Welcome to from the pulpit and classic sermons
each week We bring you a different message
from some of history's greatest speakers in the
Christian faith and powerful sermons for modern preachers,
too This week we have George Ferber with
this message discipline Discipline I Remember
when I used to work in a camp
out in Colorado And every time I would
mention or someone else and would mention Self
-discipline I would hear groans nobody likes self
-discipline And I'm becoming convinced that it's completely
contrary to our human nature We just don't
like to be disciplined.
We just don't like to do what we're
told.
We just don't like to pick up paper
We don't like to clean up things.
It just goes against us We just want
to go as we feel we feel good.
We'll do something if we don't feel good
We won't do it.
We'd like to be controlled just by our
emotions and our feelings but discipline is Just
the opposite Discipline is simply doing what's right
whether we feel like it or not A
disciple is one who is trained or taught
And after I read that definition I begin
to wonder Am I a disciple?
Am I very well trained am I very
well taught Maybe we should say we're in
the process of becoming disciples of Jesus Christ.
We are in the process of learning We're
in the process of learning what it is
to have not just self-control but spirit
control Because it's not by might or by
power, but by my spirit sayeth the Lord
And certainly discipline is way above us.
It's above me And probably I'm gonna speak
to myself more than anyone else this morning
and if it hits you well, praise God
join the crowd It's learning, isn't it?
It's learning what God has for us and
we learn in so many different ways.
We learn from the Word of God God
teaches us and he expects us not only
to learn it in the mind But to
apply it to the heart and life and
to live it.
Otherwise, it's just knowledge Which profits little we
learn by experience we say experience is the
best teacher or it's a hard teacher It
is for me, but I tell you it's
a convincing teacher Experience and I believe that
God teaches us by one another too as
the Spirit of God brings us in contact
with different people and I remember many times
my own life how Perhaps God is beginning
to speak to my heart along a certain
area and just in the next few days
I would meet someone else that perhaps was
thinking along the same lines and God would
just kind of Double and treble the lesson
that he was trying to teach me and
so we learn from one another in fact
I'm not sure just how much I would
know this morning if it hadn't been for
other people who had taught me Some of
us, you know are a lot more privileged
than others Some of us have had Christian
training right from the cradle upward Some of
us have had parents and I'm speaking for
myself who pray daily and who want just
God's best for your life Some of us
have had more training we've had more opportunities
to learn of Jesus Christ And therefore I
believe our responsibility is far greater than one
who has had little But we learn from
others and oh what a joyous thing This
is that we can have Christian fellowship where
we can learn from one another and so
we need to take every Way in which
God teaches us and learn all we can
from and apply I'd like to be as
practical as possible this morning I'd like to
to just take discipline in various realms of
our lives I'd like to look into the
scripture and see what the scripture says about
it and mention some of the principles And
then if at all possible, I'd like to
to apply this to our everyday living that
we might truly be a Disciplined one a
real disciple of Jesus Christ The first the
first area that hits me is discipline in
thought Because this is the whole basis our
thought life and I was amazed as I
began to look at scripture I was first
I was going to look at all the
scriptures on thought and on imagination and on
discipline And I started to look one look
at the concordance and I gave up and
I said well Lord Just leave me to
to some that will be a blessing.
I'll never get through all these it take
me a couple weeks The scripture is full
of talking about the mind the heart the
soul Remembrance not forgetting thoughts imaginations desires meditation
all these words which describe Some aspect of
our thinking And I'm I feel that this
is basic because if our thoughts are disciplined
our actions will be disciplined Our words will
be disciplined Perhaps we say well we speak
without thinking but somewhere in the past you
have thought what you've said And so it's
discipline in the thought that affects the rest
of our lives Sometimes there's an unpleasant picture
given of the thought life in scripture I
think of a passage in Genesis chapter 6
verse 5 and the Lord saw that the
wickedness of man was great in the earth
and that every Imagination of the thoughts of
his heart was only evil continually This is
the natural man.
This is the usual course That the imagination
of our thoughts and of our heart is
evil continually This is the way we go
This is the whole pull of our nature
is down is to be thinking that which
we know is wrong Is to be thinking
that which we know is evil and is
displeasing to God But then God steps in
and he renews the mind And so the
mind is a great potential for good or
evil And let's face it we're all faced
with it, aren't we We have it every
day Satan comes in with temptations to think
evil It may be just plain immoral thoughts.
