All right, praise the Lord.
Let's just bow our hearts tonight before the
Lord and just pray for a moment.
Father, we just want to acknowledge tonight, Lord,
our utter dependence upon you, Lord.
We want to acknowledge tonight, Lord, that the
Holy Spirit alone is able to energize and
quicken thy word to our hearts, Lord, enabling
us to share in the reality of it,
the life of it, the good of it,
Lord.
So we just want to give full reign
tonight to the Spirit, the Holy Spirit of
God, the Spirit of wisdom and revelation, that
we might come to know something more of
Christ, that there might be a greater increase
of Christ in our life, a greater increase
of His life, His stature, and a corresponding
decrease, Lord, of all that is in us,
Lord, that is at enmity to you, that
which corresponds, Lord, to our own way, our
own will, our own desires, Lord.
We just want to acknowledge that it is
our desire tonight, Lord, not to simply bring
teaching, Lord, in and of itself, Lord, but
something of life, Lord, that would minister to
us, Lord, that would change us, Lord.
So we're looking to you, Lord, to be
the life source behind our gathering around you
tonight, Lord Jesus, and want to commit our
hearts and our minds to you, Lord, for
Christ's sake, amen.
I want to look at some scriptures tonight,
and I'm not too sure how far we'll
get, but nevertheless feel that the Lord has
something He wants to communicate to us tonight,
and we can look into the book of
Luke to begin with, and the thought that
is upon my heart tonight is the Overcomer,
the Overcomer.
The scriptures speak much in the book of
Revelation of the Overcomer.
Matter of fact, in the book of Revelation,
the scriptures mention, He that overcometh, seven times,
He that overcometh, He that overcometh, each time
the Lord addresses one of the churches, He
makes that statement to the church, and there
is much that is included, intended to be
meant through the phrase Overcomer, He that overcometh.
But before we can even get into the
thought of the Overcomer, and who in fact
the Overcomer is, I think we'll be surprised
as we look into the scriptures to see
who the Overcomer actually is, and how oftentimes
Christians begin to suppose that the Overcomer consists
of certain groups of people here, and certain
groups of people there, and they develop Overcomer
teachings, and come under the idea that unless
you come under a particular end time teaching,
you can't be an Overcomer.
Well, that's simply not substantiated at all in
the scriptures, and there's a subtle leaven in
such teachings, and this leaven is that which
caters to man wanting a place, man wanting
prominence, man wanting to be elevated above his
brother or his sister in Christ.
It's a subtle attempt for man to want
to go into the things of God, and
somehow become something in himself, and he hides
behind the phraseology an Overcomer.
But I think we'll be gladdened tonight, if
the Lord permits us to get this far
into the thought that the Lord has laid
upon my heart tonight, that the Overcomer indeed
is the Lord Jesus Christ.
He is the Overcomer, and our being Overcomers
is in direct relation to our link to
Him, to our union with Him, and to
His ever-increasing stature growing in our life.
So that to be called an Overcomer is
simply to be acknowledged as having the Overcomer,
the Lord Jesus Christ, ever-increasingly expressing the
qualities, the features, the perfections of His life
through the energizing power of the Holy Spirit
through us.
We must get away from this man-centered,
man-grasping, man-seeking to take that which
belongs to Christ, and exclusively Christ, and try
and make it applicable to what He is
after His old nature.
The whole basis, the whole basis of the
Church being the Church is upon the finished
work of the Lord Jesus Christ, and upon
coming to salvation, coming to Christ, experiencing the
new birth, God reckons the Church as being
a brand-new creation, reconstituted in nature with
the very nature of Christ Himself.
And it is the work of the Holy
Spirit to cause that nature to be formed
in us so that character is realized.
That character, again, is derived from and drawn
from the very Christ Himself in heaven, the
Lord Jesus Christ, so that the whole concept,
biblically speaking, of the Church and what the
Church is as being an Overcomer is connected
to the Overcomer who lives in her.
It's Christ in you, the hope of glory.
So, as we are focused on Christ, and
focused on the centrality of Christ, and focused
on the centrality of the cross as the
means through which God brings us to an
end, and brings Christ into view as our
life, it's only in that connection that we
can understand what it is that God is
after when He is calling out Overcomers, when
He's making promises to Overcomers.
Ironically, when one considers the thought of being
an Overcomer, it can generate in them a
desire to want to go after the Lord,
to want to become something in themselves.
But the fact of the matter is, being
an Overcomer, or the call of being an
Overcomer, it's not seen in us grasping after
something for ourself, but it's seeing the finality
of Christ, seeing the finality of the life
of Christ.
So, the call to be an Overcomer is
wrapped up in the believer more and more
and more, decreasing.
As John the Baptist said, I must decrease
that Christ may increase.
How liberating, how emancipating, how freeing it is
when we perceive and understand the call of
the Scripture to the Church to be Overcomers
as related to the person of Christ, as
opposed to some kind of a call that
God is asking us to participate in, in
which we, in our own self, in our
own energies, by our own strength, trying to
reach after God to become something in ourselves.
