Children, you may wonder why we encourage you
to memorize your scripture verses.
It's a good habit.
Part of the reason, it's not to develop
your mental skill that you can do in
school, hopefully it'll help with that, but that
you know exactly what God's Word says.
Because already there's in Christendom a lot of
manipulating of God's Word.
You'll hear preachers say, I've sometimes seen little
clips of messages that of a preacher saying
something and saying God's Word says something and
I know it doesn't say that.
That's because I was taught at a young
age to know exactly what God's Word says,
not what the preacher says it says.
And for that you must know God's Word.
And that's why we encourage you to memorize
exactly what the Word of God is actually
said.
So that you'll remember, for example, this verse
that we have up there.
Do not work for the food which perishes,
but for the food which endures to eternal
life, which the Son of Man shall give
you.
I'm not going to speak on that, but
here's a little encouragement I want to leave
with you brothers and sisters this week.
For whether you go to work outside the
home or work inside the home, it's not
for the food, can we pull that verse
back up, it's not for the food that
perishes.
Somebody asks you, why do you go to
work?
Most people, even most Christians would say to
put food on the table.
It's not biblical.
The Bible says don't work for the food
on the table.
But you say I'm working for the food
which endures to eternal life and when I
work for that, God will provide the food
on the table.
God will take care of the needs in
the home.
If in your heart he sees that you're
not about making enough money to have a
good life and have a nice house and
all these things, you working for the food
which the Son of Man will give you,
which will endure to eternal life, and then
he'll put the food on the table.
Isn't it much better that God puts the
food on the table than that I do?
And so I look at the food on
the table and whether you cooked it or
not, whether you worked and got money to
buy the ingredients for it or not, you
realize, Lord this week I was working for
you.
You were giving me spiritual food through the
week and because I did that, here's food
on the table for my children.
They're doing well in school perhaps or not
well, it's okay.
Much better that our children learn to work
for the food which endures to eternal life.
Oh dear children, can you remember that when
you go to school this week or even
if you're schooling at home?
Sometimes my children ask me, what's the point
of learning this?
Here's the answer.
The next time your children ask you, what's
the point of this subject?
Because Jesus wants me to learn it.
He wants through my learning of history or
science or reading to give me something of
eternal life.
And yes, these are useful skills so that
we need to survive in the home.
So, but like I was saying children, one
of the reasons we do encourage you, whether
you come up here and say it, I
think it's good that you do come up
and say it because you'll learn boldness.
Someday I believe God is going to call
many of you, if not all of you,
to speak God's Word boldly.
Not necessarily preaching, but to bear witness of
God's, of the life of God in you
through the power of the Holy Spirit.
He wants you, sons and daughters, to prophesy.
That's the promise of the Holy Spirit.
And if you never learn to do that
while you are young, you'll be timid and
shy.
But think, what a wonderful privilege that as
children you can come up here in front
of everyone.
Something that many of us adults struggle with
even, getting nervous to stand in front.
But you're learning it at a young age.
I hope you're thankful for that opportunity.
And coming up here and saying exactly what
the Bible says, no twisting and turning and
no adding and taking away.
Exactly what the Bible says.
Now sometimes we don't have the whole verse
there.
That's so that you have enough that you
can memorize and remember.
But as I say often, I hope every
week you go and actually look at that
verse in the Bible.
I'm not going to ask you to raise
your hand, but how many of you actually
went and looked at our reference for this
past week during the week?
I didn't.
I'll confess.
And I'm convicted by that, sitting up here.
But I tried to almost every week.
I'll be honest with you.
But I didn't this week.
I read a lot of other things in
God's Word.
But I also had that verse on my
phone.
But I didn't actually go and look at
it.
And so I'm going to do that right
after this meeting.
And for this verse, go to John chapter
6 and read that chapter.
Read that verse in its context and see
how when Jesus spoke these words, shortly after
that, the multitude that had gathered to hear
him left in stages.
He said something and a whole bunch left.
And the church suddenly got empty.
This is how Jesus builds his church, by
emptying it of those who are not really
interested in eternal life.
Those who just want to work for the
food.
He had just fed the 5,000.
And he said, listen, I know you guys
are just here because this is a nice
church.
You get food and all these other things.
But do you want the food that endures
to eternal life?
Then it doesn't matter whether you don't have
lunch or not.
See, do you think Jesus would have been
happy if there was no food that afternoon?
The multitude were upset, I think.
They would have been miserable and always complaining,
man, there's no meeting, no food, should have
brought some food.
Everybody's looking at the boy who brought his
lunch with jealousy.
Thinking, man, he had a good mom, packed
his lunch.
But Jesus wouldn't have been unhappy at all.
If the Father allowed him to be in
a situation where there was no food, it
would have been perfectly okay.
The Father would have given him something that
strengthened him supernaturally.
Jesus was living.
And who is your example in that story?
What do you think?
Is it the multitude who's sitting there just
complaining why there's no food?
I mean, Jesus didn't promise them food.
But I'm sure they were complaining, how come
there's no food around here?
It brought us out into this wilderness and
there's no food around here.
Are you like the disciples who are like,
we need money?
You know, some churches are like that.
They have a donate button prominently on their
website.
We need money.
Give money now.
Are you like the boy who says, here,
here's my five loaves and two fish.
I think it's different stages.
Or are you following Jesus, for whom it
didn't matter if there was food or not.
Didn't matter if he had packed his lunch
or not.
