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 from modern preachers
too.
This week we have Zach Kunin with his
message, Only One Life Will Soon Be Passed.
Only one life and it will soon be
passed.
Only what's done for Christ will last.
Only one life will soon be passed and
only what's done for Christ will last.
Now you've got to understand it right.
For years I didn't understand it right.
I'm sure the man of God who said
it understood it right because he manifested it
by his life.
But here's what I mean by understanding it
right.
There are a lot of things we can
do for Christ which won't last because of
one verse, Matthew 15 and verse 13.
Matthew 15 verse 13, Jesus himself said every
plant which my heavenly father did not plant
shall be rooted up, shall be pulled out
in the final day.
What does that mean?
Matthew 15 verse 13.
That means if this wonderful thing you're doing
for the Lord, if the idea did not
originate in God, that's not going to last.
If it just originated in your clever brain,
it's not going to last.
Every plant, it doesn't matter whether it's a
good plant, that's not the point.
Did the heavenly father plant it or was
it your own bright idea?
There are a lot of things which have
been done for Christ, I would say in
quotes, for Christ by some very sincere Christians
because they have a lot of money.
Today a lot of people think only we
had money we could do so many things
for Christ.
Really?
If so, why is it that the God
who made Abraham a billionaire and Job a
billionaire and Solomon and David billionaires, why did
he make Peter and Paul paupers?
Isn't there something wrong there?
No.
Why did he make the apostles so poor
when he made all these Old Testament, the
same God?
It's because that abundance of wealth would have
prevented Paul and Peter from preaching an authentic
gospel.
They would have depended more on money than
on the Holy Spirit like a lot of
Christians.
I come from India, which is considered a
third world country, developing country, etc.
The object of mission worked for 200 years,
98% not even Christian by name.
And I've seen the amount of third-rate
Christianity in our country because of dependence on
money.
All the prayer letters that go out asking
people for money, money, money because we need
it.
It reduced Almighty God to a beggar.
I say what is needed.
I wish people would seek that earnestness for
the power of the Holy Spirit.
Without me you can do nothing.
But as today's Christianity says, without money you
can do nothing.
That's not the gospel.
Jesus said, without me you can do nothing.
And if my heavenly Father has not planted
it, it's going to be pulled out.
So the real way to say it would
be only one life.
It will soon be past and only what
Christ does through me will last.
Not what I do for Christ.
There's a world of difference between what I
do for Christ and what Christ does through
me.
What I do for Christ, I'll come back
with an empty fishing boat after years of
struggling.
What Christ does through me, my boat will
be filled in a moment.
The five loaves and two fish can feed
five thousand if Christ does through me.
If I try to do it myself, I
may feed one person or two.
There's a lot of difference.
That life of humble dependence upon Christ moment
by moment like the branches.
This is one of the fundamental secrets of
Christian life.
And the other side of the same coin
is what Paul said from his own experience
after many years, after 30 years of walking
with God.
He writes in Philippians 4 verse 13, the
other side of the same coin.
I can do everything through Christ who strengthens
me.
He's not saying like today's Christian workers, I
can do everything if you fellas will give
me money.
That's another gospel.
God's work is suffering because you fellas are
not giving enough money.
The time of recession, you chaps are not
paying up enough to the mission peels.
God's work is suffering.
Poor God, struggling for lack of money.
What an insult it is.
We live in a world where Christians have
descended to the level of the corporate world
where they think the is money.
It's not.
It's the power of the Holy Spirit.
Without the Holy Spirit's power, you can try
to live whatever life you want to live.
You'll never succeed.
Jesus said, apart from me, you can do
nothing.
Like the branch in the tree, the sap
flows from the branch to the tree.
And that's the picture of Christ continuously filling
us with the Holy Spirit.
Every single day, my wife and I pray,
Lord, fill us with the Holy Spirit.
It's the main thing we pray for in
the morning when we pray together.
Forgive us our sins and fill us with
the Holy Spirit this day.
I get up to speak, Lord, fill me
with the Holy Spirit.
Give me the gift of prophecy.
Give me your words according to the need
of the people.
