A sanctuary for you

With thanks to me, I'll be however

A sanctuary for you

I'll just put the light in in advance, huh?

Thank you, thank you, thank you.

While those are being passed out, I want to share with you that on Sunday

I talked about how I personally had been under some

attacks and I had been struggling with

anger and how the one particular time

I had been struggling with anger, I had asked for God's joy

as we talked about in our Bible study, to devour, or in our Sunday service

to devour my anger and it worked. And then

so since then, I'd love to say to you everything's been great, but what

actually has happened is I have been under attack today

I broke a water pipe at my house

this morning, so I heard it sound like a gunshot and then water

was draining all over the floor in our laundry room and it rolls down into Ariana's

room and it broke at the bottom of our hot water tank, which meant there was no hot water in the

house and so I'm out there

struggling to try to get the water turned off and I did and then I had an hour and a half

two hours spent cleaning up all the water and then about an hour and a half trying to figure out how to fix

the pipe and then went to the store and bought the stuff and fixed the pipe only to find out

that the pipe had another leak in another spot and so then that was another hour

figuring that out and putting a different valve on so I could at least get some water operational

in the house and so yeah, that's what my day has been like today

but the good thing is I have not been angry

in the midst of all of that. Even when I was sitting down there

as the service began and I broke the little clip that holds my microphone

and I thought, things are just breaking like

crazy, but I didn't get mad, I just figured out some other way. So if this looks a little

goofy, I apologize, it's different the way I normally clip it because I broke the little clip

Okay, alright, so we are going to

talk about that today's lesson is bait or no bait and in case you're

not 100% familiar with fishing, this is kind of the way fishing works

I was going to have Larry do this but I didn't want to put him on the spot

This is a fishing reel that has a whole lot of dust on it because

it was in storage for a real long time because I haven't been fishing in a real long time but this here line

goes up through these little hoopy things and this is a

heavy duty fishing reel and this is a heavy duty line

and this will catch you a big old fish, in fact, in our waters

Larry will probably tell you, you might not catch all that many fish because this line is so thick they might see it

Yeah, good for bigger fish

So it goes up through these holes like this and then once

it gets through the holes over here it comes off and it goes to maybe a bobber

if you're going to use a bobber to kind of keep your hook at a certain level in the water

but then it goes to a hook, okay, you might have a sinker on the line too to keep the hook

stretched down low, that kind of thing, but the hook is what's

dangerous, the hook is what gets the fish

or so you would sink, okay

because if you just put a hook in the water

probably not going to catch all that much fish, right Larry?

There might be a few places, there might be a few places, if you put them where they're

spawning, like bluegill especially where they're spawning, you drop a hook

in there and they might jump right on it, that kind of thing because they just think it's a bug in the water or something

they're kind of dumb and whatever, yeah, something shiny

whatever, so the point is the bait can be key

to get the fish on the hook, but we're not talking about

hooking fish, we're talking about hooking people

and I wish it was in the context of the fishers of men

that we could talk about that, but actually that's a net, not hooks at all

we net people, we don't hook them, and so

we teach them and then they realize, hey I need to pay attention to this and they come to Christ

so, but really what we're talking about is hooks, the painful

kind of catching fish, so you have your

worksheet, you'll see it's a little simpler than normal, I took it a little light

today as far as the total number of blanks and things that we have

by the time we are done, you will be able to circle

either bait or no bait in the upper right hand corner, but in the left

upper left hand corner right there you have two blanks and the blanks go

missing directions, that's the words that go in the blanks, missing

directions, so the bottom line is, this is what we live in, right

we don't know everything we're supposed to do and we don't know exactly how we're

supposed to do it, so as a child you learn to wash yourself, dress

yourself, to feed yourself, to go to bed when you need to and so on, then as a teenager

you kind of rebel against a lot of those rules and you go, well do I really

have to go to bed by ten, maybe I can stay up to one and still get up for work on time

and you question all, and you figure out what's, and then it goes through a cycle

and later you figure out that most of those things that you were taught actually was right