His Father was with him, and everything was
going to be okay.
He's my example.
He's the author and finisher of my faith.
Not the boy with five loaves and two
fish who planned ahead.
Not the disciples who said, well, Lord, we'll
follow you, but we still need money, right?
And not even the multitude who just complained
and came there and were around Jesus when
it felt good and ran away when it
didn't.
So that's our example is Jesus Christ.
So read that story.
Read those verses sometime.
I do hope at some point, maybe in
a couple of weeks when I speak again
to speak on spiritual authority.
I had spoken a couple of messages on
the marks of the presence of God in
his church.
And I do want to speak on spiritual
authority.
But I had a burden from the Lord
over the last couple of weeks to speak
on something that I've been seeing in my
own life.
And I want to share out of my
testimony.
I hope it'll be an encouragement and an
exhortation for all of us.
Let's turn to First John chapter four.
I believe that in the danger that the
danger in our pursuit of holiness, all of
us, I believe in this room and listening
to this message, I believe are here because
we want to pursue holiness, we want to
be more like Jesus.
And in the pursuit of holiness, the danger
is that we will become religious.
We'll become religious and not truly spiritual.
It's a real, real danger.
You know, if I said to you, there's
a snake in this room somewhere.
If I said that to you, I guarantee
you, all of you will stop listening to
what I'm saying and say, Santos, you can't
just keep going.
We got to find the snake.
It's a cobra or some venomous snake.
It's a rattlesnake.
Deal with that.
Then we can continue the meeting.
I believe religiosity is a much greater danger
to us than any rattlesnake or cobra could
be.
Because it'll destroy us spiritually for all eternity.
And it would be a tragedy, a tragedy,
if we get to the end of our
life sitting at a church like RLCF, and
realize I was just religious.
I had the look of a good Christian.
I had the look of a disciple.
I had the look of being a New
Covenant Christian.
And I compared myself to all the other
churches where they had false teaching or other
other things that they were missing, and didn't
realize that I probably ended up in a
worse condition than people who had wrong doctrine.
So it's a real danger.
And in 1st John chapter 4, I'm going
to read these first six verses.
I also believe that most Christians don't know
the difference between religious and spiritual, between religiosity
and spirituality.
If you met a religious person, and a
spiritual person, if you met a religious person,
who sounds spiritual, and looks spiritual, would you
be able to know this is a religious
person?
They have all the right language, they look
like they're good Christians, but deep down you
taste of it.
Let me give you an example.
If you saw an apple that looked absolutely,
genuinely real, like a real apple, would you
be able to look at it without even
taking a bite into it and say, nope,
that's not a real one.
I know right away that's that's a false
one.
See, you can't take a bite into people,
right?
You can't see what's inside it.
If you give me two apples and they
both look good, I'm probably going to bite
into one and see.
Can I actually bite into it?
I can see, yeah, that's plastic, can't bite
into it.
This is real.
You can't see what's inside people's hearts.
God has not allowed any of us to
do that.
I can't see into your heart, you can't
see into mine, to see if what's inside
this conversation and this space and this appearance
of Christ-likeness is real Christ-likeness inside.
The only way then for us to know
what real spirituality is, is if you're able
to discern the spirit.
When you see the actions of somebody and
listen to their words and you observe their
life and say, this is religiosity.
I'll tell you, religiosity looks absolutely like true
Christ-likeness on the outside.
Absolutely looks like true Christ-likeness.
If you look at it on the outside,
it looks like spirituality, but it's not.
We must know the difference.
And so, John says through the Holy Spirit
in 1st John 4, verse 1, beloved, O
you who God loves so much, do not
believe every spirit.
He's not talking about demonic spirits.
He's not talking about evil spirits in the
world.
He's talking about spirits in the church.
Spirits in Christendom.
Do not believe every spirit, but test the
spirits to see whether they are from God.
Because many false prophets, not false religions, false
Christian prophets, many false prophets have gone out
into the world, which means they came out
from within churches.
By this, you know the spirit of God.
Every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has
come in the flesh is from God.
And every spirit that does not confess Jesus
is not from God.
This is the spirit of the Antichrist.
A lot of people are taken up with
what the Antichrist will look like, who he
is.
Is it so-and-so?
Is it this particular church denomination or something
like that?
No.
What we are told to see is to
test whether it is the spirit of the
Antichrist.
And whether I live to see the physical
person who ends up being the Antichrist or
not, whatever that looks like, I want to
reach the end of my, until the end
of my life, live knowing the spirit of
the Antichrist.
If I don't know the spirit of the
Antichrist, the Antichrist will come looking like Christ,
preaching even the New Covenant, I believe.
But it will be religious.
This is the spirit of the Antichrist, he
says in verse 3.
Not, he doesn't say the Antichrist, the spirit
of the Antichrist, of which you have heard
that it is coming, and now it is
already in the world.
You are from God, little children, and have
overcome them, because greater is he who is
in you than he who is in the
world.
They are from the world.
So this religious spirit is, its origin is
from the world.
It's worldly-minded.
It cares about the things of this world.
Its interest is the things of this world,
but it looks heavenly.
Inside, it's earthly-minded.
Outside, it's heavenly-looking.
They are from the world, therefore they speak
as from the world, and the world listens
to them.
We are from God.
He who knows God listens to us.
He who is not from God does not
listen to us.
By this we know the spirit of truth
and the spirit of error.
Many false prophets have gone out into the
world, and I've fallen for religiosity.
