Transforming Grace

Y'all doing all right?

Well you ought to be.

It's gonna be a great day.

You know why?

Why is it?

If it hadn't already, it will be.

Why is it gonna be a good day?

Why is it already a good day?

God made it.

He put it together.

And a while back you got the incredible privilege of being born and being alive.

So you get the incredible privilege of being alive in one of the days that God created, and then you have the opportunity of becoming alive really again and knowing God.

And you get to know him forever.

A Christian, really, really and truly.

I mean, outside of any influence of the devil messing you up, you ought to never have a bad day.

Now, guys like I'm texting to read you about oughta have bad days all the time, and most of 'em do.

Let me l let me read you this.

This is called an atheist prayer.

Atheists are interesting people.

It's awful, wouldn't it?

Be an atheist, be stupid and go to hell both.

Be awful.

An atheist has a position there is no God.

That's the dumbest thing ever heard.

Number one, how do you ever come to that conclusion?

You must be the smartest person ever in the world, read every book that's ever been written, made an exhaustive exhaustive study on the whole subject.

Most of them say, no, that's just the way I think.

Well, you're stupid.

If you don't if you pardon me saying that.

I might be stupid, but I'm dumber than you.

Let me read you an atheist prayer.

See, you're thinking less and less like an apostle all the time.

I was afraid you'd come to that conclusion.

Let me read you this prayer.

Atheist prayer.

As an atheist walked through the forest, he smiled at the beauty of all that was around him and said, What natural wonders the powers of evolution have created.

Just then he heard a rustling near the river.

He went to investigate and a seven-foot-tall grizzly bear was tearing down the path towards him.

The man took off like a shot, and when he got up the courage to look back, he saw that the bear was catching up fast.

He tried with all of his strength to pick up the pace, but he tripped and crashed to the ground.

As he tried to get up, the bear jumped on his chest and picked up one paw to whack him.

The atheist screamed, Oh my God! Time stopped, the bear froze, the forest was silent, even the river stopped moving.

As a bright light shone above the man, a voice boomed from the heavens.

You deny my existence for all of these years, teach others that I don't exist, and even credit creation to a cosmic accident, and you expect me to help you out of this predicament?

Am I now to count you as a believer?

The atheist looked directly into the light and said, It would be hypocritical of me to suddenly ask you to treat me as a Christian now, but perhaps you could make the bear a Christian.

Very well, the boy said.

The light went out, the river ran again, the sounds of the forest resumed, and then the bear dropped his right paw, brought both paws together, bowed its head, and spoke.

Lord, for this food which I'm about to receive, I'm truly thankful.

Take your Bibles.

I'll be reading out of the New American Standard, and then I'll give you another version.

I want to talk to you just quickly and briefly about how to be transformed, how to allow and cooperate with the Spirit of God and the Word of God to transform the way you think, to transform your thinking and thereby transform your life.

Now, I think you'd agree with me about that, that there's not a person in this room, myself included, Pastor Robert included, there's not a person in this room today that couldn't stand some further transformation.

You agree with that?

I mean, if you're sitting there today and say, you know, I don't need to change one bit.

I am already perfect.

I am just like Christ already.

Would you come up here and do the message for me, please?

Because I feel totally intimidated.

I know you don't think like that, do you?

No one does.

We all can stand some transformation.

We all need to be transformed in our minds, in our thinking.

Now here's the reason why, and we'll get to Romans 12 in just a moment.

Here's the reason why we need to transform our thinking, the way we think.

The reason is because the way you think directly affects the way you feel.

The way you feel directly affects the way you act.

If you want to act differently, think differently.

Because if you think differently, you'll feel differently.

You understand that?

Our thinking affects our emotions, and our emotions affects our actions or activity.

It certainly does.

Don't tell me it doesn't.

You cannot be thinking wrong thoughts all the time, feeling wrong emotions all the time, and be acting well all the time.

You just can't.

You can't.

It's impossible.

Now you might do it over a short period of time.

There's times where I've been real mad at Martha.

That's my wife of 31 years almost.

I've been real angry at her and act okay to her over a short period of time.

But if I'm around her very long and I'm feeling like that, it's going to come out the way I feel is going to affect the way I act.

I don't act good when I'm thinking wrong.

I don't feel good when I'm thinking wrong.

We need to change the way we think.

And this is the transformation process that every human being that meets Christ over the course of their life goes through.

God desires to change your life from the inside out, not the outside in.

So he changes the way you think, he changes the way you feel, he changes the way you act through that process.