after you make a lot of mistakes, I'm not judging teenagers, I was one, I'm talking about

my own personal experience, that's kind of how it goes, right, you question a lot of things, now

the sooner you adapt to what really needs to be done

right, the sooner you accept the right ways, the smoother

it goes, right, so there are people who go through high school and they do their homework,

they study, they listen, they take notes and whatever, and

usually they get good grades, but that's not a necessary

outcome, but what it is, it does flow pretty smoothly

it just kind of goes along, but if you don't know to do

those things, then you have a problem, so

we're dealing with missing directions, not knowing exactly what to do, some

years ago we got a Lego set, I think Alicia

was maybe a dozen years old or so, and we got a Lego set and

it was one of the first really big Lego sets that I had ever seen, it was probably about, I don't

know, maybe a thousand pieces or something, and all those little Legos

not the, you know, back when I was a kid, Legos were big, and then they made them

smaller and smaller and smaller, and you get little Legos, now some of those pieces are so tiny, you clip them on there, you're like

is it on there? Yeah, it's there, and you look at it from a distance and it makes a picture, but when you look at it

up close it just looks like nothing. This set

of a thousand Legos, we first thought, oh well, let's build something, so we built

something out of it, and then after that we put it away, and then we got it

back out, we're going to build something again, and the directions were missing,

and we looked and looked and could not find the directions, and they might have gotten through, it was a

Christmas present or a birthday present, whatever, they might have gotten thrown away with the wrapping paper, that kind of thing,

but the bottom line is, we could not build what we were trying to build.

If you've ever been there, you realize you can build a lot

of things out of Legos, but without directions, it's hard to build what,

these massive things that take like eight hundred or a thousand Legos and make it look

exactly like what they show you, right? Well life is kind of like that.

In the midst of that then, there are those who will say to you,

you can do it this way, here's the directions, here's what you want,

here's the results that you're looking for, okay? And let me say to you

that there are worldly benefits to betraying

Jesus, okay? To not doing it God's way,

to not doing what God has taught you to do, there are worldly benefits to that.

For example, if you go to work and you cut

corners, you don't do it quite right, so you don't do it as if you're doing it for God,

you do it cut corners, or maybe your boss tells you to cut corners and you do it, or you

steal a little money here or there, but never so much that you get caught, whatever,

there's profit in that, there's money to be made, there's money

in the bank, right? Now there's a lack of integrity, you're going to struggle

psychologically, you might have guilt issues, you're always looking to see somebody looking over your

shoulder, very suspicious, paranoid, whatever, there's a lot of

issues that can arise out of it, but in the meantime, there are benefits.

But woe to those who take those benefits, because what looks

good is more often than not bait.

God is not surprised when people betray Him, He knows all,

even that which we cannot know. So when you choose to do something

because it looks right, but you actually kind of know, oh, I think that's

right, right? God knows, is it right or not?

Why doesn't God just make it easy? Why don't you walk around

and hear somebody doing something and you think, I don't know, that might be a sin, and

like a sign pops up, or there's a glowing outline

that says, don't go here, right, dangerous, right? Or what

is that saying from that game from a long time ago, the cake is a lie, right? Don't do

that, it may look good, but it's not. Well, in some sense, it is

like that, God is very obvious,

but what God is really trying to teach us is

how to be, right? Anybody here ever dealt with

a young person or somebody who had a question and you told them what to do, and they

did it and it worked, and then later they had a similar

problem, and they came back and asked what to do

instead of just doing what you already told them to do, right?

Because you told them what to do, not how to be,

right? So, we have, Ariana has rules,

for example, she's nine, she has rules where she can have dessert once a day, but if she comes

in the middle of the day and she asks for something sweet, and we

say yes, then now in the middle

of the day every day, it's, hey, do you mind if I have this? Do you mind if I have that? Is it okay if I have

this? Even though she's supposed to have dessert after dinner, she'll ask for it, and that's where

she's at right now, because enough times we've said yes, especially in the Christmas

season, that she'll ask for something sweet pretty much every day, even though the rule is

after dinner, right? So,

what we're trying to do is teach people to be, and the

rule, only eat after dinner, doesn't actually accomplish that, does it?