I've been religious myself, many times.
I've found religiosity in me, even recently, and
I hate it.
I tell you, I hate it so much,
and that's where this burden is coming from.
Alongside spirituality from the very beginning.
It's not a new thing.
It's not like, oh, something's happening in the
Christendom today in 2022.
It's been there from the first pages of
the Bible.
Cain was a religious man.
Abel was a spiritual man.
We're not told a lot in scripture about
why God had regard for Abel and his
sacrifice, and God did not have regard for
Cain and his sacrifice.
I've heard theologians say that, well, Cain gave
grain, or the crops, and God doesn't like
crops, he likes meat.
No, that's not true.
It says that God had regard for Abel.
That means, it didn't matter what Abel put
on the offering, it didn't matter what Cain
put on the offering, it was what was
inside their heart that God was looking at.
The same thing happened thousands of years later
when Jesus was sitting in the synagogue, and
he saw a bunch of people giving their
offerings again.
And here came people with lots and lots
of money, and I imagine it like this,
that the Pharisees brought only coins, because you
can hear coins falling into the box, you
can't hear bills, right?
So they brought only coins, and lots of
it, and made big, loud fanfare as they
put their offering into the box.
And then quietly comes a little widow, and
when nobody's looking, she just puts two mites
into it.
And God said, I saw what was in
her heart, not how much she put into
the offering box.
And that's what God was pleased with.
So now when you come and say, Lord,
I offer my life to you, everything I've
been through, use it for your glory.
He says, okay, that sounds good.
Some of you may have been through bad
things in the past, some of you may
go through bad things in the future.
I don't know.
It's not what you go through.
God is looking for what's inside the heart.
He says, in your heart, is there a
real desire for me to use it for
your glory?
Then I'll do it.
And he will.
So Cain was a religious man.
He brought an offering.
The Pharisees were religious people.
And God hates religiosity much more than he
hates worldliness.
I really believe that.
And I don't have scripture to back it
up, but, you know, well, I do actually.
Here's why.
Jesus said that the tax gatherers and the
prostitutes would enter the kingdom of heaven long
before the Pharisees would.
To me, that tells me that God hates
religiosity more than he hates worldliness.
We speak a lot against sin in this
church, and we will by God's grace, but
we recognize that God hates religiosity even more.
And it's so easy for us to forget
that religiosity is a hated thing.
God detests it.
And religiosity is the thing that will ultimately
persecute true spirituality.
Murder came into the world because of religiosity.
Think about it.
Murder is perhaps the most worldly thing you
can do, right?
Murder.
Think about it.
That's what they do out in the world.
No, no, no, no, no.
True murder happens in the church by religious
people persecuting spiritual people.
Long before it happens in the world.
What murder do you think offends God more?
Is it that person with the gun shooting
somebody else on the street to rob him?
No.
Yeah, that offends God.
God is more offended by the so-called
Christian persecuting this religious person persecuting the spiritual
person.
God saw what Cain did.
And it was Cain's religiosity that led him
to murder his brother Abel.
Jesus.
Have you thought about it?
Jesus was not killed by, I think I
said this a couple weeks ago.
He was not killed by the Romans, the
godless Romans, or they worshiped their idols.
He wasn't killed by the atheists.
He wasn't killed by the worldly people of
his day, the Greeks and the other people,
the other religions that existed in Jesus' time.
He was killed by the religious people.
And the true church of Jesus Christ, I
believe even today and until the end, until
Christ comes, will always be persecuted more by
religious people than by the world.
And that's what's my burden is that we
are not, that we sense that we're able
to discern the spirit of religiosity.
Paul says in 2 Timothy 3, now you
know 2 Timothy 3 from the first few
verses that we speak a lot about in
this church as well, which is that difficult
times will come.
And he goes on, and we'll come back
and look at that shortly.
But I want you to see before that,
that he says in verse 10, he tells
Timothy that you followed my teaching, conduct, purpose,
faith, patience, love, perseverance, and persecutions, verse 11,
and sufferings such as happened to me at,
then he lists a bunch of places.
And when I was thinking about that this
last week, I went back and looked at,
I have the advantage of a Bible that
allows, that has a cross-reference.
And if you have a Bible like that,
I hope you use it.
But if not, you can use a concordance
or something like that.
When he says Antioch, go back and look
at what happened in Antioch in Acts 13.
Or he says Iconium, go back and look
at what happened in Iconium in Acts 14.
Acts 13, 14, 15, it all seems to
happen almost in a sequence.
He goes from one place, Antioch, then he
goes to Iconium, then he goes to Lystra.
And if you read those stories, there was
unbelievers in those towns that he was reaching,
and he went to the synagogues, and when
the Jews saw that Gentiles were being drawn
to this gospel of life in Christ Jesus,
they got upset.
The religious people who were reading the same
book that Paul was reading, the Torah, the
Old Testament as we know it, they were
the ones who persecuted him every single time.
And they were the ones that stirred up
ultimately the Romans to kill Paul.
So it was the religious people, when he
talks about the persecutions that he endured, and
out of them all the Lord rescued me,
he says in verse 11, you see that
it was the religious people, beginning with Cain,
all the way down and I believe even
to this day.
Now, true spirituality is rare, I believe.
It says, we read that verse in 1
John, for many false prophets, and many are
drawn away by religiosity.
It's much easier to be religious than to
be spiritual, and the reason for that is
because to be spiritual involves death.
