Be Reverently Faithful in Little Things in Christ's Body

Let's pray again. Jesus said, I am the vine, you are the branches, apart from me you can do nothing. That means I can't speak anything, you cannot hear anything, unless we abide in Jesus.

Heavenly Father, you are the vine dresser, you've given us Jesus the vine, and what a privilege, Lord, that you've called us to be branches in the vine. Show us a little bit more today of how utterly good for nothing we are outside of you. Anything, any worth, any reputation that is outside of Jesus is worth nothing.

Show us our worthlessness, Lord, more today, that we will see your worthiness more today. That you will fill this place, will fill our hearts a little bit more with your glory, with your majesty, with how worthy you are, because we have made room for your worthiness by seeing our worthlessness a little bit more. Do that, Lord, my heart.

I know that the root of sin in my life is that I think I am still worth something, and I want to forsake it, whatever you show me today, that through my seeing my worthlessness a little bit more, you have more room to fill in my heart. Do that for me, do that for my brothers and sisters and the children here, those listening online. Make us a church, Lord, of people who are worthless, because that's who we really are.

And may you have all the glory and the preeminence in your church. Bless each one that's here. I believe that it's not for an empty reason that you've brought us to this place, every one of us here, and those joining online as well.

You have a specific purpose, Lord, and I pray that that will be accomplished. I pray that you'll pour out your Holy Spirit, open the windows of heaven over us now, Lord, and fill our hearts with a fresh anointing, a reverence for you. Let your Spirit open our ears to listen and open the eyes of our heart to see and to know what is the length, breadth, height, depth of the love of God which is in Christ Jesus together with all the saints.

And we stand against you, Satan, in the name of Jesus. We know you have a purpose as well at this time to distract and to steal the Word of God, and we resist you firm in the faith in the all the hosts of hell on the cross permanently. We stand against you, Satan.

Lord, I pray you'll remove all distractions from us as we hear your Word, that we will have such a reverence for you speaking to us, not me but you, that we will set aside all other distracting thoughts. You are the most important person in the universe, and you are speaking. Thank you.

You'll do it in Jesus' name. Amen. Amen.

I wonder what it was like for you when you came in to the gathering this morning. We walked in here a couple weeks ago. We looked at a verse in Ecclesiastes chapter 5. I'd like to go back there and continue a little bit of what I had intended to say and didn't have time.

In Ecclesiastes chapter 5, last time I was speaking, I was talking about having a reverence for God when we come and gather and meet. And it's easy for us to forget. And I wonder if walking in, there was sort of a casual attitude with which you came in, even though I encouraged us a couple weeks ago.

And I want to start by saying that reverence doesn't mean somberness. Somberness is a word maybe many of you don't use, we don't use often, but it doesn't mean heaviness. It doesn't mean that I've got a frown on my face or my head is hanging down.

The more I've understood reverence for God, the more it's lifted up my head. You won't see reverence and know reverence for God if your eyes are downcast. You'll see yourself.

You'll see your failure. You'll see the things of this earth. A truly reverential person has their eyes lifted up, no matter what the last week has been like.

Their eyes are lifted up to see the God whom we revere and fear. But it causes a seriousness about our life. Ecclesiastes chapter 5, we read in verse 1, guard, guard your steps as you go to the house of God and draw near to listen rather than to offer the sacrifice of fools.

For they do not know what they are doing, that they are doing evil. Do not be hasty in word or impulsive in thought to bring up a matter in the presence of God, even your singing. Do not be hasty to sing that song.

For God is in heaven and you are on the earth. Therefore, let your words be few. That actually happened for me this morning when we got to the line where we sang, as thou has died for me.

I stopped. I said, Lord, I don't know if I can sing that. I'm about to sing as thou has died for me.

And I wonder what that did for you. In my mind, my thoughts went to Calvary. And the, what we sang in that line was by that same measure, Lord, what your sacrifice was like on Calvary as, that means in equal measure, let my love for you be pure, warm and changeless, a burning fire.

I said, Lord, that's not true. I want it to be that as you died for me, my love will not be back and forth. When Jesus went to the cross, there was no back and forth.

I think I'll die. Maybe not. And as he got closer to the cross, he didn't turn back.

He didn't shrink back when he saw what he was going to face. And in Gethsemane, when he knew and he wrestled, he said, Father, this is the most expensive thing you've asked me to give up. Fellowship with you that we've had for all eternity.

And I'm asking, Lord, I still want to die for Santos's sins because otherwise he's going to burn in hell for all eternity. I still want to do that, Lord. But is there some other way that we can, we can do this together where it will not involve your forsaking me? He wrestled there all night while his closest friends slept a few feet away from him.

And he set his face like Flint. We read in Isaiah 53, he set his face like Flint. I'm going to finish the purpose that my father gave me here on this earth.

And now we sang. Did you sing like the fool who sings, you know, the sacrifice of fools, that verse one? Maybe there were some fools who sang that those words. May my love for thee as thou has died for me.

Oh, my, may my love to thee be pure, warm and changeless, a burning fire and then move on. I stopped singing to that line. I said, Lord, is it true? That's reverence, dear brothers and sisters.

Reverence changes the way we sing, changes the way we speak. Because I realize this is God in heaven that we're speaking to. If you really sing the right way, we recognize that he is, he is listening.

I was speaking earlier this morning to another church and here's what I shared with them after the time of singing as well. I said, when I come to church, you know, if I recognize that my words are being recorded, I don't know if you recognize that. In the courts on this earth, when you are called to give witness, you raise your right hand and the judge or somebody else will say, the court recorder, perhaps, do you promise to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth? And you say, I do, or yes, or something like that, which means what? The world recognizes that when you do that, there ought to be a sense of reverence for the law.

