The Blessed Life - Session 9

WEBVTT
00:00:04.886 --> 00:00:11.054
First off, really thank you for giving me the opportunity to teach you guys and speak.
00:00:11.054 --> 00:00:17.852
It's a pleasure you don't often get to teach to the body of Christ.
00:00:17.852 --> 00:00:26.042
I mean, that's a privilege God gives to elders, to men of God, and I really appreciate it to elders, to men of God, and I really appreciate it.
00:00:26.042 --> 00:00:40.564
Tonight we're looking at the very last beatitude in the Sermon on the Mount, but there's some main things I want to cover before we start on that.
00:00:40.564 --> 00:00:46.511
Matthew 5.10 says Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness' sake, for theirs is the kingdom of God.
00:00:46.511 --> 00:00:49.933
It's present tense, theirs is.
00:00:49.933 --> 00:00:57.526
It doesn't say maybe it says is, and that's important to really think about.
00:00:57.526 --> 00:00:58.768
There's so much in that.
00:00:58.768 --> 00:01:10.216
But the main thing on the Sermon on the Mount Jesus is talking about, he does several things.
00:01:10.216 --> 00:01:18.787
He is introducing a new covenant and he's introducing something here to the people that's really hard to grasp.
00:01:18.787 --> 00:01:31.593
Number one I got this out of the book that Mark Medley wrote called Trinity Trilogy, and Jesus calls God Father 17 times in the Sermon on the Mount.
00:01:31.593 --> 00:01:44.180
Calls him Father, and he's talking to Jews and he's saying Abba, father.
00:01:44.180 --> 00:01:51.063
And can you imagine how strange that might be to all those people to hear him call god abba.
00:01:51.063 --> 00:02:04.371
Father, you know, even today we all are focused on following rules and obeying the law, and I know that personally because I've broke the law in the past and I've paid the price.
00:02:04.371 --> 00:02:13.116
And Jesus is promising those who are persecuted will see the kingdom of God.
00:02:13.116 --> 00:02:34.372
He's given them a key to heaven and each blessing that he says in the Sermon on the Mount is a key to heaven that he's releasing as a seed, a mustard seed that's planted for when the holy spirit is released, that seed is going to birth and and be a key into the kingdom of heaven.
00:02:34.372 --> 00:02:41.193
And that's that's what I've been learning about the love of god through this sermon on the mount.
00:02:41.193 --> 00:02:42.562
It's amazing stuff.
00:02:42.562 --> 00:02:44.525
You've heard that.
00:02:44.525 --> 00:02:49.754
You've heard all your life, that you should become a better rule follower.
00:02:49.754 --> 00:02:53.931
But I ask you, what is the state of your heart?
00:02:53.931 --> 00:02:57.489
And that's what Jesus was asking.
00:02:57.489 --> 00:02:59.907
What is the state of your heart?
00:02:59.907 --> 00:03:03.468
And that is a major thing.
00:03:03.468 --> 00:03:06.868
He was asking then and he's still asking today.
00:03:06.868 --> 00:03:10.889
And still a lot of us don't really get that point.
00:03:10.889 --> 00:03:17.774
We still are stuck in the religious thought of being a Christian.
00:03:17.774 --> 00:03:32.526
We're stuck in obeying the rules, we're stuck in doing what's right, but our heart is far from God and I learned that the hard way, through my testimony but through persecution.
00:03:33.647 --> 00:03:36.252
I remember when I first got saved.
00:03:36.252 --> 00:03:46.153
I got saved on Tony Evans's front porch when I was 17 years old and Trinity was on Dedrick.
00:03:46.153 --> 00:03:55.408
Back then Mark was the praise and worship leader and I started going to house church with my brother Tim.
00:03:55.408 --> 00:04:19.646
He had a house church and I remember the college group started going out and we would go to Cumberland Avenue on the weekends Friday and Saturday night and we would witness to people on Cumberland Avenue that were hopping all the bars drinking drunks, and I was always a person that was a brawler.
00:04:19.646 --> 00:04:24.271
I liked to fight, I like to get you know, do things like that.
00:04:25.793 --> 00:04:43.076
But once I got saved and become a Christian, I was going with the college group out on Cumberland Avenue to witness and I witnessed to a guy that was.
00:04:43.076 --> 00:04:55.327
He was drunk and all of a sudden this guy just hit me in the chest hard as he could and normally my reaction would have been to start fighting, but it wasn't.