If you only eat your dessert after dinner, that doesn't actually accomplish that, because what will you be

if you always only eat your dessert after dinner? You'll be a person who eats dessert after dinner

every day. Is that anything?

Is there any great value in that? I mean, it'll restrain you from overeating dessert, but

what if you eat a big dessert? What if you eat a whole chocolate cake, like ten pieces after dinner?

See? Now you've eaten way too much. You've eaten your entire calories

for the day. So, it doesn't solve the rules. Don't get it done. God is

not trying to teach us rules, okay? So, we're going to the fork here.

So, you follow the big fat arrow down, and you've got three possibilities. And I'm going to

start on the left, okay? And the first one is

that big word there is betrayers.

The big long line is betrayers. So, these are

betrayers of God, or betrayers of Christ.

Okay? And so, who is the most

famous betrayer of Christ? Alright? So, let's

look at the night that Judas betrayed Jesus, there was a dinner,

and you can find it in Matthew chapter 26.

Matthew 26 · chapter mention

Okay? And I'm going to read verse 20 to 25.

Now, when evening had come, he was

reclining at the table with the twelve disciples. And as they were eating, he said,

truly I say to you, that one of you will betray me.

And being deeply grieved, they each one began to say to him,

surely not I, Lord. And he answered and said, he who dipped his hand

with me in the bowl is the one who will betray me. The Son of Man is to

go just as it is written of him, but woe to

that man by whom the Son of Man is betrayed. It would have been better,

it would have been good for that man if he had not been born.

And Judas, who was betraying him, he was in the act of doing it, Judas had already made

the arrangements, right? Who was betraying him, answered and said,

surely it is not I, Rabbi. And he said to him,

you have said it yourself. Notice that the

betrayers right here fit in. And that's your other

two little blanks. They fit in. They all do the same thing.

They all say, not I, Lord, right? So it's betrayers

fit in across that middle side of three blanks. Not I, Lord, right?

They all said, not I. Every one of them, even those who it wasn't them.

And Judas, who it was. And every one

of them showed that they were saddened, that he would even say that, that one of them was

going to betray him. They were like, oh man, that's terrible. You say that. How could it possibly

be that one of us twelve would betray you? That's terrible. And

even to the point of acting out the rituals of remembrance. They were at

his essentially last supper, right? And so

he was handing them the food, they were passing

it, they were talking, they were being polite. Everything was going on. The rituals of remembrance

were happening even for those who were betraying him,

and those who weren't.

And in Judas' case, even while in his heart, he had already

taken the bait. He was already hooked. He was already

going after it. The money had been offered, he made the agreement, all he had to do was betray

Jesus. And yet, he was saying, not I. And he was saying,

oh man, I'm sad that you would even think so. And he was taking part in the dinner

together, which by the way, that dinner was sort of representative of the

Lamb of God. It was representative of the one who would be sacrificed for the sins of mankind.

So the betrayers fit in.

So the problem with that is then, you have to ask yourself, could you be a betrayer?

So far we've filled in the blanks where it says, missing directions on the top left.

And then we've filled in, betrayers fit in. This is the

problem, betrayers fit in. So now we're going to follow the fat arrow

down so we're staying to the left.

And you see what looks basically like the front of a barn.

Now there are two stories in

the Bible about the wheat and the tares. And if you can summarize

these stories for me, then we don't have to go there and read the text. So who wants to give it a shot?

Anybody want to give a shot at wheat and tares?

Okay, how about there's a farmer

and he has his servants go out and plant the field. He sends

his servants out to plant the seed. And then the crop comes up and what do they see?

This part, so this is the easy question.

Right, so there's weeds

and wheat, both. So he sees there's both.

And they say to him,

yeah, eventually what do we do? The first thing they say is,

did you buy bad seed?