It may be bitterness.
It may be jealousy It may be discouragement
It may be self-pity My problems are
bigger than everybody else here Surely God knows
this the other people can't have the problems
I do and so we feed on it
and we feed on it and we feel
sorry for ourselves And then we want to
tell everybody about our problems So they'll sympathize
and my you are going through a rough
time you know how it does our hearts
good when we hear about people praying for
us because they know we have a lot
of Problems and we just know that see
we're getting more and more attention self-pity
This is the thought life in the discipline
thought life says cut it out Tempted to
think about our problems and to think we
have the worst Cut it out and think
of what Christ went through for us Think
about what other people are really going to
and consider them before ourselves Discipline in the
thought life Another passage perhaps that we could
mention as the remedy to this Evil thoughts
is 2nd Corinthians 10 verse 5 Perhaps we
could start with verse 3 for though we
walk in the flesh We do not war
according to the flesh for the weapons of
our warfare are not of the flesh But
mighty before God to the casting down of
strongholds casting down imaginations and Every high thing
that is exalted against the knowledge of God
and bringing every thought into captivity to the
obedience of Christ This it seems to me
as the remedy instead of evil thoughts Bringing
every thought into captivity to Christ because if
the thought is controlled by Christ, it can't
be evil And if the thought of jealousy
comes up if it's brought in captivity to
Christ Then it goes away it has to
because Christ and evil don't mix and Jesus
Christ and a rotten mind don't mix They
can't and so Paul says bring every thought
into the obedience of Christ Thinking the way
he would have us think It's so easy
to have a worldly mind Or perhaps not
worldly in the usual fundamental sense, but worldly
because it's just the human way of looking
at things We don't look at things by
faith.
We look at them by sight.
Don't worry.
That's worldly.
We look at things What are other people
going to say instead of what will God
think about it?
I Find it's so easy just to be
to begin regarding all my work just in
a very human way Instead of well now,
how does God want this done?
But you see if it's human in a
sense, it's actually worldly.
It's not of God.
It's not of the Spirit Therefore it must
be fleshly.
It's of the whole human nature And so
we need to cast down every imagination and
this is why I feel discipline comes in
It's an act of the will that says
no And it tears it out and comes
to Jesus Christ for cleansing And for purifying
And that he might control our thoughts he
says casting down the imaginations It's not so
bad if they just start to come but
it's that Keep thinking about them.
That's what hurts That's where the sin comes
in Just the first thought we're all tempted
aren't we?
But it's the second and third and fourth
and fifth for several days perhaps or even
for several moments This is where the sin
comes in Even the root of anger that
comes up It may the temptation may come
to be angry But if you feed on
it Becomes bitterness becomes hatred and that's the
same as being a murderer and that's where
the sin comes in And so the very
first sign of it it needs to be
passed down Every imagination that which exalts itself
against God and it can be anything Can
be a job It can be eating Can
be sport Doesn't matter what it is, but
it can begin to take too much plates
from God And we need to cast down
every imagination everything that exalts itself Against God
and of course, this is the basic sin,
isn't it Lucifer?
I want to be like the Most High
God.
He was cast out of heaven All these
kind of imaginations are from Satan and even
as Satan was cast out of heaven So
they need to be cast out of our
minds in the power of the Spirit of
God Isaiah 26 3 We have a great
promise of peace thou will keep him in
perfect peace Note the condition whose mind is
stayed on thee Because he trusteth in thee
and this is a condition unless the mind
is stayed on the Lord Jesus Christ It
is not at peace It's being tossed to
and fro conflicts doubts all kinds of temptations,
but if it stayed on Christ It's just
another way of saying looking on to Jesus
which causes a person to run a race
that is steadfast and to run it with
endurance and To lay aside every weight and
every sin Stay your mind on Jesus Christ
look unto Jesus This is what we need
to do with our minds discipline Disciplining our
thoughts to be stayed on him.
I Think meditation comes in here I've found
that memorizing scripture is a great way of
keeping the mind disciplined And I have to
confess that in recent weeks.