See, God's whole thought is not that we,
in ourselves, become something, but that Christ becomes
something in that His Son, God's passion is
His Son, God's focus is His Son.
The significance of the Church is not what
the Church is after the flesh.
God considers what we are after the flesh
as crucified, buried, dead.
The significance of the Church, in God's eyes,
is Christ in you, the hope of glory.
The significance of the Church is that we
have become partakers of the divine nature.
You see, God's interest in the Church is
what He has put in us that comes
directly from His Son.
That's why He redeemed us.
He loved us so much, but perceived that
we had fallen so far and had become
alienated from Him because of the sin within
us, that we were of no use to
Him.
He loved us, but we couldn't fellowship with
Him.
The Bible says that our sins separated us
from God.
We couldn't understand who He was.
The Bible says the natural mind is at
enmity to God.
It cannot understand the things of God.
We could not please God because all that
we could do in ourselves, Isaiah says, is
as filthy rags in His eyes.
He says, all of your righteousness is as
filthy rags in my eyes.
So here God sees the human race that
He loves deeply, for God so loved the
world, but yet He could do nothing with
them in the state they were in.
They were eternally separated from Him.
So therefore, the significance of our usefulness to
God, the significance of being accepted before God,
is wrapped up not in what we are
or what we've done for God, but it's
wrapped up in the person of the Lord
Jesus Christ and the finished work of Christ.
So therefore, beloved, it is essential for us
to understand that when the Scriptures, particularly in
the book of Revelation, are speaking seven times
of He that overcometh, He that overcometh, He
that overcometh seven times, the focus of that
call must be on the Lord Jesus Christ.
It must be our means to overcome and
then to be granted those things that God
promises the overcomers.
Our means to overcome is entirely 100%
connected to Christ Himself and the increase of
His life in us.
It is not me trying to do something
for God that will constitute me overcoming, but
it is Christ becoming more and more and
more all and all in my life.
He is the overcoming one.
He is the one who conquered sin and
death.
It is the spirit of life in Christ
Jesus that sets me free from the law
of sin and death, the Bible says in
Romans chapter 8.
So it is essential for us when we
see what God is expecting us to become,
when God addresses us as overcomers or He
that overcomes, calling us to that life of
overcoming, calling us to that life where we
are overcoming the flesh and the works thereof,
overcoming sin, overcoming the devil, overcoming the world.
We know the scriptures clearly teach that the
church is to be a vessel in this
world that is demonstrating a life of overcoming
these things.
We know that that is why Jesus Christ
came, the Bible says.
Christ Jesus came for this purpose was the
Son of God made manifest that He might
destroy.
That word destroy means to undo, to undo
the works of the devil.
But we make our fatal mistake when we
hear the words of God, such as what
we're just looking at now, and we fail
to connect them to the Lord Himself, the
Lord Jesus Christ Himself, His finished work, who
He is in glory, and what He wants
to be to us and in us through
the indwelling power of the Spirit of God.
Unfortunately, when we hear the Word of God,
rather than looking to the Lord Jesus Christ
as the source from which we are able
to come into obedience to the Word of
God, oftentimes we read the Word of God
and it generates a bondage in us, an
effort, a striving, a struggling to try and
line up in our own strength to what
God is expecting us to become.
And that ends in a lot of misery,
a lot of failure, it ends in a
lot of condemnation, it ends in a lot
of depression, and all different kinds of things.
Contrary-wise, God wants us to recognize that
Christ Jesus, the Lord of glory, and His
finished work, and the good of that finished
work being applied in our life by faith,
is the source, the means through which we
are able to come into an ever-increasing,
overcoming life.
So basically, what the Lord is after is
a complete change in the way we perceive
and think about these things.
The normal way is man-centered, man-centered.
God wants me to do this and therefore
I have to somehow muster up the resources
in my strength and in my power and
do them.
We have to get away from that mentality
and we have to become Christ-centered, God
-centered.
We see what God is after, we see
the Lord speaks of overcomers in the book
of Revelation, we recognize the flesh, the world,
the devil, sin, all the voluptuous powers that
are enticing us, we recognize our own weaknesses,
and rather than immediately try and generate strength
within ourselves to try and overcome these things,
we have to pray, God help me to
focus my eyes on Jesus Christ, the one,
the only one who is able to enable
me to live the kind of life that
you want me to live.
It's focused in the Lord Jesus Christ.
So we get out from the man-centered
mentality to the Christ-centered mentality where Jesus
Christ becomes my life.
Jesus Christ becomes the source.
Jesus Christ becomes the one.
Now that brings us into a state that
the Lord so longs for us to be
in.
Now it's against our nature, it's against our
very constitution, and you know what that state
is beloved?
The book of Luke speaks of it.
Chapter number six, verse number 20.
And he lifted up his eyes on his
disciples and said, blessed be ye poor for
yours is the kingdom of God.
Blessed are ye that hunger now for you
shall be filled.
Blessed are ye that weep now for you
shall laugh.
