Patience in Trials

James chapter 1, this verse that we looked at earlier, as I told you this is the verse that came to me yesterday when we were sitting on that plane for so many hours on the tarmac. James 1.4, let patience have its perfect result so that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing. The goal is lacking in nothing and that means nothing unchristlike left in my system. That takes a while because we start off our earthly life with everything unchristlike. Everything within us is like Adam, what the Bible calls the old man and God is determined from the time he invades or enters our life when we are truly born again to determine that before we leave this earth we'll be lacking in nothing. But it's not always accomplished in most believers. Paul says that one of his co-workers called Demas left him after a while. 2nd Timothy 4.10, Demas has forsaken me having loved this present world. Why? Paul was a guy who did not preach for money. He did not preach for honor and Demas thought, I don't know, but I'm guessing when it says he loved this present world the most important thing in this world is money. So if he loved his present world it must have been I'm not going to make much money working around with Paul. Maybe I can launch out on my own and start my own ministry. He left him. I don't know, maybe he was lost. But you know once you die and move into the realm of heaven or hell your vision becomes more focused. It'll happen the moment we die, every one of us, our spiritual vision which is so dim on the earth will become focused and we will see what has eternal value and what does not. The Holy Spirit comes now to fill us to get our vision focused now so that we see what has eternal values and what doesn't so that we live for the things that do have eternal values. Of course not every Christian is faithful in obeying the Holy Spirit. We still think that there are certain things of worth that have eternal value. It's amazing how people who call themselves Christians still believe that. The Bible says if you be risen with Christ seek those things which are above. Where Christ sits at the right hand of God and not the things of earth. That means you live on the earth but our values are not of the earth. Our values are different. Just like Jesus lived on the earth just like us but his value system was completely different. Imagine the more we have that value system the more we are going to be free from regret in the day we stand before the Lord. One of my great goals in my life is to have zero regret when I stand before the Lord. I mean I can't have zero regret about my whole life because so many years of that life I was unconverted and even after I got converted so many periods of backsliding I can't help it. I mean I wasn't serious partly because I never had a spiritual father to challenge me all the time say hey come press on to God's highest. I'm sorry I never had it. I don't know why God never allowed me to have one. I wanted one. I wish I could be a Timothy. I looked around for a Paul to whom I could be a Timothy never found one. So I sort of struggled along and during that period a lot of backsliding struggling struggling. It took me 16 years after I was born again before I really understood the purpose of my life. I thank God it didn't take any longer but once I began to understand that and we started the first CFC church in our home 45 years ago or 44 years ago life became more serious for me. Then I began to realize that I mustn't keep this to myself. I must share this with others. We read a story in the second book of Kings in the time of Elisha when there was a great famine in the land in the city and some lepers who were outside the city had discovered food and they were eating it and they were healthy and they said we can't keep this knowledge to ourselves. The people starving and dying inside the city let them know and that's how I felt. I said Lord I found the purpose with which you saved me. It wasn't just to go to church on Sunday and sing songs and give a little money in the offering box and support some missionary and a witness occasionally and be regular at the prayer meetings and ease my conscience that I'm doing all the things normal Christians are doing. No it was much more than that. Not more activity but more overcoming in my daily life. People ask me sometimes Brother Zach what's the difference between your church and other churches? I say first of all first of all we do not compare our church with other churches. We never claim that our church is better than other churches. We've got hypocrites in our church just like every church has got hypocrites in their church. But we have one difference I see as I've observed many many churches through the years. For most churches Sunday is the important day. For us the important day is Monday and Tuesday and Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday and Sunday afternoon and evening. Meaning our daily life at home and at our place of work is more important to me, more important to us than just singing and praising and listening to the word of God on Sunday morning. All of that has value only if it's backed up by this type of thing. So therefore we emphasize the daily life more than how well we can sing or how well the instruments played on Sunday morning or how gripping the message was. No. All those things have value only if the other six and a half days of the week are pursued and seeking to becoming a little more Christlike. So in James chapter one it says know this because let me start at verse two. Consider it all joy my brothers when you encounter various trials. Now I want to say something about the letter of James. You know there's a lot of research that has gone into this trying to discover and serious research to find out in what order were the books of the new testament written. Now we can't be absolutely sure of it but people have studied history