Death to our self-life.
If we don't experience death to our self
-life, you can have religiosity.
So, if you want to look spiritual, or
if you don't want to die, if deep
down you don't want to give up your
self-life, you don't really hate your self
-life, and you don't want to fall into
the ground and die, you can have Christianity.
A false Christianity that looks like Christianity.
Let me say that again.
You can have a Christianity without dying to
yourself, and that's how you'll be religious, and
most of Christendom, I believe, is pursuing that,
because it hurts to die.
Imagine if it's physically, okay, that Jesus said,
hey, listen, I'll give you an option.
You can come to heaven without dying, or
dying.
Which one would you pick?
Of course, we're all going to say, well,
Lord, just take me up like Elijah.
Bring the chariots, Lord.
Swing low, sweet chariot, come and take me
home.
I'm ready to go.
But death is what is always, pardon, I
have to die.
People, when they get close to death, they're
afraid of it.
Any old person, no matter how young or
old, any person that's about to go to
heaven, if Jesus came to them and said,
hey, I'll take you up without dying, oh,
thank you, Lord, I don't have to go
through death.
Now, physically, it may not be that big
of a deal.
Of course, you don't have to suffer physically,
but spiritually, there's no other option.
But the devil has come in through false
prophets and preached an option, says, hey, listen,
you can have the life of Christ without
actually dying.
Here's how.
And we're going to go through some of
that.
We'll talk about how.
And what you end up with is a
Christianity that's religious and not actually spiritual.
The only way we can have spiritual life
in us, the real life of Christ, is
if we die.
Cain gave an offering, I believe.
Abel gave himself.
To me, that's the essence.
We're not told much about it, but I
believe that the essence of true spirituality comes
from this, that you can either give an
offering to God, or you can give yourself.
And that's also why we don't pass an
offering bag or offering plate in the church,
because God doesn't want your money.
He owns the cattle on a thousand hills.
Do you think he's hard up for those
$10, or $1, or $100, or $1,000
that you want to give him?
No.
He says, give me your life.
And the devil says, no, just put $100
in the box and keep your life.
And you end up with religiosity, and you
think, well, Lord, but I gave so much
to the church.
The treasurer can even tell me exactly how
much I've given, and I claim my tax
for it, because I'm entitled to it, and
all that stuff.
And look at this that I did, and
that other thing that I did, but God
says, no, but you didn't give me yourself.
You held on to yourself.
You gave.
You served.
You did all these other things for other
people, but yourself, life, you held on to.
This is a danger, my dear brothers and
sisters.
I've served the Lord.
I have.
But I found in myself recently the tendency
to look back and think, well, Lord, I've
done so much for you.
I want to keep doing it, and I'm
going to keep giving to you.
And God said, uh-oh, you're sounding like
a religious person now.
You're thinking back on what all you've done,
and you're looking forward to whatever you will
do, and God says, no, it doesn't matter
what you do or don't do for me.
Just give me yourself.
That's it.
You won't write biographies written about you for
that, but just give me yourself.
And the biographies of men and women that
have inspired me the most are the ones
that I've seen in them that they didn't
go set out to do a great work
for God.
They didn't set out to do a great
work for God.
They just said, Lord, here's my life.
Do whatever you want with it.
I don't care.
And we live in a Christendom that's glorifying
missionaries that are doing great things out there.
They have their pictures in the back.
And neglect the missionaries in our homes that
are changing diapers, and cooking meals, and cleaning
dishes, and making sure the house is clean.
Because that looks great, and this just looks
like, wow, what did you do for the
Lord today?
And God doesn't want to know from you
what you have done for Him today.
He just says, have you taken up your
cross?
And if I put in front of you
a life that looks empty, that looks ordinary,
that looks seemingly inglorious, and just say, Lord,
it's what you asked for me.
That's all.
What do you think that woman, see we're
told a lot about that woman.
Jesus says that she out of her little
has given everything.
They out of their much have given a
lot.
She out of her little has given everything.
You see the difference between giving a lot
and giving everything?
A lot looks like this.
Everything looks like this.
Because God sees it's everything, but it's what
you have.
It's little, but it's everything.
And God says, that's what I want.
I want everything, not a lot.
Oh, will you give that to Him?
That's what I want to live.
I want to live and reach the end
of my life and say, Lord, it didn't
matter how many people I preached to, or
how big my church was, or how small.
You had everything for me.
Every moment of my day was yours.
And then it doesn't matter if you die
at the age of 33 like Jesus did.
He gave everything.
And there are others who are trying to
live to 90, giving here and there.
Philanthropists, after they make their billions and multi
-billions, they say, I have so much.
Go ahead.
And I'm not here to despise that.
Please know that.
I respect atheists and ungodly people in the
world who give a lot and do a
lot of good in society, but that's not
the example I'm following.
I'm not trying to imitate the philanthropist and
someday make so much money that I can
go and feed the hungry and give water
to the needy across the world.
No, I want to give everything.
Right now, today, I want to give everything.
That's the life that will be pleasing to
God.
Let's turn to 2 Corinthians chapter 4.
I see so much in Christendom is captivated
by the big, big churches, growth, success, this
and that, looking back and seeing how much
I've done.
Oh, I read the testimony of Hudson Taylor
and C.T. Studd and George Miller.
They weren't reflecting back and looking at how
many orphans they had or how many people
they want to Christ and keeping track of
how many baptisms they've done.
You never read that about them.