Turning from being man-centered, looking within our
own self, trusting in the resources that we
think we have in order to please God,
and in order to do what God commands
us to do, turning from that to a
Christ-centered, God-centered attitude necessitates heart surgery.
Now this heart surgery that the Lord is
after is not physical heart surgery that's done
at a hospital, but it's a spiritual heart
surgery in which the Holy Spirit of God
penetrates very deeply to the very depths of
our being and gives us a life-changing
revelation.
And that life-changing revelation is simply this,
that you can do nothing apart from the
enabling and energizing strength of the Lord Jesus
Christ.
Blessed are ye that are poor for yours
is the kingdom of God.
In order for us to come out of
man-centered mentality into Christ, God-centered mentality,
where our focus is on him, the Lord
must work within us a realization of our
spiritual poverty and bankruptcy.
He must work in us the mindset that
we are utterly and entirely dependent upon him
for everything that pertains to our spiritual advancement,
even unto the day when he is ready
to come and catch us away and transform
those who are looking for him, and those
who are loving his appearing as Hebrews and
Timothy indicates he's coming for.
There is a great need right now within
the church of the Lord Jesus Christ, a
great need for a reaffirmation, a reacquaintance of
our utter dependence upon the Lord Jesus Christ.
It is the life that is lived in
utter dependence upon God that is a life
that is able to come into all that
God intends it to come into.
Now, the life of dependence is the exact
opposite of the life of independence.
Now, independence is what we are by nature,
according to the flesh.
We are independent.
We prefer to pull ourselves up by our
own bootstraps.
We have a tenacity toward, a propensity toward,
an inclination toward my way, my desires, my
likes.
We present them and we bring them into
our marriages that causes contention, it causes division,
it causes arguing and bickering.
It's that almighty I.
It's that, it's that, it's that by nature,
it's that inclination to want to be independent.
We want to do it ourself.
Now, it would be nice, and I'm sure
everyone would agree here, that upon coming to
know the Lord Jesus Christ, becoming born again,
born from above, that that tendency was totally
eradicated.
That we would awake under salvation and we
would be, we would come into a place
where we were just utterly dependent upon the
Lord at all times, and just as a
child, just trusting Him, that would be nice.
But we know that that's not what happens.
We know that that's not what happens.
We know and experience that that's not what
happens.
And we also know the Word of God
teaches us that our growth is a process.
So, blessed are the poor in spirit, for
yours is the kingdom of God.
Beloved, this whole issue of being an overcomer,
the call of the Spirit of God in
the book of Revelation, He that overcometh, that
whole issue is wrapped up and connected to
coming to the place where we are aware
of our spiritual bankruptcy, our spiritual poverty.
It is essential that this work of grace
be wrought in us, because it is only
a life of dependence upon the finished work
of the Lord Jesus Christ and the continuous
work of the Word of God and the
power of the Holy Spirit in us, that
enables us to move on into spiritual maturity
that the Lord is after.
Now, I want you to turn your Bibles,
if you would please, to Luke.
You're in Luke chapter 18.
And as you're turning there, I just want
to read here in verse number 21 of
Luke 6.
Blessed are you that hunger now, for you
shall be filled.
Blessed are you that weep, for you shall
laugh.
When the Scriptures here speak of blessed are
you that hunger and blessed are you that
weep, this indicates that which follows, that which
follows in the life of someone who recognizes
their spiritual bankruptcy.
When you realize that you are spiritually bankrupt,
when you realize that you do not have
the resources within yourself to live the Christian
life, that produces two things.
You begin to hunger and thirst.
You realize that you are, in fact, a
beggar with no bread.
You are a beggar with no bread, and
you realize that the Lord Jesus Christ is
the bread of life.
He is the bread of life.
Beloved, I cannot emphasize enough the need for
these things to become realities within our life.
This is where we stand or fall.
This is where we find ourselves either going
on with the Lord or wandering around in
a spiritual wilderness, not making any progress toward
the Lord's purpose, towards the Lord's full purpose.
This is where we swim or we sink.
We stand or we fall along this line
right here.
So the initial revelation must be the poor,
spiritually bankrupt, which follows a hungering.
So many people want to hunger after the
Lord, or should I rather say, so many
people are aware of the absence of hunger
in their life for the Lord.
And oftentimes it bothers them, and they sometimes
even feel condemned, and they feel troubled, and
they become very distressed over it because they
recognize, my, I just don't have a hunger
for the Lord.
Well, it's very possible that the absence of
hunger in our life for the Lord is
directly related to our inability to see our
spiritual poverty.
You see, we're trying to get the cart
before the horse.
You cannot genuinely have a hunger for God.
I mean, that's really born of the Spirit
of God.
That's really something deeper than just an emotional
whim, like, boy, I'm really hyped up after
hearing today's sermon.
Boy, I tell you, I'm hungry for God.
And then a few days later, that's like
a firecracker.
It fizzles out and smokes, and it's gone.
God wants a hunger that goes deeper than
an emotional thing.
God wants a hunger that is deep within
our spirits, that's before the Lord continuously.
