After all the searching I now have the recording and I can now resume regular posting. I have this sermon and two others top post and I will be back on track. Thank you for your patience.
The sermon is entitled, "The Prize Of Faith". During the giving of this sermon we experienced a small technical glitch in the video sound. I did not edit the glitch out.
Note: (This following text is the manuscript for the principles I gave for drawing closer)
Drawing Closer to God
James 4:8a
8 Draw nigh to God, and he will draw nigh to you.
Today I have chosen to take a slight deviation from the Letter to the Philippians and the study we have been on to cover some ground that is necessary.
If you will recall the last time we were together I asked you the question, “Do You Know Jesus?” In addition to that I laid out for you that all we strive to do, apart from a living and vibrant relationship with Jesus, is a pile of warm steamy manure. It is benefitting us in no fashion. The balancing statement is that when we draw near to Jesus and develop relationship with Him there is a change in our lives and is in its fullest expression an example of the Adventist faith.
And so we have two camps of people. Those who are truly in a relationship with Jesus and it is evident in their lives and those who have a form of godliness but are lacking the power thereof. This is where we left off.
Since that Sabbath there has been several people ask me, “How do I get to know Jesus?” And, “How do I develop relationship with Jesus?” These questions are the main reason for my jumping out of Philippians for a moment. This morning I want to help you to know some basic principles of how to develop a relationship with Jesus. Won’t you pray with me?
(Prayer)
The first step we must take in developing relationship with Jesus is to answer as truthfully as possible, “Am I in relationship with Him today or am I practicing a form of godliness but am lacking the power thereof? We have to come to address our own hearts, our minds, and our motives. Have I died to myself today and is Jesus firmly on the throne or do I have my Sabbath persona on in order that you will believe I am in right relationship with God?
You know just to give you some insight as to how serious this matter is Ellen White goes right to the heart of our pretentious ways and declares in Christian Service on page 41 and I am paraphrasing; “Only one in twenty of us will be ready for Jesus when He appears.” If there are sixty of us here today and this ratio plays out… that means only three of us in this room is genuinely in right relationship with Jesus and the other fifty-seven of us are merely playing church having a form of godliness but lacking any power thereof.
So the first work of coming into correct relationship with Jesus is to consider your own heart’s condition and where you are today in regards to knowing Christ. There are two questions that you should consider asking yourself daily. “Do I know Jesus today?” and the second question, “Did I just deceive myself?” This is a daily work that must be done. When you rise in the morning you must put off the man of sin and put on the knowledge of Christ. Friends you must die to self daily. There is for those who long to know Jesus a need to mortify their own will and surrender to the perfect will of Christ. This is a daily work church.
The second principle of coming into a right relationship with Jesus is prayer. A true Christian prays. And I am not just talking about mumbling off our daily list of desires to God. That is praying but not the sort of prayer that brings you into right relationship with God. You see in you prayed in order to be in right relationship with God you would say something like, “Lord let it be that in all my dealings this day thy will be done and not my own. Lord may it be that I would be a servant to all before I should choose to serve myself. Lord may it be that thy kingdom will be made manifest in my actions that I might be lowered that you might be lifted up.” For when Jesus taught His disciples how to pray He taught them saying:
Matthew 6:9-13
9 ¶After this manner therefore pray ye: Our Father which art in heaven, Hallowed be thy name.
10 Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven.
11 Give us this day our daily bread.
12 And forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors.
13 And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil: For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, for ever. Amen.
You see when we look at how we are to pray… what Jesus taught us is that we should pray that in us the will of God will be presently demonstrated in such a fashion that it will be exactly on earth as it is in heaven. That means the same fashion that you dwell here is your message to God on how you intend to dwell there. Think about that. He taught us in this prayer that we should look to God for all of our needs and we ask God to judge us for eternity in the same fashion that we have judged one another. Are you prepared to be judged by God in the same fashion as you have judged one another? It is coming.
To give you some idea about the nature of prayer in the Adventist church, a study was done in the late nineties and published to the North American Division on the current state of the members of the Adventist Church. It was determined in this study that less than 50% of Adventists pray at all. Of those that do pray it was less than 19% that pray daily and study the bible daily. When we consider these numbers if there are 60 of us in here then only about 12 of you pray daily and study the bible daily.