and done a research into it have stated and you can see this on the internet for yourself that the first book of the new testament written most people say was not Matthew. That was not even the first gospel. It was James. James was written around 44 45 AD and a lot of other books. I mean Paul's letters were written after 50 AD. So if that is right that the first of the 27 books of the new testament was James and he was the younger brother of Jesus by the way. Jesus was the first born of Mary and the next Joseph's and Mary's son was James and interesting that inspired by the Holy Spirit the very first thing he writes to Christians is not about the shepherds coming to meet Jesus and all. I mean Luke will write that much later. He says hey listen fellas I just got a few pages to write and I want to tell you the most important thing you guys need to remember. Here's the first page of scripture being written in the new testament. Consider it all joy when you face trials because Christians in those days trials was just normal experience for them. Today trials may be a little more strange for many of us but for those Christians it was just normal and he says don't get discouraged. Consider it joy. That means rejoice when you face these trials because that is the test of your faith. When you go through that trial do you really believe like I said earlier is this a stone or is it bread. The man of faith says this is not a stone. It may look like that but it's bread. He's going to strengthen me. It's not going to be difficult for me to swallow. He's going to do me good. This is not a scorpion. It's egg. My father has given me. This is not a serpent. It's fish. Yep because he says the testing of your faith will produce patient endurance. So the apostle felt that to become like Christ there must be a patient endurance over a long period of time before God can accomplish his purpose in you and me through many trials to make us Christ-like which is the ultimate goal. It's like an aircraft flying through many storms and finally landing at the destination written on your ticket and the destination written on my ticket is to become totally Christ-like. Do I have to go through storms to it? Sure. It doesn't matter. Whatever it is sometimes the deviation of the path because this path is dangerous. Maybe some war going on somewhere but ultimately I'm going to be Christ-like. If that is your goal and not just going to heaven, not just a comfortable life and not just experiencing health and wealth on this earth, something way a million times greater than all that becoming Christ-like. You will discover in eternity that the wisest Christians who lived on the earth were the ones who pursued the goal of becoming like Jesus Christ in their home life and the way they behaved at home to their husband to their wife and the way they worked in their offices with total righteousness refusing to make any money through illegal means paying all their taxes righteously even though it meant that income was reduced their bank account became less because they paid all their taxes they avoided debt altogether that means they lived very simply they did not go on a vacation because they couldn't afford it okay all their friends went on a vacation but they didn't say going on a vacation is not the most important thing staying out of debt is the most important thing and such people probably maybe their children couldn't enjoy the vacation that other children boasted about hey we went on a vacation man where did you go we didn't go anywhere we just stayed at home because my dad and mom couldn't afford it i don't mind my children saying that i think my wife and i in our entire life we had one vacation we couldn't afford anything more than that that's how it was but we never lost anything all four of our sons are following the lord wholeheartedly today that's a million times more important to me than that i could take them on a vacation that doesn't mean anything to me you you discover in eternity the things that have real value and the true christian is the one who lives by those values now and if you say that you receive christ as your savior the holy spirit spirit of god has come in he should have maybe you could see something of heaven's values of eternity's values and that's the purpose of every one of these conferences and i never get tired of repeating it i i'm encouraged when i heard about the great evangelist the great american evangelist in the 1800s called d l moody i believe he once went for a series of meetings in england and every day of that week of meetings he preached on you must be born again and there was an there was a guy there atheist or some unconverted man sitting up there and you know how intellectuals like to hear on a new subject every day when you go for a conference he went up to d l moody and said why do you keep on saying you must be born again and d l moody said because you must be born again that's why i keep saying it so people come to me saying why brother sank you keep on saying you must become like jesus because you must become like jesus that's it and until you're born again you've got to keep listening to it now until we become fully like christ like we have to keep on hearing it and you may not i mean that atheist may not have understood the value of it then but if he responded to it he would discover in eternity that he's glad that d l moody persisted with that message until the guy was born again and you'll be thankful that somebody kept on reminding you to be like christ like when you get to heaven you'll be thankful and that health and wealth were not the greatest things at all i hope we understand that so let patience have its perfect result and god's way of doing it is taking us through different trials not something we relish we don't relish any type of trial and even jesus had to go through trials and the apostles went through many many trials but they