Well, the only way to get this kind
of hunger, beloved, is to come to where
the Lord is able to show us by
a definite dealing of His Spirit, by a
definite quickening of the Word of God, show
us our spiritual bankruptcy apart from Christ, show
us that we have nothing.
There is no good thing that dwells within
my flesh, Paul says, Romans chapter 7.
We must see that we are branches.
A branch of itself can bear no fruit.
Do you see your Christian life?
Do you see your relationship with God?
Do you see the totality of your spiritual
life as that of a branch, utterly, utterly,
entirely dependent upon its union with the Divine?
Oh, my beloved, this is where spiritual progress
is made.
This is where the overcomer comes into view.
It is not me becoming something, no.
When one comes to the realization of their
utter spiritual bankruptcy before God, that's when Christ
comes into view.
That's when Christ can take the place of
all and all in my life.
See?
Oh, what a joy, what a joy to
be emancipated from the striving and struggling of
trying to offer to God something of ourself,
something of our own wisdom, something of our
own religious works.
God doesn't want our religious works.
God is satisfied with Christ's work, and it's
only as that which is springing out of
our life, which is the result of Christ's
work, it's only then that God finds pleasure
in it.
Oh, how wonderful.
Christianity is wrapped up in a person, the
Lord Jesus Christ.
Our Christianity has become everything but Him, and
how the Lord longs for it.
Now, I'm still going to go to Luke
18, so hold your finger there, but now
the antithesis, the opposite of this blessed state.
Jesus uses the word blessed to describe those
who see their spiritual poverty.
He uses the word blessed to describe those
who see this, and as a result, begin
to hunger.
The Bible says, they shall be filled.
Then it says, blessed are ye that weep
now, for you shall laugh.
Laugh, praise God.
So there is a spiritual poverty revelation that
results in a hungering and results in weeping.
All of that, Jesus called, is a blessed
state.
You know, beloved, so many Christians, and I'm
not saying that this is wrong, but it's
very, very limited in its application.
So many Christians equate being blessed with having
a home, having food, having shelter.
I could never, ever, ever say that that
was wrong.
That's true.
You're blessed.
We're blessed.
But how often we limit the state of
being blessed to that which relates to the
physical world, when Jesus pronounced blessed, blessed, blessed
so many more times on that which pertained
to a spiritual inward reality.
And so often, we limit being blessed to
a physical state, but Jesus here is not
talking about a physical state.
He's talking about an inward reality.
So I want to ask you a question
tonight.
You're blessed based on a natural understanding.
You have clothes.
Most of us have places to live.
We have shelter.
We have heat.
But I want to ask you a question.
Are you blessed tonight based on Luke 6
21?
Are you blessed?
Now the antithesis, Jesus uses the word blessed
to describe these states of the heart, but
he uses another word to describe the opposite,
and that is woe.
So Jesus is saying one kind of heart
is a blessed heart.
Another kind of heart is described as woe.
Now in verse number 24 of the same
chapter, 6 of Luke, woe unto you that
are rich, for you have received your consolation.
So if Jesus is talking about spiritual poverty
in verse number 21, then when he says
woe unto you that are rich, he is
not referring to monetary richness.
He's not referring to money, but he's referring
to a state of the heart in which
one does not consider themselves to be in
need of God.
They're rich.
In Revelation chapter 3, Jesus describes a church.
Revelation chapter 3 verse number 17.
The church in Laodicea had fallen under the
indictment of Jesus' words in Luke 6 25.
What a dreadful state to be in.
May the Lord guard our hearts.
Revelation chapter 3 verse number 17.
Beginning in verse number 15, actually, I know
thy works that thou art neither cold nor
hot.
I will spoo thee out of my mouth.
This is what Jesus is saying to the
Laodiceans.
Because thou sayest, watch this, I am rich.
Now what did Jesus say in Luke 6
24?
But woe unto you that are rich, for
you have received your consolation.
Now here's a church.
It says unto the angel of the church,
those who were professing the name of Christ,
those who the Holy Spirit addressed as the
church.
And yet Jesus says, because thou sayest, I
am rich.
Now notice how these statements here describe the
exact opposite of that blessed state of Luke
6 21, where we are hungering, where we
are mourning, where we are poor.
Notice these statements that are strong indictments against
these believers here in Laodicea.
Because thou sayest, I am rich and increased
with goods, listen to this, and have need
of nothing.
And knowest not that thou art wretched and
miserable and poor.
There it is.
Jesus is saying, you don't realize that you're
poor, but you're not blessed because you can't
see it.
You're not blessed because you can't see your
true state.
Oh, to see our true state is such
a blessed place to be in.
This is the secret to living a life
that is pleasing to God.
The secret.
Thou art wretched, miserable, poor, blind, and naked.
And then Jesus's words, I counsel thee to
buy of me gold, tried in the fire,
that thou mayest be rich.
They said they were rich, but Jesus said,
no, you won't be rich unless you purchase
of me gold, tried in the fire.
And white raiment, that thou mayest be clothed,
and that the shame of thy nakedness does
not appear.