Fill me with the Holy Spirit.
Otherwise, I'm wasting people's time and my own
time and God's time.
Without me, you can do nothing.
And that by itself is not enough.
With Christ, I can do everything, not everything.
I mean, I can't win the 100 meters
in the Olympics.
You got to understand, all things means all
things that God has designed that I should
do.
Every single thing that God planned that I
should do when he brought me into this
earth through my mother, every single thing I'll
be able to accomplish before I leave this
earth so that I'll be able to say
like Jesus, Father, I finished the work you
gave me to do.
And like the Apostle Paul said, I finished
my race.
I've kept the faith.
I fought the good fight.
You should be able to say that.
Not that I somehow managed to scrape through
to the end or I made a lot
of money or became very famous.
I finished the work, Lord, you gave me
to do.
I want to ask you, my dear brothers
and sisters, do you believe God's given you
work to do?
I'm so thankful that I don't remember anybody
telling me this, but as I read the
scriptures when I was 21 years old, soon
after my baptism, I was gripped by this
truth 50 years ago that God had a
plan for my life.
I had already made a plan for my
life because I joined the military in India
before I was converted.
And I had a plan to go right
up to the top.
But then Christ came into my life and
altered the direction of my life completely and
showed me from scripture that he had a
plan for my life.
That applies to all of us.
Let me show you this verse, which originally
spoken to Israel, but applies to us, Jeremiah
29.
Jeremiah 29 and verse 11.
This is one of these Old Testament prophecies
in the book of Jeremiah, which have a
dual fulfillment, once in the nation of Israel
and secondly in us.
There are many Old Testament prophecies like that,
that have a double fulfillment, once in the
nation of Israel and the other for us.
This was for the nation of Israel initially
that God would bring them back from Babylon
after 70 years, but it also applies to
us.
I know the plans I have for you.
Make it personal.
Plans for welfare and not for calamity.
Not to mess up your life.
I mean, if you don't follow my plan,
you will mess up your life.
But if you follow my plan, there will
be no calamity.
I'm not saying there won't be any trials.
I'm not saying you won't be persecuted.
I'm not saying you won't be killed for
the faith.
All the apostles except John were perhaps killed.
I'm not talking about that, but there won't
be any spiritual calamity.
Examples of spiritual calamity, credit card debt.
You think of that as spiritual calamity?
Absolutely.
One of the biggest calamities facing people in
North America.
Complete disobedience to scripture in Romans 13 verse
8, which says, oh no man anything.
And how does it come?
Through Christians covetous, covetous, covetous, wanting to buy
things they cannot afford.
Calamity.
I think it is a calamity.
I decided when I became Christian, I'd never
get into debt.
My wife and I have known deep levels
of poverty when we were first married.
Not today, but when we were first married.
But we decided we'd never, never get into
debt.
We'd never, we never bought clothes because we
couldn't afford them.
We didn't buy many things because we couldn't
afford them.
We said when God expands our financial boundary,
we'll buy them.
And the result is in 71 years of
my life, I've never been in debt for
a single day.
It's a calamity.
Those are the type of calamities God saves
us from.
From messing up our life, messing up other
people's lives by adultery, harming others, exploiting others.
Paul said, we never took advantage of you.
We were never a burden to you.
So it's a calamity to make yourself a
burden to other people.
God is able to do all things for
us.
I've got a plan for your life, which
will be the best possible plan, which you
yourself will not be able to better, to
give you a future and a hope.
I said, Lord, that's the plan I want.
Think of someone planning your life, who knows
everything about your personality, who knows all about
the dangers that are going to take place
in your life 50 years from now, all
through those years, and who's got maximum wisdom.
Wouldn't you commit your life to ask him
to plan your life and you plan it
yourself?
You're so short-sighted, so short-sighted that
I don't even know what's going to happen
tomorrow morning.
That's how blind I am.
I'm so ignorant about my own capabilities and
my own limitations.
I can have high thoughts about myself that
I can do so many things.
I thank God that I can commit my
life to another person who plans my life.
And that's what it means.