Remember where we started this whole conversation? Missing directions.

So we're accusing God of not giving us enough information, which leads us

to taking the bait. So now here they go, oh, did you buy bad seed?

Because we planted it and the wheat came up, but a bunch of weeds came up too.

And then he says, no, the seed's fine.

And they say to him, somebody said, what do we do?

We go up and tear out all the weeds. We're sorry we planted it and

all these weeds came up, so we'll go tear out all the weeds. And the master

says what? Say it again.

Yeah, it was an enemy who sowed the weeds. And should they go tear all the

weeds up? Anybody?

Okay, he says, no, don't go tear all the weeds up. And then

it's because the roots of the weeds are intertwined with the

wheat. And if you tear up the weeds, you'll tear up the wheat.

That's what he said. He said, so don't do that. Don't go tear up the weeds, because if you do, you're going to mess up

the field. You're going to tear up the good stuff too.

So he says, then wait until the harvest is ready.

And then we'll harvest the weeds and we'll harvest

the wheat. And what are they going to do with the wheat when they harvest it?

The paper's a clue.

Eventually, yep, you're going to take it into the barn.

He says take it into the barn. And then he said, and what

are we going to do with the weeds? Also a clue on the paper.

Burn them.

Burn them.

Yeah. And so the other story is

very similar. Does anybody know it?

Okay. Bottom line is this.

God will sort when judgment comes.

If anybody wants to read those later, I can give you the references.

Okay. God will sort

when judgment comes. Do you have blanks for the references next to your barn?

I'm going to give you the references now then. That's good. Matthew 13,

24 to 30.

And Matthew 13, 36 to 43.

So

you notice that, by the way, that there are similarities between wheat and tares.

Have you ever heard that? If you look at a tare before wheat comes in,

before the wheat becomes fully harvestable, it looks a lot like a tare.

They look very similar. Okay. Then once the wheat grows,

you can walk up and take the wheat. You can actually take the scourmables like this with your hands

off the top of the wheat. You won't get much. But you can take it out and you can pop it right in your mouth

and eat it. But there's nothing on tares that you

do that with. It just drops wheat. It's weeds.

And they spread really, really fast.

So with people, have you noticed that

the Bible says, and it's true, that all humans have sin?

We're all alike. We all have sin. Even after getting

saved, usually you can see the sin in people's lives. So there's sin.

And then in the church, all people

profess to be in the kingdom. We all say, I'm part of the kingdom.

Right? And then

if you're a betrayer,

you're actually a tare, not wheat.

And then he says, in the end, I'm going to

harvest it all and I'm going to burn

the betrayers. I'm going to burn the tares.

And I'm going to let those who are not betrayers,

I'm going to bring them into the barn. That's what that's all about.

And then it's clear in the story that we summarize,

it's not our job to sort. So while this is

true, that bait is dangerous because there's a hook on the back

end of it, and it'll get you hooked. Right? Whose job is it

to see to it that you don't take the bait? Say it again.

It's God's job. And God has already provided you

with everything you need to make sure that happens, which means if you now do it,

you're culpable. Understand? So if

you know what to do, or if God would lead you to

do the right thing, either way, and you do the wrong thing, you're

culpable. You're a betrayer. You went after the bait.

Go back up to the fork there. And in

the box is the word bait. So the middle

prong of the arrows is the word bait. And notice that then there is an arrow

that goes down to Betrayers Fit In.

So if you started with Missing Directions, and either you went straight to

Betrayers Fit In, or if you go down and you go through bait to Betrayers Fit In,

either way, you could arrive in this room tonight, studying

this word tonight, talking about this thing tonight, and actually be

a betrayer. You could actually be somebody who has been

hooked by someone or something that you want

that basically

is deadly. It's ungodly. So you have to ask yourself,

are there things that I want more than following

God? Are there things that I want more than letting

God work through me? Because if there are, then you're in

danger because at some point in time, you'll be going after those

things while God is trying to do something else.