And anoint thy eyes with eye salve that
thou mayest see.
So you see, the opposite, the antithesis of
this state is in verse number 24.
Woe unto you that are rich, for you
have received your consolation.
Listen to this.
Woe unto you that are full, for you
shall hunger.
Oh, beloved, how dreadful it is to be
full.
Again, this is a state on the inside.
It is the exact opposite of dependence.
Our feeling, our overwhelming feeling of our need
for God is the exact opposite of dependence.
To be full, to be full is to
live a life of independence.
To be full is to live a life
of self-sufficiency rather than Christ-sufficiency.
To be full is to live a life
governed by my will rather than a life
governed by not my will, but thy will
be done.
To be full is to draw from our
own resources and to reach within the depths
of our own tenacities and our own ability
rather than to humbly depend upon the enabling
and working of God's mighty Holy Spirit, the
Word of God, and the sufficiency that comes
from the Lord Jesus Christ.
So the Lord is after something here.
Remember earlier we said the Lord has to
do some heart surgery?
This is the heart surgery that God has
to do.
Aren't you glad that Jesus is still a
physician?
You know, today when someone has a heart
problem, they seek out a good physician who
they feel confident is able to operate on
their heart and unplug those arteries and get
them going again.
Well, aren't you glad when we realize how
needful we are, how in need we are
of a heavenly physician?
We can turn to the great physician Jehovah
Rapha.
He calls himself in the Old Testament, I
am the Lord that heals you.
Praise God.
He is the Lord that heals us.
When God presents to us something in His
Word that exposes our lack, like He's doing
now, isn't He?
His Word is quick and powerful and sharper
than any two-edged sword and makes us
to see our lack, doesn't it?
Doesn't the Word of God shine and we
suddenly get glimpses of our life and how
in many areas it is so independent and
so controlled by self-will and doesn't see
its need to draw from Christ.
But aren't you glad when the Lord, through
His Word, shines light in that capacity?
He doesn't do it to intend to make
us feel condemned or to belittle us or
to make us feel like, now look at
the state you're in now, you better get
yourself out of that state.
No, He never does that.
The great heavenly physician says, look to me
and live.
What did Moses say to the children of
Israel when they were bitten by the vipers?
He hung up a serpent, a brazen serpent,
which represents Christ taking sin.
The serpent was sin.
The serpent was the cross.
Christ became a curse.
Moses said, look to the serpent and you'll
be healed.
God says, look to me and live.
God is saying to us, if you see
tonight your need to see how needful you
are of me, look to me and I'll
show you.
Cry out to me and I'll show you.
And that's what the Lord is after tonight.
He is a heavenly heart surgeon.
A heavenly heart surgeon.
And He's able to do it in us.
Luke chapter 18.
Now, Luke chapter 18 is in an interesting
setting.
Luke chapter 18 follows the discourse of Luke
17 verses 20 to 37, which refer to
the kingdom of God during this age not
being something you can observe outwardly, not something
that is being set up outwardly.
That is, in a particular city, here's the
capital of the kingdom of God, like Zion
City, Illinois, and we're all going to go
there.
There's no Christian meccas.
There's no Christian meccas down here.
So Jesus is teaching that the kingdom of
God during this age does not come with
observation.
Verse number 20.
Then in verses 24 to 37, Jesus goes
into the setting that will be present when
the Lord Jesus comes again.
Then interestingly, and this is very important because
you don't, 17 and 18 is not broken
up.
The Holy Spirit's got one thought here, but
the chapter is misleading.
It's like you read verse 37 in chapter
17 and then you stop.
And then chapter 18 comes and you think
it's a whole new thought.
It's not.
It's the same thought.
What the Holy Spirit is saying here is
verses 24 to 37 talk all about the
end times and how they ate and drank
and married wives.
They were given in marriage until the day
that Noah entered into the ark and the
flood came and destroyed them all.
Likewise, also as in the days of Lot,
they did eat, they drank, they bought, they
sold, they planted, they built.
Verses 27 and 28, Jesus is saying, as
in those days, so shall it be.
Right before the Son of Man comes.
It's going to be just like that.
And then He talks about, remember Lot's wife.
Don't look back.
Keep your eyes focused on the Lord Jesus
Christ.
And He talks a little bit about losing
our life that we might preserve it.
And then same thought, Holy Spirit's still moving
here.
And then chapter 18 comes, and He spoke
a parable unto them to this end, that
men ought to always to pray and not
to think.
So I'm telling you, beloved, the Holy Spirit
is saying here that one of the feature
qualities, one of the most important qualities, that
the Lord Jesus is looking for right now
in the lives of those that profess His
name, particularly now that the end of this
age is coming to an end.
And this is just what Luke 18 is
all about.
Right in this discourse of the end times,
Jesus inserts this parable to show us something
of what His Father and He is looking
for.
What's it about?
That men ought to always pray and not
to think.
One of the feature qualities the Lord is
looking for in the church, particularly as the
time of this age is drawing to a
close, and the coming of the Son of
Man draws nigh, is a people in whom
the spirit of prayer is operated.