had faith to believe that god has a purpose in this this is not a stone the thing to say in every trial we go through is to say to myself this is not a stone this is bread i don't care what it looks like i believe my father will never give me a stone never never never in my foolishness i may go and pick up stones and eat them myself and ruin my teeth and my life but my father will never give me a stone impossible that's faith and if you can say that no matter how heavy a trial you're facing this is not stone this is bread it's come from my loving heavenly father and i'm going to take it but i'm going to digest it and every command of god it's not a stone some i mean the devil may keep saying think of that that god's making you do that difficult thing he tells you to love your wife like christ loved the church that's what the devil says that nasty wife of yours you want to love her like christ loved the church you say well god's told me to do it i'll do it god loved a nasty person like me i can't i do do that to somebody else or the devil tells some of you why is submit to this wretch of a husband this person who doesn't care for you i'm not saying blind submission because above your husband is god so if your husband tells you to do something against the word of god you don't listen because he's got an authority above him but otherwise submit to him as the church is to christ it's so difficult right in a reasonable way if you understand it right it's so important you know family life is a place where we face many trials and that's the place where god sanctifies us so when paul said i wish you were single like me that was to preach the gospel in those days in one translation it says in the one corinthian seven passage those who persecute christians know that it's easy to get at a man through his wife and family so in these days it's probably better to be single if you're passionate about preaching the gospel to be an apostle like paul i thought of paul you know when he had a problem in corinth uh it would take maybe a couple of months for a letter of his to reach there and a couple of months to get a letter back it's so different today i mean when if i read if i hear of a problem in one of the churches that i have responsibility for i can reach there within 24 hours and be there physically present to try and solve that problem it's difficult for paul and i don't have to be single in order to do that because i can finish the problem and come back in a couple of days finish dealing with the problem but paul couldn't do that so he said you know situation today is better to remain unmarried but today i say it's better to be married if you really want to be sanctified get married and god god will really do a work for you i can tell you that from my experience not only for my personal sanctification but i thought of when i when i first came to serve the lord in 1966 when i stepped out of my job i said lord i'm willing to be single all my life if that'll help promote your kingdom and i really meant it but as i look back now for more than 50 years you have been married i see that there's so much i could not have done if i was single i could not have advised families i could not have advised husbands and wives when they come for counseling i say sorry i have no experience go to somebody else or i could not have taught people how they should bring up their children i could not have taught people how to handle family finances which is different from handling single man's finances so many things and sisters in need would could not come to me see me in my house because i'm a single man so so many advantages i saw through the years in being married that i can see that there's a purpose in it and all the sanctification that comes to us as we seek to live with one another as husband and wife you know one of the great things that i mentioned this because a lot of patience when it says here let patience have its perfect result in verse four so that you may be perfect and complete lacking in nothing a lot of patience that we need is in our home not only with our wives and husbands but with our children all children are the professors of patience god has appointed in your home to teach you how to be patient and if you listen to those professors they'll do a good job in teaching you to be patient what i mean listen to that means endure in submit to god what god is trying to teach you they're not perfect god gives you imperfect children so you can learn patience and as you seek to bring them up in the fear of god in an evil corrupt world and all the wisdom you need dealing with their friends and their colleagues and the type of things they learn in school and everything else to protect them from evil boy you're going to learn a lot which you would not learn if you're just single or have no kids so family life is so important i want to just show you one part of that in one peter chapter 3 since most of us here are married or will be married soon let me show you one peter chapter three it's a very interesting verse that i've tried to understand as a husband through the years that i've tried to teach other husbands 1 peter 3 7 you husbands in the same way live with your wives in an understanding way now when i read that i said what are we supposed to understand i mean that a woman is different that she's got hormones that make her feel discouraged and depressed sometimes and that she can have depression after birth of a child and things like that which men don't understand and many other things like that it's more than all that the thing a husband needs to understand permanently verse 7 is that the woman is a weaker vessel verse 7 that is the thing he's primarily talking about your wife is a weaker vessel so if you have two suitcases to lift when you go travel let her tell you the lighter one i mean that rule we know you're stronger you carry the heavier one the same principle applies