I can do all things that God has
planned for me, through Christ who strengthens me,
that is through the power of the Holy
Spirit.
If you are gripped and if you're a
young brother, you're lucky to be gripped by
these truths.
I often say to people in my own
churches back in India, you who are young,
boy, you don't realize how lucky you are
to hear these truths when you're 17 years
old.
I know people who are hearing when they
are hearing this for the first time when
they are 50.
They messed up their life for 50 years
and now they are hearing.
Thank God there's still some hope for them.
But what can they do about those 50
years they wasted?
Nothing.
There are certain things even Almighty God cannot
do.
For example, He cannot give you the year
2010 once again.
Sorry, that's gone.
He can't even give you the first five
months of 2011.
It's gone.
If you wasted it, it's wasted.
However much you fast and pray, He can't
give you those years back.
I know there are people who quote that
verse in Joel chapter 2 which says, I
will restore to you the years that are
locusts as eaten.
Don't misquote it to find some comfort in
your sin.
It doesn't work.
God will forgive you.
Sure.
Acts 17 verse 30 says, the times of
ignorance He overlooks.
But the wasted years are wasted years which
could have been useful for God.
I'm so thankful that I was gripped by
this truth not when I was 51 but
when I was 21.
My only regret is that I wasn't gripped
by it when I was six.
Imagine how much more we could have offered
of our life for the Lord without having,
you know, spoiled His name in any way
by any action or word of ours.
We don't realize how serious sin is.
But what I want to say is when
we think of this overcoming life, recognize these
two very important truths.
Apart from me, you can do nothing.
Or in other words, whatever you think you
have accomplished apart from Christ you have discovered
in eternity is zero.
That is what the Bible calls in 1
Corinthians 3, wood, hay and straw which will
be tested by fire and it'll all be
burned.
And then there's gold, silver and precious stones
which will remain through the fire.
If you're not familiar with that scripture, let
me show it to you in 1 Corinthians
in chapter 3.
1 Corinthians chapter 3, it says here, it's
fine that you laid a foundation in Christ.
That means your sins are forgiven and Christ
is underneath your life.
Great.
1 Corinthians 3 verse 11.
There's no other foundation a man can lay
other than that which is laid Jesus Christ.
You founded your life on Christ.
That's great.
Most of you are really born again.
You received Christ as your Lord.
Now it says you better be careful how
you build.
The picture is of a house that you're
building.
You've laid the foundation all right that your
sins are forgiven.
Now be careful what type of bricks you're
using.
In India we use bricks.
Or here you use wood.
Be careful what type of wood you're using.
In those days they built with stones.
But here he's thinking of building a temple
for God and the material you use must
be material that lasts.
And he says it's going to be tested
by fire one day.
A man can build either with gold, silver
and precious stones or with wood, hay and
straw.
But whatever man uses, God's not going to
force a person to, compel a person to
use gold, silver and precious stones.
Each man's work will become evident.
What it looks like now is not going
to be in the day the Lord comes.
The day will show it because every man's
work will be revealed by fire.
And this is why I say the opinion
other people have about your life or your
ministry is fit for the trash can.
Throw it in the garbage bin.
Whatever people said about you, good or bad,
it's worth nothing.
People think you're a wholehearted brother, throw it
in the trash can.
People think you're a compromiser or a hypocrite,
throw it in the trash can.
Live before God, brother.
It's absolutely liberating.
I tell you, one of the most liberating
things I've experienced in my life is to
live before God's face.
What does he think of my life?
When he evaluates everything in my life by
fire, my thoughts, my words, my attitudes, my
motives, especially motives.
You can do a good thing with the
wrong motive.
And it's all going to be tested by
fire.
And look at this lovely word, quality.
Verse 13, the fire will test not the
quantity, but the quality of each man's work.
In Christendom today, as I've observed it for
50 years, statistics is the big thing.
Have you heard that saying, there are three
types of lies?
Black lies, white lies, and statistics.
So many people were converted.
So many people came to the meeting.
So many reports that go out like that,
one would think the whole of India is
already converted.
The number of total of all the people
different Christian organizations are saying are converted.
Quantity, quantity.