And some places they say, so help me, God. They even recognize God in that, that God is also here. So help me, God.

That means that even the world recognizes all the rest of this time, you could have been lying. It's fine. But now you better not.

You raised your hand, you took the name of God and you said that I will tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth. Nowadays, when I sit in church meetings and sing, I imagine myself like this. I say, Lord, I'm sitting here.

I better tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth. Help me, Lord. That's how I sing now.

I want to encourage you, our LCF family, especially that we'll be such a church. When we sing, we're not just sort of casually sitting around and letting our thoughts run amok onto different things, but we sing with a reverence. Say, Lord, I'm about to sing.

As thou has died for me, O may my love for thee, pure, warm and changeless be, an eternal burning fire. We must have that reverence and think about not just here when we're here together, but when you're at home with your wife. In the courts, they have court recorders who transcribe everything that you say.

They're busy typing. They have shorthand little machines that they type. If you've been in court or watched a scene in a court, you've seen that.

They're busy typing. Nowadays, they have video recordings of a lot of court sessions, so you can go back and see, did he actually say that? Did she actually say that? They say, yeah, it's on record, because they lifted their hand and they said, I will tell the truth. And if you lie then, now you could have lied every other time and the court won't hold you guilty.

But if you lied after you raised your hand and said you would tell the truth, then you can go to jail for that. You lied under oath. This is the world.

This is the old covenant. Under the new covenant, Jesus said, your hand is always up and you are always under oath. Read Matthew 5 carefully.

Let's turn there. We'll start there maybe. Matthew 5, we'll begin reading in verse 33.

Matthew 5, verse 33. Again, you have heard that the ancients were told, or the world, the law, earthly law, were told, you shall not make false vows, not false statements, false vows, which means when your hand is up, that's a vow, then you shall not be false, but shall fulfill your vows to the Lord. But I say to you, make no oath at all, neither by heaven, for it is the throne of God, or by earth, for it is the footstool of His feet, or by Jerusalem, for it is the city of the great King.

Nor shall you make an oath by your head, for you cannot make one hair white or black. Don't make any oath at all, which means what? Is it that I can lie all the time? No. It means your hand is always up.

That's why there's no oath anymore. You're always under oath. But let your statement be yes, yes, or no, no.

Your hand is always up, brother, sister, whether you're singing the song, or whether you're at home with your wife, whether you're in the workplace where your wife cannot see you, whether you're away from the brothers and sisters in the church, and how you speak at home at the dining table about them, your hand is always under oath, and there is somebody transcribing everything that you're saying, and recording it. And one day, Jesus said, you will have to give account for every word. He'll play back that videotape and said, you said it.

You may not have realized that your hand was up under oath, but it was, because you're now under the new covenant. Jesus has come. We're not under the law anymore.

We're not living by the standard of the world anymore. But for you, sitting in RLCF, who have heard about the new covenant from the day you walked in these doors, you were told that every word that you speak, you will have to give account for. You're always under oath, brother, sister.

I think it was Tozer who said, Christians don't tell lies. They just sing them at church on Sunday morning. What did he mean by that? It's so easy, dear family, for us to sing these words, and reverence that we've been hearing about means what we just read in Ecclesiastes.

I said, I pause and say, I'm about to say this, and God is in heaven. I'm here on this earth, and he's recording it. Let's be reverential.

And I want to, before I move on, I want to say this, that everything you hear in the church, especially your children, and, but for all of us, everything we hear in the church is encouragement, even if it's exhortation. It's to build us up. If you hear a strong word, if you heard a word of rebuke, a word of correction, or a word that like, maybe what I just said, you're convicted now.

And you say, Lord, I just skipped past that line. I missed it. If Santosh hadn't stopped and reminded me of that, I would have completely forgotten about it.

Move on. The sound, the tune sounded good. That's all I was interested, taken up with.

And again, it's not, I just, those are the words that pierced me to the core right as I was singing, and I stopped, and wept, and said, Lord, I want that to be true. If you're convicted by it, it's not that you, so you go away and beat yourself up over it. The good thing about the church is that we preach truth and grace.

And like I said a couple weeks ago, grace isn't go back to sleep. It's okay after you wake up from the truth. It's get out of bed.

The alarm has sounded. That's truth and grace. The alarm has rung.

You've been told that it's seven o'clock in the morning. Now get up. That's grace.

Most people think grace is the alarm sounds, and then I hit snooze and go back to sleep. That's a false grace that leaves you defeated in the same sin, leaves you sleeping with the same slumber that you were spiritually. Thank God for his grace that says, I've shown you that the standard is higher than you thought it was, but I'm giving you power to live that standard.

This is grace. This is the true grace. Early this week, I injured my thumb by my own mistake.

I was in a hurry and slammed the door of the car in it, and it hurt a lot and still does. You can probably see it. It looks like it's all kinds of shades, and it's about twice the size of my other thumb.

And I've been dealing with it a little bit. I don't think it's quite broken, but it's getting better. But I've been dealing with the pain of it for the last three days.

It happened on Thursday, and it's getting better. But because of the constant pain that I've been dealing with in this thumb, it's there no matter what I'm doing. I still had to go to work.

I still had to coach the kids in their soccer games. I still have to do eat. I still have to brush my teeth and take showers and all that, but this is always there.

And the pain, the dull ache that's there, and kind of the awareness of this injury there is with me irrespective of what I've had to do. And it's been a good lesson for me in what it means to be a part of the body of Christ. Every member in the body of Christ has a function.