I haven't been doing so much memorizing of
scripture In all how we need to Discipline
ourselves to memorize even if it is hard
to memorize.
I remember Krista Fisher when we worked back
at 30 Middleton Road She sat at the
typewriter and above her typewriter She'd put a
new scripture text every day or maybe one
or two or three of them and every
spare moment She had she'd look up and
she'd be reading and meditating on that verse
until she memorized But usually we get a
spare moment and and we just kind of
let it slide idly by While we're waiting
at the bus stop for a bus Maybe
nobody else is there so you can't talk
to anybody You can't give out a track,
but then to pull out a New Testament
and memorize a word of scripture To Fill
our minds to occupy our mind with that
which is good.
It's not enough just to have a clean
mind.
That's still empty Because if you clean out
the mind and it's empty then pretty soon
all sorts of other things will come in
and you'll have seven Devils instead of one
it's got to be filled up with that
Which is truth with that which is good
with that which is pure Whatsoever things are
pure lovely of good report honest think on
These things And if it doesn't measure up
to that standard that Paul laid down in
Philippians 4 don't think on these things Meditate
and it's a discipline It's a discipline because
I find that my mind just likes to
to do nothing Yeah, I don't like to
think I don't like to plan I get
going for a while and then about the
middle of the day when I get sleepy
and tired I Don't want to think of
what I should say in the next letter.
I just don't like to it is lazy
And it's a discipline to say think Or
maybe in that time pray and ask God
to discipline you to think But in the
idle moment to let the mind the thoughts
wander, you know, another thing that's come to
me is Being very sentimental I think this
is what homesickness is Sometimes I go for
four years without seeing my parents and every
once while I get a hankering for my
old life out in West Africa especially when
it was a cold winter and I thought
of the 90-degree weather out there and
The beautiful sunshine and getting that nicely baked
feeling when you get out in the Sun
and so my mind begins to wander and
I just go back to boyhood days and
I think of have any problems then hardly
and I Just get carried away And yet
how foolish it's unrealistic.
I can't go back there It doesn't do
me a bit of good About five or
ten or maybe minutes later or maybe an
hour later I come back to reality and
have to face up to it all again
And it's just a waste of time, isn't
it?
To have all these little fluffy airy feelings
about the past or wanting to be somewhere
where we aren't And or sometimes I'm thinking
here in England Well, I wonder what it'd
be like to be slugging it out with
those there in the Muslim world What it
would be like just to to be with
some of those brothers I begin to think
of some brother and you know I have
a great love and I just love to
be with them in fellowship again And it's
good to have that bond of unity, but
sometimes it becomes just vain imagination and it's
a waste of time Instead of seeing things
as God You know how we need to
discipline our minds so they just don't wander
all over the place doing nothing going nowhere
But rather that we might discipline our thoughts
and discipline our whole lives Towards one purpose
to know the Lord Jesus Christ and to
do his way Of course, we could talk
about worry too Good passages Matthew 6 in
case you've never read it before.
I Think it'd be good to read it
again.
Anyway Because worry is in the mind, isn't
it?
It may affect the body it may affect
How you feel but worry is all in
the mind and most of the time worry
isn't even it's not even reality You're worrying
about something that's in the future that you're
not sure how it's going to turn out
And it doesn't it doesn't help a bit
It doesn't do one thing for you as
we've heard before but let's remind ourselves what
the Lord Jesus Christ said Verse 25 therefore
I say unto you read 24 No man
can serve two masters for either he will
hate the one and love the other or
else He will hold to one and despise
the other you cannot serve God and mammon
Mammon is worried Therefore I say unto you
be not anxious for your life What you
shall eat or what you shall drink nor
yet for your body what you shall put
on is Not the life more than the
food and the body than the raiment Behold
the birds of the heaven that they sow
not neither do they reap nor gather into
barns and your heavenly father feedeth them Are
not ye of much more value than they
and which of you by being anxious can
add one cubit unto the measure of his
life?
I suppose all you fellows were like me
and One time or another you were shorter
than everybody else.
Well, I still am but I used to
my brother's about five six inches taller than
I am and Every couple weeks when we
measured against the bedroom wall of my mother
I Was here and his mark was up
here always above me and I wanted to
be tall like my brother but all the
thinking about it didn't do a bit of
good and Even exercises.