You understand?

Ezekiel said this.

The prophecy came to Ezekiel and he prophesied it.

He said, God in the future is going to come and take out the heart of stone and put in a heart of flesh.

Meaning God, the word of God, the presence of Christ and the Holy Spirit within us, is going to change us, if we'll allow it, from the inside out.

Religion attempts to change you from the outside in by regulating how you act through rules or regulations or external pressure and force.

That's what the Pharisees tried to do.

God desires to change you, not from the outside in but from the inside out, through changing the way you think.

Your thinking's messed up.

So is mine.

And every place it is messed up, it needs to change in line with the Word of God.

Do you agree with that?

Now, will you say, I am a subject today, a willing participant, to put my mind on the altar and allow God to change the way I think.

Are you willing to listen?

If you're not willing to do that, you're never going to grow.

You're never going to change.

You're never going to progress.

You're never going to become like Jesus if you stay like you are.

Now, that's not all that brilliant, but I think it really is the truth, don't you?

If we stay the way we are, we keep thinking like we do, we're never going to make progress in becoming like Jesus.

And I don't know about you, but I want to be like Jesus.

And you know why?

Not just so I can bless other people.

That's part of it, maybe, but so I can be happy.

So I can be fulfilled.

I'm telling you, being like Jesus is a wonderful way to live.

It's the most exciting way to live.

It's the greatest way to live that any human being could ever live is to be just like Jesus.

And that's my destiny because I'm being conformed to the image of Christ.

Okay?

Now, if you want to know how Jesus is, look at the fruit of the Spirit.

That is a package that describes what every human being will be like that's like Jesus.

That's what it is.

And it's complete, I believe.

The fruit of the Holy Spirit.

This is what the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of God, produces in a person, and when that is fully formed in a person, inside at least, they look like Jesus.

And that's a great way to live.

It's a fun way to live, a happy way to live, a successful way to live, an inspiring way to live, a glorious way to live.

Which one of you in this room wouldn't love to have, wouldn't, wouldn't uh be very excited about having the fruit of the Spirit?

Love, for example.

Wouldn't you like to love without having to try?

Huh?

Wouldn't you just like to love and be loved and have this sense of love about you from God to others in me, for me, for you?

It's just love.

Wouldn't you love to have love?

God created you to want it, desire it, need it.

Love?

How about joy?

Any of you could stand a dose of joy at 8.30 in the morning on Sunday?

Huh?

Some of you are already thinking about Monday already, and the day's already shot because you know what you've got to do on Monday.

My joy's gone.

8.30 on Sunday morning.

Boy, I was happy on Friday afternoon, but I'm not anymore.

Wouldn't you love to have joy pouring out of your life?

Wouldn't you like to be happy?

I mean, our Constitution guarantees our right to pursue that, and most of us pursue it with all of our heart and never end up with it.

Wouldn't you like to be happy, filled with the joy of God, that no circumstance could thwart or stop?

Huh?

Let me talk to this side over here.

That one won't talk to me.

Wouldn't you like to be filled with joy?

Yeah, yeah.

Uh-huh.

They see they'll do it next time.

They don't want to be left out.

Love, joy.

How about peace?

You want a little dose of peace?

How about how about having a lifestyle of peace where there's no anxiety, no worry, no, no uh at least debilitating sense of impending doom about your life or or something happening?

Wouldn't you love to live at peace?

Aren't you tired of being angry and upset and all frazzled and stressed out?

Wouldn't you love to have a life of peace?

That's a good way to live, isn't it?

Love, joy, peace.

Was Jesus peaceful?

Was his life characterized by peace?

Sure was.

Storms going on, the boat tossed, tossing around, about to go under, and he's asleep down the bottom of it.

There wouldn't have one of us in this room been asleep down on the bottom of that boat.

Including myself.

I'd have been up there on top worrying with the rest of them, wouldn't you?

He was down there asleep.

He's saying everything's under control.

No use of wasting your time worrying.

Love, joy, peace.

What about patience?

Patience.

Jesus was patience.

Filled with patience.

Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, long-suffering, faithfulness, gentleness, perseverance.

If you ever want to get there and release re uh have the whole the fruit of the spirit released through your life, you're going to have to change the way you think.

Romans 12, 2.

And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind.

So you see that, the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what the will of God is, that which is good and acceptable and perfect.

So he says he uses two terms here.

He says, do not be conformed to that, but be transformed into this.

Don't be conformed, be transformed.

Now he's saying in that that we need to be transformed in our thinking.