And dear brothers, dear sisters, I want to encourage you to know and to live a life of fully being integrated into the body of Christ. And I know we speak on that often. We preach on that often.

We seek to live it out. And most, if not all of you, I believe, are living that out according to your measure of faith. But I want to draw you in to an even deeper integration and commitment to the body of Christ.

And if you're part of the body of Christ, first of all, I thought about this thumb and the reasons why it's injured. It was the fault of the other hand. It was my left hand that closed the door onto my right hand in a hurry.

It didn't mean to. No part of my body ever means to hurt the other part of the body. I think you know that.

You never punch yourself in the face, right? That's why the beauty of the body of Christ is we're all seeking to do each other's good for the good of the head, which is Christ Jesus. And in the bigger scheme of things, in the hurry to get things done, the left hand closed the door without realizing the right hand was still in it and slammed the door shut on it. OK.

Now, this thumb could sit here and complain and grumble about the other hand that hurt it and fight back. It's only going to hurt itself more if this thumb out of revenge was to say, oh, you spoke about me like that or you treated me like that. I'm going to treat you back like that.

Who would be the loser for it? The thumb would, because it's a part of the same body. And now you've got another finger that's injured because this injury, this thumb decided to fight back. And now the whole body is even more in pain, including the thumb.

This is a picture of the body of Christ. And often in churches, you find people nitpicking and fighting, gossiping, backbiting, slandering, thinking, oh, you did that first, so I'm going to do it back to you, thinking that I got even with you. And yet who you're hurting is yourself.

If you're a part of the body of Christ, your brother, your sister and your child, and you pick a fight, you gossip against, you backbite, you slander, do something to hurt somebody else, you're only hurting yourself. If you do that in your marriage, if you as a husband think, well, my wife said that first, so I'm going to get back at her, bring up the past, who are you hurting? Are you hurting your wife by what you said? It might feel like that to your flesh. But if you're truly made one in the spirit, you're hurting yourself.

If the two have become one, and now you're picking a fight with your wife, you're picking a fight with yourself. Children, remember that. You'll face situations where you'll see conflicts in the church.

So this thumb doesn't get upset at the rest of the body. Yeah, we can learn from it. The head will tell the hand, next time be a little bit more careful.

It'll tell the eyes, watch where the other person's hand is. Yes, we can all learn from these things, but we don't hold on in vengeance against things that happen. And if you're, I want to leave two words of encouragement with you in this context, and that is that if you're a member of the body of Christ, first of all, don't be discouraged.

There's no room for discouragement in the body of Christ. Everything you hear is to build you up. And if, even if the thumb's injury was a result of its own failure, or of its own carelessness, or foolishness, there's still no reason to be discouraged.

Because what is discouragement? Let me leave with you a little picture that the Lord gave me this week of what discouragement is. Discouragement is cutting yourself off from the body of Christ, spiritually. Cutting yourself off from the head.

Discouragement is saying, Lord, whether it's your own mistake or not, I don't really think that you're working out everything for good. I don't have faith. I have unbelief.

I don't believe that you're really going to work this out, even though your word says you work all things together for good. That's cutting yourself off. The worst thing that this thumb could do after it was injured, was isolate itself.

Discouragement will lead you to isolate yourself. You'll go and hide. You'll stop coming to the meetings.

You'll sit at home and mope. Discouragement does that. That is isolating yourself from the body of Christ.

In some cases, separating yourself from the body of Christ. Imagine if this thumb said, this body, man, it hurt me. I'm done.

I'm just going to cut off and go and be by myself. Could that thumb ever heal? My thumb is feeling a lot better today because it's been integrated into the body of Christ. And there's that process of healing and the nourishment and the blood supply and the nutrition that comes into this body at the time when it needs it the most.

My dear brother, dear sister, dear children, especially if you're a part of the local church, you have a privilege that God has placed you in a body. And by body, I don't mean this thumb. I'm trying to use this as an analogy of how people often respond in circumstances like this.

Maybe they disagree with decisions the church leaders had to make or they're disillusioned by this or jaded about that or something like that. And say, fine, I'm just going to go be by myself connected to the head. If you see a thumb sticking out of my head, you know there's a problem.

This thumb was called to be a part of the hand, a part of the arm, a part of the shoulder. And even though its connection with the head is independent, it can move without the hand having to move, God has so placed it in the body in submission to the structure of the body that God has placed. He's given us a picture of the body.

And while you're strengthening your connection with the head, listening to the head, receiving instruction from the head, that thumb, God has ordained for this thumb to receive its healing through the hand and the arm. And so people who say, well, I was hurt by this church, I was hurt by that church, and it seems like all churches are the same. They all fight with each other.

Maybe. Who are you going to hurt by isolating yourself? You'll hurt yourself. But thank God that God has placed this thumb into this hand where now my four other fingers have had to learn how to do things that they didn't have to do.

I've had to learn how to hold a cup for a few days, it's going to heal pretty soon, I believe. But I've had to learn how to hold a cup with my other fingers and kind of make up for the lack of power and the sensitivity that's in this thumb. Use my left hand.

My left hand has had to do things it didn't realize it could do. Clumsily, yes. But effectively, for the good of the body, because the teeth still have to be brushed, the water still has to be drunk, the food still needs to be eaten.

God has a purpose for this body and a purpose for his church that moves forward while the member of the body heals. Don't be discouraged, brother, sister, even if this week was a bad one for you. You were defeated, perhaps.

The devil had a foothold in your life. Circumstances got away from you, and you didn't do the things that you wanted to do. You didn't live as sold out.

You didn't live as he died for you this week, perhaps. Don't be discouraged. Come in.

