Feb 4, 2016 /

The Forgotten Commandment

Did you know that there is one small command in the Bible that, if you miss it, makes obedience impossible? Listen closely as Dr. Jim Van Gelderen examines and explains this oft-forgotten command in Scripture.

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This sermon was originally delivered to hundreds of young people in Menomonee Falls, WI at the 2009 Teen Revival Conference.

Speaker 1: 1 Peter 1. Take your Bibles. We’ll go to 1 Peter 1.

And what I’d like to do here this afternoon is really kind of pick up where we have left off and continue to develop it. But I am going to say this young person just right off the bat, if I can communicate this to you, I am stepping in the pulpit this afternoon with a great burden on my heart. And I believe this is a very critical hour.

I’m just going to throw it out here, young people. I just want to just shoot absolutely straight with you. There are young people out here.

You have responded to God. And I’m thankful for that. I’m not minimizing that.

I think God’s doing great work in some of your hearts. But I’m just going to be just dead honest with you. I’m just going to shoot straight with you.

I believe that I’m in a crisis personally here in this conference. And if I do not deliver my soul, then I will have sinned against Almighty God and in a certain sense sinned against some of you. But there are problems all across this auditorium. when I came up after Evangelist John preached a wonderful message I looked out and I saw some of you kids talking some of you laughing I’ve seen some of the invitations kids looking across the aisle smiling at each other

we got problems in this room big problems and some of you kids out here think you’re big stuff you walk around your youth group you tout yourself as some leader you’re a leader bud but you’re a lever for the devil and the sooner you realize it the better off you’ll be we’ve got problems in this room. We’ve got big problems in this room. And I’m just going to be dead honest with you, young person.

The only hope you’ve got is truth. The truth will set you free. Some of you kids are so believed the lie of the devil, you’re so deceived it’s not even funny. Some of you kids think you’re spiritual

and you’re the biggest rebel in your youth group. It’s just times, it’s wake-up time for some of you kids in this room. I’m not trying to be unkind.

I’ve just got to tell you that God’s burdened our heart. And I’m telling you, some of you kids out here, you’ve got huge issues. it’s time for you to wake up bud some of you are so cool you think you can shoot a basketball and just because you can score 30 parts in a game you think you’re something I want to tell you something friend you can score 30 parts in a game and you can be working for the devil

some of you just need to wake up here’s an invitation where God’s working and some of you think it’s a big joke you’re laughing at each other smiling at each other think it’s a big joke it’s not a joke friend hell is not a joke I’ve preached to over 40 kids who are 6 feet under the ground I’ve preached to kids who are burning in hell you know what I’ve learned in 25 years of ministry

it’s not a joke it’s not a joke what we are doing in this room if the Lord tarries will probably, and I don’t think I’m overstating the case will affect the eternal destiny of millions of people some of you if you will surrender to Jesus Christ will win thousands of people to the Lord or you’ll win people to the Lord who will, you know, the ripple effect will be into the thousands

if not millions the reason i’m burdened here is because eternity is on the line probably for thousands it’s probably fair to say for millions and yet some of you think it’s a big joke some of you kids i’m raised in church you’ve been to 15 million holiness conferences you know you think oh yeah we’ve heard all this before it’s time for you to wake up bud i i i just hope that this

morning you get this some of you get the wax out of years and realize this is no joke listen this country the the prosperous days this country may be over friend some of you may one day realize this but god may just take the money right out of this country so yeah some of you haven’t lived long enough to realize it doesn’t take long god can pull all the money out of this country so fast

it’s not even funny and some of you may be one day living in a third world country called the united states of america it’s time to wake up bud money’s not what you’re living for i’m just burdened because i think that if i it was i if i was on i think i could go to every sponsor and every sponsor would say we got problems we got we got we i’m burdened

and so young people please understand if you’ve been responding to the lord i’m not i i’m for you god knows i’m for you but i’m burdened for the kids out here think everything’s a big joke so i hope you listen this afternoon because there’s some hope in first peter chapter one it’s a great passage of scripture and um i uh i’m gonna ask you to i’m not gonna try to i’m not

trying to be in kind but i’m just gonna play it so you understand the rules if i see somebody another i’m going to address it because this is big stuff okay so i just want to be fair with you i like to be fair with teenagers i want you to know i’m for you i’m going to play fair with you but this is serious stuff as i see you’re not taking it seriously we’ll address it because

it’s serious i don’t want you you may not be serious about it but the guy next to you i don’t want you to distract him first peter chapter number one is a phenomenal passage of scripture that i find if you get a hold of it’s really a kind of one of those truths that kind of goes in sync with what we learned in Galatians 2 and verse number 20. The Bible here in 1 Peter chapter number 1,

a few years ago I was assigned this topic. And when I was assigned the topic in 1 Peter chapter number 1, or actually I was assigned the topic of personal separation or personal holiness, and I thought, well, what better chapter to go to than 1 Peter chapter 1, because I knew enough about 1 Peter 1 to know that twice it said be holy. I figured, well, if we’re going to talk about holiness, let’s go to where it talks about it twice.

And I figured I’d do an exegetical message that simply means the whole message would come out of the text. That way nobody could argue with it. It would be right out of the Word of God and we’d just go that direction. So I came to 1 Peter 1

and I have a little study habit. And the study habit is I get an analytical Greek New Testament out and I mark the moods of the verbs. And one of the moods of the Greek verbs is a mood called the imperative mood.

Guess what that is? It’s a command. So I mark the imperatives because I want to find out what does God want me to do with this material?

I’ll mark some of the other moods as well. But the imperative is one I really notice because those are commands. When I came to 1 Peter 1, I honestly, I think I thought that the first command I was going to find was going to be holy.

I thought, wouldn’t that be great preaching? Get up and say the very first command in the book of 1 Peter is be holy. But you know, young person, when I came to study it, I found it’s not the first command, it’s the second and it is the third, but it’s not the first. And I discovered that without obedience to the first command, there would really be no way you could in any measure

obey the second and the third command. thus I’ve called the message the forgotten commandment I meet a lot of teenagers and I’m going to prove my point here that find themselves discouraged in their question life because they’ve tried and failed in fact let me let me prove that how many of you have ever made a decision it could have been a camp could have been two years ago at the teen revival conference it could have been

at your home church and revival meetings you made a decision and you meant it you weren’t joking around it was not a way to get out of out of pressure you made a decision for Christ that you meant and uh you made the decision and maybe for a while it lasted you know a couple weeks maybe even a couple months but as john gave testimony i think earlier here and and it’s somebody that did

that and that you made the decision last for a little while and then you end up going back on the decision and living like you were or worse than before you made the decision that’s ever occurred in your life would you raise your hand with me because it certainly has occurred with me far more than i’d like to admit okay you can put your hands down you know what many of you are saying

you’re saying exactly what i’ve said in fact some of you come to this conference and say man I’m not making a decision. I tried that before and it didn’t work. I made a decision and I couldn’t keep it. Now, I think you found in the last couple of sessions that that excuse does not hold any water

because the answer is not you, the answer is Him. And He lives in you. So I want us to see here, this passage of Scripture teaches us that anytime we make a decision to be holy, if we do not obey the first commandment the passage gives us, we will find it absolutely impossible in any measure to be holy.

Because, you know, our holiness does not impress God. For all of our righteousnesses are as filthy rags. I remember when that finally got a hold of me.

I don’t know why, but I always thought the verse meant all of your righteousnesses. It’s kind of easier to put in a second person. I thought maybe Isaiah was saying, you guys out there, you know, you give to the United Way.

You know, you give to charity. You know, you do good things. Your righteousness is a bunch of filthy rags.

I thought he was talking about lost people. But he didn’t say your. He said our.

Was Isaiah saved? Well, obviously he was. He wasn’t talking about lost people.

He’s talking about us. And all of our righteousnesses are as filthy rags on the side of God. Why?

Because they’re tainted with us. The Bible very clearly says the flesh profiteth nothing. So flesh-dependent righteousness stinks in the nostrils of God. not having mine own righteousness which is of the law but that which is through the faith of Christ

the righteousness which is of God by faith. Now with that understanding let’s go and understand that the importance then is to get a hold of what truth we can hear to understand how in any measure we can be holy. So if you go and open your text, your Bible if you’ve already got it open open your notebook to page 55 and the very first point is going to be biblical mindset.

Biblical mindset. now before we get to the verb before we get to the main verb here I want us to recognize there are two I hate to get technical but I’m going to get technical because this is the way God wrote it and by the way young person if you’re not good at English get good at it you know why? the Bible is written in English I mean it was written in Greek but it’s translated in English now Frank over here

he liked that statement but anyway the point is you’ve got to learn how to read the Bible so learn English OK, so I’m going to give you a little English that actually, by the way, if you learn good English and you ever take Greek at Baptist College of Ministry, it’ll be a lot easier. OK, as Greek has a lot of correlations. But there’s two participles here.

And notice what it says. Those two participles precede the main verb. OK, the participles, as a result of their being tied to the main verb, take on a command force.

OK, they’re not commands in and of themselves. They’re commands because they’re tied to the main verb. Now, main verb and the forgotten command.