in many other areas emotionally don't let her carry the heavier load you carry the heavy one she's a weaker vessel in every area she's easily disturbed she cries easily because she's a weaker vessel and god has made her like that because she has to be something that you will never be a mother and because she has to be a mother she has to be very sensitive to what her child needs and because of that god has made a woman's constitution and emotional everything else about her inside in such a way that she can detect immediately and because of that there is an emotional weakness there because she's a mother he's trained to be a mother and like you know a child cries and the father doesn't have a clue what's happening and the mom immediately knows why is that it's not because she's cleverer than you you may be far more intelligent but she's got a nature that god's trained and because of that she's a weaker vessel you must remember that all your life that's part of the job of a husband and the interesting thing it says here is therefore you must show her honor don't say oh why do you cry so easily the answer is she's a woman why don't you cry so easily because you're a man not because you're more spiritual let me clarify that it's because you're a man she's so sure honor as a fellow heir of the grace of life i see fellow air like is a woman equal to a man that's also answered in this verse yes if you're a king she's the queen and the interesting thing it says here both the thrones are at the same level that's how i understand fellow air it's not that her throne is a few inches below yours not at all fellow air means both thrones are at the same level king and queen treat her like that even though she is your wife and if you don't do that here's what god tells you i will not hear your prayers you want god to say that to you men i will not hear your prayers so though it may look as if uh wives have a difficult job because it says uh verse one some be submit to your husbands even though they don't disobey even if they are disobedient to the word boy that sounds a tough thing a husband who doesn't obey the word of god and lord you tell me to obey him of course in matters that are not related to obedience to god and don't adorn yourself with a lot of external things but have the quality verse four of a gentle quiet spirit which god values so greatly and many other things there you may think that it's more difficult for a wife but i think the husband's got an equally difficult job there's no partiality with god god made men and he made women and he's determined to make both of them like christ but the spheres of ministry are different and the trials they go through are different but god ordains it if you can bring god into your situation in your home or whatever situation you're facing i'll tell you this my dear brothers and sisters that everything you face i don't care whether you're man or woman husband or wife you can be absolutely sure however difficult a wife or a difficult husband you may have that god will not allow you ever to be tested beyond your ability is one of the most wonderful promises in the whole of scripture i would have despaired if that one verse was missing from scripture i'll tell you honestly in my life 1 corinthians chapter 10 if you don't know that that verses is one of the most wonderful verses when you're tempted to despair when you're tempted to think that god's forgotten all about you anyone here who doesn't know that verse you must memorize it 1 corinthians 10 verse 13 just that important part in the middle god is faithful in the middle of that verse who will never allow you to be tempted in any way beyond your ability never never means never now how in the world can god do that unless he can control all the circumstances that affect your life your boss unexpected financial losses maybe out of your own blunders maybe you went into the stock market and thought you'd make a lot of money and you lost a lot of money okay you did something foolish you may have to reap somewhat of the consequences of that but if you repent and come to the lord even there god will not allow you to be tested beyond your ability you come to the lord and say lord i was covetous lord i'm sorry i heard of people making money on the stock market i thought i'd go into it i didn't have a clue about it all and i just bungled and lost a lot i'm sorry the lord says okay let's fix it let's fix it doesn't mean he's going to give you all your money but i'll help you to overcome that and not live forever with that regret it's wonderful god's a loving father you know he never comes to people like some fathers say to their children i told you that or like some mothers i told you that would happen you know god could easily say that to us when we disobey some scripture of his and we suffer the consequences hasn't that happened to us we disobey something and we reap what we have sown and we are full of remorse because we know that it is because of our stupid bungling my covetousness led me to try and make more money and i lost a lot and now i'm in debt i thank god that i have a father in heaven and you have a father in heaven who will never come to you and say i told you that he's not like earthly parents you know what he says let's fix it i like that he's always told me and i made a lot of mistakes in my life he's always told me okay let's fix it this is our father that's why i will love him all my life i'll do anything he says because he never torments me with mistakes i made you know the story of the prodigal son explains it better than anything else here is this person this young man and if you want to know how rich his father was think of what that prodigal son said you read that in luke 15 think what that prodigal son said when he was in the far country how many servants my father has how many servants do you have in your house if you want to know how rich that father