Thinking Outside The Bible - Pastor Jesse Soto

Continue to speak to you this morning.

Developing our spiritual senses.

I always think of when I say that, I think of spidey senses because I like Spider-Man so much.

But as we develop our spiritual senses, it's really just another way to grow spiritually.

Because spiritual growth for a believer is not something that just happens, it's not automatic.

There has to be an intentional shift, like a radical shift in our thinking.

If we're going to discover how the kingdom of God works.

Our own strength, our own wisdom, our own logic.

There's a spiritual life or a spiritual realm.

And there is a natural realm.

And so it's helped me to grow spiritually as I understand it this way.

I begin to think differently.

So when things happen in life, I don't say, oh, there's another problem.

Well, that's life.

No, I go over to my spiritual side.

And I look for an answer, I look for a solution to change that.

Otherwise, we'll live our lives as Christians like a roller coaster.

Sometimes up, sometimes down.

Just like the roller coaster.

You go way up, and if you like roller coasters, you're excited.

And then you go down.

Christians, sometimes we live our lives that way.

But it shouldn't be like that.

Jesus said, I have come that you might have life and have life in abundance.

Abundance to me speaks of always being on top.

But there is another word that defines abundance.

That I think is much better.

It means advantage.

That means we have an advantage in life.

That's what Jesus was saying.

He wasn't saying that you're always going to be in abundance.

But the reality is when lack comes into our life.

Because he's called us to live a life on top.

Even from the times of the children of Israel.

In the book of Deuteronomy, chapter 28, God says to his people You will be above and not below.

Deuteronomy 28 · chapter mention

And so it's a mentality shift.

That even when I'm down, when I'm low, I see myself as on top.

Because the advantage is the advantage of faith.

And faith changes the way I see things.

It changes the way I speak.

Even though I'm in the valley, I'm speaking from the mountaintop.

Because that's how God sees us.

That's where He placed us above and not below.

He said, You shall be the head and not the tail.

You're not going to be behind, you're going to be in front.

That means we're always advancing.

And so as believers, we're at different levels.

We may be in a race.

All of us may be in a race.

But not everybody is together.

There's some way up front.

Others are way back.

And some have a pace.

And so there's different levels of spiritual growth.

And so we always have to be shifting the way we think and the way we speak.

Look at Hebrews 5, 14.

We'll begin right there.

It says, but strong meat belongs to them that are of full age or mature, even those who by reason of use have their senses exercised to discern both good and evil.

And so our spiritual senses have to be developed, have to be trained.

But what can what happens too often is that we don't use those tools.

And so we live our whole life as Christians that way.

The Bible says He's provided all things.

So when you're up against the wall, when something comes against you, don't go into your mode of sadness and depression.

Get that spiritual tool of the Word of God.

David would say David, Bless the Lord, O my soul.

You know why he would say that?

His soul was down.

In other words, there was opposition coming against him.

And so he would speak to himself.

Bless the Lord, O my soul.

That's the time to bless the Lord.

That's the time to lift our hand toward heaven.

And lift our voice high.

No weapon formed against me will prosper.

See, what are you doing?

You're going from the natural to the spiritual.

Strong meat belongs to those that are mature.

You want to be mature, you want to grow in the Lord.

You have to do what?

Develop your spiritual senses.

Take advantage of the tools that God has given to us.

The natural realm and the spiritual realm, we have to live both.

Our mind and our five senses kind of control our natural life.

We still need them, we're not ignoring them.

But when there's a contradiction, we set that aside and go to the spiritual realm.

We move into the spiritual.

What does the word of God say?

You see, just like the mind controls the natural world.

Which is good.

Because if there's a hot stove, you're not gonna touch it.

That's the natural.

That's the five senses.

It's good.

But there's a time to override the natural.

Faith is the driver of the spiritual realm.

So when you're in trouble, when trouble comes, and the Bible says trouble will come.

Paul talks about it in Ephesians, I think it's chapter six.

He talks about the evil day, that the evil day is coming.

But if we understand, and we shift our thinking, and we understand that God wants nothing but good for his children.

Remember Paul said the evil day is coming.

When the evil day comes, that means that it's not every day.

If it's coming every day, if you're always in some kind of battle, then you're gonna have to readjust your thinking.

Because God has called us to peace.

And so the majority of our life ought to be spent in peace and good time.

And from time to time, evil will come.

In the world you will have tribulation.

But tell your neighbor they're not supposed to be every day.

There's seasons.

The Bible says that the devil came against Jesus.

Remember, he was in the wilderness.

For a season.

Not every day of his life.

There should be more good days than bad days in our existence here on earth.

But you know why there isn't?

Because the bad comes and we accept it.

And we live through it.

Right.

But Jesus said when the mountain comes, speak to the mountain and it has to obey you.

It has to move.

But what happens?

When we're we're just Christians who coast, I call them coastal Christians.

What happens?

The problem comes.

The mountain shows up.