And I may as well get it out there. is the command to hope. That’s the main verb. Okay, these two participles preceded, and as a result of that, they really, I found this to be so true, that the obedience to these two participles are absolutely essential to create the atmosphere in which obedience to what I’m calling

the forgotten commandment can be effective. Okay, so it’s very important that we set the table, that we allow God through obedience to these first two participles to create the atmosphere, the mindset that will allow us to properly and effectively obey this command I’m calling the forgotten commandment. Okay, so first of all, God says, wherefore, gird up the loins of your mind.

Now, the one problem we have with that is that in our culture, we don’t gird up our loins. In fact, I doubt many of you have a mental picture right now. Girding up your loins, you know what’s that uh you know you just don’t we don’t think that way so let me give you an illustration in the mid-1960s my father was traveling around the world with two other preachers

for you older gentlemen in here one was ed nelson and one was charles holmesher it was a very colorful trip around the world okay but what they did is they never backtracked they kept going forward until they got back to the same place that’s traveling around the world and so uh they ended up in the country of India during the language riots of the mid-1960s. And they were in a large city and they ran across a large group of Indian men who were rioting.

I guess the women don’t riot in India, just the men do that. And so being good American tourists, they got out their 35 millimeter cameras and they began to take pictures of these rioting Indian men. My dad said it was not long before these rioting men became uninterested in the riot and became very interested in the three american tourists who were taking their pictures and my dad or one of the preachers

looked at the other two and said let’s get out of here and they began to run now my dad said we would have been in huge trouble except for one thing the men the indian men had to gird up their loins they had these long flowing robes and my dad said they would reach down grab the robes they take them around their back tie them off up front so their legs would be free enough to pursue the

american preachers but by the time they had done that my dad and his preacher buddies were long gone okay now girding up your loins it’d be like this can you imagine getting out on the track and running a hundred yard dash in a bathrobe that went down to your ankles if you’re on a cinder track you know what would be happening you’d be eating cinders buddy

you would not win i mean you could make it okay we all understand that why because the robe is going to hinder your progress okay now all of us know that the christian life is often referred to in the bible as a race okay so so we say well preacher what’s this saying then what says gird up the loins of your mind so whatever we’re talking about involves the mind and friends

it obviously don’t miss this is something that comes from the mind that hinders your progress okay so here it is okay every single one of us including this preacher have wrong thinking patterns you have things that hinder your your christian life that are wrong they’re wrong mental patterns every problem you have and every problem i have spiritually comes from wrong thinking you know what preaching is preaching is confronting wrong thinking it is saying this is bible thinking

this is wrong thinking some of you this week have been in a crisis some are still at the crises when god confronts you and say that you’ve been thinking wrong you say how do you know you’ve been thinking wrong because you’re doing wrong you see wrong action is always preceded by wrong thought and every problem you have comes because you don’t think right if you don’t do right it’s because you

don’t think right you kids out here that laughed in the invitation i’ll tell you why you do that because you don’t think right you got wrong thinking processes and so what god does through his word is he confronts wrong thinking it’d be like this he’d be like a kid who said i’m surrendered and yet he he has problems with the authorities in his life you know what that kid is

deceived the kid here he is got problems with school teacher problems with his parents problems with the spiritual authorities in his life, he says, I’m okay, man. I’m surrendered. You know what the problem is?

That kid has wrong thinking processes. And that’s been confronted this week. But some of you may still not get it. So what God does is He takes His Word and His Spirit and in preaching and Bible study,

He confronts wrong thinking. I don’t know about you. There’s been many times I’ve been in a service, I’ve had a light bulb moment.

I’m thinking, man, have I been thinking incorrectly? You’re in a crisis. Now, if you’re going to grow spiritually, Here’s what you do.

You dropkick the wrong thinking. You embrace the right thinking. That’s what this is the idea.

And in doing so, you’re taking those long flowing robes of wrong thought processes. You’re pulling them up and you’re tying them off so they don’t hinder you anymore. And you’re replacing them with Bible thinking.

Listen, there are young men out here who have the call of God in your life. And if you yield to the call of God and have the power of God in your life, you will see thousands of people get right with God and come to know the Jesus Christ. But you know what’s hindering that?

Wrong thinking! It’s killing some of you. Just killing you.

And so what happens is God confronts that. You know why? Because He loves you!

You know what one is? If I surrender to God, it’ll ruin my life. Have you ever thought about how stupid that is?

God doesn’t need you to surrender to Him if He wants to ruin your life. He can ruin your life if you don’t surrender to Him. You’re thinking, oh, if I surrender, God will ruin my life.

Yeah, it’s just so moronic. You know, person, God’s not out to ruin your life anyway. It’s wrong thinking.

So many young people have wrong thinking. You know, they get the idea, you know, if I surrender to the Lord, you know, I’ll be running from the cannibals in Africa, you know, and swinging from tree to tree, trying to get away from the cannibals. You know, you get this whole idea.

Wrong thinking. No offense, Aquila over there, but, you know, so, quill is one of our students from ghana west africa uh they don’t have trees to swing from vines and he’s okay but um my points friends is simple we really buy into a lot of wrong thinking the young people out here you bought into wrong thinking some of you bought into some big time wrong thinking okay so here it is you reject the wrong thinking you embrace the right thinking

that’s what i’m calling the commencement of biblical thinking it’s the beginning okay you know at the end of the at the end of your high school year they say we’re going to have commencement you say oh yeah that’s the end no no no no that’s not the end that’s the beginning that’s what commencement means it’s the beginning of your life okay when you graduate from high

school it’s the beginning of really a pastor mentioned the other day really getting responsible in life okay so commencement of biblical thinking is simply this god confronts you with wrong thinking you reject the wrong thinking you embrace the right thinking he connects you excuse me with biblical thinking you embrace the biblical thinking and you’re pulling up those raw long robes as i mention of wrong thought processes tie them off so they don’t hinder you anymore you know what that

is it’s a crisis in fact the verbal tense is the idea if it’s an event it’s it’s the unity of its action it’s a crisis it’s a point in time it’s an event it’s the invitation it’s the teen revival conference okay so that’s the beginning some of you have done that i’ve seen some of you this week

you made a decision i’ve been thinking incorrectly that’s going man i’m not hiding that sin from my parents anymore i’m done with it man i’m gonna stop i’m gonna get right with my parents about the way and treating them and some of you’ve rejected wrong thinking you’ve embraced bible thinking and you’ve made a decision and you’ve pulled up those robes that have been hindering you

and you’ve tied them off and you already feel the freedom to run the christian race okay now it’s the beginning now notice the next verb says okay having gird up the loins your mind it says be sober now that’s in the present tense and god changes uh images here from girding up your loins to sobriety. Now, sobriety is not an event. It’s not a crisis.

It’s a condition. It’s like this. You’re either sober or you’re inebriated.

There’s no in-between. It’s one or the other. And as I understand it, it just takes a little bit of alcoholic beverage and you’re technically inebriated according to the law. That’s why we know Jesus didn’t turn the water into alcoholic

beverage. Because He had never done anything that would have violated what He said in the Old Testament. that used to be a given it’s not a given anymore but uh but anyway my point is he’s not going to do something that’s going to violate old testament truth okay so my point is sobriety is obviously there’s no intoxication there’s nothing inebriating you’re not you’re not impaired at all

okay now the idea then would be this okay god says reject wrong thinking embrace right thinking and what he’s saying is maintain it he changes images and the images now of the wrong thinking is inebriation. It’s alcohol. Don’t let the alcohol or the inebriation of those wrong thinking processes to fuzzy your brain.

You ever done this? I have made a decision for Christ and truth was crystal clear. I mean, just as crystal clear.

It changed your life. You went on and after a while it seemed like, what was that truth that changed my life? Yeah, I know it changed my life. What was that why did he get fuzzy well you you didn’t you got the first thing right you rejected wrong thinking embrace right thinking but here’s what happened you didn’t maintain it see so the second one is the continuing of biblical thinking it’s continuing it first of all you have the crises

reject wrong thinking embrace right thinking secondly you have the continuing now let me ask you a question once you write that down continuing the idea here of course is that we uh we we get the truth into our hearts so it sticks so that we don’t lose it so it becomes life transforming okay let me ask you a question i want you to answer this back verbally how many of you if i

told you tonight or this afternoon if i told you there was something you could do that if you did it um that every time you fell into sin god would personally catch you and then instead of continuing to backslide god would catch you so you could get back up and be restored and Continue on for God. Would you be interested? Would you be interested this afternoon if I told you there was something you could do that if you did it, when you sinned and fell,

God would catch you so you could get back up so that you would not continue to slide down the path of compromise. Would you be interested in whatever this is that can prevent you from backsliding? Would you be interested?

Answer, yes or no? Okay, here it is. Don’t miss this.

The steps of a good man are ordered by the Lord. And he delighteth in his way. Though he fall, he shall not be utterly cast down, for the Lord upholds him with his hand.

Okay, you say, preacher, I see that, but what do you do for that to happen? Okay, a few verses later, it is. The law of his God is in his heart.

None of his steps shall slide. You know, young person, when you memorize the Bible, you’re putting the Bible in your brain. That’s good, but that’s not enough.

Memorization puts the Bible in your brain. Meditation puts the Bible in your heart. And when you put the Bible in your heart, you embrace it.

You live by it. You use it. You make it yours.

It becomes a very part of the fiber of your being. That’s the idea of meditation. It would be like this evening if we were to take you into a training center and you’re about to be flown over to a battle zone somewhere overseas.