But let me tell you something, beloved.
The spirit of genuine prayer is directly related
to and connected to our continuous ability to
see our utter dependence upon the Lord.
True prayer is born out of a realization,
without me, He can do nothing.
We have no need to pray when we
feel confident that we can handle the situation
ourself.
Why should we pray about it?
We can do it.
So, the very presence of Luke 18 in
this little parable, verses 1 through 8, indicates
that God is looking for the blessed people
of Luke 6 in the end times who
will be there waiting for His appearing.
The Lord is looking for the blessed people
of Luke 8.
Also, Matthew chapter 5, the Beatitudes, same thought
there.
He's looking for that blessed people.
Now, listen, beloved.
Let's not put the cart before the horse.
A lot of believers are trying to work
up a prayer life, but you can't do
it.
You can't do it.
We've tried it and we have failed over
and over again.
We make our commitments to the Lord.
We make our promises to the Lord.
Listen, God doesn't want us to pray in
that way.
You can't have a prayer life that's really
effective to the Lord until you first recognize
your need for a prayer life, and you
don't recognize your need for a prayer life
until you go back to stage one, and
that is blessed are the poor.
Blessed are those who are spiritually bankrupt.
Now, let's read this and let's glean some
thoughts here that I believe will be encouraging
to us.
Jesus taught a parable that men are always
to pray and not to think, saying, there
was in a city a judge which feared
not God, neither regarded man.
And there was a widow in that city,
and she came unto him saying, avenge me
of my adversary.
Avenge me of my adversary.
I want you to first notice what this
widow woman is crying out.
Avenge me of my adversary.
Deliver me from this enemy.
There is a cry within this woman's heart.
She wants freedom from an enemy.
She wants deliverance.
She wants vindication from this adversary.
That's very important.
That indicates the kind of attitude that God
is looking for in our hearts.
Now, let's go on here.
And he would not for a while, but
after he said within himself, though I fear
not God, nor regard man, yet because this
widow troubles me, I will avenge her, lest
by her continual coming she weary me.
And the Lord said, hear what the unjust
judge saith.
All right, let's do just what Jesus said.
Let's hear what the unjust judge says.
Verse four, he would not for a while,
but afterward he says, though I do not
fear God, nor regard man.
So in other words, the judge is saying,
listen, I don't fear God, nor do I
care about what people are thinking or saying.
I just don't care about either God or
man.
Yet because this widow troubles me, I will
avenge her, lest her continual coming to me,
she weary me.
All right, hear what the unjust judge says.
Here's what he says.
I don't fear God or man, but because
there are two outstanding qualities in this widow
woman, I'm going to do what she says.
What are those two outstanding qualities?
That's it.
The widow troubles me, number one, and number
two, continual coming, she weary me.
All right, Jesus said, hear what the unjust
judge says.
There's qualities in this widow woman that is
the basis upon which I'm going to give
her what she's asking.
Now watch what he says.
Verse seven, and shall not God avenge his
own elect, which cry day and night unto
him, though he bear long with them?
I tell you that he will avenge them
speedily.
Nevertheless, when the son of man cometh, shall
he find faith on the earth?
Now see that last statement connects this whole
parable to what he was speaking of in
verse number 17, because in verse 17 or
in chapter 17, verses 20 to 37, he
was talking about the son of man coming
again.
So that last statement proves that this little
parable was inserted by the Holy Spirit in
order to show us something of what the
Lord is desperately looking for in the midst
of an end-time world, an end-time
age that is going about their business, marrying,
given in marriage, eating, drinking, selling, buying, planting,
building, all the cares of this life and
the desire for things, all of these things,
because they see their spiritual bankruptcy, because they
see their spiritual poverty, because they are engaging
in genuine mourning, mourning because they realize that
apart from me they can do nothing, mourning
because they realize they're seeing that according to
their own nature they're at enmity to me,
they're weeping, they're searching for me, because of
this, they are coming into a prayer, a
prayer life, more than a prayer life, a
prayer attitude that is indicative of a day
and night continuous crying out before the Lord
as this widow woman, and God is saying
that what they're doing is they're crying out,
avenge me of my adversary, deliver me from
my enemy.
Now this widow woman was crying that out,
but I believe that's significant, I believe what
that indicates in this very clear teaching throughout
the whole New Testament, that the heart cry
of the church is Lord make me like
you and therefore deliver me from my adversary,
that is deliver me from everything and anything
that is not like you, avenge me of
my adversary Lord, bring justice Lord, bring more
of yourself into my life Lord, let me
be governed more and more and more by
you.
Now beloved, this is what constitutes the heart
of a bride, this is what constitutes the
bride, this is what the Lord is looking
for.
Oh beloved, the heavenly bridegroom delights when he
sees these qualities in us.
Do you think the Lord wants to come
back for a divided, earthly, worldly bride?
No, no, no.
God's thought is that amidst this end time
scene where the things that were going on
in the days of Noah and the things
that were going on in the days of
Lot are happening, amidst all this, God has
a people, God has a chosen people, who
are what?