As a matter of fact, the the uh the uh uh I forgot what version it is, says that you need to find or have a change within and that will be caused by a new way of thinking.

That's what he's talking about in transformed.

You need to have your mind changed or transformed, and that changes everything else.

Now, that word comes, translated transformed there, comes from actually it's the Latin, but also the Greek derivative of that is the English, which we get the English term meta what?

Meta?

You ever heard that term metamorph or metamorphosis?

The process of change.

And can you think of anything that goes through the process of metamorphosis?

Every child in here even knows that.

Actually, the butterfly doesn't go through the metamorphosis, the worm does, the caterpillar does, the fuzzy thing does, the ugly thing does.

That's what your mind is like before God transforms it.

Look like that worm.

And then God wraps a cocoon around you.

It's a cocoon of his grace around you to give you the capacity and the safety and the and the nourishment to allow your mind to be transformed.

And when it is, you come out different.

You come out like Jesus.

So we must allow ourselves to live in the cocoon of God's grace and his word to allow our minds to change.

It means to be metamorphosized by God's grace.

Now let me give you three things, just simple things, that will change your life, areas where you need to change your mind.

You need to have God change your mind and your thinking.

First of all, you need to change your mind or have God change your mind, allow the word to change your mind about God.

You need to change your opinion about God.

Anybody in here brave enough to already say, I already know everything there is to know about God.

I wouldn't.

We need to change our minds or our thinking, allow the word to transform the way we think about God.

Now think about it.

In the Garden of Eden, when God created Adam and Eve, put them in the garden, they had perfect relationship with one another.

They were without sin.

They had perfect relationship with God.

They knew God as God is, and they loved God, and God loved them.

There's the cocoons, so to speak.

Now the enemy comes and he starts tempting or testing them, bringing temptation into their lives, and where did he tempt them?

What was the lie that he told them?

What the first lie that the devil ever told human beings, what was it about?

What was the subject of his lie?

The subject of his lie was God.

He brought into question a question in their minds about the veracity of God.

He brought into question in their minds what God was like.

He said, Hath God said?

Did God really say that to you?

And if he did say that to you, think about his motive.

He's got a hidden agenda.

He wants to keep some stuff from you.

He wants to keep some things from himself and not give it to you.

But if you will go ahead and eat of this, you will be like him.

Wrong, wrong, and wrong.

It's a lie, it's a lie, it's a lie.

Now, the devil is still lying to us about God, and he uses all kinds of avenues of doing that.

Let me read to you 1 John 4, 16, last portion of that verse.

For example, this is an example.

Trust me, I could speak, I could preach 18 weeks in a row on this one subject.

1 John 4, I'm not, but I could.

1 John 4, 16 says, God is love and the one who abides or lives in him, knows him, abides in love.

The one who abides in love abides in God and God abides in him.

And what does that say about God right there?

God is what?

Love.

Do you believe that?

It's not that God is loving.

It's not that God has love.

If he just has it, then he might could lose it.

If he's just loving, he might wake up one day in a bad mood and not feel that way again or anymore and change his mind.

It's not that God has it.

It's that God is it.

He is love.

If you ever relate to the true God in the true way, you will relate to one who is love.

Now, religion doesn't tell you God is love.

Religion will tell you that God is mad.

He's angry.

Let me give you, listen, I hope you never forget this statement I'm about to tell you.

Contrary to popular religious opinion, God is not mad.

Angry, I know the difference.

God is not angry, not at you if you know Jesus.

Now he was angry.

As a matter of fact, he was really angry.

But the Bible says that God poured out all of his anger, all of his sense of violated justice and holiness, all of the punishment really against sin.

God poured out his judgment and his anger, all of it, on his dear son for your sake.

God's not mad at you.

God's not angry with you.

That would be contrary to who he is.

He is love.

Now don't you ever think that God can't get angry because he can.

But he's not angry at you.

He got angry at his son for your sake.

That doesn't mean he doesn't discipline you as a loving father would.

He's not mad at you.

Don't walk around thinking that God is some unpleasable parent up in the sky that you have to work and always contend with over your actions and activities.

That's not what a good relationship is all about.

God wants to change you from the what?

Inside what?

Out.

Say it.

Inside out, not outside in.

It's not about regulating your activities from an external perspective.

If that's all God wanted to do, he could have done it in different ways.

You understand that?

God can make you act good.

He can.

There's lots of ways God can make you act good.

You understand?

Listen, Jesus did not die to modify your behavior.

He had a higher goal than that.