And heaven forbid that you arrive at the end of the road and you're going after

those things when Jesus says, come on, let's go.

Because you'll be hooked and you won't get to go.

Now you have a fishing pole in the middle there, and I

put some examples. I should probably just compare these and then I'll know where the blinds are.

There we go. I put some examples of things

that you could get hooked on and you'll notice that one of the little tags

there is empty, and that's for you.

What is yours? You put in the box,

what's your potential temptation?

What could hook you? It's hooked into the

last word in. So it says, betrayers fit in and then there's a hook on the

end and there's a box and there's a line and you can put something in that box

that's your temptation. If I had

to do it today, I'll just tell you probably my temptation is anger or frustration. That's what it's

been recently. That's been my struggle. I get frustrated. I get angry when things

are not going right. What's yours? It can be

entertainment. It can be TV. I've got examples already in the box.

It could be the name of a person. You could be pursuing somebody

that's not Jesus. And you put something in there.

But notice from missing

directions there's a big fat arrow around to the right. We're making

great progress.

Big fat arrow around to the right because the goal is for God

to teach us or show us or walk with us as we learn

what to be. Not what to do.

Your mom or your dad or your police officer or your teacher

they're going to teach you what to do.

The rules. The governors. They're going to teach you what to do.

Now in Ohio, you drive down the road, texting

on your cell phone, you can be pulled over by a police officer and given a ticket. Because in Ohio

it is not acceptable by law to do that.

Now you have to make a choice whether or not you're going to do that.

And if you do it and they pull you over you may get a ticket. And then you do

it again later. They pull you over and you may get another ticket. And ultimately you could get

pretty big debt and maybe lose your vehicle and bunch of points in your license. I don't even know what the

actual penalties of it are. But the bottom line is you can get all kinds of trouble. And you could

have an actual accident. If you're texting while driving it does create

a distraction. But also man a cell phone can sure be a hook.

It's very tempting. A text comes in while you're driving to read it.

Or to respond real quick. So the bottom line is

there are a lot of people in place.

And I might be one of those. I try not to teach people what to do. I'm not

most of the time I'm not trying to teach. My family is different.

I'm required to teach my children and folks like that on a personal level.

But as a pastor I shouldn't be teaching you what to do. I should be teaching you what to be.

When I talk about giving and serving and I say you should give and serve. What I mean

is you should be a servant. The greatest of monks you shall be your servant. That's what God said.

Jesus said. And so the top blank

in the box then is B. B.E. I did capitals.

Because it's important. But you can do it however you want. The top blank is B.

So some examples of things that then God has given us to teach

us what to be are. We talked about this already.

I'm going to give them in the order that I would have listed them. But that's not in the order of importance

or anything. Prayer. So you're with God.

Talking to God. Listening to God. You should be praying. And it really ought to be pray

every time anything happens. It's the starting point

of every conversation. Every train of thought. Every research.

Everything you do. It ought to be prayer. We pray before we eat because we're grateful

for our food. But we don't pray before we talk to people because I guess we're not grateful for them.

Or whatever. No. Be grateful. And if you realize what God's doing, then pray

all the time. Every time it pops in your head. When I was doing the youth group

back at East Lido nearly over 20 years

ago. There was a guy in there who was struggling with anger

and frustration. And I learned about popcorn prayers.

If you know what a popcorn prayer is or not. But basically it's where you realize

all of a sudden that you have a problem and you jump right into prayer. Just like that. You say, OK God.

You turn away from whatever it is you're paying attention to right now. Whatever

your focus is. Whatever you're struggling with. And just start praying. You realize

I had to stop working on the pipe. There's no water on in my house right now.

We have no water. I had to stop working on the pipe to finish up my lesson.

Because that's important. So what's important

to you if you start getting frustrated, angry, struggling, trying to solve a

problem? Have you prayed? And I would suggest that you should

at least do it. And I would suggest that you should try to stay in a

state of prayer while you're dealing with whatever significant problem you are. Because that's how

God will teach you what it is you're supposed to be in that circumstance.