00:04:55.327 --> 00:05:13.788
I was speechless and I just stood there and everybody else just was like in awe and I was like, wow, he hit me for sharing jesus and and the revelation hit me.
00:05:13.788 --> 00:05:21.425
That's, that's why he hit me, just for being kind to him, and that's persecution.
00:05:21.425 --> 00:05:23.528
That's what persecution?
00:05:24.690 --> 00:05:27.115
And there's different forms of persecution.
00:05:27.115 --> 00:05:27.841
You know now.
00:05:27.841 --> 00:05:32.353
The Bible says that we will experience trials and tribulations.
00:05:32.353 --> 00:05:37.752
Every Christian will experience that in your life of sanctification.
00:05:37.752 --> 00:05:40.088
But that's not persecution.
00:05:41.779 --> 00:05:55.934
Persecution is when you are being treated ill for being righteous, because people see the presence of Jesus in your life.
00:05:55.934 --> 00:06:05.870
You won't be persecuted if you don't have the fragrance of Jesus on your life, and that's what the Beatitudes is saying.
00:06:05.870 --> 00:06:19.192
You have to have the fragrance of Jesus, showing the righteousness of Jesus, not your own righteousness, it's not our own, but it's the righteousness of Jesus Christ himself.
00:06:19.192 --> 00:06:32.968
And, like we've been hearing in all the other messages from Eben and Josh and all the other guys, and even Tyler on Sundays, it's about your identity.
00:06:32.968 --> 00:06:38.607
It's about who you are in Christ, and that's what Jesus was teaching.
00:06:38.607 --> 00:06:41.404
He was teaching you know.
00:06:41.404 --> 00:06:43.391
This is an identity.
00:06:43.391 --> 00:06:47.307
You can be an adopted child of God.
00:06:47.307 --> 00:06:50.221
You don't have to be a rule follower.
00:06:50.221 --> 00:06:52.586
You don't have to obey the law.
00:06:52.586 --> 00:07:00.728
You do have to obey the laws, but you do it with the desire of your heart, because Jesus has become in you.
00:07:00.728 --> 00:07:02.913
He's in you, he's living in you, he's living in you.
00:07:02.913 --> 00:07:04.435
You become a child of God.
00:07:04.435 --> 00:07:10.007
The presence of Jesus Christ is in you and that's why you would be persecuted.
00:07:10.988 --> 00:07:16.084
And now here recently, we've experienced some in the prison ministry.
00:07:16.084 --> 00:07:20.870
It's not violent persecution, it's not.
00:07:20.870 --> 00:07:24.795
It's not, you know, hateful persecution.
00:07:24.795 --> 00:07:35.759
But there are some people in the administration that don't like the fact that Jesus is being shared in the prison.
00:07:35.759 --> 00:07:42.305
And what we've been sharing in the prison is the same thing we've been sharing here at Trinity your identity.
00:07:42.305 --> 00:07:48.663
It's up to you to show the fragrance of Christ in your life to all the other prisoners.
00:07:48.663 --> 00:07:50.146
We can't do it.
00:07:50.146 --> 00:07:59.093
We can come up here and share gospel with you and love on you, but you have to change the prison and that's what they've been doing.
00:07:59.093 --> 00:08:04.704
And there's been an outburst of the Holy Spirit at Morgan County Prison.
00:08:04.704 --> 00:08:06.404
And there's been an outburst of the Holy Spirit at Morgan County Prison.
00:08:06.404 --> 00:08:08.607
They witnessed it this past Sunday evening.
00:08:08.607 --> 00:08:14.552
And the administration some in the administration are working against us because of that.
00:08:14.552 --> 00:08:26.637
I showed up on a Wednesday morning, like I always do, being a volunteer chaplain, and I'm told I ain't allowed in.
00:08:26.637 --> 00:08:37.325
All of a sudden, just boom, I'm not allowed in and I'm still on hold waiting for them to let me back in.
00:08:37.325 --> 00:08:39.289
Pastor Tyler's been trying to go through orientation for what?
00:08:39.289 --> 00:08:43.721
Three months more, and now they're telling him he has to go through orientation again.
00:08:43.721 --> 00:08:49.573
These are the things that we are battling while sharing the gospel in the prison.
00:08:49.573 --> 00:08:58.652
The prison administration is changing in the state of Tennessee and it's trying to stop sharing the gospel of Jesus Christ.