was how many servants my father has he was such a multi-millionaire the father and there were only two sons and then the second son it says took 50 percent of his father's wealth he said give me my share 50 percent of millions so how long do you think he was away from the father's house one or two days to one or two years how long does it take to spend many millions of dollars he came back after a long time wasting everything become skin and bones and i'll tell you the thing that amazes me in that story always it says his father saw him coming how did he know did he send a message who's that hey i'm coming back today no he was wondering whether his father would even accept him i know how the father knew i think every day the father would look out of the window sees my son coming back to me that is a picture of god the way he looks at backslidden believers who've gone away from him seeking something for themselves and making a mess of their life and he looks out for them every day and when he sees them at a distance he says the father ran do you know that's the only place in the bible which pictures god is running only place not for a faithful servant of his but for a disobedient son who's made a mess of his life but who has repented and who's coming back and if anybody there is like that over here god's running for you brother sister to welcome you to put his arms around you and he's saying and when you see oh father i've seen and you got your speech ready saying i did this this is this is lots of stuff no no i don't want to hear anymore i've got a ring for you to put on your hands i want a new robe for you i got a feast ready for you this is our god and you know jesus could never have explained it better than with that parable meditate on the parables of jesus i've learned such a lot about god and about jesus from those parables it's amazing we need to spend time meditating on scripture he never says i told you the father could have told him that i'm sure the father warned him hey my son you're too young to understand how to spend these millions of dollars you're irresponsible you'll make a mess of your life i tell you that right now and he could have told him didn't i tell you this 10 years ago when you left home he never said a word he said let's fix it give him the best rope with a ring on his hand let's celebrate this is our god tell me when you have such a god can you do anything but serve him faithfully till the end of your life i i mean i've seen a god like this in my own case i say lord i think of the days when i was backslider and how you cared for me and i remember i was so discouraged those days i'm thinking of nearly 50 years ago when i was discouraged with so many things in my christian life and i was not i was in full-time christian work and things were not working out as i anticipated and we had financial problems and other problems and i was but i have more than anything else i was seeking for a life of victory and i did not get it i was defeated in my thoughts and i was struggling struggling struggling struggling and i said lord help me and it seemed as if there was no answer from heaven it was the heavens were brass for years and i would seek god and pray and fast and and i remember finally i came to rock bottom rock and i'm rock bottom and you know what god did he suddenly answered my prayer of many many years he suddenly filled me with the holy spirit i had received the holy spirit the day i was born again 60 years ago but that day he filled me like the apostles were filled on the day of pentecost and my life when i look back over the last 44 years since that day my life started moving up and the important thing the lord taught me that day was he did not fill me with the spirit at a time when i felt i deserved it but when i was at rock bottom when i deserved the spirit the least teaching me that god does not give his the fullness of his spirit to those who think they deserve him or who paid some price for it with a lot of fasting and prayer and the thing i learned that day was that god gives his spirit and his fullness not because people deserve him but because they desperately need him and boy did i desperately need the power of the spirit that day sure you know how we can think and i know there are a lot of people who pray for the fullness of the spirit and think i haven't prayed enough i haven't fasted enough i haven't done this enough i haven't given for missionary work enough when will you do it up deserve the holy spirit not in a hundred years he does not give a spirit to those who deserve or who have worked hard enough he gives the spirit to those who desperately need that power to live a life which they want to live but cannot live are you there well then you qualify to be filled with the holy spirit if you say lord i i want this more than anything else on earth i want the power of the holy spirit in my life to make me like jesus more than i want money or position or respect or anything i'm not interested in anything i see my goal with which you chose me before the worlds were created to become like christ i want that at any cost i want it i don't deserve it i'll never deserve you know when it comes to forgiveness of sins we've understood the gospel that you don't qualify in any way for the forgiveness of sins you have to receive it freely i'm a sinner that's my qualification i'm the chief of sinners you know that's how the greatest men of god have felt the bible paul says at the end of his life 1 timothy chapter 1 verse 15 paul says i am the chief of sinners he didn't become an apostle because he was so faithful in all his life no he was the chief of sinners that's how he felt i'm not saying he was living in adultery or murder all the time but somehow when you come close to god and you see how pure and holy and loving he is and how you see you have none of those qualities in you you really feel you're the chief of sinners and