Crying out day and night, Lord avenge me
of my adversary, Lord make me like you,
Lord bring judgment on anything in my life,
the judgment of the cross on anything in
my life that's not like you.
Beloved, only the Holy Spirit of God can
cause these qualities and these features to become
real in our life and God offers us
the invitation to come to Him, God offers
us the invitation to come to Him and
say Lord, I want to know this blessed
state, I want to know it more fully
Lord, I've known it in part, but this
widow woman Lord, she's not just praying and
then gets tired and stops praying, no.
One of the qualities of this widow woman
is that she continuously came to the unjust
judge.
This is not the firecracker syndrome where we
make a commitment to the Lord because of
an emotional excitement and then that fizzles, no.
This is a deep work of the Holy
Spirit of God making known to us only
what God could make known to us.
Isn't it exciting to think that the Lord
is going to have a people like this
who omits the apostasy within Christendom that is
occurring now, a great falling away from the
faith, a great departure from the Lord Jesus
Christ, the finality of His work, the centrality
of His person, there's a great falling away,
people are professing Him in word but denying
Him in deed, lives are being governed and
controlled by greed and covetousness and the love
of money and the cares of this life
and as a result the word is being
choked, Jesus said, the cares of this life
choke the word from bringing forth the full
fruit.
Isn't it encouraging to know that the word
of God clearly tells us that amidst this
God is going to have a people who
are going to be crying out day and
night, they're going to be gripped by their
own spiritual bankruptcy but at the same time
they're going to see the wealth that's in
Christ, they're going to see the treasure that's
in Christ, they're going to see the altogether
loveliness of the man in glory and their
hearts are going to be sold on God,
they're going to go after God with everything,
they're going to be willing because of God's
work in them to lay everything down, yay,
their very life to be after the Lord.
God will have a people like this who
will begin to demonstrate in a significant measure
the heavenly qualities of the Lord Jesus Christ.
After all, isn't that what the purpose of
the church is?
What is the church?
The body of Christ.
If the church is the body of Christ,
then who is it that lives in the
church?
Christ.
And if Christ lives in the church, then
who is it that we ought to be
seeing in one another and who is it
that the world ought to be seeing when
they look at the church?
Christ.
They ought to be seeing all of the
heavenly qualities in an ever-increasing measure, all
the qualities that characterize the head, His holiness,
His love, His compassion, His hatred toward sin
and His love toward God.
Blessed are those who come to fulfill
the story of the widow woman and learn
the blessed lesson of utter dependence upon God,
who allow the Lord to deal with them
by the Word of God and the Holy
Spirit, to deal with them in such a
way where they begin to see those areas
where independence is yet governing their lifestyle.
Where is it that we want to do
things our own way?
Where is it?
And what do we do?
We cry out, God, I want You to
conquer this area of my life.
I wholly look to You, Lord, but I
want to make a decision.
I choose Your way and I renounce my
own way.
I choose Your way and I say no
to my way.
We've got to do that.
And as we take a step with the
Lord and stand with Him together with the
Holy Spirit in agreement with the Word of
God, the Holy Spirit will then do the
work that we can't do.
May the Lord help us tonight to see
our need for Jesus as branches.
John chapter 15, as the branch cannot bear
fruit of itself, neither can you, Jesus said,
except you abide in me.
There's a perfect illustration of the Christian life
of branches, utterly dependent upon our Lord.
If we ask the Lord tonight, I believe
He'll be faithful to lay this foundation in
our life.
Beloved, most assuredly, our progress along the path
of spiritual maturity into spiritual adulthood, where we
have the mind that Paul had in Philippians
3, which is counting all things but loss
and done, everything, and focusing all of our
heart's desires on Christ and Christ alone.
That's, Paul said, that's the mature mindset.
In order to come to that place where
our life is governed by that one chief
thing, Christ.
Let's turn there as we close tonight.
Philippians chapter 3, this is a most marvelous
testimony of a man in whom the Lord's
dealings were very thorough, very deep, very rich.
The Holy Spirit blessed us to communicate them
on to us.
Philippians chapter 3, verses 1 through 6, Paul
speaks about all those things, particularly verse 4
and 5 and 6, that related to his
own accomplishments, his own success.
Though I might have confidence in the flesh,
verse 4, if any other man thinketh that
he hath wherewith he might trust in the
flesh, I more.
Verse 5, verse 6, was all of his
Jewish heritage and all of the accomplishments that
he did apart from Christ.
All the things that he could boast in,
all the things that he could take pride
in, all the things that he could be
proud of, all the things that he could
use to exalt himself above another person.
But verse number 7, this, brothers and sisters,
has to become a reality to us.
But the things which were gain to me,
those I counted loss for Christ.
That's spiritual adulthood.
That's spiritual maturity.
Being able to say and really, truly have
the reality of this profession in our heart.
What things were gained to me, I count
loss for Christ.
What Paul is saying in verse 7 is,
I've lost my life.
He that seeks to save his life shall
lose it, but he that loses his life.