I don't think that helped any either It
does it just doesn't help it doesn't do
anything And why are you anxious concerning Raymond,
you know, I found the real problem when
I used to have A lot of clothes.
It took me five or ten minutes in
the morning trying to make up my mind
which shirt to put on It's so much
simpler when you just have one or two
changes It simplifies life It's bad here in
England, but it's even worse in the States.
I remember working in the camp and for
one week I remember a girl coming they
had 20 blouses for one week.
She changed three times a day of course,
she was catering to the fellows, but think
of it the decisions that would have to
be made to change 20 times in one
week and Decisions are what's hard to make
well Raymond consider the lilies of the field
How they grow they toil not neither do
they spin Yet I say unto you that
even Solomon and all his glory was not
arrayed like one of these But if God
does so clothed the grass of the field
which today is and tomorrow is cast in
the oven shall he not much more clothed
you all ye of little faith an Anxiety
about Dress and what we're going to wear
is not a faith and if it's not
a faith, it's sin Now we've been told
we're to be neat But one can be
neat Without spending half the day trying to
get a wardrobe together Some people just when
they go to pack it takes them it
takes them a week to get prepared even
some of the girls here I'm used to
I'm used to just Telling them well, you're
going for this weekend But they want to
know in advance by two or three days
so they can plan what they have to
be iron and what has to Be washed
and so forth In some ways this is
good but it shows how occupied we get
with what we wear and how much time
we can spend just on Ordinary living which
should be the minimum and of course we
could say the same for food Now I
enjoy good food But I don't see that
it makes much difference if the radish is
whore if it's peeled in a nice little
tulip type thing And yet I know some
ladies that will spend hours I've been in
their homes.
They spend hours preparing a meal.
Let's go down in a half hour, and
that's it Well, we need to be realistic
don't we?
About our time and about just plain ordinary
living 31 be not therefore anxious saying what
shall we eat or what shall we drink
or wherewithal shall we be clothed?
We serve tea and coffee and you have
to make up your mind whether it's going
to be tea or coffee You're going to
drink for me.
I just like plain old cold water, but
most people don't go for that quite so
much I'm still trying to convince the Britishers
that cold water is good for them But
I'm having a hard time they like their
tea and coffee or something else For after
all these things do the Gentiles speak for
your heavenly father knoweth Well
that came in didn't it For your heavenly
father knoweth that you have need of all
these things And so what does it matter
if I can't get my cold water?
I'll drink whatever is available But seek ye
first his kingdom and His righteousness and all
these things shall be added unto you now
This is a promise from the Word of
God that if we seek him first The
food our raiment, whatever we really need will
be added unto us And if we don't
rest on that then we're just disregarding what
he said Don't worry be anxious for nothing
And I tell you sometimes there are things
that humanly speaking is something to be anxious
about But God tells us be anxious for
nothing and I found that most of the
time we're worried about something That's coming in
the future and we're not sure how it's
going to come out.
We don't worry too much about the past
It's already happened in the present.
Well, we're actually in that but it's something
in the future and many times There's something
that's come up in my life and I
know that it's going to be hard to
do it Maybe it's a situation and I
know that I have to tell that person
to do something that I know they aren't
going to like and and this is difficult
and I can begin to worry.
Well, just how are they going to react?
Will I lose their friendship?
But God says don't worry about it Because
you can't change it anyway, and we're always
worried about something that we can have no
influence over really And usually when we get
to it, it's not nearly as bad for
instance when I think of chopping my finger
off I don't like the thought of it
And I could I could worry about if
I knew that five minutes from now I
was going to have to take a hatchet
and chop my finger off I would get
disturbed and sometimes I when I think of
martyrdom I think of different ways people torture
you I can get bothered by it.
I think what if what if I had
to go through this certain physical torture?