it's only one who comes close enough to god who feels that and we can repeat that it's a pious statement that we can all say oh yes i'm the chief of sinners and you don't really convinced about it it's like these people who pray in their prayer lord i'm such a wretch and wait till they hear that somebody else said behind their back that guy's a wretch then you see how you didn't really believe it you get all worked up because somebody called you a wretch and that's what you told god yourself in prayer we don't believe it we say all these pious so-called humble things to god which we don't really believe oh lord i'm the chief of sinners i don't think you believe it but when god gives you a revelation you really feel like that and i'll tell you this i can't say i feel like that all the time but times when i've really been close to the lord i have really felt like that not because of a verse in scripture but i've seen something of the holiness of god like isaiah you know it says he one day he saw the glory of god and he had been saying to so many others woe is this woe is that drunkard and woe is that man who was just making money for himself it was all right in isaiah chapter 5 all of a sudden in chapter 6 he says woe is me what happened he suddenly saw the lord and he saw him an unclean i'm an unclean man he wasn't quoting a verse he had seen the lord and it's an amazing thing when you've seen something of the holiness of god and you're not quoting a verse you say oh god i am indeed the chief of sinners every godly man not only the apostle paul has really felt like that in moments when they really come face to face with god it's very rare that such occasions happen in a person's life i mean it happens very rarely in my life but when i do come face to face with god like isaiah i say i'm the chief of sinners john wesley was one of the greatest saints that christendom has seen he founded the methodist church way back in which is a very different from the methodist church of today by the way it is a very godly movement way back 300 years ago and john wesley he lived up the age of 88 or something having served the lord faithfully for 50 years and on his deathbed the words people heard him say on his deathbed probably the holiest man living at that time he said when i enter the gates of heaven my words will be i am the chief of sinners but jesus died for me that's how a person feels when they come right into the presence of god and god will not allow us to be tested beyond our ability i mean from that point of chief of sinners god can make us saints so much like christ in our attitude behavior conduct is the wonderful miracle of god god will never allow you to be tested beyond your ability but the other part of this verse which i also want to read 1 corinthians 10 13 there are two parts to it the comfort is one that god will never allow me to be tested beyond my ability we thought about let patience have its perfect result when you go through a trial that's what we were thinking of from james and that james writes the first book of the new testament and what he wants to speak about is how patience should have its perfect result to make you like christ that's his goal he doesn't talk about comfort of when you go to heaven life will be so wonderful that's not what he talks about he says right now on earth let patience have its perfect result be patient in those trials in that difficult situation in your home the difficult situation your office if your conscience is clear be patient god will bring you through it he will never let the trial get to such a point where it becomes too much for you he'll reduce the pressure he's got his hand on the knob that controls the pressure and he'll reduce it when he finds it's getting beyond your ability to handle and the wonderful thing it says the second part of that verse is in that trial he will make a way for you to endure it the way of escape is the way to endure it not escape the trial but it says that the way of escape so that you can endure that and come out more christ-like at the end of it all it's like the gold being put into the furnace to remove all its alloys that have corrupted it and he will never let the fire become too much for you to bear at any time he'll control the temperature as much as you can bear that's all slowly he'll increase it little by little by little by little that you can bear it until you finally come forth as gold i've heard it said that when people put people who work with purifying gold they put it in the furnace until they can see their own face reflected on it in that gold that corrupt gold in the beginning you can't see anything in it but as it gets purified they begin to see their own face reflected in it and that's what god is waiting for till he sees his own nature reflected in you and me it's not just a nice picture word picture it's actually what happens god is trying to make us more christ-like because that is the ultimate goal of our life turn with me to 1 john please in chapter 3 there are two statements here that john makes one is in 1 john chapter 2 and the other is in 1 john chapter 3 and the statement in 1 john chapter 2 is not a very popular statement i preached on it for more than 40 years i believed it i've longed to live this way and i've sought to live this way 1 john chapter 2 verse 6 if anyone says he abides in christ he ought to walk in the same manner as jesus walked can you think of a more challenging statement than that in the new testament every day to live as jesus lived in the living bible paraphrase is very clear anyone who says he's a christian must live as christ lived anyone who says he's a christian not that he should go to church and pray and tithe and all that no no no something way beyond all that he must live every day as christ lived is that a burden 1 john chapter 5 john says after remember john is writing this at the age of 95 having been filled with