00:08:58.652 --> 00:09:05.339
It's trying to get it to where they have to do it themselves and there's no volunteers coming in.
00:09:05.339 --> 00:09:06.869
That's what they're trying to do to where they have to do it themselves and there's no volunteers coming in.
00:09:06.869 --> 00:09:09.986
That's what they're trying to do and that's persecution.
00:09:09.986 --> 00:09:14.147
That's what that is and we're all going to experience that.
00:09:14.528 --> 00:09:17.927
Yeah, now there's other scriptures.
00:09:17.927 --> 00:09:23.893
If you look at Matthew 5, 10, it cross-references with Luke, chapter 6.
00:09:23.893 --> 00:09:27.188
Can somebody open up to Luke chapter 6?
00:09:27.188 --> 00:09:31.163
And we're going to look at verse 22.
00:09:31.163 --> 00:09:32.942
I think it's verse 22.
00:09:32.942 --> 00:09:35.302
Yeah, 22 and 23.
00:09:36.515 --> 00:09:40.961
It's a beatitude as well, but it words it quite different.
00:09:40.961 --> 00:09:58.019
Blessed are you when people hate you and they excrete you and revile you and they spurn your name as evil on account that the Son of man rejoiced in that day.
00:09:58.019 --> 00:10:10.359
Yes, it words it a little differently there and if you notice in Luke.
00:10:10.359 --> 00:10:13.988
It doesn't have all nine of the Beatitudes in Luke.
00:10:13.988 --> 00:10:23.528
It only has four or five, and one of the main ones that its focus is on in Luke is the ninth one.
00:10:23.528 --> 00:10:31.308
Blessed are they who are persecuted for righteousness sake, for they shall see the kingdom of God.
00:10:31.308 --> 00:10:44.644
They shall see the kingdom of God and I don't.
00:10:44.663 --> 00:10:46.995
You know, a lot of us Christians today are lacking knowledge of what's going on in the world around us.
00:10:46.995 --> 00:11:00.118
I don't know, maybe a bunch of you are, probably are, familiar with Voice of the Martyrs, but I recommend that everybody please read that newsletter.
00:11:00.118 --> 00:11:09.958
I mean, there are people in our world that are being persecuted, imprisoned and violently being tortured for the gospel of Jesus Christ.
00:11:09.958 --> 00:11:15.308
We here in America aren't experiencing that, but we will.
00:11:15.308 --> 00:11:28.784
We're going to experience that and I wonder how many of us are truly ready for that to happen to us, like that day when I went out and got punched in the chest.
00:11:28.784 --> 00:11:43.455
But you know, the thing that I realized and got with that is a revelation the peace of god is upon those who are persecuted.
00:11:45.716 --> 00:11:58.331
If we look in the book of acts at the account of stephen, a deacon, and we read that account, stephen was an awesome man of God.
00:11:58.331 --> 00:12:00.317
He was more than a deacon.
00:12:00.317 --> 00:12:11.522
He was one of the first seven deacons chosen and he was stoned to death for preaching the gospel to the Pharisees and the Sadducees.
00:12:11.522 --> 00:12:14.706
He preached a harsh word.
00:12:14.706 --> 00:12:19.799
I mean it perished their hearts and and they?
00:12:19.799 --> 00:12:24.149
They gnashed their teeth and they growled at him and they stoned him.
00:12:24.149 --> 00:12:36.010
And the thing that amazes me, during this, this account, stephen looks up and sees heaven and sees Jesus.
00:12:36.010 --> 00:12:38.342
The peace of God comes upon him.
00:12:38.342 --> 00:12:45.904
He's being stoned to death and he doesn't even I don't think he even realized what was going on.
00:12:45.904 --> 00:12:52.726
Maybe he did, you know, but what I see the most of is the glory of God in the moment.
00:12:52.726 --> 00:13:00.197
The most of is the glory of God in the moment.
00:13:00.197 --> 00:13:01.100
How much God was glorified in his life.
00:13:01.120 --> 00:13:14.188
Enough to where they have a whole chapter in the book of Acts that is accounted to Stephen's life and that can be any believer that is sold out to Jesus and that's what the Beatitudes is trying to teach here.
00:13:14.188 --> 00:13:15.676
That's what Jesus is doing.
00:13:15.676 --> 00:13:23.597
He's passing out keys to the kingdom of heaven and all nine of the Beatitudes, that's what he's doing.