That's how it's in the corporate world.
What is the bottom line?
How much profit did we make this year?
Quantity, numbers, numbers.
How big is your church?
Only 10,000.
We got 30,000 in our church.
What is it?
Quantity, quantity, quantity.
Here it says the Bible tests quality.
I say that constantly.
I'm not talking about other churches.
I'm talking about my own church.
We have maybe about 200 adults in our
church.
And I said to them like this, this
is what I speak in my home church.
Less people think I'm only speaking about others.
I say, brothers, if someone were to ask
me, and we have about 200 grand people
and children, so 400.
I say, if people ask me, how many
people in your church?
I said, we have 400 chairs that are
usually filled on Sunday.
But how many are disciples?
Supposing one of the angels were to ask
the Lord, Lord, how many disciples are there
down in Christian Fellowship Center Bangalore?
Lord says, about 20.
Will I be shocked?
I said this in a meeting there.
I said, brothers and sisters, I'll be thrilled
if there are 20 wholehearted disciples in this
church.
11 people turned the first world upside down.
Can you imagine what 20 can do in
India?
Don't glory in numbers.
It means nothing.
Quality.
Wholehearted.
So remember this, that your life is quality
that's going to be tested in the final
day.
I'm not saying about going to heaven, because
it says if you're built with wood, hay,
and straw, verse 15, a man's work will
be burnt up.
He shall suffer loss, but he will be
saved.
So if all you're interested in is going
to heaven, you might as well not come
tomorrow onwards for the meetings, because you've got
nothing to tell you.
But if you're interested in overcoming life, you're
interested in standing before the Lord, people have
asked me, Brother Zak, why do you so
often say that people will have regret in
heaven?
Well, I'll tell you, I believe that.
And my main aim is to prevent people
from having regret when they stand before the
Lord.
And I'll tell you why.
I'll show it to you from scripture.
Supposing you're one of those people who spent
years and years and years emphasizing quantity and
doing this thing for the Lord and that
thing for the Lord and giving money for
the Lord and this thing and other thing,
going here, going there and doing so many
things.
And in God's eyes, the whole thing is
wood, hay and straw.
None of those things originated in God's mind.
It was all your bright ideas.
And you were pretty proud of all that
you were doing so called for the Lord
and all the people you thought you were
reaching, etc.
I'm not against numbers.
The first day of Pentecost, 3000 were converted
and the Bible says that.
Sure, I'm delighted if multitudes become disciples, not
just say they believe in Jesus.
And you stand in the Lord before the
Lord.
Let's imagine Jesus has come and you're standing
before the throne and one by one we
are being evaluated.
Your turn has come.
Okay, the Lord reveals and plays the videotape
of your life from the time you're born
again, because all the previous part of your
life is blotted out.
Okay, from the day you're born again, here's
your life.
And shows by the standards of heaven, what
your life was worth, not by what people
thought about you.
And your work is tested there by God's
standards.
And you stand there after 50 years of
being a believer, with nothing to show for
your life.
Everything was done by human methods and for
money and honor and everything earthly.
Not the result of waiting on God and
trying to find out His will or seeking
for the power of the Holy Spirit or
for the glory of God.
A lot of it for your own honor,
etc, etc.
And it's all wiped out.
And the Lord says, but you're forgiven.
Tell me, will you have regret at that
time?
I tell you, if I heard that from
the Lord, I would bow my head in
shame and sorrow.
Say, Lord, please give me one more chance.
No more chance to live on earth.
The one life, not because I won't get
a reward in heaven.
That's not what I'm looking for.
No, no, no, no, no.
Don't misunderstand me.
Not because, oh, I can't sit with the
throne of Jesus.
Jesus on the throne or won't have some
crown or mansion.
Those are not the things that I'm looking
for.
But I'll tell you what will bring me
sorrow.
Lord, you gave me one life on earth
to show you, show my gratitude for what
you did for me on the cross.
And I wasted it.
Seeking man's honor, seeking to advance myself in
the world, making more money, trying to become
famous and living basically for myself.
Knowing more about movies and film stars than
I know about the Bible.