An instructor gives up, hands you an instruction on how your machine gun works. And he begins to go over that manual. And he says, you’ve got 24 hours. to become familiar with that machine gun manual, if you were thinking you would absolutely not just memorize the manual,

you would meditate on it. Why? Because in the midst of battle, you wouldn’t want, you know, bullets are flying over your head, you’re thinking, where is that manual?

How does this thing work? You know, how do I reload this thing? You wouldn’t want to be doing that.

You’d want to have it down. Why? You’re in a battle, young person.

You’re in a battle. So the Bible is the instruction manual. God’s saying, take those areas that I confront you with.

It’s like this, young person. When God confronts you with Bible truth, don’t just, I mean, you reject the wrong truth, embrace the Bible truth, but take the very Bible truth that God impacted you with and put it in your heart. So you need to go home and you need to take Galatians 2.20 that God used today and you need to first memorize it and then you need to meditate on it until it’s yours.

You can use it in battle. Listen, you got a problem with music? Memorize verses on music.

I remember a few years ago, a kid named Patrick, 1999. We were in Charlotte, North Carolina. And this kid, Patrick, got right with God about his music.

And we came back a year later. Patrick walked up to one of our team members. He said, hey.

He said, a year ago, he said, I got right with God about my music. He said, I took that verses sheet you guys gave me. And he said, I took all the verses on music.

And he said, I read them every night for four months. You know what Patrick was doing? He didn’t even know it.

He was putting God’s law in his heart. He said, it’s been one year now. He said, you know what?

He said, I don’t even like that music anymore. He said, I haven’t gone back to it. But he says, I don’t even like it anymore.

There are young people out here, and you know who you are. You so love this world’s music, you cannot imagine one year from now not even liking it. You can’t imagine that. But I’m telling you, if you put God’s law in your heart,

God’s big enough to take that wretched desire and pull it out of your heart. See, that’s what God’s Word does. It’s powerful. And so what we’re talking about, friends,

is this is the atmosphere in which this command works. It’s rejecting wrong thinking, embracing right thinking, taking the Bible truth that confronted you and put it in your heart. Listen, you have trouble with mom and dad, you get our verses sheet and you memorize and meditate on the verses about honoring parents. Whatever your issue is, take those very verses and embrace them,

imbibe them, put them into your heart. Okay, that’s the idea of sobriety. It’s maintaining right thinking and completely being wary of allowing any alcohol, any inebriation to enter in fuzzy your spiritual brain, spiritual thinking.

That’s the idea. B, being sober is the idea there of maintaining a sobriety of mind. Okay, now that’s the first point, is what we’re going to call the biblical mindset.

It’s absolutely essential or the rest of the message won’t work. So you’ve got to develop. Some of you need to make a decision that you are going to be a man or a woman that is going to seek and study and embrace and memorize and meditate on the Word of God. The truth is, and I can’t prove this this morning or this afternoon,

there are some of you out here who are far more familiar with Hollywood than you are the Holy Word. If I asked you certain actors, you’d be right up there. But if I asked you about certain questions of the Bible, you’d, you know, whatever.

Okay, so this is why this is absolutely important. Okay, which brings us to point number two. And that’s the biblical mandate.

The biblical mandate. Okay, now we move on here in 1 Peter 1. It says, gird up the loins of your mind, be sober.

There it is. And hope to the end for the grace that is to be brought unto you. Okay, we’re going to look at the hope in just a moment.

But first of all, I want you to see the grace, which is the enabling. The enabling. Grace is a wonderful thing.

We touched on it a couple nights ago. Grace is such a wonderful, vast topic, I almost feel doing it injustice and trying to handle it in just a minute or two. But grace is supernatural. Grace is that, when you see it happen, you say,

that was God. That’s grace. Frank, I don’t know if you remember this, but Frank’s father grew up in North Carolina, correct?

He doesn’t remember the first time he smoked a cigarette. He does not remember. Frank’s dad does not remember the first time he smoked a cigarette. Now, if you’ve ever been to North Carolina,

that’s no shock to you because there’s a certain crop they grow down there. Okay? We won’t go into it, but it’s the big state crop.

Okay? You southern boys in Tennessee know what I’m talking about. But anyway, so he doesn’t remember the first time he smoked a cigarette. Now, if I’m remembering correctly, Frankie, you correct me if I’m not remembering correctly,

you prayed for years your dad would get right with God. But he said he never prayed that he’d stop smoking because that’s impossible. Now, Frank’s dad not only got right with God, guess what happened?

You know what that’s called? Grace. you cannot humanly explain that that’s called grace young person I want to tell you God has grace for you too listen here’s a man who doesn’t remember the first time he smoked a cigarette and most of us would honestly say well doesn’t seem to be much hope for a man like that ever having victory at least you know maybe it’ll get other things right

but you know my friend God’s grace is bigger than cigarettes and if God’s grace can free you tobacco God’s grace can free you from your bad attitude from your deception from your attitude toward authorities in your life to your sinking deception and hypocrisy God’s grace can deliver you young person can deliver you from your lack of courage and soul winning it can deliver you from your attitude toward spiritual things it can deliver you it’s called grace supernatural

it’s God at work in my life you know what I feel sorry for? every teenager in this room who knows Jesus Christ but does not really experience God’s grace, or at least does not realize what they’re experiencing. God’s grace is constantly being poured out on you, young person. You know the problem is, many times as we talked about the other night,

the Bible says we fail the grace of God. Grace of God will never fail you, Christian, but you can fail the grace of God. God’s grace is a wonderful thing.

I’m talking to some of you who can’t remember the last answer to prayer. You cannot remember the last time God met with you. You cannot remember the last time the Bible came alive.

You can’t remember the last time God used you in ministry. You cannot remember, and I feel sorry for you. You know what’s so great about the Christian life?

This is going to shock you, absolutely shock you. The greatest thing about the Christian life is Jesus Christ. And if you’ve got a wall between Him and you, you don’t got much left, bud. Some of you young people out here, you’re saved, but you don’t have much in your Christian life

because you’ve got a wall between you and Christ. You know what you’ve got a letter? Three letters left.

I-A-N, that’s all you’ve got left. You just put a wall between you and Jesus Christ. You know what grace is?

It’s Jesus Christ at work in my life. You know, I’ve been in the ministry 25 years. I know me.

I know me. You say, what do you mean? I know me.

I know how shy I am. I know. I know.

I know. I don’t know how to explain it. When I was growing up, I was shy.

I was really shy. I’m going to just be dead honest with you to try to help some of you. I hated, and that may be too strong a word, but I’m not sure it is.

I hated visitation. Now, I went. Why?

I was a preacher’s kid. I’d go, and every Thursday night, about 9 o’clock, I’d go, that’s over for another week. Because I was shy.

I don’t like to talk to people. About anything. I just was too shy.

But you know what I found? God’s grace does some marvelous things. My senior year, God began to awaken my heart, and although I didn’t see a lot of victory, I began to see some. I got involved in some unsaved kids’ lives and tried to help them,

and I wasn’t maybe too effective, but it was at least a start. But then I went to college, and I began to see guys who had God’s grace on their life. I mean, guys on fire for God. Guys that get up in a hall meeting, and they’d spit forth fire, and they’d let it rip, and they’d go after their fellow students

and say, man, that’s where we need to go. We’d have an invitation, man, the room, the study hall, kids bawling their eyes out, getting right with God. I said, you know, that’s interesting.

Here’s a senior in college who had the grace of God in his life. I began to realize there’s something to this grace stuff. Of course, I’d seen it in my parents.

I’d seen it in other family members. And I knew God’s grace was a real thing. I just, you know how it is.

You know you. Do you know you? Unless you’re schizophrenic, you should know you.

I know me. I’m shy. And I’ll never forget, I don’t know if my brother remembers this, I remember coming back after my freshman year, and God had begun to do a work in my heart, and I made a decision in my freshman summer. I thought, you know, if I’m ever going to be a soul winner,

I just got to absolutely immerse myself in it. So I made a decision that every night that summer I’d go so many that I wasn’t in church. I went out Monday night, Tuesday night, Thursday night. I don’t want to say, I mean, there’s certainly people who are a lot more effective, and I’m not sure I did those kids a whole lot of good,

but they did me a whole lot of good. I’ll never forget, I stopped, the very first time, I stopped Tony Parashas and Lenny Orlando. I stopped them on the street, and I began to give them the gospel.

And you know what I absolutely was amazed? I loved it. And you know what I knew?

This is grace. Because I know me. I began to meet, in fact, I began that summer.

You know, sometimes I’d meet the big, huge pack of teenagers. You know, and this was before video games, so kids actually outside and had suntan and all that kind of stuff. That was a long time ago. But anyway, you know, kids would be outside, you know,

and that’s where we’d goof around, you know, and that’s where they’d be. And so I’d go outside in the evening and they’d all be out, you know. And I remember finding these huge packs of kids, 10, 15 kids, smoking, you know, arm and arm with their girl, music jamming.

And I start to give them the gospel. They’d start to heckle. They’d start making fun.

They’d start going after it. And I absolutely loved it. I thought, this is great.

You know what that’s called? It’s called grace. You know, now I have a ministry where I go across the country and preach to unsaved teenagers.

And I’ll tell you, Frank and I have talked about this before. And I’m sure Bill would relate the same thing. And my brother John, you give an invitation, a bunch of hell-bound teenagers.