They were the men.
William Booth.
Godly men and women who were used by
God.
They just said, well, there's more to be
done.
I'm going to C.T. Studd, that poem
that he says, only one life, it'll soon
be past.
Only what's done for Christ will last.
I like how Zach's paraphrased that.
Only what Christ does through me will last.
And if God gives you a short candle
that burns quickly, a short candle, that means
a short life, but it's empty at the
end of your life.
That's more pleasing to God than the big
candle that burned 50%.
And you look at it quantitatively and say,
well, this, this is actually more than this.
God says, no, your ways are not my
ways.
I'm not looking for how much you can
give me.
I'm looking that you'll give me everything.
And there will be so many in heaven
who will be great because they gave everything.
And you look at it from an earthly
standpoint and say, man, how is that more?
Do you think the disciples thought that?
They saw the woman put two little, it
says the two cents she put in were
worth a penny.
I mean, you don't even have a coin
that's small enough to represent that in our
society.
Think about putting a half a penny.
I think they used to have it in
England back in the day.
You know, when a penny was worth a
lot, you get a half a penny.
She put two coins, the total of which
was worth one penny.
I think if I remember correctly, and she
put it in quietly and God says, that's
what I want.
I saw her heart.
Second Corinthians four, we read in verse 10.
See, like I said, this is, this is
preaching that will get you persecuted.
I believe, I believe RLCF will experience persecution.
Not necessarily long before it experiences persecution from
the world, it will experience persecution from religious
Christians who say, no, no, no, they're preaching
a false doctrine.
They're called whatever.
The preaching of the way to become spiritual
is only by death.
There's no other door.
But there's plenty of other doors to get
what looks like a new covenant church, even
in a new covenant home and a new
covenant life without real death.
And here's the thing, only you and the
Lord Jesus Christ and Satan know whether you've
actually died or not.
Even, I think even your spouse doesn't know.
Even Megan doesn't know if I'm actually dying.
She might see evidence of it.
You don't know as much as you know
me.
You don't know if I'm actually dying inside.
God has hidden that.
He's kept it secret.
But one day all that is secret will
be revealed and you'll find out whether I
was actually dying or not by whether everything
was given or not.
And you might think, well, Santo, he does
so much for RLCF, he's always available.
And God might see, well, actually, it looks
like a lot, but he's self-centered.
He likes the fact that people think he's
a sacrificial person.
He likes the approval of people.
I'm not like that, by the way.
I'm just imagining that it could be like
that.
And that's why I live in reverence and
say, Lord, save me from religiosity.
I tell you this, the more you do,
the greater danger you are of being religious.
The more sacrificial you are, the more you
give yourself to your children or your husband
or your wife or the more you do
in the church, I'll tell you, the more
you're in danger of being religious because your
candle is growing and you might not be
giving all.
I hope that as God, you know, one
of the reasons I'm not very, very keen
for our church to explode in terms of
quantity is because the more my candle grows,
now all of a sudden I have a
greater responsibility that I give everything.
I would rather I stay small and grow
at God's pace, whether it's spiritually and my
marriage, my home and even in the church
that we grow as a church at God's
pace so that everything is on the altar.
Because I'll tell you, this that that's half
burnt is worse than this that's fully burnt.
That's the essence of it.
2nd Corinthians 4 verse 10.
You know, he says again before that, look
at the look at the context.
We have this treasure in earthen vessels so
that the surpassing greatness of the power will
be of God.
This is 2nd Corinthians 4 verse 7, not
from ourselves.
See, that's why because why God wants everything
is because when you have everything, you give
everything, you have nothing left to hold on
to yourself.
Why is it that God wants 100%, not
even 99%?
You know, 100% of this is better
than 99% of this.
Why?
Because that 99% is an indication that
you held back 1% in unbelief.
You thought, well, I can give you, you
know, 99% is a lot.
Even if you gave 99%, it's not the
quantity that matters.
It's God looking at that 1% and
says, why did you hold that back?
It's an indication of unbelief that you said,
well, Lord, I'll give you a lot, but
I got to keep a little bit for
myself because I have a feeling you're not
going to come through.
Some way I need to have a at
least a 1% backup plan.
And that's what God hates.
He sees that you're still got a little
bit of self you're holding on to.
It looks little, but it's everything to God.
That 1% is everything to God because
it is self.
And when we're fully emptied, we say, Lord,
I've got one day to give you today.
And it looks like what I'm going to
be doing today is this and this other
thing and that.
And then the children have to have this
and that.
It looks very ordinary.
Nobody's going to write a biography about that.
But God says, ah, that's what I wanted.
And the result of that, look at Paul's
life.
He was afflicted in every way, verse 8,
but he was not crushed, perplexed, but not
despairing, persecuted, but not forsaken, struck down, but
not destroyed.
And look at this always.
This is why Paul was a spiritual man
and Demas was a religious man.
Why Jesus was truly religious and the Pharisees
who traveled land and sea to make a
convert.
You know, Jesus didn't travel land and sea
to make a convert.
He did travel a little bit, but not
as much as the Pharisees did.
They did far more evangelism in terms of
geographical distance than Jesus did.
Who do you think was more pleasing to
God, to the Father?
Jesus was.
Why was it that Paul was spiritual?
Why was it that Jesus had the most
spiritual life, 100% spiritual life?
Because he was, verse 10, always caring about
in the body the dying of Jesus, so
that the life of Jesus also may be
manifested in our body.