00:13:23.597 --> 00:13:40.826
He's planting them, mustard seeds and their keys to the kingdom of heaven, and he's relying on the Holy Spirit to give that revelation and, believe me, throughout sanctification in your life of Jesus Christ.
00:13:40.826 --> 00:13:44.625
Searching through the Word of God is full of jewels.
00:13:44.625 --> 00:13:57.440
It's like searching through a treasure and just going through the Beatitudes is like going through that treasure hunt and it's so full of so many jewels and you have to search for them.
00:13:57.440 --> 00:14:01.999
You have to be hungry, you have to be thirsty and you have to really dig for it.
00:14:01.999 --> 00:14:16.870
But once you get one of them jewels, and once you get one of them revelations, it's so amazing and it so encourages you and and gives you the strength to go forward and walk even further into your relationship with God.
00:14:16.870 --> 00:14:25.609
But the main thing is is that you learn your identity in Jesus Christ, who you are and who your father is.
00:14:25.609 --> 00:14:27.701
That is the main thing.
00:14:28.576 --> 00:14:30.783
There's another scripture that I want to look at.
00:14:30.783 --> 00:14:34.620
It's in Revelations.
00:14:34.620 --> 00:14:36.144
I believe it's.
00:14:36.144 --> 00:14:38.261
Let me find it.
00:14:38.261 --> 00:14:40.321
It's Revelations 6.
00:14:40.321 --> 00:14:49.278
Let me find it here.
00:14:49.278 --> 00:14:54.581
I'm all scrambling in my notes.
00:15:01.929 --> 00:15:07.826
Well, let's look at 2nd Corinthians, 5, 21 first, and then we'll look at the revelations.
00:15:07.826 --> 00:15:16.645
For our sake, he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.
00:15:16.645 --> 00:15:25.690
So when we trust in Jesus, we are declared righteous by faith.
00:15:25.690 --> 00:15:30.022
That's our identity.
00:15:30.022 --> 00:15:31.225
That's who we are.
00:15:31.225 --> 00:15:38.299
So the Beatitudes teach us everything we need to know about being a child of god.
00:15:38.299 --> 00:15:44.416
Just in those nine things we learned the truth of what it means to be a christian.
00:15:44.416 --> 00:15:51.105
Jesus released in one sermon everything we needed to have, but we got the whole Bible.
00:15:52.506 --> 00:16:18.857
And the thing that amazed me while doing this study is there's nine Beatitudes and there's also nine fruits of the Spirit in Galatians, chapter 5, and those nine fruits of the Spirit is what allows us to walk out our sanctification and follow through with the nine beatitudes.
00:16:18.857 --> 00:16:20.942
That's what gives us the power.
00:16:20.942 --> 00:16:36.743
So if you look at galatians, chapter 5 and tie that with matthew, chapter 5, you'll see that everything you need is given to you by the Holy Spirit to obey the Beatitudes.
00:16:36.743 --> 00:16:45.888
You don't have to work at it, you don't have to give yourself a hard time and stress out.
00:16:45.888 --> 00:16:50.947
You just have to surrender to Jesus and surrender to the Holy Spirit.
00:16:50.947 --> 00:16:52.120
That's all you got to do.
00:16:52.120 --> 00:17:05.520
You got to know that you are a child of God, you are adopted into the kingdom of God and that's your identity, and let the Holy Spirit do the work inside you that he needs to do.
00:17:05.520 --> 00:17:10.320
So you can follow out the Beatitudes and live it out in your life.
00:17:10.320 --> 00:17:14.983
It's that simple and we like to complicate it a lot of times.
00:17:16.815 --> 00:17:20.405
Now what guarantees that we're going to be persecuted?
00:17:20.405 --> 00:17:23.923
It shows in Revelations, chapter 2.
00:17:23.923 --> 00:17:26.582
Yeah, chapter 2, verse 9.
00:17:26.582 --> 00:17:43.344
It talks about the church in Samaria and God promises there will be persecution on the church in tribulation, and I think we're starting to see that here in America a little bit.
00:17:43.344 --> 00:17:50.642
I think we're starting to see persecution come to the church in America.
00:17:50.642 --> 00:18:04.386
We're seeing things happen that we don't normally would see, and that is proof where we're at and we're going to experience harshness.
00:18:04.386 --> 00:18:16.506
And I wonder there's questions on the sheet tonight that will ask you where you're at in your relationship with God and what you think about persecution.