Renew your devotion to Christ the head and renew your commitment to the local expression of his body where he has placed you. Now, every member of the body of Christ must be integrated into the body that way. Because God has placed local expressions of his body all over the world.

And if this isn't the church for you, I say this often. I'm not afraid of people leaving this church. Plenty of people have left this church over the years, and maybe some still will.

I don't know. But if you leave, let it not be because I got upset. You didn't treat me right.

You did this. You didn't do that. I don't like this about you.

I don't like that other thing about you. Don't leave with a complaint. Leave because you realize that you're actually an ear, not a thumb.

Maybe. God has called you to be in a fellowship somewhere else. Why not? Sure.

I would rather you be planted in a body where God wants you to be somewhere else than be here, not fulfilling your purpose. Absolutely. Because there's only one thing I'm committed to, not RLCF, to Jesus Christ, the head and his body, that it might grow to its fullness, that the bride may be ready when he comes pure and spotless.

And if God's plan for you to be a part of the bride of Christ, ready for his coming, is for you to be somewhere else, in another church in town, sure, why not? Or in another town, in another part of this country, or somewhere else in the world, why not? Sure. But not leaving with complaint, grumbling, disillusionment. I don't like this.

I don't like that. For me, that's a sure sign that they haven't really understood the body. Don't be discouraged.

Secondly, don't be lazy. Don't be slack. Jesus said in Luke 16, yeah, Luke 16 verse 10, you know that verse, he who is faithful, let's turn there, Luke 16 verse 10, he who is faithful in a little thing, is faithful also in much.

Luke 16 verse 10, therefore if you have been faithful in, no, verse 10, he who is faithful in a very little thing, I like that Jesus said that, he who is faithful in a very little thing, is faithful also in much. And he who is unrighteous, or I would say unfaithful in a very little thing, is unrighteous and unfaithful also in much. That means that, why do I say that? Because the tendency is that some of us, some of you I will say, will think, well, what's my function in the body of Christ? I don't get up there and preach every Sunday, or I don't, I'm not part of the praise team.

I don't have a visible function. I just, I do a very little thing. So is it going to really matter if I even come today? Will people notice whether I come or not? Now it's not about people noticing whether you come or not.

That's why we, it's dangerous when you get so big as a church where, I used to be a part of a church before I came to Colorado, where if I showed up or didn't show up, people didn't notice, didn't matter. Now we're not coming here to be noticed, but would your, if for most of you, your function in the church is not publicly visible here in front. That's true about 99% of the church.

It's true. But does that mean that you don't have a function? Of course not. You do have a function.

And the tendency is that we'll think, well, I just have a very little, very little function. Then I don't have to be faithful in that. And that's exactly what Jesus was saying.

If you are unfaithful in the very little responsibility you have as a member of the body of Christ, then you are being unfaithful in the great things in the kingdom. If you don't care, take care of that quarter that I've given you, it means that you've just lost $25 billion. Spiritual wealth.

All you had was a quarter. You didn't realize that God was evaluating that quarter as a billion, as billions of dollars. He who is faithful in a very little thing is counted faithful in much.

He who's not faithful in a very little thing is counted not faithful in much. So you see that the very little thing that you are careless about or hopefully careful with makes a difference. One day, turn with me to Matthew 25.

Matthew 25 verse 34. The king will say to those on his right, come you who are blessed of my father. Inherit the kingdom, the whole kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world.

Come, here is, to use an earthly term, $25 billion. Here is it. And I imagine Jesus saying this to a simple housewife at the end of her life.

I picture, this is the judgment seat. He's talking about the judgment seat of Christ and God calling everybody, separating the sheep and the goats. And everybody's thinking, how did he, that's a sheep, that's a goat, and what's the basis? And he's saying, let me show you how I separated the sheep and the goats.

It was on the basis of a very little thing. And then he'll call one of the sheep, like I said, a simple housewife who feels like all she did, she looks back on her life and thinks, which category will I fall in? Well, there's the Hudson Taylor and the George Mueller and all those wonderful missionaries who did amazing things. And I look back on my life and if I was to write a biography of my life, it would be filled with dirty clothes and a bunch of dirty dishes and making food that probably got burned half the time because there was also something else going on at the same time.

And then the house just got beyond me and I felt overwhelmed. And then, but I did whatever I could. And then you see Jesus saying, come, you who are blessed of my father and the whole kingdom is yours.

And you'll say, Lord, what? What do you mean? What did that laundry pile have to do with the kingdom of heaven? What did that food that I cooked that got burned half the time have to do with the kingdom of heaven? He says, you were faithful in a very little thing. Because you are faithful in a very little thing, you are faithful also in much. I'm going to entrust much to you.

That's what he's talking about here. You read the rest of those verses. They'll say, Lord, when did I? When did I treat the kingdom of heaven with such value? He said, I was there in your home as a six-year-old little girl and you fed me.

I was there in your home as a ten-year-old boy. I was there in your church as somebody who needed to be sustained and encouraged and fed and you did it. You never got up once in the pulpit and spoke, but you sat at lunch and you spoke to that brother ten words that made a difference in his life.

You spent two minutes with that young child who was lost, that young teenager who's trying to find his way to God in the midst of a world that's craving his attention. And you encouraged him and said, dear young person, press on. You weren't so caught up with your own pain and your own weak and what it was like and how people are treating you or what all's going on in your life that that prevented you from being faithful in a very little thing.

Let's turn to Mark 14. I said, first of all, don't be discouraged, brothers, sisters, children. Maybe what you're hearing today is convicting you.