It's so plain and simple that the only
way we can have the life of Jesus,
which is true spirituality, is if you're always
caring about in the body the dying of
Jesus.
He was not talking about physical death.
It's this death to self.
I'm just going to die to myself today.
It doesn't matter how God's going to work
it out or people's going to take advantage
of it or anything like that.
Die with Jesus.
Caring about in the body the dying of
Jesus, the dying of Jesus, the dying of
Jesus.
Little by little, inside was spiritual life.
This treasure in an earthen vessel that was
dying every day, so that the life also
may be manifested in our body.
I think what a wonderful thing it would
be if ...
I once said in this church, you might
have heard me say it too, that I
wish we had a sign out in the
front, River of Life Christian Fellowship.
Come here if you want to die.
Come and die.
If you want to die, come here.
They've got the funeral homes which are after
you die.
What about a place that says, if you
want to die, come here?
I remember once I said that and I
got in trouble by it in this church
actually by somebody said, no Jesus actually said
to come and live.
I thought about that.
Is that really true?
Let me ask you a question.
It's not a trick question.
Ask yourself honestly, does Jesus say come and
die or come and live?
The difference is spirituality and religiosity.
Oh, we want life.
Doesn't Jesus offer us life, abundant life, new
covenant life?
Oh, he does.
But he doesn't say come and live.
He says come and die.
Let's look at that.
John chapter 10, right?
Jesus says come and die and you will
have life.
If Jesus said come and live, I would
have to live.
I would need some ability to live.
That would be like me going to the
cemetery over there and telling those dead people
in the graves, come on, go ahead and
live.
Come on, stand up.
You dead person?
No, they can't stand up.
And what offends Jesus is the people who
are pretending to be dead in the cemeteries,
in churches.
They're pretending to be dead.
Yeah, I died with Christ, but there's a
little bit of me that's still alive.
I still want a little bit for myself.
I still have love of money, love of
self, love of pleasure.
Just a little bit.
I'm mostly dead, but not all the way
dead.
And then I hear a preacher say, come
live.
And that little bit of me that has
life stands up and says, yeah, I want
life.
A little bit more money?
Yeah.
A little bit more health?
Yeah, sure.
Come and live.
You can't tell a dead person to come
and live.
What you can tell living people is to
come and die and Jesus will raise you
back to eternal life.
That's the secret.
And the difference between religiosity and spirituality is
in that message.
They will have it and have it abundantly.
That means you'll just be given it.
You didn't live.
And I'll tell you, the world is full
of religiosity that says you can have your
best life now.
There's actually a book like that.
It says you can have life, good life,
the good life, now.
And Jesus says no.
When a grain of wheat falls into the
earth and dies, it remains alone.
But if it dies, it bears much fruit.
He who loves his life, saying I want,
Jesus said I can have life.
Jesus said come and live.
No.
Jesus says if you come because you want
to live, it means you love your life
and you'll lose it.
Do you hate your life?
Do you want to die?
You hate your life that much that you
just can't wait to die?
Spiritually, I mean.
And everything else is great.
I mean the family's great.
You've got enough money in the bank and
your job's going well.
But you want to die.
You're sick of this self-centered flesh.
Sick of the love of money.
Sick of the love of pleasure.
It says I want to be done with
this old life.
Jesus says okay, come and die.
He who hates his life in this world
will keep it to life eternal.
You'll have eternal life.
So, not come and live, but come and
die and you'll have it.
And I've thought of it like this that
the difference between religiosity and all legalism stems
from religiosity and spirituality is like the difference
between a bride who really loves her husband
and a bride that's pretending.
So, think about it.
A real wife and a pretend wife.
A real wife, when she does something for
her husband, she doesn't care if anybody else
sees it.
I mean, have you ever heard of a
wife, let's say one of your wives coming
to you, or have you ever heard, I'll
use Megan as an example, sorry Meg.
Have you ever heard her come to you
and tell you, hey, I made my husband
a really good meal today.
Have you ever heard her do that?
No, because she's a real wife.
None of your wives have ever done that.
Come to me and say, I made my
husband a wonderful eggs and toast and bacon
and all this stuff.
No, that's a pretend wife.
That's a wife that wants a reputation as
a wife.
Says, yeah, oh, what a good wife.
See what all she did and that other
thing.
That's a pretend wife.
I use that example to say that that's
spiritually the case as well.
Pretend brides of Christ.
Pretend wives are the ones who are saying,
oh, I've done this, I've done that other
thing and they like the reputation, they like
the appearance in the church for what all
they've done.
And the real bride says, Lord, I don't
care.
Nobody sees it.
It's for you.
It's before you.
You alone saw it.
I was doing it for you anyway.
And it's the pretend brides of Christ that
are building a religious church today.
You know there's another bride of Christ.
It's not the real bride of Christ, but
it's the pretend bride of Christ.
It's the religious church, Babylon it's called.
It's the religious church that is full of
activity like the church in Ephesus became.
Is it possible to once upon a time
be the bride of Christ that loves Jesus
so much?
And it's all about Him.
And as we grow and as God blesses
us to eventually become the pretend bride of
Christ.
It happened.
Let me show you.
It's happened many, many times.
Revelation chapter 2.
The difference between the pretend bride and the
real bride of Christ.
They have the marriage certificate framed on the
wall.
Married to Jesus Christ on such and such
a date.
Living in His house.
To the church in Ephesus, he writes in
verse 1.