Because He's there. He is with you. Prayer.

And then the Bible. And I genericed this one. The Bible.

So reading, study, memorization,

meditation, application. It's all Bible intake and

usage. So you read the Bible. And the more you read it

or have it read to you if you're using the Bible app listening to it. Which is by the way is not as good as

reading it in your own eyes. But it's still good. It's better than not doing

it. But reading, study. It becomes study when you write something down.

You're doing study about scripture right now. So you're taking notes on a

worksheet. You don't always have a worksheet. You can make worksheets for yourself. You can outline things

for yourself. There was a lady who had a third grade education who

undertook to rewrite the whole Bible in her own handwriting. She didn't understand

what many of the words meant. And she just copied over the exact spelling.

And I think that's a noble pursuit.

I wouldn't quite call that study if you don't understand it.

But she was writing down the Word of God and getting it in her.

If you get the Word of God in you, it'll be available to you when you need it to

do whatever it is you're trying to do. Why? Because you'll be

being whatever it's teaching you to be.

And then when something happens, you'll know what to do.

Giving and service. Right? And I

lump those things together on the next line. Giving and service.

Giving is when you give something you have, money, whatever.

Whatever it might be. And you give it. And you give it with no strings attached.

It's not alone. Right? Or if it's alone, you say, if I don't

ever get it back, I'm not going to hold it against you. I would like to get it back. But if I can't,

I can't. Whatever. Here it is. Giving. We know what that is.

Service. Service is when you do something for somebody else. It may be they could

completely do it for themselves. In fact, that's the best time. When they could do it for

themselves and you do it for them instead of letting them do it for themselves. I got it. I got it.

No. I already took care of it. Service. Right?

And that is a tool where God is teaching you

how to be, who to be. We're going to be like Jesus. Jesus was a servant.

We're going to be like God. God is a servant. Right?

Work. Man was created to work.

And we are going to work.

Counting my lines real quick.

One, two, three.

Okay. Encouraging others.

Encouraging others. That was on the next line.

God is the extreme encourager.

He creates things in people's lives and they are always positive, always loving, always kind,

always gentle. Right? And when you're going the wrong way, He will as gently

as possible try to steer you back on course. But having failed to do that,

He will... If He has to.

God is good. Encourage others.

And then the last thing is

Christ

not me. And this is the hardest one of all.

The goal is for Jesus to live through you. It actually says

in 2 Corinthians 5 that we now live for the one who died for us.

Right? He brought you back to life so that He can

live through you. And as you pursue to do that,

He will wait for it, not take the bait.

The last four blanks are don't take the bait. Don't take the bait.

I'm going to read one last reference to you.

Now your

list of be things may not be exactly the same as mine,

but they all have to be from God, if you will.

And as He is teaching you to be those things, then when the bait comes along

and looks good, you'll say, no thank you. You won't have time

to worry about

one of these other activities

interfering with what it is that God is trying to do, because you'll be busy doing

what it is that God is trying to do. Okay? And so it's 1 John

2, 19-23. I already gave you the reference there.

1 John 2, 19-23.

And the blanks are don't take the bait.

Don't take the bait. 1 John 2, 19-23.

And it says,

They went out from us, but they were not really of us.

For if they had been of us, they would have remained with us. But they went out

in order that it might be shown that they are not of us.

But you have an anointing from the Holy One, and you all know.

I have not written to you because you do not

know the truth, but because you do know it, and because no lie

is of the truth. Who is the liar?

But the one who denies that Jesus is the Christ. This is the Antichrist,

the one who denies the Father and the Son.

Whoever denies the Son does not have the Father. The one who confesses the Son

has the Father also. Bottom line is, it starts at the top.