But then when the moment comes and you
do chop your finger off It's just over
like that and then you go about getting
it repaired But It's usually not nearly as
bad as your mind imagines there's that word
again imagination imagines it to be usually the
real thing is not nearly so bad as
The real thing, of course, sometimes we can
imagine something is going to be very wonderful,
too And we can get so wrapped up
in how wonderful something's going to be and
then when we get there it falls flat
Maybe that's happened to you at this conference
Maybe your hopes were so built up that
God was going to take one or two
people and they were going to give such
wonderful Messages that you just had to get
blessed and therefore you depended on some great
speaker coming along and you've been disappointed Because
if we're going to receive a real thing,
it's got to be God he gives it
to us He uses men.
Yes, but it's amazing what kind of men
he does use I Guess
we'd save ourselves a lot of a lot
of anxiety.
We'd save ourselves perhaps some ulcers We'd relieve
the situation in our mental institutions a lot
of other places if we could learn this
lesson not to worry.
I Sometimes find myself doing it I praise
God I have some friends that they can
come along and they see if I'm worrying
or not and they say Are you worried?
Get back to reality and it's good It's
good to have brothers and sisters that are
honest enough with you and they tell you
when something's wrong with you You know how
we need to do this to exhort one
another Because God says don't worry about something
that doesn't mean you're not to ever think
about it Because in the same breath that
Jesus would say don't worry don't be anxious
about these things He also tells us to
take care And he says I put you
in remembrance of these things for instance over
in first Timothy 4 15 After
Exhorting Timothy along certain lines to let no
man despise his youth But rather be an
example and to be a learner and to
really give heed to reading an exhortation Notice
he says in verse 15 be diligent You
can't be diligent without thinking Be diligent in
these things give thyself wholly to them that
thy progress may be manifest unto all And
in other places we read about study or
be diligent to show yourself approved unto God
And give all diligence to add to your
faith Virtue brotherly kindness love and so the
scripture talks about actually giving thought to something
in many times We are reminded to Remember
something remember now thy creator in the days
of thy youth and Peter mentions in his
first epistle I believe I put you in
remembrance of these things I remind you of
them and so over and over again We
have the same things stated in the Old
Testament We were commanded to love God with
all our heart soul strength and mind and
our neighbors ourself It's recorded another three or
four times in Scripture to remind us and
we are to remember We're not to worry
about something but were to remember The things
that God has taught us and were to
give thought to something Not in a worrying
sense, but thinking with God Depending on him
to give us wisdom if we lack wisdom
ask of God in faith, and he will
give Perhaps I could give this illustration.
I Don't want you to worry about dirty
plates left all over the campground But it
would certainly be nice if you would remember
them to take them where they're to be
washed Don't worry about it, but just remember
And then get on with the more important
thing.
Don't worry about If the lines getting too
long Outside the washroom or outside the dining
hall but remember To redeem the time while
you're there in line And use it to
really fellowship with one another and to make
the time profitable And of course to be
sensible don't all crowd into the doorway so
that all the lines get muddled up don't
worry but remember The things God wants to
teach us and has taught us One more
thought along this matter of the mind In
Romans 12 1 and 2 we read about
the presenting of our bodies a living sacrifice
But he goes on in the second verse
To mention another aspect And he says and
be not fashioned according to this world But
be transformed by the renewing of your mind
And this is what we need.
We need our minds renewed.
We need our whole attitude toward life renewed
we need our thinking Renewed in Ephesians 4
tells the same thing to be that we
should be renewed in the spirit of our
mind and This is the answer to it
all.
This is the answer to a disciplined mind
get a new one Instead of ours get
the Lord Jesus Christ mind instead of I
Christ renewed in our mind I Remember when
I was in Montana, I Keep mentioned different
places.
You probably know that Traveled around a little
bit Lord keeps shifting me here and there
but when I was out in Montana a
couple summers the Lord Taught me this lesson
about the thought and how basic it is
If you saw a thought You reap an
action And if you saw an action you
reap a habit If you saw a habit
you reap a life you saw a life
you reap an eternity and it starts with
the thought and Unless God comes in and
arrests that whole order.
He can't stop it at the habit He
can't even stop it at the life and
change the life We praise God that he
can stop at anywhere except in eternity and
then it's too late But remember it starts
with the thought Another area that's very important
and very closely linked together with this is
the tongue James chapter 3 Discipline of the
tongue Americans seem to have a great desire
to talk a lot.