Paul saying in verse 7, I've lost my
life that I might gain Christ.
Verse 8, verse 7 refers to his religious
accomplishments.
He says, what things were gained to me,
those I count loss for Christ.
Verse 8 is even more inclusive.
Verse 8 becomes all-inclusive.
Verse 7 was just his religious life.
Now verse 8 is comprehensive.
Yea, doubtless, I count all.
That word all.
Oh, may the Holy Spirit make that real
to us.
Do you know what that entails, beloved?
All.
That's inclusive.
That entails everything.
Paul's not playing church here.
Paul's not playing games here.
Yea, doubtless, I count all things loss for
the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus
my Lord, for whom I have suffered the
loss of all things and do count them
but dung.
So not only does he, not only does
he count all things loss, but he considers
those things to be dung, refuge, garbage, trash,
in comparison to knowing the Lord Jesus Christ
and coming into a life where Christ's life,
Christ's will, Christ's very character is being demonstrated.
That should mean more to us than anything.
Doesn't mean we become monks in monasteries.
It means we live our life among the
world, in the world, but we're not of
the world.
We use the world's goods but don't abuse
them.
We may have possessions but possessions don't have
us.
Nothing has got us but a passion for
Jesus Christ.
Now, that's quite a confession there.
That's a confession born out of spiritual maturity.
Here's the question tonight as we close.
Do you want the Lord to make good
in you this kind of profession so that
you can say these things like Paul and
truly, truly, truly mean it from your heart
and know that it is true?
Know that when you say I count all
things loss, I count them but dung, that's
really true.
Do you want that to be true in
your life?
If you do, may I say beloved, that
the only way these things will be true
is if we go back to the fundamental
basics.
Blessed are the poor.
Blessed are they that mourn.
Blessed are they that hunger.
All of those states of being blessed indicates
a heart that is utterly dependent upon God,
recognizes its need for God, recognizes that apart
from Christ it can do nothing and is
in a constant posture of reaching out to
Christ to draw by faith the sufficiency that
comes from Christ and pouring contempt upon and
disowning self-sufficiency and all that that entails.
The only way to come to the realization
of Philippians 3 is for that heart condition
to be raw in us, but not just
raw in us as a past experience, but
maintained and fanned into flame by an ever
-present relationship and walk with the Lord and
a constant dealing with the Holy Spirit through
the Word of God.
That's the way to spiritual maturity and spiritual
adulthood in Christ Jesus.
So when our aspirations are set on spiritual
maturity, we didn't even get into the overcomer
tonight, the life of Joseph.
That's all right though.
I feel like the Lord wanted to lay
a foundation and the foundation has been laid
in the scriptures and we just talked about
it now.
But when our hearts aspire toward spiritual maturity
and we consider the call of being an
overcomer and we say, Lord, I know positionally
I'm an overcomer.
That's not the question.
Judicially, I know.
I know that God sees Christ now.
He doesn't see me.
I've settled.
We're not talking about a judicial thing.
We're talking about the Lord wanting to make
good in us experientially all of those realities
that are already settled in God's heart because
of Christ's finished work.
That's what we're talking about tonight.
We're not talking about, you know, the fact
of our position.
That's settled.
But God wants to see it in experience
in us.
And when we have our hearts set on
that, there's no coming to it unless we
are possessing and maintaining by God's grace a
heart of dependence upon Christ.
So let's bow our hearts tonight before the
Lord and just express our desire to Him.
Father, we sense our overwhelming need tonight, Lord,
for Thee.
We thank Thee, Lord, for the Lord Jesus
Christ.
We thank Thee, Lord, that You are fully
satisfied with Christ.
You're satisfied with His atoning work.
You accepted His sacrifice.
Raised from the dead was Your approval of
Your Son.
Seated down at the right hand of Your
Majesty, Lord.
And Lord, we pray that tonight, You will
enable us to focus our heart's eyes upon
Jesus Christ and see that everything in our
Christian life is wrapped up in Him and
a continuing coming to know Him in ever
-increasing measure.
Holy Spirit, I pray tonight that You will
challenge each one of us over this issue
of dependence or independence, sufficiency in Christ or
sufficiency in ourself.
Lord, help us to see that this is
the fundamental foundation upon which we must stand
if we're hoping that spiritual maturity will be
arrived to, Lord.
We know the believers in Hebrews, according to
the very Holy Spirit record, should have been,
teachers, should have been spiritually advanced, but weren't.
They weren't.
They had gotten their eyes off of Christ
and the finality of His work.
Lord, keep us from getting our eyes off
of Christ.
Keep our eyes off ourself, Lord.
Help us not to look to others, Lord.
Help us to look to You.
We commit this work of the Holy Spirit
into Your hands, Lord, and pray You'll give
us humble hearts, dependent hearts.
Free us, Lord, from the cares of this
life that have ensnared us.
Free us, Lord, from those things that are
numbing our hearts from passion for You.
We're a needy people, Lord, and we look
to You, Lord Jesus, and we pray in
Christ's name.