And instead of speaking to the mountain, we get closer to the mountain.

We cozy up to the mountain.

We grab a cup of coffee and start talking about the mountain.

We don't call the best people.

You know who we call when we have trouble?

The people who are gonna pull up a cup of coffee and drink with us.

Oh, look, you don't know what I'm going through right now.

And before you know it, instead of facing one mountain, you're facing two mountains.

Your mountain and their mountain.

And you finish your cup of coffee and you're both depressed.

Nothing has changed.

Jesus didn't say cozy up to the mountain.

Get close to it.

Hug that mountain.

He said, Speak to the mountain.

And it will be removed.

That's a different mentality.

That's a different way of thinking.

Jesus said, We got thousands of people following us, he told his disciples.

And the day is late and they're hungry.

And so look at the difference between thinking in the spiritual and thinking in the natural.

And we'll start all over in the morning.

But Jesus said, But Jesus dijo, sit them down and feed them.

You see, the spirit of faith in Jesus was operating.

He saw the same natural problem the disciples saw.

But when he stepped into the spiritual side of life, he had a solution for the natural problem.

So everything that we face has a solution in the spiritual realm.

Lift your Bible and say the spiritual realm.

The problem is we go to the Bible.

And sometimes we open it.

We don't know where we're going, we just say, God, I need something today.

And we read it.

And it says, And Judas hung himself.

I mean, that's not going to help us.

The devil already knows you're depressed.

He says, I got the perfect scripture for you, young man.

And so there's going to be contradictions.

But we have an advantage in every problem and situation in life.

The spiritual realm will always override the natural realm.

If there's a contradiction, put the natural aside and go to the spiritual realm.

Some mornings you feel saved, you feel like a Christian.

Christian today.

What's the difference?

The word of God.

Stepping over into the spiritual realm.

What does feeling have to do with what Jesus did on the cross?

Absolutely nothing.

And the word of God will always take us beyond our senses.

That's where the challenge is.

We have to go beyond our senses.

In order to develop our spiritual senses.

Elijah was hungry one day.

I can't tell you the whole story, but he was hungry one day.

And he went to a widow.

And God had said, Go to that widow over there.

Was it Sereaphath?

Serephath.

Or Seraph, I don't know how you pronounce it.

And she's going to sustain you.

He said, First of all, God, why would you send me to a widow who's got no money?

In the natural, we would say, Lord, send me to a rich widow.

If you're going to sustain me.

But he didn't know.

Because God said, Go see that widow, she's going to take care of you.

So he goes.

And he says, Hey, how's it going?

He's all excited.

He got the word from God.

He said, Hey, how are you doing, little widow?

She said, Sir, I'm on my last meal.

I'm about to prepare my last meal and feed my child.

And then we're gonna die.

Elijah said, Wait a minute.

Is this Seraph?

Am I in the right city?

You're a widow, right?

Why?

Because the natural senses don't match up with God.

God doesn't care about the natural.

He created the worlds out of nothing.

He calls those things which don't exist as though they already existed.

He said, Abraham.

I'm gonna change your name.

Abraham said yes.

But change your name to Abraham.

It used to be Abraham.

So he changed it to Abraham.

Now it means father of many nations.

I don't know Abraham's reaction, but he must have looked up and said, What does that mean again?

No, no sé qual fue la reacción de Abraham, pero yo pienso que says, You know I don't even have a child, right?

You know that my beloved Sarah is barren and can't have children.

But he said, No, no, your name is Abraham, father of many nations.

He says, I can't even produce a polywag right now.

A polywag, a little fish like that.

What was God doing?

Calling those things which be not as though they were already were.

Speak to the mountain as though it's already out of the way.

When God speaks, he already sees the finished product.

He already saw Abraham with generations in ahead of him.

The spiritual realm and the natural realm.

We live in both.

And sometimes we just have to supersede the natural realm.

If we want to walk with God, if we want to see results in our lives, we have to go a little higher.

You can drive to New York, or you can go a little higher.

And get there a little faster.

That's what the spiritual realm does for us as believers.

We know it's real.

We're not saying that's not real, that's not real.

We're just going above and seeing things from God's perspective.

And getting to the finish line a little faster.

Go over to I can see we're not going to get through today.

How many are coming back next week?

In Hebrews 5 12.

It says for when the time that you should be teachers, you have someone or you're in need of someone teaching you again the very first principles of the Word of God.

And you are in need of milk, not of strong meat.

If we're always on milk, we're always up and down.

And you could be a baby, but be a Christian for 20 years.

But you're still a spiritual baby in need of spiritual milk.

And what do we know about babies?

They're like little baby roller coasters.

Sometimes they smile, but most of the time they're crying.

Sometimes they smile at you.

And sometimes they need to be changed.

So Paul here is saying it's time to grow up, children.

It's time to start eating strong meat.

It's time for steak.

Like a ribeye style.

Yeah.

There was something I wanted to show you.