And you see someone respond sometimes with tears coming down their cheeks. You think to yourself, man, this is the greatest thing you could do on planet Earth. There’s nothing better than this.

You know what that’s called? It’s called grace. I don’t tell you some of you shy kids.

Don’t worry about it. We’re not talking about you. We’re talking about him.

He’s not shy. You might be, but he’s not. He’s bold.

See, grace, young person, you need to get a hold of it. It’s divine. It’s God interacting in my life.

It’s Him strengthening me. It’s I can do all things through Christ which strengtheneth me. That’s grace.

That’s His strength, not ours. My grace is sufficient for thee. For my strength is made perfect in what? Young person, you may not know this,

but you’re weak. I hope by the time you leave, you get what my brother John said moments ago. I’m weak.

And I’ll always be weak. But young person, don’t let that be despair. Weakness is your ticket to His strength. my strength jesus says is made perfect in your weakness the idea that literally is strengthlessness my lack of strength friends is my claim for his strength friends i will tell you what his strength is it’s grace my grace is sufficient for thee my strength is made perfect in weakness they’re

parallel concepts and although grace certainly is broader than strength certainly one of the things that God graces us with is Christ’s strength. I can do? Let’s try that again.

You don’t seem too convinced. I can do? Through?

Which? Young person, it’s true. That’s grace. And I’ll say more personal testimony later, but I want to tell you, friends,

that’s grace. Get a hold of grace. Listen, I want to tell you, the little junior high kid out here who’s not very, you know, kind of out of it, Maybe, you know, a little unpopular.

Doesn’t have a lot of gifts. You get a hold of grace, you’d be shocked what God can do. Some of you guys who think you’re God’s gift to mankind, who continue on in self-dependence, you’ll find that your life’s not going to count for much.

You know why? Jesus said, without me, you can do nothing. That’s the way they say it down south.

I was down south for 15 years, so I do know how to say it. Did I say it right? Over you from Tennessee, nothing.

Okay, we got it. Okay, let’s continue on. You know what nothing is?

Okay, it’s nothing. Okay. got that you northerners okay so uh so we got god’s enabling so um let’s continue on the next thing let’s go to hope hope first is the grace is the enabling hope is the expecting now obviously hope is different than that we use it in the english hope is a wonderful concept now this is where i’d like to spend a moment because you got to get a hold of hope now the question i would ask

you young person today did you hope did you hope for grace now if you’ll notice in the text this is the grace that is to be brought unto you at the revelation of jesus christ the word brought is in the present tense which means that there is a present tense aspect to god’s grace we know that and although it says the revelation of jesus christ and there may be certainly an eschological

nuance here there is also a present tense aspect and we could certainly argue for revelation being a couple of different things his revelation to us now or his revelation later but i’m not going to go into that i’m simply pointing out that the grace we’re hoping for is in the present tense although there may be a future aspect there is a present tense aspect and that’s what i’m going to

to kind of focus on here okay so the word hope okay hope uh d edmund hebert is a wonderful commentator in fact he’s got a book out there on prayer that is outstanding but he wrote a commentary on first peter and in that commentary he gives a two-word definition of hope and if if you have never memorized this, you need to memorize it. It’s a great definition. Here it is.

Hope is expectant reliance. The hope is the expecting. It’s expectant reliance.

Okay, so what it means is this. It’s getting up in the morning and saying, God, I need you today. God, I cannot do it in my own strength.

God, I’m too weak. Oh, God, I’ll always be weak. God, I need you today.

I’m dependent on you, God. And I’m not only dependent on your grace, I’m expecting it. see dependence is good but we’re talking about expectant dependence see it’s not just dependence well he might he might not it’s i’m expecting him see that’s what’s different from english hope now english hope we use this all the time i mean we mentioned the baseball teams and i apologize to you milwaukee fans somehow the brew crew slipped out of my mind

but uh but anyway you you please accept my apologies but uh but you know you might say about a baseball team or a football team or your high school team or anything i hope my team wins the championship we do that all the time now what do we mean by that well it might probably won’t but it would be nice okay we use that word hope all the time now i mentioned that i’m a cubs fan

and and they say hope springs eternal but there’s one thing about a cubs fan that is very beneficial there is a benefit to it and that is you learn to cope with disillusionment early in life um see the Cubs don’t just lose they get your hopes up before they lose now you New York Mets fans who understand history you understand that 1969 Cubs were 10 games up over the New York Mets September

1st now I want to ask you a question how can you be 10 games in first place on September 1st and be in second place at the end of the season how in the world can you do it there are two words to the answer chicago cubs see the cubs are one of those teams that know how to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory i mean they they know how to do it so a few years ago i think was 2003 you remember 2003

i don’t know i know we got the new york people that’s one thing i love about new york fans is they’re great fans they really are they know the game they know the players and things but um 2003 sammy sosa and the chicago cubs were tearing up the national league um that was when sammy sosa was evidently still taking steroids and had cork bats but they hadn’t

found that out yet but uh so sammy’s sailing the ball out of the park and and uh but anyway so uh look good for the cubs you know people saying hey look at those cubs i’m thinking have you looked at the calendar you know no cub fan gets your hopes up to her september 1st hey look at those cubs i’m thinking you were you must be young 1969 don’t you remember well second last day of the season

and they swept the Pittsburgh Pirates, and they clinched the playoff spot. And they were going to play the Atlanta Braves in the first round of the playoffs. And you know what I said to myself?

I’m being the honest truth. Here’s exactly what I said. Oh, there’s no problem.

The Braves will beat them. You say, that is an unusual way to be a fan. Well, what you do as a Cubs fan, you always expect the worst, and you’re shocked if anything else happens.

That’s how you do it. And so, you know what happened? The Cubs shocked me.

They beat the Braves. Well, I thought, no problem. The Marlins, they got a great team.

They’ll knock them off. Well, they started playing the Marlins in a seven-game series. I mean, this is one before the World Series, but Cubs and World Series, in my generation, they do not go together.

It’s called an oxymoron. Okay, so I’m sitting here thinking, no way. You know, it’s not going to happen.

And I’ll tell you what the Cubs did. Now, you have to understand, this is typical Cubs fashion. They started playing baseball. I mean, the Cubs, they’re playing baseball in October,

highly unusual. But they started playing baseball in October. And they started winning ball games, and they went up on the Marlins three games to one.

Now, I knew I shouldn’t have done it. I mean, I really did. but you know what i did i got my hopes up i said the cubs are going to the world series you know what they did three games how can you lose three games in a row the only team i think can do that on consistent fashion is the washington nationals but i mean how can you lose three games in a row they did okay now we all understand hope in that scenario

don’t we you know all of us have gotten our hopes up and dashed okay you green bay packer fans understand that i mean you understand that we all understand what it is get hopeful and then brett fire throws an interception on the last play of the game okay we understand that so um so anyway everybody’s been through our dashed hopes okay now that’s how we tend to think of the word and the

only reason i give such an extensive illustration i want you to understand get oh yeah that’s how we Use hope. But that’s not Bible hope. Bible hope is, go to the bank, buddy.

It’s a done deal. Expect it. Don’t just depend on it.

Expect it. In fact, when somebody gets saved, they do depend, don’t get me wrong, but they also expect. See, when somebody gets saved, they call on the name of the Lord and they expect them to save him.

Why? Because he said he would. See, so expectation.

In fact, this word hope, even in the Greek language, you can see three letters overlap. It’s a cousin concept, hope and faith. Okay, there’s a little bit of a nuance, but they’re very cousin concepts.

Okay, so hoping for grace. Now, did you catch the idea of how important it is? Reject wrong thinking.

Embrace Bible thinking. Put Bible thinking in your heart. You know what you’re doing?

Faith cometh by hearing and hearing by? Yeah, you are nurturing faith. That’s why God gives us those first two participles, Because obedience to them is absolutely essential to create an atmosphere in which faith is being nurtured.

Because hope is a cousin concept of faith. Okay, so we see the expecting. We’re expecting grace. So it’s getting up in the morning and saying,

God, I’m weak. I’m not strong. God, you live in me.

Your son, your spirit lives in me. You’re in union with my spirit. I’m weak, but you’re strong.

And God, I’m dependent on you today. And I’m not only dependent on you, I’m expecting your grace. okay that’s the idea okay now it brings us to the final point now gang hang on because this is where you better fasten the seat belt because god not me god gets extremely confrontation i want to just warn you because i’m trying to help you here this passage of scripture is going to confront some of

you even in a visible fashion so understand i’m not picking you out i’m going to preach it no different than I normally do. Even though in this audience there may be some who in the last few days have even illustrated what God’s trying to talk about here and trying to tell us not to do. So I’m not thinking that way.

I understand that. But we’re just going to preach it because it’s pretty out there. It’s pretty confrontational.

But it’s helpful. Now look what it says here. It says in verse number 14.

Don’t miss this. As obedient children this whole passage If you have not made a decision, God, you speak, I’m all ears. Literally, it’s the idea of children of obedience.