This leads me to the next principle of getting to know Jesus: study of the bible and the Spirit of Prophecy. We get to know each other by communicating with each other. So it is with God. Not only do we speak to Him in prayer but He has spoken and He continues to speak to us today through His word and through inspiration.
Many of you are married and some of you look forward to being married. What sort of marriage would it be if you showed up to your spouse and daily all you have to say is, “I need this, I need that, and I would like this.” And then when the spouse starts to speak or longs to communicate back you turn a deaf ear. This is what is done to Jesus when we hit Him with a to do list and yet care nothing to let Him speak to us through His word. When you think of it, such a habit as I have described, diminishes the God of the universe to the slave of your will. This is what I want from you God. Do it and I might even thank you someday. We are called by God brothers and sisters to do more listening to Him and far less speaking. That’s why I believe we have two ears and only one mouth. We would be wise to listen to God twice as much as we speak to Him. If we pray without ceasing then that would mean we would be doubly in tune with His words. Think about that.
The last principle I have time to share with you today and one of the most important is reflected in our text of study this morning. James 4:8a
8 Draw nigh to God, and he will draw nigh to you.
The principle revealed in this text is simple. God is only coming as close to you as you are willing to come unto Him. Is that plain enough? Did you understand? If you want God to draw close to you but you are unwilling to be close to Him do you think that will work? You say how is it that I can say we want God to draw close to us yet we are unwilling to draw close to Him? In a word it is sin.
Sin is what separated us from our closeness to God in the first place. We want God to draw close to us but yet sin in our lives that we harbor, protect, and nurture is the very thing that keeps us from coming close to God. We hide just like Adam and Eve did. As we hear God drawing closer we recognize the sin that we embrace and so we hide. Maybe He won’t see us and we won’t have to explain what has found a greater position in our hearts than what He has.
To draw nigh unto God is to come to God with no pretenses, no excuses, no solutions, and no blaming and say Lord except you do something for me I will perish. Without you I am lost. I recognize that I harbor this sin in my life. It is out of my control. I need you Lord and so I am coming to you asking only that this gulf between us created by my sin will be overcome by Your righteousness on my behalf. Nothing worthwhile have I to bring and simply to your cross I cling help me Jesus.
There is a story told by a Baptist man that lived around 1860. His name was A.C. Dixon. He told this story of a close friend of his. This is how the story goes. "Rising early one morning," he said, "I heard the baying of a score of deer hounds in pursuit of their quarry. Looking away to a broad, open field in front of me, I saw a young fawn making its way across, and giving signs, moreover, that its race was well nigh run. Reaching the rails of the enclosure, it leaped over and crouched within ten feet from where I stood. A moment later two of the hounds came over, when the fawn ran in my direction and pushed its head between my legs. I lifted the little thing to my breast, and, swinging round and round, fought off the dogs. I felt, just then, that all the dogs in the West could not, and should not capture that fawn after its weakness had appealed to my strength."
So is it you see friends when human helplessness appeals to Almighty God. Well do I remember when the hounds of sin were after my soul, until, at last, I ran into the arms of Almighty God."
8 Draw nigh to God, and he will draw nigh to you.
This morning I want to encourage you in your desire to really know Jesus. I have shared with you the key principles of how this can be done. You must ask yourself daily, “Am I in right relationship with Jesus.” You must ask yourself shortly afterward, “Did I just lie to myself.” You must be daily in prayer. Praying without ceasing hot fervent and genuine prayers. Prayers that tell God really where you sense you are with Him. Prayers that give voice to the same issues you would tell anyone you were trying to come into relationship with. You must listen for God to speak. And He has. God has chosen to communicate to you through the Holy Scriptures and the Spirit of Prophecy. If you truly desire to know God you must let Him communicate to you through His chosen means. And finally you must like the fawn and recognize the frailty of your situation. When you see your own weakness and appeal to His strength brothers and sisters God will not reject the trust that you have placed in Him. When you draw nigh unto Him, He will draw nigh unto you.
This is the Word of God in Jesus name, Amen.