I think it was in the earlier passage where it says that we know the difference between good and evil.

Sometimes when we read that, and we say we've exercised our senses to know, to discern good and evil.

But really it includes much more than that.

Watch this.

The word good means also the first meaning, it means beautiful.

And then it means surpassing.

So when our senses are developed, our spiritual senses developed.

That causes us to walk in excellence.

And to surpass the problems of life.

When we're walking in the natural and ignoring the spiritual part of our life, we only enjoy that which really has no lasting value.

Because we said that we have to think outside the Bible, so I want to explain that just a little bit.

The word logos and the word remah.

The word logos has to do with everything God has said.

So it's important that we get familiar with the Bible, everything that he has said.

Now, this is important.

He doesn't open the Bible to us.

In other words, he doesn't give us revelation or understanding.

So that we can teach it to someone.

Sometimes that's our problem as believers.

God speaks to us through his word.

And so we find somebody to teach what we just learned.

But that's not the primary purpose.

The first reason why he speaks to us through his word is so that we can live it.

So the difference between logos and rehema is that logos when we read the Bible and rehema is when it comes alive, it's personal revelation to us.

It shows us what the judge and king of the universe is thinking about humanity, about you and I.

That he loves the world.

He loves people.

And if we come into his world unclean, unholy, then we will drop dead before a holy God.

But he loves people so much that he made a way to make us holy and clean before him.

So then when we bow our head and we say Father in the name of Jesus.

But it's because righteousness.

When we get that revelation on the inside of us, we begin to live righteous and holy.

When he says you are righteous, God, what does that mean?

And suddenly our eyes are open.

And then we read to live.

Everybody wants to walk in the blessing of the Lord.

Which is love, joy, peace.

Advantage in life, abundance, the goodness of God.

Let me throw this in while we're here.

Remember Moses got this thing where he wanted to see God.

Show me your power.

I want to see you, God.

And what did God show him?

God showed him his goodness.

God wants goodness for us.

For when people see God in your life, they see the goodness of God in your life.

Now there's a real God, and we can see a real God.

David said, surely surely goodness and mercy will follow me all the days of my life.

That was a picture of the presence of God on the life of David.

So we all want to walk in the goodness and the blessing of the God, but watch this.

Proverbs 8, you're there.

Blessed is that one that hears me, watching daily at my gates and waiting at the posts of my doors.

That's why we go to the word of God.

That's why the scripture says the one who hears my voice.

The one who's watching daily at my gate.

And waiting at the post of my door.

That every now and again I want to get rid of them.

Every now and again.

Oh, I just want to get rid of them.

I tell my wife.

But then they touch my heart.

We leave them for a few hours, we come back.

And they see us through the window.

And they are jumping like they haven't seen us in six months.

And they're barking and they can't even control themselves.

That's how we ought to be with God.

We kind of read this and we don't really take the full impact.

But he says the blessing is upon that person.

Who wants to hear me?

Who's watching daily at my gate.

Waiting at the post of my doors.

Tell your neighbor.

I think I'm a spiritual chihuahua.

Watch this.

The word blessed means more than just having something.

When we say we're blessed, we always think of things that we might have.

The word blessed means a straight line.

It means going forward.

It means not only going forward, but advancing.

Keep looking straight.

Keep going forward and keep advancing.

We lose out on the blessings of God.

Because we stop going forward.

The blessing is not just what we possess.

The blessing is staying focused on Jesus and moving forward.

So then faith comes by hearing and hearing by the word of God.

You see that word, word right there, word of God.

That's the word remah.

Faith doesn't come because you read the Bible.

Faith comes because you read it and read it and you call out to Jesus.

And you say, Jesus, speak to me.

I'm hungry.

Holy Spirit, open my eyes.

And he speaks.

And the Bible, the logos becomes rehema.

And it changes the way we live.

It changes the way we think.

It changes the way we think.

James says the blessed person is not the one who hears only.

But it's the one who does the word of God.

The blessing is in the remote.

When it comes alive, we begin to live it.

We begin to enjoy it.

Being a Christian.

All of a sudden you're always on a spiritual high.

You're always the joy of the Lord is my strength.

Paul said, When I'm weak, that means weakness might come.

But he said, When I'm weak, then am I strong.

The prophet said, Let the weak say.

Let the weak say what?

Let the weak run to the altars of God.

And say, God, help my weakness.

I don't know what I'm gonna do.

No.

No.

The prophet said, Let the weak say I am strong.

Don't let the devil see you sweat.

Confuse him.

He brought weakness on you.

And you're declaring strength.

He's like, there's another Jesus on the earth today.

They saw the disciples in the early church.

They said, there's something different about these disciples.

It seems like they've been with Jesus.

Let the devil see Jesus in your life.

In your attitude, in your actitude, and in your word.

Every time you speak, He knows what you're thinking.

That's why the Bible says shut up.

In so many words.

Would you stand with us today?