Jesus wouldn't have died just to change the way you act.

He could have done that in a lot of ways.

I mean, he could have this big, big cosmic cattle prod, and every time you had a wrong thought, hmm.

Every time you had a wrong action, I guarantee you about your actions and your thoughts, they would straighten up both ways pretty fast.

God listen, Jesus didn't die to modify your behavior.

He died to redeem your life.

He wants to change you from the inside out.

Change your motive.

And in order to do that, you must change the way you think about God.

God is love.

Listen, God loves you.

He loves you.

That leads me into the second area that you need to change the way you think.

Now there's a lot more about places to change your thinking about God, but that's the starting place.

I promise you that.

It's the most fundamental change that your mind will ever have is changing your opinion about God.

The word of God says he's love.

Here's the second place where you need to change the way you think.

You need to change the way you think about yourself.

Not only about God, but about yourself.

The first portion of that verse in 1 John 4.16 says, And we have come to know and have believed the love which God has for us.

And we have come to know and have believed the love which God has for us.

God is love, but that doesn't mean anything to you unless you believe it and you receive it.

That's the truth.

The fact that God is love is meaningless to you unless it personally touches you.

So John says, we have come to know, first of all, in my mind, I've come to know this.

Will you please come to know that in your mind today?

I don't care what kind of religious background you have.

Will you come to know that God is love?

Will you do that today?

In Jesus' name, will you do that?

Don't you play at that.

You get it.

And don't even go anywhere else in your studies until you get that down in your mind.

God is love.

Because that is the only place in the Bible where there is a direct definition of God.

And when it comes to a direct definition of God, it says He's love.

There's implications of Him being lots of other things.

But it says it directly there.

God is love.

You get that down.

Don't you ever forget that.

Don't you ever let the enemy lie to you about him?

Don't you ever believe that?

believe a lie of the devil contrary to what the word of God says about him.

He is love.

You get that down in your mind.

So you believe it.

You believe it.

We have come to know in our minds, come to know and been believe.

That's a hard issue.

We come to know with our minds, we believe in our hearts.

We've come to know and we have believed the love which God has for the general population.

For the good people for the reverend.

I hate being called Reverend.

The reason is because I'm not very we have come to know and have believed the love has God has for little children.

What does he say?

We've come to know and we believe the love that God has for say it.

Us or me.

I have come to know I'm telling you friends it's changed my life.

It's changing my life because I have come to know and I have believed the love which God has for me.

I can tell you something today that I know is the truth.

God loves me.

I felt it the first moment I was awake this morning but it took a war for me to get there, friends, a while back in the past.

Can I tell you something?

God loves me more than he loves anybody else in the world.

He told me that.

Matter of fact he told me he loves me more than all you put together.

That makes me feel special.

Wouldn't you feel special if you knew that?

God loves you more than anybody else in the world that you're his favorite child.

Matter of fact, God said I could lump them all together, Clark, and I love you more than all of them put together.

Wouldn't that make you feel special?

And that's the truth.

But the truth is he loves you exactly the same way.

He cannot love you any more than he loves you.

God loves you.

You gotta change the way you think about yourself.

I'm loved and I'm loved in a way that no human being can love me.

I'm loved in a manner that not a single human being on earth will ever display And that didn't that didn't just start a while ago it started before the foundation of the world and it's not going to end tomorrow either friend.

It's going to stretch up to eternity I'm loved Most of the time this is the honest truth most of the time I wake up in the morning with a sense of well-being a sense of well-being wouldn't you like to wake up in the morning with a sense of well-being most people don't and I believe that's the saddest thing I ever saw because you got every reason and right in the world if you know Christ to wake up with a sense of well-being you're loved religion's told you a lie religion says you're not worthy God's mad at you you gotta spend your life running on the treadmill jumping to the tune that someone else plays for you you're never good enough you never measure up you always feel tired and frustrated because of that.

So you don't have any energy from the spirit you don't have any vision from the spirit you don't have any hope for a teacher that has anything good in it really for you except heaven so you spend your life under it instead of over it that ain't the way God intended to be Jesus told me this He said I came Clark religion came to do something else but I came I came that you me might have life and life more abundantly abundant life.

That's what Jesus told me one day when I was reading John 10 10 He said the same thing to you He loves you.

Listen It it's almost as if I mean you see it all over the word it's almost as if God is a good father and He's taking you by the shoulders getting your attention then he'll put his hands on your face and say look have you ever done that to your children?

Look at me.