And I fooled other people that I was
a wholehearted disciple of Jesus.
And I raised up children who are like
me.
And I produced other believers who are like
me.
Boy, I tell you, if I were like
that, I'd have tremendous regret, because I can't
live my life again.
Forget the reward.
Lord, I let you down in the one
life you gave me on earth.
What's the use shouting in heaven?
Oh, I love you, Lord.
I love you, Lord.
It'll sound so empty.
Because the one life he gave me on
earth, where he wanted me to prove my
love for him, I didn't.
I lived for myself.
Think about it.
This is real.
I'm not painting an imaginary picture.
It's all from scripture.
Turn to 2nd Corinthians chapter 5.
2nd Corinthians chapter 5, verse 10.
We must all appear for, whenever you find
the word for, connect it to the previous
verse.
2nd Corinthians 5.9. We have, we can
say, one ambition.
That is, whether we are in heaven or
earth, to please God.
Why?
Because, because, for means because we must all
appear before the judgment seat of Christ.
Not whether we're going to heaven or hell,
so that we can be rewarded according to
the deeds we did on our, in our
body, whether good or bad.
Good or bad means whether gold, silver, or
precious stones, or wood, hay, and straw, by
God's standards.
And therefore, knowing the fear of the Lord,
we persuade men.
We tell others, hey fellas, don't forget that
you're going to stand at the judgment seat
of Christ.
Make sure you're ready to be evaluated by
God's standards.
And so Paul says, verse 9, this verse
has really gripped me.
I want you to think for a moment,
I feel that many of us read the
scriptures too superficially, too fast.
I want to encourage you to develop the
habit of sometimes stopping on a verse for
a whole day.
It's happened to me many times.
I read the Bible and I get to
a verse and it's like a stoplight there
saying, stop.
Don't go further.
I stop.
It's like obey the traffic lights on the
road, I stop.
God's got something to say to me.
And sometimes the next morning when I get
up, the stoplight is still red.
I can't move on from that verse.
God's got something more to say to me
from the same verse.
Have you ever had that experience?
Or you're trying to, you know, somehow complete
the Bible in one year.
You know, I'll tell you honestly, once upon
a time I had that goal, but I
don't want to get into the Guinness Book
of Records of how many times I went
through the Bible.
I want the Bible to go through me
once in my life.
Every verse in scripture.
I prayed this prayer.
I said, Lord, every commandment I'm supposed to
obey as a New Testament Christian, I want
to obey before I leave this earth.
And so what does God do?
He gives me a few enemies.
But how can I love my enemies if
I don't have enemies?
Thank God for enemies.
Otherwise I wouldn't be able to obey that
one verse.
He gives me people who persecute me because
it says you got to pray for those
who persecute you.
He gives me people who curse me, thank
God, because it says you've got to bless
those who curse them.
I'm serious.
I thank God for all these things which
the Lord has arranged so that I, he's
trying to answer my prayer.
He makes me lose money sometimes.
And I asked him, my Lord, why did
you do that?
Didn't you pray that you want to be
free from the love of money?
Okay, Lord, fine.
If that's the reason, it's okay.
And I said, the other thing is, I
want to claim every promise that there is
in scripture which I'm supposed to claim as
a New Testament Christian.
I remember there were some who hated me
a lot, who created some problems for me,
so-called Christians.
But finally, after a number of years, I
just loved them and did nothing.
They came and sought peace and cleared the
whole thing.
I said, praise the Lord.
Fulfillment of Proverbs 16, 7.
When a man's ways please the Lord, he
makes him and his enemies to be at
peace with him.
I want to give you a project, lifetime
project.
Ask God what I ask God.
Lord, before I leave this earth, I want
to obey every commandment I'm supposed to obey
as a New Covenant Christian.
I want to claim every promise there is
in the Bible which I'm supposed to claim
as a New Covenant Christian.
I don't want these empty promises other people
are trying to claim which are not in
scripture.
And I said, Lord, this verse really gripped
me.
Verse 9, 2 Corinthians 5, 9.
If you read the context, you will read
there that at home means heaven and absent
means absent from heaven.