I hope it is because it's convicting me. It has been convicting me for the last few days and it is convicting me even now as I speak. I'm not afraid of conviction.

It's the Holy Spirit who brings conviction. Unfortunately, like I said a couple weeks ago, most preaching in the church today has lost the fear of God, lost the hatred for sin and a reverence for God. You see very little of that in preaching today.

And because people are afraid of maybe where they heard hatred for sin and reverence for God was in a legalistic church environment perhaps. And they always associate preaching against sin and reverence for God with that old legalistic system. Sure, but the devil wants you to do one thing.

And many of you have come from those circles perhaps with a heaviness of the law and legalism and all of that. But the devil wants you to do one thing more than anything else, to swing from one extreme to the other where you throw out hatred for sin and reverence for God completely. And where everything that he has said in the new covenant ceases to lose its value.

Reverence for God will cause me to go to the new covenant and say everything you've written in the New Testament, Lord, is one I want to obey. I don't want to toss it out as cultural this or cultural that. I say, Lord, it's in your word.

I revere you. It's you who said it. And unfortunately, like I said a couple weeks ago, that's missing in churches.

But in the midst of a church, as you sit here in this church where we seek to uphold a hatred for sin and a reverence for God, you must never be discouraged. As much as we see of truth, that much we see of God's grace. Jesus said, it says about Jesus, John 1 verses 14 and 17, the word became flesh and dwelt among us full of truth and grace.

Full of truth and grace, which means that until then, what truth they saw under the old covenant, while it was truth, it wasn't all of it. So if you thought the old covenant standard was hard to live by, nobody in the history of mankind ever was able to live by that old covenant standard. And then Jesus came and said, actually, it's higher.

We just saw that in Matthew chapter 5. Full, you want to know the full truth? It's actually quite a bit higher than what I showed you in the Levitical law and numbers and Deuteronomy and Exodus. You thought the law was hard? The new covenant is even harder. But as much as I've shown you of the fullness of truth, I've also shown you the fullness of grace.

We heard about grace. It's not go back to sleep, massage. It's okay.

You know, in some way diminishes the truth. If you've heard a preaching of grace that diminishes the standard of truth, it's false grace. True graces.

Here's the standard of truth. Here's an equal standard of grace. God's power to live by the truth.

That's grace. And then you walk with God a little bit more. You stay at RLCF and you realize, actually, guess what? The standard is even higher because we're knowing more of Christ and more of his truth.

Correspondingly, he gives us more grace. This is the new covenant, brothers and sisters. That's why I say you don't have to be discouraged.

If you were discouraged under the law, you know that you've come into the new covenant and understood grace because you're not discouraged anymore. My dear friend, dear family, if the new covenant truth is discouraging you, I want to tell you, you've either misheard it or we've been preaching it wrong. And I'm willing to go and examine my heart and say, Lord, if RLCF is still in discouragement, if there's even one member in this church who has been hearing my preaching, hearing our preaching, and really seeking to follow you, but is discouraged, then I fail them.

Lord, help me that they see truth and grace. And I believe that you're hearing truth and grace. Then perhaps it's that you don't really want to hear it.

You'd rather hear a watered down truth by which you, by your own strength, can somehow meet, live up to, or at least think that you do. And we want to continue to push the standard of truth higher until we see Jesus. Because guess what? Now we see darkly.

Now whatever I see of what I think is the whole truth is certainly not it because I haven't seen Christ fully. But we'll keep pushing it as God shows us more. We'll keep pushing it, keep pushing it, and preaching, be filled with the Holy Spirit, dear brother, dear sister, dear children, cry out for the power of the Holy Spirit that is able to give you a life that is equal to the standard of truth that you've heard.

And when we see Him, 1 John 3 verse 2, we shall be like Him. We'll see Him as He is. We'll see Him fully.

And we'll have gone this way of seeking for the power of the Holy Spirit, seeking for the power of the Holy Spirit, and living by the standard of truth. If you went to a doctor, he says, you think you're healthy. The tests have come back positive.

Everything's great. But guess what? I can make you even healthier. What would you say? Nah, I'm satisfied with the 50% health.

It's okay. Which sane human being would do that? If you're sitting here and you have a clear conscience, God is bringing you increasingly to a life of victory over sin. Praise God for that.

I have good news for you. The standard's even higher. There is sin in your life, unconscious sin, that you're not aware of, that God wants to set you free from.

Are you afraid of it? Does it discourage you? Does it cause you to think, man, every time I come to RLCF, it's just like, I've got to go even higher. Come to know Jesus, full of truth and grace. Where today, when I hear a convicting message that says, hey, I hear the Father saying through the Holy Spirit, my standard for you to live by is quite a bit higher than what I showed you so far.

I said, thank you. Let me show you a verse in Romans chapter 7. Romans chapter 7. You know this passage. Well, we hear from it often, and it's speaking about Paul's wrestle with unconscious sin.

Sin that is in him, if we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, 1 John tells us. So we all have sin. Every one of us.

We're at different levels on this journey. We all have sin. If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves.

And thank God that he allows trials and circumstances in our lives to show us, oh, there was a little bit of unconscious sin there. You didn't realize it. What do I mean by that? That means that I don't want to do that sin.

See, there's sin that I want to do. I'm just like, yeah, I'm just going to live a hypocritical life, continue to live in sin, continue to have that lustful way of living, that angry way of speaking, that irritability, and that complaining attitude, that grumbling attitude, that gossiping, all of those things. You choose to continue to do it, even though you sit in a church where we preach against such things.

That's willful sin. None of us should ever be in such a category. I hope not.