Children who are marked by obedience. See, once you get a hold of hoping for grace, the next thing that happens is obedience. And I will tell you, young person, every single one of you out here whose lives are marked by disobedience are strangers to understanding sanctifying grace. I’m not necessarily saying you’re lost I’m just simply saying as a christian You hadn’t gotten a hold of grace

See it’s just as obedient children of obedience as obedient children in fact, I remember a few years ago I was walking through a gymnasium before sunday school. One of our team members was speaking. I think it was 1998 I’m walking through the jet back of the gymnasium He is addressing about 40 kids in sunday school while he’s addressing those kids All of a sudden he started saying something I perked up my ears

He said how many of you kids heads are bowed eyes are closed He said, how many of you kids, if God speaks to you today, would be willing to say, God, you speak, I’ll do it. If God shows you something from the Bible that needs to change in your life, you say, God, I’m willing to do it. Forty kids.

Four kids raised their hand, and I think some of them were joking. Well, I was burdened. Because I knew, and I realize some of you wouldn’t raise your hand either.

You’ve illustrated it. And again, I’m not that I’m looking for you. Don’t think that I’m picking anybody out here. but you know i’m talking about some of you god’s dealt with you but you stiff iron god and so i got burned that morning god led me to preach on first peter chapter one when i came to this part of the text i looked out i said young people i i did i was just walking through the gym

i said aaron got up there and he he said how many of you if god deals with you today you’d be willing i said four of you raised your hand i said i if you understood the question some of you may not have but if you understood the question and you kept your hand down you know you mark this down, young person. You can take 1 Peter 1 and just cut it out of your Bible. And some of you teenagers,

I’ll give you the scissors, need to get some scissors and cut 1 Peter 1 out of the Bible because you have not set in your life, God, you speak I’ll obey. Because this passage crumbles if you have not made the decision in your life, God, you show me I’ll do it. It crumbles, young person, it crumbles. Sometimes young people come up to you And want to argue about music I’m not interested in arguing I’ll look at them and say

Listen, if God shows you that music’s junk What are you going to do about it? Well, I don’t know The conversation’s over It is no use Unless the kid will say Listen, absolutely, 100% God shows me it’s wrong It’s out of my life Oh, I’ll talk to you You know why? Because they’re children of obedience Listen, friend Some of you, all I’d have to do Is when your vehicle comes back to your church parking lot here tomorrow,

all I have to do for some of you is walk into your church parking lot with your car keys, just jump into your car, stick the key in the ignition, turn it, start hitting the buttons, and I can look at you and say, you’re not a children of obedience, you’re a child of disobedience. And again, I’m not saying you’re lost. I’m just saying that if you’re saved, you have not come to the point in your life

where you’ve made a decision, I’m going to be obedient to God. All I have to do some of you is go to your room. All I have to do for some of you is just, you know, Follow you around a little bit. This is young people, not perfect,

but these are young people who are marked by obedience. In other words, they want to obey God. They’re not trying to wiggle out of it.

They want to obey God. That’s what this passage is written to. I’m talking to some of you.

I mean, you know, you’ve got bad attitudes. Again, I don’t know why I’m burdened about this, but I feel it’s some of you out here, you push your parents big time. You just push them.

You know how to hassle your parents. You know how to pull the strings. You know how to get what you want.

And young person, you better realize that that’s not obedience. Obedience is, Mom and Dad, what do you want me to do? I’ll do it.

It’s not pushing their strings. It’s not pushing their buttons. It’s being submissive to whatever they want. Saying, Lord, I really want to be a child that is marked by obedience

to you and to the authorities you put in my life. Are you that kind of children? See, that’s the mark of someone here in 1 Peter chapter. it says children who are marked by obedience children say okay god you show me it needs to be go i’ll get rid of it god you show me no more tv program i won’t watch that tv program anymore i remember when i was in high school my parents were good parents but television was changing the 70s

and they should have probably monitored it more but they let me watch some tv that really i probably shouldn’t have watched again kindergarten compared to today but it’s still wrong and I remember turning off the television God saying don’t watch that anymore and I remember having to make some decisions I’m not watching that anymore it’s got too much violence God says if you love violence God says he hates the soul that loves violence that’s a pretty strong old verse

send me out here love the blood you love the guts you love the violence why don’t you go read Psalm 11 you might realize that God has a huge problem with people who love blood and guts See that’s the idea You got to start making decisions in your life When god says don’t watch that anymore Don’t listen that anymore Don’t use some dumb excuse like well so and so watches it

You know friends god’s really not concerned who watches it if he tells you not to watch it. He probably is right Well, obviously he is right i’m only using probably to show us how ridiculous the statement is I’m talking to some of you If Jesus Christ came down to you face to face And told you what to do You wouldn’t do it You might think you would But you wouldn’t You know why? Because he’s speaking to all the time

And you’re stiff arming him He speaks to an invitation You stiff arm God You think you’re cool You think you’re the big man This passage of scripture is written to you Those of you who are marked Children who are marked By obedience I’m begging you young people I’m begging you I believe somebody in this room This is a big deal I believe there’s somebody out here who this conference is watershed bud.

It’s going to be one way or the other for somebody. I do not know who you are, but there’s somebody in this room who’s headed to huge trouble. I mean, your life is going to be destroyed and God loves you so much.

He has brought a conference across your life to arrest your attention. I don’t know who you are, but God does and you probably do too. It’s children marked by obedience.

Now, there’s three things that God says come out of this obedience. I want you to see what they are. Look what it says. As obedient children, here it is,

not fashioning. Wow. There it is.

Fashion. You ever heard of that? Not fashioning yourselves according to the former lust and your ignorance.

Number one, godly appearance. Godly appearance. We all know what the word fashion means.

But the word fashion is an interesting word. Very interesting word. In fact, go ahead.

Let’s everybody do it at once. Go ahead and flip your notebooks. Would you do that?

Let’s all turn the page at the same time, get it over with. And let’s go ahead and read the definition for fashioning. Could we do that?

Let’s read it from Kenneth Wiest. Yesteryear was a great professor of Greek, and I’ve enjoyed many of his commentaries. Here’s what it says. The act of assuming an outward appearance, patterned after some certain thing, an appearance or expression which does not conform

and is not representative of one’s inmost and true nature. It refers here to the act of a child of God assuming his outward expression, the habits, mannerisms, dress, speech expressions, and behavior of the world out from which God saved him. Thus, not giving a true expression of what he is.

Did you say, here, this guy’s a Greek guy. I bet you he could preach to teenagers. You know what he’s saying, young person?

He’s saying, don’t be on the outside when you’re not on the inside. If you’re blood-bought, born again, and going to heaven on the inside, don’t look like you’re going to hell on the outside. That’s what I mean.

This verse has nothing to do with your inside, nothing. It has everything to do, hang on, friend, with your outside. The way you wear your hair, God’s concerned about it.

The clothes you wear, God is concerned about. The shoes you wear, God is concerned about. That’s what He says.

He says, don’t let your outward appearance look like you’re conformed to the world. 2003, Mike Fisher, who’s working with real character, he’d only been saved a few years, traveled with me in Christian schools. Mike would often come up to me and he said, see that kid over there?

That kid listens to Green Day. That kid listens to Pearl Jam. Or whatever.

Back in that time. and I say, Mike, how do you know? Well, how do you think he knew?

They told him, no. How do you think he knew? By the way they were dressed.

By their necklaces or the bracelets that they’d wear. It would all betray the fact that they were in some subculture. You know, people, you know it better than I do.

You know. I’m talking to some of you. You know why you wear the hair that you do?

I may not know, but you do. You know exactly who you’re imitating. You know what Hollywood star you’re imitating.

You know what pop rock star you’re imitating. You know. I don’t.

Some of you do. You know exactly why you do it. I don’t tell you, young person, that’s what God’s saying. Listen, if you wear your hairstyle because some ungodly rock star or ungodly Hollywood actress or actor wears it that way,

then God’s saying you’re in violation. You don’t understand grace. Grace, young person, is wearing a hairstyle that is not conformed to this world.

Doesn’t look like you’re identifying with pop culture that hates God. Now, let me help you understand this. Grace is not waking up in the morning and saying, oh, what a bummer.

I can’t wear my hair this way, you know, can’t be worldly, what a bummer. I’ll, you know, I’ll wear it nice, what a bummer. That’s not grace.

Grace is not wearing a worldly hairstyle and loving it. That’s grace. Now my brother wayne has already beat me to this I’ve known this for years. I’m not sure I knew it in high school, but i’ve known it for years

I am not cool. I know that A few years ago, I came to realize you know when I preach to these teenagers They don’t look and say man that preacher is so cool. No, none of them say that Number one i’m wearing a belt that rules me out Number two my pants fit that really rules me out number three i know what a comb is that really knocks you out comb your hair

in the morning you’re really out of it okay number four i wear a part i’m like sean hannity they call me a comb over okay i realize that i’m out of it okay no problem you know person this may shock you but in the morning i don’t wake up and say oh what a bummer you know got to wear a belt today what a bummer what a bummer you know got to wear pants that fit what a bummer you know

you know that’s not it you know what grace is grace is not looking like the pop rock star not looking like the hollywood actor and actress not looking like the world and absolutely loving it that’s grace if you think the christian life is a bore you’ve missed out on grace the christian life is exciting you’re different you really are you got the greatest message mankind can ever hear that jesus christ can change your life young person you don’t have

to look like the world to win the world about three years ago may have been two i was in a church and the pastor came to me and said brother van gelden i’ve got a fringe kid his family comes from time to time and he hardly comes at all his parents don’t make him come it’s unfortunately a mark of our day but um he wants to talk to you he goes over to high school he claims to be a

christian he’d like to talk to you at lunch would you be well i said man send him over i love teenagers i’d love to talk to him now this kid walked in and he looked worldly looked just like unsaved kids look and and so no problem i i i talk to kids all the time like that and that’s not a problem and and so he sits down and and he starts talking and he uh he’s asking me these questions

and i’m kind of wondering where is he going then he kind of stops and he says now preacher i don’t want to offend you he said but look at you you know look at you what’s wrong you know uh but look at you you know he said you’re not don’t don’t be offended he said but you never win my friends to

jesus christ i mean you know after all you don’t look like um you just couldn’t relate with him he said now look at me he said you know i i i i can i can win i’m i’m right with him so i said okay let’s go on that theory i want to ask you a question how many people have you won to jesus

christ looking like you are that’s a fair question isn’t it i mean he was he was so here’s what he kind of got a little embarrassed he said well he said i think i’ve won my girlfriend now that’s suspect. You know, the girl just went through the motions to get the guy. You know how that goes.