Skip down to verse 2.
I know your deeds.
Oh, I know you made me the best
meal that I could have had.
I know your toil.
I know you got up early in the
morning to do it.
I know your perseverance.
I know that you just kept at it.
I'm using physical analogy for the spiritual.
Things got burnt, but you went back and
started over again.
I know all that you did.
And I know that you cannot tolerate evil
men.
And you put to test those who call
themselves apostles and they are not.
And you found them to be false.
And you have perseverance.
Oh, you've been a church for 20 years
now.
And you have endurance.
And you've endured for my name's sake.
And you've not grown tired.
You've faced opposition.
And you're growing strong.
And all these things.
But he says, but dear person who calls
yourself my wife, I can see through it
all.
You've left your first love.
You're a pretend wife now.
Yeah, you come to the meetings.
And you're there.
And you serve.
And you do that.
But you're a pretend bride.
Everybody else thinks you're the bride.
Everybody else thinks that you're a wonderful brother
or a wonderful sister.
But I see.
I see by your actions.
I see by your motives.
I see what's in your heart.
And I see you're a pretend bride.
The love's not there.
God knows it.
You know it.
And the devil knows it, I believe.
The devil is a student of human character
and human behavior.
And he knows.
He can tell when the love's gone.
And he wants you to go to sleep.
He wants you to think, hey, the works
are okay.
You know what happened to the church in
Ephesus?
They fell asleep amidst all the activity.
Oh, they were busy.
You think it's possible to be spiritually asleep
and yet religiously active?
Listen to this carefully.
Is it possible to be religiously active but
spiritually asleep?
Oh, yes.
That's why it's a danger.
I'm doing a lot, but it's a dream.
Think about it.
Have you ever had a dream where you're
running a marathon?
And you're like, man, I'm tired.
Running and running and doing this workout.
And you went to the gym and all
that.
And you wake up and realize I was
asleep the whole time.
The muscles didn't grow at all because it
was just a dream.
And in that dream, all this activity, it's
going on in churches and it's a danger
for us.
River of Life Christian Fellowship, I believe it
with all my heart.
It's a danger for me.
Perhaps as one who does a lot in
this church.
I could be doing a lot.
I'm pedaling the peloton, the bicycle, and I'm
running the treadmill and all that spiritually.
But it's just a dream.
I'm asleep spiritually.
And God, the Holy Spirit said to John,
go wake up that church and tell them,
I'm going to remove your lampstand.
Repent.
Wake up.
I'm coming soon.
And you don't want to be caught when
Jesus comes realizing that all this activity was
just a dream.
I did nothing for him.
Let's go back to 2 Timothy 3.
This is what Paul calls the form of
godliness.
We read in verse 10 onwards, but in
verse 5, he talks about the form of
godliness without power.
Here's a paraphrase of that.
2 Timothy 3 verse 5, holding to a
form of godliness, although they have denied its
power.
You know, that's like having a badge that
says married to Jesus, so that everybody can
see it, but inside it's not there.
Again, let me use the example of wives.
Do any of your wives say, married to
my husband?
You know, like a little badge or something,
a little bracelet.
In some parts of the world, they wear
something that's an indication that they're married.
Like for us, it may be the wedding
ring.
In some places, the women wear like a
necklace.
That means you're married.
That's an indication of it.
Let me ask you this.
Are you just wearing the wedding ring with
Jesus, but the love's not there?
It's much better to not have a wedding
ring at all because you can't afford it,
but love me, Lord.
It doesn't matter whether other people know that
I'm married to you or not.
You know it.
And I do everything for your sake, for
your glory, that you will receive honor and
your name will be exalted and that I
will have simple, pure devotion to you and
that's it.
I don't have to do some great thing
for you.
I want to give you everything.
My love for you, Lord.
So this namesake wife, you know, I would
paraphrase this form of godliness, but denying its
power.
It's like having the name that you're married
to Christ, but you're not really married.
The power, that power is in the life.
You could have the same attitude in a
church.
You could say, I'm a member of RLCF,
but your heart's not here.
It's happened in this church, I tell you.
It's happened.
I have nothing against people who have left
this church and I'm not saying that you
should stay in this church for the rest
of your life.
If God wants you somewhere else, please leave.
I would not hold you back if God
wants you in a different church.
But if God wants you here and you
leave, and you leave because you get offended
or something, this or that or something else
is not the way you want it.
But it's possible to sit in this church
and I've seen that pattern.
I've been in this church and even in
the church I grew up in where something
happens.
Love starts to go and yeah, they're still
fulfilling their religious responsibility as members in the
church and they're showing up and then the
attendance starts to wane a little bit and
they start getting here and there and there.
I guess I should show up every now
and then and I guess I need to
stay here and there.
I need to do this, I need to
do that.
That's the reason you're here.
Oh brother, sister, I hope you'll find a
church where God wants to plant you and
you'll do it out of love.
And if he keeps you here, which I
hope he will, that you'll do it out
of love.
That that love is there.
It says, Lord, I'm not thinking about the
minimum that I need to do.
Do I need to come to at least
two or three meetings?
You do the math, I can come to
seven meetings a month and I'll be good,
keep my membership.
I don't think any of you do that,
by the way, but that's what's going on
in Christianity.
And if you sense that spirit coming into
your heart, catch it.
It's a quick spiral where you go down
into a religious life where you're just coming
along in the church, not really experiencing the
life of Christ.