I don't think so here. But I think that most of us are in the category where we say, Lord, thank you that you show me more and more un-Christlikeness in me, that most of the rest of the world probably doesn't even think that that's sin. Their standard of sin is don't go and actually commit adultery, where we say, no, don't even look with lust.

Don't entertain that sensual thought. Turn off that movie if there's sensuality in it, even though it's a cartoon. Okay, Lord, thank you for that.

But I don't want to, and yet I find in me that I end up doing those things, and I slip into anger. I fall into a complaining attitude, or I fall into anxiety. That's a sin we preach a lot about in this church.

Anxiety. You'll hear very few sermons on how anxiety is a sin, and yet, like we heard already, Jesus said he rebuked them for their unbelief. He says, don't be anxious.

Don't be fearful. Don't be unbelieving. If Jesus says don't do something, that's sin.

That's my standard of sin. I don't have to ask the question, will I go to heaven still if I do this thing? That's the standard for many Christians. As we've heard often from the very beginning, we're not interested in gathering a bunch of people who want to go to heaven in this church.

Let the other churches do that. What we want is people who want to be free from sin, who want to be like Jesus in every area. And if there's zero impatience in Jesus, I want to get to the place where God brings me to a life where there's zero impatience in me.

If there was zero anxiety in Jesus, Lord, bring me to the life where there's zero anxiety in me. If there's zero unbelief in Jesus, I want there to be zero unbelief in me. If there's zero lust in Jesus, zero lust in me.

Is that the life you're after? I believe it is, brothers and sisters. And children, I believe for you as well, what a privilege that you can be here and hear this. This is the life we're after.

And I believe that if you're sitting here, you will find that you do that which you don't want to do. You don't want to do it. You don't want to go back and speak to the kids that way.

And yet, you did. What shall we do? Romans chapter 7, verse 24. Wretched man.

You read a few verses before that. Paul is describing this. He himself, Paul the mighty apostle.

He's been forgiven of his sins, Romans chapter 4. He's been justified, Romans chapter 5. His old man has been buried with Christ in baptism, Romans chapter 6. He doesn't see the old man as the one that wants to do those things. That old man has been buried, Romans chapter 6. Now, I've got the new man living in me, but the new man still tends to fall into those things. That's what he's talking about here.

He says, wretched man that I am. I did that. I spoke to my wife that way again this last week.

Ten years ago, before I was born again, and it was still the old man, I spoke to her and there was no conviction at all. And I just went on with my day. Now, when I spoke to her that way, there was immediately a breaking in my conscience that Santos, that's the old man.

I said, yes Lord, I didn't mean to do that. I didn't mean to react in that circumstance that way. Help me, wretched man that I am.

Who will set me free from the body of this death? There's the potential, I would say, for discouragement. All discouragement starts with wretched man that I am. Who will, I'll never get it.

It's always going to be the same old, same old for me. Same old, same old. But that's not Bible.

What's the very next sentence? Thank you. You know the sure way to be freed from discouragement? Give thanks. How is it that Paul can go one moment from saying, wretched man that I am, who is ever going to say, I'm so horrible that I'm never going to be able to set free from the body of this death, to the very next moment saying, thank you? The man whose eyes are lifted up, who refuses to look down, refuses to look at himself even.

Oh, wretched man that I am, who will set me free from the body of this death? His eyes get cast upward and he sees Jesus. Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ. You see why now there's no discouragement.

No room for discouragement. No room for laziness. If you were defeated this last week, brother, sister, child, you're here and God has a purpose for you to fulfill in his body today.

Fulfill that purpose. Because you've set aside all discouragement. Your eyes have been lifted up and says, thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord.

And then, in a couple sentences later, he says, therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. For the law of the spirit of life has set you free from the law of sin and of death. Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Turn to Mark chapter 14. Mark 14, we read the story of Jesus sitting in the house of Simon the leper, who was also, I believe, Simon the Pharisee. And he didn't really love Jesus.

I think he was interested in Jesus, like a lot of Christians are today. He spent a lot of money, I believe, to host this party at his house and probably went through some level of inconvenience to host the party in his house. But he did it out of self-serving motives.

I think he liked being known as the guy who threw the party. The most important person in that room was himself, not Jesus. This is Simon throwing the party.

I want to encourage you, dear brother, dear sister, dear children, in your life, in the house that is your heart today, who is the most important person? Are you the most important person and Jesus is second? You know, Simon threw the party for Jesus and probably gave him a very important place at the table. Maybe even at his own right hand. Here's Simon, the important Pharisee, whose house it is, whose table it is, whose food, whose money has paid for all the food, saying, Jesus, come.

I want to show you how important you are. Come sit next to me. But I'm still in the center of the attention.

That's why Jesus, in the parallel passage, says, Simon, when I came, you didn't give me any water for my head or for my hands. You didn't anoint my head with oil. You just, you tried to treat me as important, but you were the most important person, Simon.

And yet, here's this woman who has poured her everything at my feet and has watered my feet with her tears and wiped my feet with her hair. And I imagine what it was like. You know the story.

She was a sinful woman. In fact, we're not even, we think it was Mary. It seems to perhaps have happened multiple times, maybe.

But either way, in Luke 7, we're not even told her name. She's just called, her name, you know what, she's known as the sinner. Everybody in town doesn't know her name, but they know that she's a sinner.

You ever been in a situation where people don't know your name, but they know you're a sinner? And it was true, she was a sinner. They knew her as the sinner. And imagine this sinful woman, not invited to the party, let alone getting to throw the party.

She doesn't have money. If she had a house and money to throw a party, nobody would come to her house. She probably didn't even have the audacity to think that Jesus would come to her house, sinful woman that she was.