Earlier verses indicate that.
So what he's saying is, whether I'm in
heaven or on earth, I have only one
ambition.
Verse 9, to be pleasing to God.
And I meditated on that.
I stood at that stoplight and I said,
Lord, what does that mean for me?
And the Lord said, think what will be
your ambition when you go to heaven?
Will it be to become famous or make
more money or to be known as a
great preacher in heaven?
I said, ridiculous.
I wouldn't have any such ambition in heaven.
I said, Lord, I only have one ambition
in heaven, to please you.
If you're a wholehearted disciple, that'll be your
ambition on earth as well.
That's what Paul says.
That means when I move into heaven, there's
not going to be any change of ambition.
There's going to be a change in my
body, sure.
There's going to be a change in my
mind.
I shall understand things I never understood before.
My body will never be sick again.
I'll have a resurrected body.
I won't be wearing glasses there.
But no change in ambition.
Great.
I want to ask all of you a
straight question.
Don't give it the answer to me.
Give the answer to yourself before God.
Will your present ambition change if you go
to heaven today?
Then you know for yourself whether you're a
wholehearted Christian or not.
I took that decision years ago.
I said, Lord, I don't want any change
of ambition when I go to heaven.
I want to align my earthly...
I've had many ambitions in the past, but
I want to align my earthly ambition to
be exactly the same so that I don't
have to alter track when I go to
heaven.
Hey, I've got to please God now.
No, no, no, no.
It's the same old ambition I had on
earth for a number of years to please
God.
Not to impress people, not to impress the
angels or impress anybody in heaven, but my
Savior.
And it's exactly the same on earth.
And the only way to do that is
if I judge myself all the time.
I do that every day.
I never preach a sermon without going home
and judging myself.
Lord, was there something I said?
I sat here between the two sessions.
At the end of the last session, I
said, Lord, show me.
Is there something I said in the last
session which was really not of use?
I want to cleanse myself.
If you live in that, if you think
it's a burdensome life, far from it.
Is it a burdensome thing to have a
shower and get rid of all the dirt
from your body?
Don't you feel fresh when you come out
of a shower?
That's exactly how you feel.
Judging yourself is like having a spiritual shower.
Lord, cleanse me.
Show me the things that some dirt's taking
here and there.
As long as we live on this earth,
we're going to perspire and be dirty.
But thank God for a shower.
If you have the habit of taking a
daily shower, have the habit of cleansing yourself
every day.
I've developed that habit long ago.
Make sure that you're, you know, we all
start off with many, many ambitions when we
are born again.
I don't think every born again person has
the ambition only to please God.
What is your ambition in life?
On what basis did you make the decisions
that you made in life?
After you're born again, forget the early years.
After you're born again, what, on what basis?
There are many decisions you made in life
after you were born again.
Whom to marry, what to do, where to
live.
What was the motive behind those decisions?
Was it, I want to please God.
If I want to please God, I must
find out his plan for my life.
Don't think that the most difficult task on
earth is always God's will for you.
Or maybe God wants me to go to
Afghanistan and I'm living here.
That's a crazy thing.
A lot of people think that if I
seek God's plan, he will always give me
the most miserable possible thing I can think
of.
Young people fear like that.
If I say, God, I'll marry anybody you
choose for me, God will pick out the
ugliest woman in the world and say, marry
her.
Or if I'm asking God for a job,
he'll pick up the most low-paying job
in the world and say, take that.
Or if I ask him where I should
live, he'll tell me some, the most inconvenient
place on the face of the earth and
go and live there.
Who gives you these ideas?
The devil.
To make you feel that God's not a
good father.
He's not a good father.
He's one who's out to mess up your
life.
I remember one young person telling me this.
I said, why don't you give your life
completely to Christ?
He said, I want to enjoy life a
little.
In other words, if I give my life
to Christ now, I won't be able to
enjoy it.
I'll mess up my life and I can't
do this and I can't do that and
can't do the other thing.
I said, it's the other way around.
To do your own will is like eating
the pig's food, the prodigal son.
To do God's will is like sitting at
the banquet table with God.