00:18:18.435 --> 00:18:24.087
And it's a serious thought, because that's where the rubber meets the road.
00:18:24.087 --> 00:18:30.547
It's really where the truth of your Christianity comes out.
00:18:30.547 --> 00:18:33.942
It no longer is a religious game.
00:18:33.942 --> 00:18:34.444
No more.
00:18:34.444 --> 00:18:38.319
It's not something you just go to church on Sunday.
00:18:38.319 --> 00:18:38.782
No more.
00:18:38.782 --> 00:18:41.999
It becomes a reality.
00:18:41.999 --> 00:18:48.461
Man, what are you going to do when somebody wants to put you in prison for sharing the gospel of Jesus Christ?
00:18:48.461 --> 00:19:07.898
What are you going to do when somebody wants to kill you for sharing the gospel of Jesus Christ, or take your home away or punish your family, are you going to be able to show the fragrance of Jesus Christ in that moment?
00:19:10.262 --> 00:19:14.989
That's a serious thought and we have to really think about that.
00:19:14.989 --> 00:19:17.989
That's where the Beatitudes take us.
00:19:17.989 --> 00:19:21.869
It ends at the very thought.
00:19:21.869 --> 00:19:27.112
Are we willing to eat the flesh and drink the blood of Jesus Christ?
00:19:27.112 --> 00:19:31.089
Is that the truth of our salvation?
00:19:31.089 --> 00:19:35.430
Is that the truth of our relationship with god?
00:19:35.430 --> 00:19:43.669
If we take in the account the disciples, they were all martyred harshly.
00:19:44.349 --> 00:19:47.674
Peter neil told me tonight, hung upside down.
00:19:47.674 --> 00:19:51.124
Stephen stoned to death.
00:19:51.124 --> 00:19:53.828
One of them was boiled in oil.
00:19:53.828 --> 00:19:57.334
Can you imagine that?
00:19:57.334 --> 00:20:04.173
Yep, that's right.
00:20:04.173 --> 00:20:05.737
Can you imagine that?
00:20:05.737 --> 00:20:18.633
Can you imagine in our day and time, or maybe in our children's day and time or our grandchildren's day and time, what's life going to be for them in the kingdom of God?
00:20:18.633 --> 00:20:40.951
So we got to be prayer warriors now and we got to know our identity and we got to understand the word of God now and live it and be it, just be it, just let it happen, and we will persevere.
00:20:40.951 --> 00:20:42.967
We will win the war.
00:20:42.967 --> 00:20:46.890
That's what it promises and that's what it says.
00:20:48.121 --> 00:20:55.027
But if you're not ready, it ain't going to happen and it's going to catch you off guard.
00:20:55.027 --> 00:20:58.210
It's going to catch you.
00:20:58.210 --> 00:21:08.748
It could catch any one of us off guard and we have to be ready and I always really do think about that when I'm praying for other nations and stuff.
00:21:08.748 --> 00:21:29.272
I've been, I've not traveled as much as Mark and all them, but Neil, but I have traveled some in missions and I've seen some of the things that they go through not a lot, but, man, it's going to come here, it's coming.
00:21:29.272 --> 00:21:40.325
We have to be ready and we have to listen to our elders because what they're teaching us is the pearls of the kingdom of heaven, man.
00:21:40.325 --> 00:21:44.673
They're preparing us for what is to come.
00:21:44.673 --> 00:21:52.288
They're trying to get us ready and mature so we can be obedient to god through the Holy Spirit.
00:21:53.770 --> 00:22:03.951
So please go over the questions, ponder them, think about them and really take them serious and really take the Beatitudes series.
00:22:03.951 --> 00:22:06.805
Don't let this see in your study in the Beatitudes.
00:22:06.805 --> 00:22:11.523
You could study the Beatitudes for a whole year and still not finish with it.
00:22:11.523 --> 00:22:14.354
I mean, there's so much there to grasp.
00:22:14.354 --> 00:22:16.200
The gospel is never ending.
00:22:16.200 --> 00:22:20.728
It is never ending and the word of god is never ending.
00:22:20.728 --> 00:22:30.673
There's so much there to grasp a hold of and and I just I appreciate y'all listening to me and I hope you got something from this.
00:22:30.673 --> 00:22:35.228
But good, good joy with the questions there.
00:22:35.228 --> 00:22:36.650
I hope they do something for you.
00:22:36.650 --> 00:22:37.951
Praise god.