Okay, maybe it was genuine, but it’s suspect. Okay, I’ve been working too long with teens on that one, not to have a little suspicion there. And so, okay, so maybe one, right?

Yeah, maybe one. Oh, isn’t that interesting? So you’re doing it looking like the world of one, maybe one. I said,

it’s not me. I guarantee it’s not me, and God knows it, young person. But I said, I’ve had the privilege to lead hundreds of teenagers to Jesus Christ.

Isn’t that amazing? young person i’ve learned this you don’t have to look like the world to win the world the gospel is more powerful than that to me it’s an insult to the gospel and godly appearance young person simply means this that you’re identifying your uniform is really really identified years ago i heard an illustration i’m not sure that if it is that is true but even if it’s a parable it certainly illustrates the

truth there was one time um a uh a hippie came walking up to a preacher and uh began to go after him about the appearance issue and say you just judge us by uh by appearance and uh walked by a serviceman and the hippie looked at the serviceman and said hello sailor how you doing whatever something like that and the preacher said that’s the problem with you hippies always judging people by their external. You know what the problem is, folks? We all do that.

You know, you see somebody and they’re dressed a certain way. You assume, okay, that’s what they are. Okay?

So we understand that. God’s simply saying, if you’re saved on the inside, look like it on the outside. A godly appearance. I just dealt with hair,

but my friend, it can be clothes. There are certain fashions I wouldn’t wear. Listen, just a couple days ago, I was somewhere I don’t normally go to malls just because you’ve got to really be careful of malls, but I was walking by Abercrombie & Fitch. And I will tell you, friend, the worst, most ungodly, filthy ad that I’ve ever seen in the world, I’m just being dead honest with you,

my entire life was an Abercrombie & Fitch ad in an airport. Not that I go looking for them, but obviously in our life we run across filth. I would not buy something with Abercrombie & Fitch if you put a gun to my head. I’m not interested in promoting an outfit place

that is completely just surrounded with marketing to teenage sensuality. I’m not interested. Some of you are, but I’m not. When I walked by the store, I shouldn’t have looked in,

but I looked in and thought, yeah, they haven’t changed. You know the pictures on the wall. Some of you know far better than I do.

They’re sensual. You see, somebody who just reached a point, I want to be identified clearly. I want everybody to know whose side I’m on.

I don’t want there to be any confusion of whose army I’m with. See friends, that’s what we’re talking about here And when you get a hold of grace It’s no problem Grace affects your hairstyle, sure It affects the clothes It affects the shoes you may wear Because grace, young person Is not looking like the world And loving it That’s what it is And if your preacher gets up And preaches about some external

And you walk out and there’s a preacher Just talking about external You just missed it Grace is bigger than that, friend okay so first of all godly appearance but let’s keep going this passage of scripture has got some great truth let’s go on look what it says here in verse number 15 and 16 but as he which hath called you is holy so be holy in all manner of conversation because it is written be holy for

i am holy now most of you know the word conversation is the old english word for lifestyle issues so God first of all says godly appearance number two I’m going to call it godly actions lifestyle issues are a lot you’ve heard a lot of lifestyle issues dealt with in these days that we’ve been together there have been a lot of lifestyle issues but godly actions I could deal

with a few here let me just as the Lord leads let’s just deal with a few of lifestyle issues probably today one of the biggest lifestyle issues for teenagers are media choices you’re confronted with the multimedia choices every day you live. Now, media choices, friends, simply means this, that you’re going to be holy in all manner of lifestyle issues just like Jesus Christ is holy. Like He who has called you is holy.

God’s telling you to be holy as He is holy. Okay, so holiness in actions, godly actions, it comes out of grace. In other words, friends, when you wake up in the morning and say, God, I can’t do it, I’m so weak.

Oh God, I need your grace. God, I’m expecting it. It results in steps of obedience. And when you take those steps of obedience,

God graces you. He strengthens you. He delivers you.

We dealt, first of all, with godly appearance. But secondly, godly actions. You know, for some of you that got a hold of God’s grace this week, if you continue on grabbing on to what God’s given you in these days, when you get home tomorrow, there’s going to be some junk going in the garbage can.

You catch my drift? Some of you know, you’ve got DVDs. Listen, over the years, every Friday night in our War of Special Forces, we have a campfire service.

I have seen thousands of rock CDs burnt. Thousands. I remember a few years ago, a kid stood to the campfire.

He had a wicked video game in his Grand Theft Auto. I thought, why would a kid want to play Grand Theft Auto? I think there’s an obscure verse in the Bible somewhere.

Thou shalt not steal. It’s somewhere. You catch my drift?

Listen, some of you guys play Grand Theft Auto. I realize the theft is the least thing about the game. But you don’t think it’s no big deal to virtually steal cars. Maybe you ought to get back and read the Ten Commandments

and take them seriously. I remember that kid got up there, threw Grand Theft Auto, and that’s exactly where Grand Theft Auto needs to go, in the fire. I remember another young lady standing in the microphone.

She had a cell phone, and she’s weeping. Nothing wrong in and of itself with a cell phone, but there’s a lot of junk that goes on in cell phones. She opens up the cell phone. She said, I’ve used this cell phone to contact a young man

my parents do not want me with. tears were streaming down her face she said i’m done i’m through throws that fire that cell phone in the fire in that case i think she did the right thing oh i’m talking to some i mean one young lady in orlando florida came with a garbage bag i don’t know how many ungodly clothes in this black garbage

can a bag and she comes and throws in the fire and says i’m done with it so you need to go home and clean out your wardrobe and grace is not oh what a bummer you know i gotta throw this away oh what a bummer. No, no, no. Grace is throwing it away and loving it. Like this kid named Mike

a few years ago. Burned 60 rock tapes. This was before CDs.

He burned 60 rock tapes. You know what he said to me before he burned the rock tapes? This is going to shock some of you.

This is exactly, I’m quoting him. This is exactly what he said. I never knew how much peace Jesus Christ could give.

Yeah, 60 rock tapes. You know what? He wasn’t burning those rock tapes saying, Oh, what a bummer.

I’m going to do this. It’s for Jesus. No, he was burning them and he was loving it.

He burned those rock tapes. We began to sing victory in Jesus. I want to tell you, old Mike’s mouth was wide open.

You could see his tonsils as he sang victory in Jesus. It’s good stuff. And by the way, it wasn’t white smoke coming out of the fire.

It’s black smoke. Okay, I think it means something. I’m telling some of you young people, you need to do that. and I’ll tell you, you get a hold of God and you start doing that,

I want to tell you something, friend. You’re going to realize it’s grace. You know why some of you have ungodly kids in youth group?

I’m talking to some of you who have kids in youth group that mock. They make fun of God. I’m talking to some of you that have hard-nosed kids, maybe even in this room.

And they absolutely think Christianity is a joke. You know why? Because you’re powerless, defeated, compromised life. And if some of you would get a hold of grace,

you know what would happen? Jesus Christ would start showing up in youth group. You know what? I guarantee you, Jesus Christ shows up,

things are different. That’s grace, friend. And I want to tell you, I remember one Christian school I was in, it was 500 kids.

It had an evangelistic philosophy. I’m certainly not for an evangelistic philosophy of this kind of flavor. It was unbelievable.

It was just like a public school. And you know what? They weren’t winning anybody. If anybody was being evangelized, the Christian kids were being evangelized

by the unsaved kids. and I’ll never forget I got so burdened because I’d get up and start preaching and I’d hit some sin and I’d look out and there’d be all kinds of kids smirking I’ve seen that this week some of you laugh and smirk when I hit the sin I’ve seen it some of you know exactly what I’m talking about you think it’s a big joke

I started preaching out there and those kids would smirk and laugh and the final day God just burdened my heart I preached a message on Lot I preached on the fact man you know some of you out here you’re saved on your way to heaven but your unsaved buddies think Christianity is a joke. Just like Lot’s son-in-laws did. They thought it was a joke.

You know why? Because of Lot’s powerless life. And some of you Christian kids, you don’t have any power.

You’re compromised. You say the same dirty jokes, don’t you? You talk about the same compromise programs.