Do you believe that?
Hasn't the devil reversed it and said, doing
your own will is like sitting at the
banquet table and doing God's will.
That's like in the far country with the
pigs.
The devil's a master at reversing the truth.
Dear brothers and sisters, I encourage you.
An overcoming life is God's will for every
single one of us sitting here.
It's not something for the spiritual elite.
You know, those who are upper class Christians.
There's no such thing as upper class Christians.
There's only one class of Christians.
Those are disciples of Jesus and God wants
every one of us to live an overcoming
life and that is the best possible life
you can ever live on this earth.
I wish I could convince people about this.
I feel my words are so inadequate.
So often when I finish preaching, I say,
Lord, I tried my best, but your Holy
Spirit's got to convince them.
I can't do it.
Flesh and blood cannot reveal to anyone that
following God's plan every day is the best
possible life you can have.
Obeying him in all things, walking in humility,
when it says put away all anger, it
means put away all anger.
When it says put away all hatred, it
means put away all hatred.
If I say, please put away all the
pews from this building, how many pews will
be left?
Not even one.
You take verses like that, Ephesians 4.31,
put away all anger, put away all knots.
You take it like that or do you
think a few remnants lying around are okay?
It's all a question of how seriously you
take God's word.
There is a life we are missing.
You don't realize what a wonderful, glorious life
the overcoming life is.
I hope you'll get a little glimpse of
it and want it.
Like many things that people want to sell
us something, give us a taste of something,
that you want it.
I hope that you'll want this overcoming life.
God wants you to have it, brother, sister.
Jesus died that we might all be overcomers.
Let me show you this verse in Revelation
21.
Revelation 21, it says, verse 7, this is
talking about heaven.
Revelation 21, it's speaking about the new heaven
and the new earth in verse 21, verse
1.
And who are the ones who are going
to inherit this new heaven and the new
earth?
I saw a new heaven and a new
earth, verse 1, because the first heaven and
first earth have passed away.
And God says in verse 7, he who
overcomes shall inherit these things.
I will be his God and he will
be my son.
I want to be in that number.
I hope you also want to be in
that number, inheriting all things that God has
prepared for us, that Jesus died to purchase
on the cross for us.
In that day, we shall see that all
the things of earth, which we valued so
much, were temporary, were used by God, not
for us to keep permanently, but to test
us, to see what we're going to do
with it.
Let's turn to 1 Timothy chapter 6.
I want to show you one word, which
you may have missed out in this verse.
We're all familiar with this verse, but there's
one word that you may have missed out.
1 Timothy chapter 6, and that verse makes
a lot of difference.
One word.
1 Timothy 6, verse 7.
Let's read it slowly.
For we have brought nothing into the world,
so we cannot take anything out of it
either.
What is the important word?
So.
So, why can't you take anything when you
leave this earth?
Because when you were born, you brought nothing
in.
It's like I've seen sometimes, you know, mothers
come with their little children to visit a
home, and the people in that home are
very kind to let that little boy play
with the toy cars and all types of
things.
And like little boys who like these toys,
may put one or two toy cars into
their pockets when they are leaving the house.
So, mommy has to check the pockets before
leaving the house, and says, son, you shouldn't
take these out.
But mommy, they allowed me to play with
it.
Yes, but that's only when you're here.
They were kind enough to let you play
with it.
We empty our pockets when we leave the
house.
Why?
Because you came to this house with empty
pockets.
So, we must go with empty pockets.
Now, apply it to this verse.
You came with nothing.
You have to go with nothing.
So, what about all this I worked so
hard to achieve and earn?
You didn't realize they were just toys God
gave you to play with on this earth.
And more than toys, God was using them
to see how you would use them.
Did he help?
He just tested you to see what you
do with that help.
I remember once, I was invited to pray
for some nominal Christian.
He wasn't born again.
So, I wanted to help him to understand
the meaning of praying.
It's not just an empty.
So, I said to him, I said, so
brother, I mean, I call him brother just
to encourage him.
He's a brother as a human being, not
as a Christian.
What shall I pray for?
You're sick, you're lying in bed.