Look at Abby look at me I take her face and turn it up look at me Abby it's only I can get her attention in the early days you know she's a little hard headed one of my daughters say Abby look at me it's like God comes to me takes me by the cheeks turns my face up to him and says Clark look at me I love you If I could say it any better than I have I would say it If I could prove it to you in a way that would help you believe it more I would but Jesus said this about love.

He said greater love than this hath no man that he lay down his life for his brother Jesus did that for you he can't do anything else the absolute epitome of love the absolute statement of God's love for you is the cross every time you see the cross have this feeling in you he did that for me because he loves me that much I'm loved.

Listen if you live to be 150 years old there'll never be one single thing you ever do in your life to make God love you one bit more than he does right now.

And if you live that same length of time you'll never do one single thing to make God love you one bit less than he does right now.

His love is absolute it's absolutely perfect you are an you are an inf you are an eternally lasting infinitely valuable human being created in God's image you're the you're the apex of creation the world wasn't created for you weren't created for the world the world was created for you God put the universe in place for me he loves me that will change your life change your mind about God change your mind about yourself and then change your mind about others matter of fact you don't really have to change your mind about others when you get those first two down now here's the point.

First John 4 7 says beloved let us love one another for love is from God and everyone who loves is born of God and knows God here's what that says you cannot say you love God and you hate people if you love God you love people.

Everyone who is born of God loves God knows God loves people you can't love God and not love what God loves.

And God loves human beings he loves people has it ever sunk into your mind that this whole life thing has to do with people that's what it's all about as human beings.

It's not about what you wear it's not about what you drive it's not about where you live it's not about what you have it's not about your career it's not about any of that stuff really it's all about human beings and relationships that's what it's about that's what church is about do you understand that it's not about the new building I mean that's going to have Robert because he's not going to have to preach 1800 times every weekend but it's not about the building church isn't about the building it's not about it's not about that kind of stuff really it's it's not about let me tell you what it's about it's about human beings that's what it's about it's about people and when you receive the love of God that he has that you believe that he is a lover you believe that he's love you think he is you believe he is you receive it for yourself it's easy to give away have you ever noticed when you're really rich in something it's easy to give away it's easy to give I mean when I've got you know when I got 50 bucks into my pocket it's easy for me to give one it's easy it's easy and I know when that 50's gone there's going to be a hundred if I knew that when that 50's gone there'd be a hundred's going to appear in there every time I give it away I'm going to get more what would you do if you every time you give it away you'd get more what would you do?

I'd be giving away to everybody wouldn't you same thing is true of God's love.

If you give it away it's replenished there's more in other words it makes it grow in you you get it you begin to get it when you love people.

I didn't say you had to like them all but you but you love them all.

You embrace them you include them in your heart you begin to see them as God created them to be you don't you don't see them in the natural you see them in the spiritual you see them in the supernatural really after the spirit rather than after the flesh you see who they could be what they can be what God created them to be.

Makes you a loving person.

The reason the church hasn't been loving in the past I believe and been judgmental and hurtful and I don't blame people for not going to tell you the truth.

Wouldn't go either unless I had to in the past.

If I didn't work there I wouldn't go I've had that thought a couple of times in the past the reason the reason the church hasn't been loving for the world really in the measure it should be is because the church hasn't received love.

You can't love if you haven't received it.

You can't give away what you don't have any more than you can come back from where you hadn't been.

Think about that a minute you ever seen anybody that just got back from where they hadn't been they don't look good when they get back from where they hadn't been so we we've been dry of love so we can't give it and when it gives it it costs us you know we feel it like it's just cost us and we paid a price.

We had to sacrifice the truth is we're rich in love and it doesn't cost us one bit to give it General Booth the the founder of the Salvation Army which is a great institution and still is when he was older he was an invalid he couldn't travel and they had a big convention for all the delegates of the Salvation Army in London, England.

And so he couldn't travel over there so he sent a a telegram to the leader and said I want you to read this telegram in my address to the delegates of the Salvation Army and when the time came all the delegates were gathered and the leader comes and he has an envelope and he opens the envelope and he says I'm going to read the address of General Booth to all of you because he wants to encourage you and it said Dear delegates of the Salvation Army others signed General William Booth that was his message others others will enrich your life in a way you'll find yourself at home in loving other people once you get the first two things right.

Here's a prayer I heard one time or saying Lord let me live from day to day in such a self-forgetful way that even when I kneel to pray, my prayer shall be for others.

Others Lord yes others let that my motto be Lord when I live for others I become like thee and that's the truth.

God wired you to