You wear the same stuff the world wears. You’re just like the world. And you know, friends, you’ve got hard-nosed, backslidden Christian kids who laugh at Christianity because of your compromised life. You’ve got unsaved kids that are around you Maybe even in your youth group That laugh, they think Christianity is a joke You know friends, if you get a hold of the grace of God They won’t think Christianity is a joke And I’ve seen kids get a hold of God

God starts coming to youth group meetings In their lives And I want to tell you something happens I remember one girl She got up to give a testimony Tears were streaming down her face She said God dealt with me about my music She said three weeks ago I’ve got a hunger for God like I’ve never had before six months later i was talking to your youth pastor i said how’s it going he said man you

remember that girl i said i do he said that girl everybody she was so way away from god everybody knows she’s she’s good she’s she’s changed for good she said he said when she comes to christian school she single-handedly is impacting our christian school now you know friend in a sense he was wrong she was not single-handedly i’ll tell you who was impacting in that Christian school’s name is Jesus Christ. He just happened to be showing up

through her dependence around her life. The joy of the Lord exuded from her. This was a girl that didn’t have it before. And I will tell you, some of you kids out here,

you think you’re a leader in your youth group. Or you think you’re the big man in your youth group or the big lady in your youth group. And yet you’ve got kids who could laugh and make fun of God, even in this conference.

And you know why it happens? Because your compromise, backslidden, defeated Christian life. You need to get a hold of grace. and I got good news for you God’s ready the grace is there it’s been there I’m talking to some of you better wake up smell the coffee because some of you already got blood on your hands you’re just adding to it you see you think it’s a big deal you don’t live for God and you ill affect others around you

who don’t live for God and you have no idea some of you are going to be absolutely responsible for thousands of people going to hell because you helped other kids in your youth group stay compromised backslidden and defeated and some of you guys and gals need to wake up and smell the coffee. It’s a big deal. When I see kids go out from a good Bible-preaching church and I see them go out and live for that devil, I think to myself,

man, think of the hundreds of people God wanted to impact through their life. What a tragedy. Some of you need to recognize grace affects your actions.

It’ll affect what you watch on television. I’m talking to some of you, nothing for you to watch a bed scene, nothing for you to hear God’s name taken in vain. Nothing for you to listen to dirt and filth and dirty innuendos and you come to youth group, you know how it is, and you talk about it. And you laugh together

with some of your buddies. Yeah, some of you done it here at the conference. You know what I’m talking about.

You know what Grace is, friend? Grace is not watching that garbage and loving it. I’ll tell you something, young people, the movies that have been made in the last 25 years, I maybe seen five, six, I don’t know, something like that, probably five. have all been cartoons going across the ocean to kill time you know what I’m talking about you know my point is friends if I told you the movies I hadn’t watched you’d be shocked

I’m living proof that you do not have to watch Hollywood movies in 2009 you can still be happy I’m living proof I’m not going to watch anything where God’s name is taken in vain I’m not going to watch anything where there’s a vulgar dirty word I’m not going to watch anything where there’s an innuendo I’m not going to watch anything where there’s a bed scene or any sexual innuendo not going to do it.

At one time, I thought I’ve heard about this movie, Cars was flying across the ocean. I threw it on there. I watched maybe five minutes.

I said, this is a piece of trash. You say it’s just a cartoon. That’s because you’re desensitized.

You watch the filth so much, you don’t think it’s that big a deal. It’s a big deal, bud. Just trash.

Some of your minds are so filthy, you don’t pick up the trash. You’re so far dirtier, your brain’s such a garbage pit. You’re so desensitized to the bill.

You don’t get it. You see, friends, grace is not watching the garbage and loving it. You know how much television I’ve watched in the last year?

Probably less than five hours. I’m not even sure it’s been five this year. It’s been a busy year.

Usually I’m watching it when I’m going through the grocery store. I’m going through the department store, and I’ll stop and watch a few innings of baseball. That’s about it, you know.

But I’m living proof that you cannot watch television. You can be happy. You say, you haven’t seen this?

Probably not. You haven’t seen this? No, probably not.

You don’t watch this? No, probably not. No, no, probably not.

I’ll tell you what I have seen. A couple of months ago, I was in Tampa, Florida, and, man, God moved. We had a prayer meeting, and I won’t tell you, it’s from 45 minutes to an hour. I saw, man, we used more tissue than I can,

and we were using it like crazy. Kids were weeping before God, praying for their classmates. I want to tell you, it was a great prayer meeting.

We prayed for 45 minutes to an hour. You’d have thought it was 10 minutes. We were done with that prayer meeting.

And that night we had our campfire service. And I want to tell you, God came down. I preached the gospel, gave an invitation.

I noticed the girls weeping, just weeping, just bawling. And one of the Christian school kids, taps her on the arm, says, I’ll go with you. I’ll go with you.

Leads the girl over. She gets wondrously saved. You know what, friends? if they hadn’t got right with God,

they wouldn’t have cared. Just like some of you don’t care. I remember as soon as that thing was over, a kid who came clean with God, God began to burden his heart. He thought the hardest kid in the youth group, that’s what they told me,

I didn’t know he was the hardest kid. That’s one thing I love ignorance, you know, you don’t have no clue. Hardest kid in the youth group, some homeschool kid that was just hard as nails. When the kids in the Christian school got burdened for him, he goes over to the kid in his own teenage way, he begins to confront his friend with his need to get right with kid god and this kid broke and brings him back to the team captain

that kid wept unloaded the truck got right with mom and dad that’s pretty neat stuff i did see that that was pretty neat you ever seen stuff like that just two weeks ago i was in canada 33 kids in the youth group at this camp just that church i’m preaching all week long i’m thinking man this is tough but i began to pray it was a battle got another guy to pray with me i believe some people back here were praying

and I began to see God begin to work. I left for the airport. I knew something was going to happen.

I got word back that they had an hour and a half testimony service with 33 kids. The pastor just emailed me. It’s been two weeks. He said, I have never seen such a widespread sweeping move of revival

that I saw from my kids from that camp. And I will tell you, I’ve seen that, friends. You know, God wants you to see it too.

Just got to turn off the television. Maybe you’ll see something a little more dramatic, something a little more supernatural. So it’s something fake. You see, grace is not waking up in the morning, oh, what a bummer, I can’t watch that movie, oh, what a bummer, I can’t watch that TV program,

oh, what a bummer, my parents won’t let me watch it. No, no, no. Grace is not watching the filth and loving it.

Are you getting it? Some of you need to get a hold of grace. Some of you bum out about the rules.

You complain. Listen, I’m talking to some of you who complain about the rules, and I want to tell you, you’re an ambassador for the devil. I’m talking to some of you who complain about your pastor, You complain about your youth pastor.

You complain about the rules of your Christian school. You complain about your church’s standards. And I want to tell you, you’re helping the devil get his work done. Why don’t you get right with God, get a hold of grace,

and let God start doing something through your life. Some of you are mouthpieces for depravity. And you masquerade as some good kid.

You may be fooling me. You may fool your youth pastor. But you hear me, you are not fooling God.

Better get a hold of grace, friend. Get a hold of grace. I’m talking to some of you.

It’s wake-up time. Some of you need to realize this is a big deal And I’m telling you some of you kids in this room Some of the reasons you’ve got problems in youth group Is because you’re just playing neutrality There is no neutrality See grace affects your actions It affects the TV programs I’ll tell you I just got started on it I’ll tell you another thing I saw this fall This spring saw another Christian school Same thing happened man

Thing busted wide open 45 minute prayer meeting You ever seen that? I remember one time I was in Fort Walton Beach forward i gave an invitation 39 young men stepped out to trust jesus christ i came in the room we didn’t even anticipate this many kids packed kids are standing against the wall i’m talking about bit old football players tears streaming down their face as they came forward to trust jesus christ

that’s pretty neat you ever seen something like that i want to tell you young person god wants you all to see stuff like that there’s not anybody out here god don’t want to use in remarkable ways you know what your problem is you’re too busy living your own life and you’re not letting christ live His life through you. I’m talking to some of you at the crossroads and you just better wake up.

Some of you treat your mom and dad like trash. And it’s time to wake up, friends. I’m begging you, get a hold of grace.

Get a hold of grace! Well, God will let you see things. You turn off the television, get in the book, God’s going to start seeing things you never thought you’d see.

Now, there’s one other thing we need to see here. God of godly actions, but there’s one other verse of Scripture we need to see, and then we’ll spend a little time in conclusion. We’re not done, nor are we close, so please don’t pack up.

But look at letter C, and you see it in 1 Peter 1.17. And if you call on the Father, who without respect to persons, judgeth according to every man’s work, pass the time of your sojourning here in, hang on, fear. I’m quoting Proverbs 8.13, which is obviously, this is a reference to the fear of the Lord.

The fear of the Lord is to hate evil. So number three, godly attitude. Godly attitude.

Grace not only results in godly appearance, it does that. Grace not only results in godly actions, it does that. But grace results in a godly attitude.

I’ve already referenced attitudes, but we may refer to a few again. The Bible says the fear of the Lord is to hate evil. And I will tell you, friends, the only way to hate sin is grace.

Because your flesh loves it. God’s grace, God can enable you to hate what God hates and to love what He loves. But one of the things that hits me about this thing, the fear of the Lord, You know, the fear of the Lord, friends, if you fear God, you’re not afraid of man. Fear not them which kill the body, but are not able to kill the soul, but rather fear him,

who is able to destroy both soul and body in hell. You know, friends, when you fear God, when you have a godly attitude, you’re not afraid of your peers. Some of you out here are scared to death what somebody in this room is going to think if you get right with God.