I find it easy to talk if I'm
not careful I Get carried away, you know
how we need to be disciplined in what
we say It's not wrong to talk a
lot, but it is wrong to talk a
lot about nothing for in many things we
all stumble Sure enough if any stumbleth not
in word the same is a perfect man
Able to bridle the whole body also Now
if we put the horses bridles into their
mouths that they may obey us we turn
about their whole body also Behold the ships
also though They are so great and are
driven by rough winds are yet turned about
by a very small rudder Whether the impulse
of the steersman will it so the tongue
also is a little member Behold how much
wood is kindled by how small a fire
and the tongue is a fire the world
of iniquity among our members is the tongue
which defied us the whole body and Sets
it on fire the wheel of nature and
is set on fire by hell For every
kind of beasts and birds or creeping things
and things in the sea is tamed and
half been tamed by mankind But the tongue
can no man tame it is a restless
evil It is full of deadly poison Therewith
bless we the Lord and father and therefore
therewith curse We men who are made after
the likeness of God out of the same
mouth cometh forth blessing and cursing My brethren
these things ought not so to be Yes,
the unregenerate man may curse God but not
many of us would dare to curse God
with me But instead we'll just talk behind
everybody else's back and just run him into
the ground And yet from the same tongue
we praise God one moment and we tear
a fellow brother down behind his back Now
if you tear him down to his face,
it's a different thing If you're saying to
his face Perhaps pointing out something you feel
is wrong in his life That's scriptural.
That's done in the spirit of love to
exhort one another but when you say something
behind their back That you wouldn't say to
his face or at least you wouldn't say
unless you absolutely forced you then it's wrong
The tongue it's bad enough to complain inwardly,
isn't it?
It's bad enough to To murmur and complain
Within ourselves so that nobody else knows about
it But if you start voicing your complaints
then it influences someone else and they voice
their complaints and that's joined together with your
complaints and they get greater and your complaints
are far worse by the time you finish
discussing them than they were to start with
and This works in a crowd because we
influence one another And this is what happens
usually in a mob when when some mob
action is started off One person says go
get him and off they are to lynch
somebody But just one person saying that it
stirs everybody else up If he had said
that just to one other person sitting down
their living room I would have laughed it
off but you know in a crowd you
see it influences them and Perhaps you're standing
over there by the dining hall and you
may make just one little word about the
food Maybe it isn't quite as good as
you expected or what you would like But
this will influence someone else and is it
boy, you know, that's right I hadn't thought
about that and those beans are a little
burnt after all or what have we been
eating beans tomatoes and so we Our complaints
add to each other and they get worse
That's why if we have a complaint Voice
it to God and not to one another
or if it is something that can be
corrected Voice it to the person in charge
And then if he doesn't take it then
perhaps you can voice it to everybody But
how easy it is just to talk behind
a person's back and I find this Sometimes
we're thinking about people who have applied this
of course applies to some of you and
we receive their applications and We're looking at
them and to be quite honest.
I look through them with the soul well
more than one purpose, but one of the
purposes is to try and find anything that
kind of Flashes a red light and I
want to know more about that person now
maybe all of you are really you really
mean business, but some people can write in
and they want to apply and Well, it's
hard telling what their backgrounds been and we
need to find this out because all we
have is one little sheet of paper With
a few questions at the first part and
a little testimony on the back Have you
ever tried to figure out what a person's
like from that much?
It's pretty difficult, but I find that perhaps
we see the picture there now Sometimes the
picture doesn't always glorify the person or perhaps
we see something else and I can find
myself beginning to talk about someone else Look
at this.
I kind of question about that and pretty
soon.
We're so Talking about what we think might
be wrong That we overlook the whole other
part and instead of taking that and writing
to the person and trying to get it
straightened out We can just talk about it
or we can talk about one another and
it in running the camp here.
I found myself I've got to think of
well, where would these people fit in the
best?
Because I must Evaluate the kind of work
they're doing it where I feel by God's
grace.
They could be used the most But I
can find I'm tempted to talk about their
failures and their weak point and end up
where they don't have any strong points I
don't know where to use them You've been
listening to the from the pulpit and classic
sermon series this week you heard George Verber
with his message discipline Tune in next week
to hear Hans Wattvogel ask are you a
living epistle on from the pulpit and classic
sermons?