She's not invited to the party. And maybe she thought, okay, maybe I can go and help in the kitchen. Imagine if she goes to the kitchen, the sinful woman, everybody sees, oh, sinner is coming.

Oh, you want help in the kitchen? Sorry, we don't need your help. Can I serve the food? She just wants to be near Jesus. That's all she wants.

I'll find any excuse to be near Jesus. That's what she's thinking. I want to show him my love.

Under the excuse of serving food, can I be near him and just anoint his feet? Nope, nope, sorry, can't even let you serve the food, sorry. We got plenty of other people, non-sinners who can do that. And so she sneaks in.

I believe she snuck in. We're not told explicitly. She snuck in, unnoticed.

Behind everybody, behind their backs, everybody's backs are turned towards Simon, the important guy and Jesus next to him. And she comes in behind and sneaks in behind her, behind everybody and quietly comes and slips behind him and starts anointing his feet and weeping over his feet and wiping his feet with her tears. And I thought about that as a picture because Jesus says here in Mark 14.

And on top of that, the people in the room including Jesus' disciples who are supposed to be the chosen ones, right? They make fun of her. They're like, oh, what is she doing? What kind of, what are you doing putting your hair on his feet? Come on. Making fun of her.

She didn't ask for that. She just wanted, I think she would have been quite content to quietly come, anoint his feet and go. That's all she wanted to do.

Quietly anoint his feet, just say, Lord, you've been so good to me. I just want to show you and let you know. Whether you notice it or not, it's fine, Lord.

I just want to pour out my love for you at your feet. And if I can just slip away after that, not get into any trouble, that's fine. But Jesus wasn't going to let that happen.

God allowed her to be discovered because Jesus said, you'll see here in a few minutes, I've got to put this on record. I want everybody, including those sitting at RLCF on September 21st, 2025, to know what it means to have a simple, pure devotion to me, where you're not coming here to be noticed and to have something to do or some place of importance. You want to come in here, pour your heart out to his body, to Christ's body, and leave.

That's your only ambition. Is that why you're here, dear brother, dear sister? Is that why you're a part of RLCF? That at the end of your life, you'll simply have poured, anointed the feet of Jesus, his body, here at RLCF in a very practical way. Poured out your love for him to his body, at his feet.

Maybe RLCF is just the feet, the loneliest of churches in the world. I'm perfectly okay with that. I don't seek reputation or renown.

We don't want to be a church that's talked about around the world. No. I want to know that this is a place where everybody who comes here has only one ambition.

To glorify Jesus. To anoint his feet. To bless him in some way, practically.

Not some metaphysical, theoretical, ideological way, oh, I love Jesus, my devotion. Is the devotion that you have for Jesus real, dear brother, dear sister? Is it real? I know you say you love Jesus. I know you're saying that you love Jesus.

But how are you showing that in your life to his body? Mark 14, verse 8. She has done what she could. A very, very little thing. In the grand scheme of things, it was a very little thing.

But she could do something. She had enough money. It wasn't a lot, I don't believe.

But it was enough. Everything she had was enough to buy this expensive ointment. It was expensive.

But what she had was enough to do it. And she said, in the grand scheme of things, Lord, I can't throw the feast. They won't even let me serve the food.

I can't cook in the kitchen. And they don't want, they haven't invited me. But I'm going to do what I can.

I think, again, I'm using my imagination a little bit here, for the point of the spiritual lesson. I think that she had to fight to get into that room. A little bit of planning.

Going and buying the ointment, of course, first. And then slipping in. Because if they saw her coming, if Simon saw her, or any of the others saw her, they would have kicked her out.

He says, what are you doing belonging here? Who are you trying to seduce with your sin? That's probably what they have said. Get out. So she had to, she had to scheme.

She had to plan. She had to somehow find a way to slip in there and get to Jesus' feet. Could you imagine if Peter, Peter, the guy who cut off somebody's head, ear with a sword, saw her coming at Jesus.

What he would have done? Right? And let's not pick on Peter. We would have probably done the same. I got to protect my Savior.

I got to protect Him from the people who are going to try to harm Him. Like they would the President of the United States. Protect Him.

He's got a security detail around Him. She's got to figure out a way to get to His body. My friends, dear RLCF family, what are you willing to fight for to be a part of this body? That's a question the Lord's been asking me.

To be that thumb that when it's hurt, it gets nourished and nurtured. For many Christians, we live in a world, in a country where it's very convenient to go to church. If you don't like the time this church has a service, they've got a second one later on for those who like to sleep in.

Or if Sunday is more taken up with a football game, come on Saturday. We'll come to your convenience. We'll bring God down to you because there's something else that's more important to you.

And those other activities that you'd rather invest your time in, sure. We'll cater to you. This is the gospel.

Not gospel. It's a degradation to the word gospel to call it that. This is what is being preached.

And the way many people are seeking to be seeker-sensitive towards churches. I'm not here to judge anybody. Please know that.

But brothers and sisters, let's not fall into the same trap of convenience that many of the other churches are falling into. That I'll come if it's convenient for me. What did you have to fight to be here this morning? What will you have to fight to be here at that time when you don't feel like coming? It takes everything within you to come.

And I tell you what helps me is I read the stories of people who live in persecuted countries. I read the stories of how coming to the meeting is a matter of life or death. And in the country where they see you going to this church, guess what? They're probably going to kill you or if things haven't gotten that bad yet, you're not going to get that promotion at work because they know that you're a part of a Bible-believing church.

This is going on in Christendom today in other countries. Unfortunately, here in this country, it's convenient. I've got a bit of a headache.