There are missing directions. I'm just going to be playing with you. God is not going to

tell you everything you need to do. It's not going to happen. If you came to Christ so that Jesus

could tell you every single thing you need to do, every moment of your day, you came for the wrong

reason. You're looking for a controller. You're looking for somebody to protect

you from any mistake. Somebody, whatever, it's not going to happen. He will walk

with you. You ever take your kid to the store, or

a friend to the store, or whatever, and you've got to get something, and they're getting something,

and they're going to go one way, and you're going to go the other way, and they start to head off to the bread aisle

even though they said they were going for milk. You're like, hey, do you run up

to them real quick and grab their arm and say, that's the bread aisle.

Go to the milk, and kind of grab by the waist and shove them toward the dairy

department. No. You say, didn't you say you were getting milk?

Yeah, I said I was getting milk. Well, you're going toward the dairy aisle.

I mean, you're going toward the bread aisle, not the dairy aisle. Oh, yeah, that's right.

You don't run over and grab them by the waist and shove them toward the dairy department.

That's crazy. That's not how we work.

If you're with somebody and you care about them, they start to go off course,

and they say, hey, wait a minute, don't go off course, and that's what God does for us.

The Antichrist shows you what you want to see

so that you'll go after it. It's bait, then

you're hooked. Now, you're a betrayer, not truly

with God, not becoming like God. You can still act like

the things you're supposed to be. You can still come to church. You can still read

your Bible. You can still do things, but you're not

being anything but a betrayer.

So, it happens then, usually,

that the betrayers go out. That's what usually happens.

They make themselves known. They step out of their

house. They get mad because somebody said something they didn't like.

Or they throw a fit because things didn't go the way they wanted.

Or it lasted too long,

or it was too loud, or the list just goes on and on, of all kinds

of reasons why they have decided that this is not for them anymore.

The real reason is because they had already

become a betrayer. I'm not judging anybody's salvation. That's not my job.

But the real reason, according to scripture, is that that person had already decided

that there was a way that they wanted to go. They had taken the bait.

They were already hooked. And now this is their opportunity

to stop their own hypocrisy. Stop

pretending to be what they're not. And then

they go out. That's what John was talking about. They went out because they were

not really of us anyway. Now it's become obvious. And the

anti-Christ is against what God says. So you've got people in the world

for example right now, and I'm not trying to get political in any way shape or form, or whatever,

says that the church should be open and affirming and support all lifestyles.

And that we should be pro-abortion because it's women's rights.

And all kinds of things like that. And they'll tell you all kinds of things about why you should be a certain

way. There's a lady who said

you can't be overweight and be a Christian.

You can't wear skirts and be a Christian.

All these things, this make it look a certain

way. And that person that's trying to make it look a certain

way probably isn't even a Christian themselves.

The standard is will you learn to be the kind of

person that Jesus is making you to be?

The question is bait or no bait? And I told you up in the upper right hand

corner, God does not bait. The word says God

does not tempt. God empowers us to pursue Him.

He places in our hearts the desire to pursue Him. He gives us with

enough information to pursue Him. Yes there are missing

directions for the same reason that God allows the deceiver, the world, our flesh, to offer

up the bait, free will. So that by the end all will

know the answer to the question, do you love Him? When you stand before Him

and are required to bow on one knee, when you are

required to bend your head, will you do so in anguish and frustration?

Or will you do so out of gratitude and love for Him?

Because all knees will bow and all tongues

confess. And will you bow your knee and confess Him

because you love Him? If you love Him, then you are filled by His

love and you do not need the bait.

Hungry fish eventually bite.

Every fisherman knows.

But the fish that are full, that have eaten well,

they are not going to take the bait. So fill your life with the

things of God and you won't have to worry about the bait. When people come

by and they say, well let's go do this. You can say, no, no, that's not what God

will want me to do. That's not the person. And it isn't even that. And I make

that mistake a lot. We shouldn't say, that's not what God would want me to do.

We should say, that's not the kind of person God is making me into.

I know who I am in Christ

and I don't need whatever, drugs, sex,

entertainment to be whole. I don't need praise.

I don't need any of that that the world is

offering me if I'll do what they want me to do. Because I'm okay

in God. God's got me. I'm all full up.

And in that sense you can say to the Antichrist, there's no

room at the end.