the holy spirit at the age of 30 after 65 years of walking with the lord what is his testament 1 john 5 3 the last part his commandments are not a burden jesus said that once take my yoke upon you matthew 11 29 my yoke is easy my burden is light it's not like the yoke preachers put upon you what is the yoke a lot of preachers put on you pay your tithe god will curse you if you don't pay 10 and then you start calculating is it 10 after tax or pre-tax or after tax all these calculations god doesn't put burdens on you like that his commandments are not a burden there's not a single commandment in the new testament to pay your tithe does that make you happy he asks for something more difficult god's not short of money not at all he wants your body he wants you to use your eyes never to lust he wants you to use your tongue never to get angry never to tell a lie he wants you to use your hands never to type a letter that will hurt anybody never to do things that are wrong he wants your body every day every day that your eyes will be pure your tongue will be pure i think most christians will say lord let me give you 10 don't disturb me about my body i tell you it's much easier to give 10 than to give your eyes every single day to god and your tongue every day to god give your hands every day to the lord but that is new covenant standard he doesn't want your money let me say he wants your body romans 12 one great verse i beseech you therefore brethren by the mercies of god present your body living sacrifice to god and that's not a burden little john says obeying god his commands of god are as much a burden as wings are to a bird part of that as much a burden as wings are to a bird that's what the commands of god do the promises and commands of god are meant to lift you higher and higher and higher and if you're not experiencing that if you're not experiencing that continuously in your christian life i want to say to you in jesus name you're not serious about your christianity that's why you've missed something there's something serious you've missed in your life and you better wake up and say lord let me discover it before i drift along like a lot of other christians aimlessly through this earth never making any progress always defeated by the same old sin always murmuring and complaining about this that and the other there is a higher life for you i want to tell you that in jesus name and perhaps the lord brought you here this weekend just to listen to that and to lift your life to an altogether different plane his commands are not a burden so if he has given a command saying if you are a christian you must live as christ lived it does not mean perfection let me explain to you to walk as jesus walked let me ask you a simple question do you walk when you're awake or when you're asleep i mean normal people walk when they're awake when you're conscious or when you're unconscious when do you walk when you're conscious so i learned one truth from that it's talking about the conscious part of my life which is only 10 percent of what i know there's a whole lot in me which is unconscious i don't know i don't see it and in those areas i cannot walk like jesus walk because i don't even see it it's like asking a student in the second grade do you know anything of what they teach in the fifth grade no i don't have a clue one day i'll know three years from now but right now i don't it's like that there's a whole unconscious area in our life which god doesn't expect us to deal with but walking is a conscious act in the area where you know that's all god expects let me give you a verse another verse that clarifies it i'm trying to liberate you from law wrong concepts in the christian life and to challenge you to the right ones listen to james 4 17 this is exactly what i just said now it's in scripture james 4 and verse 17 to the one who knows the right thing to do that is the conscious area of your life and does not do it to him it is sin so what is sin is that which your conscious is wrong and you don't do it in other words what your conscience tells you is wrong for example a little two-year-old plays with a sharp knife he doesn't have a clue this is harmful but it's going to hurt him that's why the mother takes it out of his hand but he himself doesn't know so you can't say he's guilty but when that even that two-year-old when he tells a lie he knows you can look at the face of a little child when he's telling a lie and it's written all over his face mom i'm telling a lie i mean as they grow up they become shrewder and by the time they are 17 18 years old they can tell you a lie with a straight face and make you believe something is just totally untrue but they can't do that when they are four or five years old because their conscience is very sensitive you can a four-year-old can never tell a lie with a straight face i mean but the world is sinking into wickedness so rapidly perhaps four-year-olds will develop now to the place where they can tell a lie with a straight face but that's a wickedness they're developing into but the average four-year-old would not be able to tell a lie with a straight face because the conscience tells him you're telling a lie you're telling a lie and it's all over his face but as we grow up we suppress and suppress that conscience till we don't listen to it god wants you only to be perfect in your conscious area that's a great relief one day is the second verse i want to show you one john chapter three and verse two when he appears on john 3 2 we will be like him that's the day where conscious and unconscious will be like christ completely so one john 2 6 and one john 3 2 are two different things in the conscious area i walk by the principles jesus walked by the rest of my life i'll become like christ only when he comes again but that's the goal towards which i work so his commandments are not a burden that's why we can obey them god bless you all