So, I pray, Lord, give him strength so
that he can watch internet pornography.
Now, he's not able to do that because
he's lying in bed.
He's not strong enough to yell at his
wife, Lord, please give him strength and heal
him so he can get up and start
yelling at his wife again or go and
stand in line for the cinema tickets.
He's not able to stand.
Do that now, Lord.
What do you want God to heal you
for?
I say that to Christians.
Do you pray for healing?
I've had different problems at different times.
I'm 71 years old now and you can
expect that the machine doesn't work perfectly always.
So, we pray for God to repair it.
But the question is why do you want
God to repair it?
Why do you want God to repair this
body?
I can honestly say every time, Lord, only
to do your will better on earth.
No other desire.
I've said that for many years now.
So, you will discover in that day that
all the offerings, God gave you health.
You can ask, what do you do with
it?
He gave you a house.
What do you do with that house?
I remember the first time years ago when
I owned a house of my own and
I was scared.
I was scared because I said, Lord, I
never expected in my life that I would
own my house, own a house of my
own.
It wasn't worth very much but the old
house we lived in, but it was a
place and I was so scared.
I said, Lord, please take it away.
It's going to be an idol in my
life.
I want nothing on earth but Jesus.
This is way back, nearly 40 years ago.
I said, I only want Jesus and if
you think this thing is going to come
between me and Jesus, burn it up.
Let there be some electrical short circuit or
something and it gets burned up.
I don't even have insurance on the house
so I'd really be reduced to zero.
Great.
But I don't want anything come between me
and Jesus.
For six months, I really thought he would
burn it up but he didn't.
I placed my Isaac on the altar.
He said, you can have it back.
But now I said, God, you've got to
give me a house.
What am I going to do with it?
Use it for my glory.
And that's where, three years later, the church
was born.
People were saved.
Demons were cast out.
People were healed.
That became the door of heaven and the
gateway into God's kingdom for many.
God loves you.
I gave you a house.
What did you do with it?
It was something God was testing you with.
I gave you an increase in your salary.
What do you do with that?
So many things.
I gave you children.
What do you do with them?
One life and at the end of it,
it's all gone.
What did I do with it during this
one life?
God took me through trials.
What do you do with that?
They were meant to produce glory in me.
Instead of that, it produced complaining and grumbling.
I messed up.
I said, Lord, of the years that are
left to me, I can't do anything about
the past.
Help me to bow and do your will.
I want to be an overcomer.
I want to live as Jesus lived on
the earth, with one ambition, to please the
Father.
Don't think gifts are necessary for that.
You may not have the gift of preaching
that God's given me.
I find in India that I many times
pray, Lord, I wish you'd give a hundred
people in India this gift of being able
to preach like you've given me.
But He hasn't done it.
I wish there were many more.
But the Lord showed me that gifts are
not the main thing.
Get people to live the way Jesus lived.
That's the main thing, to live the way
He lived, even if you don't have any
gifts.
Jesus lived for 30 years without any gifts,
not preaching a sermon, not healing the sick,
not casting out demons.
And the Father said, I'm well pleased with
him.
Can God be well pleased with a man
who never preached a sermon, never healed a
sick person, never cast out a demon?
Is that the overcoming life?
Yes, it is.
33 years Jesus lived on earth, only 10
% was in ministry.
33 years He lived an overcoming life.
So the overcoming life has got to do
more with our daily life as a mother,
as a father, as a brother in the
church and serving, not just in fantastic gifts.
May God help us.
I hope we got a little of our
ground plowed up to receive what the Lord
has for us in the coming days.
Let's bow before God.
Heavenly Father, as we bow before you, we
pray that you will help us to be
gripped, even if we don't remember everything we
heard in our mind, that we be gripped
in our heart by the challenge to live
the way the Lord Jesus lived on earth.
Help us.
You've been listening to the From the Pulpit
and Classic Sermons series.
This week you heard Zach Poonen with his
message, Only When Life Will Soon Be Passed.
Tune in next week to hear Grant Jeffrey
talk about pre-tribulation rapture of the church
on From the Pulpit and Classic Sermons.