Yeah, I think I'll stay home today. I'll watch on Zoom. It's convenient.

Please don't be discouraged. Be convicted. If you find that there's a laziness that's coming in into your life because you're in a steady state, things are good.

Yeah, I thank God that we have technology that makes it possible. And I love the gathering of the saints as often as we can. And sometimes, yes, we've got school going on the next day and all that so we can't always meet in person midweek.

But is there a value for the body of Christ that's meeting here? Have you lost that perhaps because you think, oh, my role in the church is very, very little? And I hope you've seen today, brothers and sisters and children, that God has a responsibility for you. She has done a very little thing. She has anointed my body.

Verse 9, truly, I say to you, listen to this, wherever the gospel is preached in the whole world, what this woman has done, this very little thing that she has done will also be spoken of in memory of her. One day, God will peel back the curtains of what RLCF was like. And I tell you with all my heart, I don't say this lightly, brothers.

I think I will be towards the end that God will call up. I know you think, well, I'm one of the elders. I preach here.

I have different roles that I fulfill here. And you may think that that's why God will call me first. I have even the slightest thought that that will be the case.

Because many who are first will be last. And many who are last will be first. And if you're one of those last members of this body, what do I mean by last? That you feel like of all, you go down the pecking order in the world's views of who all are do what in the church.

And you think, well, I'm down here somewhere. If you are faithful in little, God will call you first. I believe that with all my heart.

God will say, Santos, yeah, he was up there every other Sunday, so I don't need to call him first. I'm going to call that sister, that sister who quietly was faithful in the little that she did, walked with me in fellowship, raising her children, building up a godly home, was careful with her words, was careful in encouraging others, never having high thoughts about herself, praying for the saints, like it says about widows, washing the feet of the saints. And here was somebody who felt like they did very little.

And yes, they had failure. Yes, their life may have been a mess, perhaps. God will call one of the last, perhaps the ones that everybody else despised and think, well, that person, Lord? I want to ask you an honest question.

Do you believe that when you see who God calls first in the kingdom of heaven, you are genuinely going to be shocked? I think I'm going to be. Because I really think that it's going to be the last who will be called first, I believe Jesus' words. But I still haven't seen it clearly enough.

It's going to be somebody like, whoa, that person first, and then God will show. You thought that person was the sinner. You thought that's the person who could barely put two words together when they shared the testimony.

You thought all this, and you thought all that, but you didn't see what I saw. I gave her a very little thing. I drew a very small circle around her, but she was faithful.

I drew a very small circle around him, but he was faithful. I'll give you a practical example. We memorize our verses.

I believe that is a very little thing. Children, when you get up and you come here and either memorize them or read them, we don't mind. It's not about memory power, as you know.

We don't mind if you bring your phone or bring a paper where it's written down, but it's the prophetic utterance of the Word of God that we want to instill in you. That's why we have you come up here. It's not to impress on others, but getting up in front of everybody else and standing on a platform where we and those watching online can see you boldly speaking the Word of God more than the people listening.

The devil who's here and all his hosts hearing that little six-year-old child saying God's Word, speaking God's Word. We want you to do that. It's a very little thing.

Would it surprise you, dear brothers, dear sisters at RLCF, if God calls a little girl who just got up and said her memory verse first and say, you little girl, you didn't have any gifts. You weren't even in school yet, perhaps. You just knew ABC, and you could barely speak.

You couldn't speak for minutes upon minutes, dozens of minutes like the teachers in the church do. But you spoke 10 seconds in the ability that I gave you to speak God's Word, and you took it seriously during the day to read it, even if you couldn't memorize it. You tried it.

You read it. You read it. That's why I put it on my phone.

Every time I turn on my phone, the first thing I see, He will conform you to the unblameless. 1 Corinthians 1.8. It's going through my mind, going through my mind, going through my mind. And God sees that you are faithful in that little thing.

You didn't think of it as a big thing, and then you got up there every Sunday, and you stammered through it, and you stumbled through it, and you had to be helped through it. But you tried. You did the very little thing that you do, and the Father will say, come, the whole kingdom is yours.

And then there will be some preacher, perhaps, I hope it's not me, but I recognize it could be me, who God will say, well, I gave you a bigger circle, Santosh. And you had all these other things, and everybody thought, oh, look at him. He does this, does that other thing.

But you weren't faithful to fulfill the ministry that I gave you. If I gave you a bigger circle, I would have given you, I gave you grace available to fulfill it. But you weren't faithful.

He says, go to the back of the line, you who were first. Let's have a last attitude, like I've said here before, in all the things we do here in this church. God is building a body, dear brothers and sisters, of people who are not seeking to be prominent, not seeking to be gifted, and have a big place in the church, but those who are willing to do what they can.

She has done what she could. He has done what he could. And Jesus never said, when the gospel is preached, that you'll hear about the sacrifices Peter made, and John made, and how they gave up their nets, or anything else.

He says, what you will hear, the gospel is about little, insignificant people, men or women, who did what they could, within the circle that I drew around them. Theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Let's pray.

Heavenly Father, I pray that you will make this a reality. There won't just be some cute idea we heard, or... Help us, Lord, to abide in you, that we might bear much fruit, and to recognize that outside of you, we can do nothing. I pray, Lord, like we heard, there will be no discouragement, and no laziness in our midst, that every single member of this church is set free from discouragement from this day forward.

Lord, set us free completely, and no one here ever goes back to a life of living in discouragement. And no more laziness, either. No more slackness, Lord, in our fulfilling the ministry for which you placed us.

Give us a Z, Lord, for your house, and for your body. Thank you. You will do it, in Jesus' name.

Amen.