Think about it with evangelism.
I thought about, I was thinking about this
recently, you know, it says in Matthew 23.
Let me show you that verse real quick.
Matthew 23 verse 15.
I referenced it earlier.
It says that these Pharisees, religious people, will
travel over land and sea to make one
convert.
Matthew 23 verse 15.
Woe to you.
Listen to this.
Listen to God saying, you traveled around on
sea and land to make one convert, but
I say, woe to you.
Woe to you, evangelist.
You went all the way to the other
end of town to make one convert.
He says, why?
Well, I went and made a convert and
I got him to sign the card and
gave him baptism and all that.
He says, woe to you, because you were
a religious person.
And I thought about that even in how
we do evangelism, you know, there's a lot
of evangelists that are going around trying to
save people because they feel sorry that they're
going to go to hell.
This is religiosity.
Are you keen to save people because you
feel bad for them that they're going to
go to hell?
Now that's, it's okay, but that's not spirituality.
Spirituality is I'm burdened by the dishonor that
that person's life is bringing to God by
his sin.
Whether he goes to hell or not is
not as important as the fact that God
is dishonored by his life.
And long before you point your finger at
him and see the dishonor that God is
getting because of his life, you look at
your own life and realize, Lord, I'm bothered
by the dishonor I brought to your name
by how I spoke to that person, to
my wife this morning.
And the Pharisees didn't care about God's honor.
They didn't care how they lived in secret,
but they would go to the other end
of town to give somebody the gospel.
And this is going on in Christendom today.
Evangelism.
While their marriages are falling apart, their children
are wayward.
And oh, the religious talk is there.
Traveling land and sea.
But God says, you're not, you're not concerned
about my, my name.
And I pray, dear River of Life Christian
Fellowship, that as a church family, our burden
to win the lost will come from seeing
the glory of God and his, the honor,
the dishonor that's brought to his name by
my life, perhaps by my, my marriage, my
home, our church, and, and the world around
us.
And say, Lord, you must save that person
that's crossing the street because the way he's
living his life is a dishonor to you.
This is the bride that's in love with
Jesus, not somebody that just wants to add
people to their church and get people to
sign a decision card and get them to
pray something so that I can brag about,
hey, look, 10 people got converted today by
the little thing that I said.
Oh, that's religiosity.
It's garbage.
It will burn up when Jesus comes.
Religious people are interested in heaven.
They want to go to heaven because they
love themselves.
Spiritual people are interested in the kingdom of
heaven.
Righteousness, peace, joy, which means, Lord, I don't
care what happens to me at the end
of my life, whether I go to heaven
or hell.
Give me righteousness.
Give me your life.
Give me true joy, Lord.
Give me your peace.
Which means that if you end up throwing
me into hell, it'll be okay because I
have your life.
I have the kingdom of heaven within me.
And such a person will be welcomed.
An abundant entrance will be given to him
in heaven, it says.
2 Peter 1, I believe.
An abundant entrance.
The gates will swing wide open, it says.
Such a person has life.
And you'll sit there and think, well, Lord,
what did I do?
I read the biographies of Paul and this
other brother, that other sister, and what all
they did.
Now, what did I do?
He says, you gave everything.
You had my righteousness.
You had my life.
You had my joy.
You suffered with all your heart like a
treasure that was worth giving up everything.
Let me ask you an honest question, brothers
and sisters.
If God gave you the opportunity to go
be a famous missionary on the other side
of the world or to have his joy
in your home, what would you pick?
I'm going to ask you again.
Examine your heart.
If God gave you the opportunity as a
housewife, let's say, or as a single woman
or a single brother or a husband to
go to the other end of the world
and be a missionary for him or to
have his righteousness and his peace and his
joy in your home in quietness, what would
you pick?
The difference is that between religion and spirituality.
That's it.
Oh, I know.
I'm not trying to point a finger at
you.
I know.
That seems more appealing.
Oh, I have a burden for the lost.
I want to go preach here and preach
there because I have a burden for the
lost.
It's garbage.
It's humbug.
It's hypocrisy.
A lot of what I see in Christendom
as a burden for the lost is really
just, it may be just I like to
preach somewhere.
I've met plenty of that.
They just want an opportunity to preach somewhere.
Or it may be even, I'm willing to
give the benefit of the doubt to some,
that they really care that that person's going
to go to hell.
But neither of those is spirituality.
Spirituality says, Lord, I've seen your nature.
I've seen your kingdom.
And it starts with me, Lord.
Judgment must begin with the household of God.
It starts with me, Lord.
I dishonored you today by what I did
and what I said.
I dishonored you with that thought.
Cleanse me, Lord.
Purify me completely and then take me to
do whatever with whoever.
And God says, that will be more valuable
to me in eternity because you gave everything
to me.
I think I'll end there.
It could be a good idea.
You say, OK, religious, spiritual.
I understood it here.
I would have failed in my calling if
that's all we get out of it.
I want to be spiritual, brothers and sisters.
That's it.
Whether I continue to be an elder in
this church or whatever, wherever God's calling me,
I want the life of Christ.
Whether people see it or not, whether people
accuse me of false things and all that,
it means less and less to me.
I perhaps receive more accusations and things have
been said and written about me in the
last three, four years than ever before, before
that.
But I tell you, I've become more joyful.
I've experienced more peace and more righteousness in
my life because I'm interested in the kingdom
of heaven even more than heaven itself.
Let's be such a church.
Amen.