The fear of man bringeth a snare, but whoso putteth his trust in the Lord shall be safe. Proverbs 29 and verse 25. And I’m begging, young person, if you fear God, if you fear God, you will not fear man.

And if you fear man, you mark it down. Not only do you not fear God, you don’t trust Him. Because the Bible says, contrast to me, if you fear man, don’t fear man, trust God.

If you trust God, you won’t fear man. You know, friends, if you fear man, you’re going to be snared. And I’m talking to some of you who are snared from getting right with God.

Do you know why? You fear your peers. You fear your peers.

I remember I was at a Christian school in the state of Maryland. there was a young man in that christian school or 99 kids in that christian school there was a young man by the name of tom he was a freshman in that christian school i began to preach that week they loved special forces absolutely loved it i’ve known very few kids who didn’t it’s a great

that was a great thing of course i’m prejudiced but anyway they absolutely loved it they were into the games into the competition but there was one thing i noticed when i gave an invitation no high schoolers finally toward the end of the week a couple of high school girls come forward shaking not after i don’t think because of conviction because they were scared to death And I began to realize something’s going on in high school. I was preaching in the afternoon,

and I was doing what we did a moment ago. I said, I can do, and they would say, all things. And then I would say, through Christ, which strengthens me.

And all of a sudden I realized that’s the treble clap. You catch my drift? You know the problem with the treble clap, don’t you? It was all the young junior high kids whose voices hadn’t changed,

and all the girls. You know who was missing? Yeah, the senior high guys.

They were missing. and I don’t know the Lord I believe led me to address it in a very strong manner so strong that when I finished I thought nobody’s coming tonight they won’t come it’s done but you know what I realized I got to get back on the ground of faith and they came almost all of them and that night we came to our testimony service and I’ll never forget it there was only one young

man who had gotten right with God in the high school only one only one he was a freshman his name was tom and this kid got right with god and he got all the grace and it come time for testimonies nobody had to pull his arm buddy he’s in line he gets up and i will tell you when he gave his testimony this doesn’t happen that often but he gave his testimony i said god was all over

that testimony i said man that was unbelievable and tom wasn’t a good speaker you know what i mean he erred he uh he split infinitives had bad subject or verb agreement you know i’m talking about but man he had the power of god in his life a couple minutes later another a sophomore guy who hadn’t made a decision all week long steps the microphone tears are in his eyes

he said i’ve never seen tom act like that before that was god you know i thought i think he picked it pretty well don’t you and i want to tell you friends that thing busted wide open i remember a junior by the name of chris chris amos he grabs the microphone he’s pacing back and forth he was more than me, and that’s Payson. I mean, he’s going back and forth. He’s saying, man, I’m sick of it.

He said, I’m so sick and tired of it. He said, I’m sick and tired of the preacher giving an invitation. And all of us sit out there scared to death that somebody might laugh at us. He said,

I’m sick of it. He said, I’m getting right with God, and you need to too. And I’m not exaggerating how he did it.

I thought, that’s pretty good. That’s a pretty good sermon. That’ll work. He didn’t have to give an invitation,

buddy. It busted. Senior in high school steps to the microphone Tears are streaming down his face And he apologizes for putting pressure on people Not to get right with God That’s like some of you are Oh you may not do it verbally But your very life You pressure people not to get right with God It’s time bud You better realize you’re playing with big stuff I’m begging young people This is important And that thing all busted wide open

I could give you other stories where it broke through when people stopped fearing man and they started fearing God. You know what that’s called? It’s called grace. Friends, when you get a hold of this, let’s just review it,

then I’m going to give you the conclusion. It is a few moments, so let’s just review it. Here it is.

You’re walking through life. God confronts you as He has this week. You reject wrong thinking.

You embrace right thinking. You begin to put it in your heart. As you put it in your heart, you develop the attitude of dependence.

Oh God, I need you today. I need you. And I’m expecting your grace. And then as a result of that, you begin taking steps of obedience that result in godly appearance,

godly actions, and godly attitude. And when you start taking those steps of faith that result in godly appearance, godly actions, and godly attitude, God graces you. He strengthens you.

I’m going to go back to when I was a teenager. Not only was I shy and outreached a tremendous challenge. By the way, young person, every single one of you can be vibrant witnesses for Jesus Christ.

It does not matter how shy you are. God’s grace is bigger than that. And God can give you a love for what you now are scared to death of.

He can do it. Well, anyway, I was shy, and God has a sense of humor. He called me to preach.

There’s only one problem. I didn’t like to speak in front of people. And you know what else?

This is going to absolutely shock you. I was a middle child. You know what?

Middle children, you middle children, we relate. You know what we relate on? We hate conflict.

Because we’re always in the middle of it. You know what I’m talking about? They call us closets.

We’ve got all these hang-ups. That’s the middle kid, okay? Some of you middle kids, you know what I’m talking about, okay?

And so here I am. God called me to preach, and I hated confrontation. I’ll be honest with you. To this day, outside of ministry, if I’m listening to some talk radio, and some guy calls in and they start going after each other,

I cannot take it. I turn the radio off. I tell you, I don’t like confrontation.

I’m just dead honest with you as far as just life, okay? Just walking through life. I don’t like it at all.

And so God calls me to preach. Well, you know what preaching is? It’s confrontational.

At least it used to be. It’s not anymore, but it used to be. It wasn’t the Bible.

We kind of got away from the Bible. But anyway, so I’m called to preach. I remember one time my uncle was preaching, and he said, Jimmy, would you?

They used to call me Jimmy. And Jimmy, would you get up and would you read a passage of Scripture? And he gives me the passage.

I mean, I’m telling you, I don’t know if this has ever happened to you. A lump comes out. It’s like a huge apple in my throat.

Tears come to my eyes. I’m afraid I’m going to start bawling. My face goes beet red.

All those blonde people, we understand the beet red thing. You know what I’m talking about? Just boom, just beet red.

I’m afraid tears are going to start to spill out. I’m choking out the words. I’m barely getting through it.

And man, when I sat down, I was so grateful. It was over. I said, oh, I hope I never have to do that again.

God called me to preach. Well, young people, I’ve got good news for you. God does not call the gift that He gifts the call.

So I started to preach. God called me to preach. 16 years old, I yielded.

I started to preach. And I remember my dad, you know, he’s all excited about it. I was kind of excited about it.

But he sent me over to some church for pulpit supply. I prepared the outline. I got up.

And I want to tell you, that was the most boring sermon I have ever heard. You think it’s a hard thing hearing a boring sermon. Feel sorry for the guy giving the boring sermon. i’m thinking to myself this is terrible this is terrible i can’t do this i tried a few other times boredom i i just i’m thinking this i can’t do this but and i’m called to preach so i better do this

you know what else am i going to do you know flip burgers and mcdonald’s you know and diet 30 of obesity but i you know i didn’t what i’m going to do so uh here it is go off to bible college start preparing to preach I remember coming back after my freshman year And God had begun to stir my heart as I’ve already mentioned And I didn’t realize it at the time But you know what God was showing me His grace

I’ll never forget toward the end of the summer My dad said Jim I want you to preach on Sunday night Sunday night At the Marquette Manor Baptist Church I mean there’s going to be 500, 600 people there Me, freshman me I was scared to death I prepared a message I have no idea where the outline is but if I looked at today I’m sure I’d be embarrassed I mean it was sorry sorry so I prepare the outline

and I spent all afternoon brother nothing I wasn’t doing anything Sunday afternoon but pleading with God I didn’t even start I didn’t even work on the message I didn’t care about the outline I needed God I remember spending all afternoon crying out to God I remember getting in the pulpit and that day when I got the pulpit I knew something was different you know what? God was there. And every young preacher boy knows the experience.

He’ll never be the same. And I began to preach and I realized God’s here. I remember God giving application.

I remember God giving sentences. I’m thinking, this is unbelievable. And you know what?

I absolutely loved it. I absolutely loved it. And that day I gave the invitation and here it is, my home church. People start coming down the aisle

and I couldn’t believe it. you know young person that’s called it’s called grace it’s not me i know it’s not me you know i know me do you know you i know me i’ll tell you every time i preach and i’ll tell you i see god work and i see soul saved you know friends if i think about it and i really think about it i

know that was god because i know me young person some of you’re going to miss out on that you’re too benched in doing your own thing you’re going to miss out on grace i feel so sorry for you grace is God intersecting with your life. Young person, it’s time to wake up. Some of you out here have been stiff-arming God all week. Some of you have no clue who you are,

but I’ve got good news for you. God knows who you are, and some of you, God’s on your front doorsteps, and that preacher’s talking about you. And some of you know this message, and the burden that God’s given in this hour is for you.

I don’t know who you are, bud, but you do. I don’t know who you are, hard-nosed young lady, plays big tough girl, uses the bad language. I’m talking to some of you girls who are filthy.

You’ve got filthy minds. You talk about the guys. You talk about all kinds of filthy stuff.

I’m talking about girls who’ve done it in the hallways of this church. Probably in the last couple of days. Your mind is so filthy.

I’ve got good news for you. It’s called the grace of God. And you get a hold of the grace of God, it’s unbelievable.

For 25 years I’ve traveled with college-age young men. I could give you stories. I won’t give names because I haven’t gotten the permission to give their stories.

Some of them you know. When they first started traveling with me, they didn’t have much. They started depending on God, and I’ve seen God transform some of them into some of the most phenomenal workers among teenagers I’ve ever seen.

You know what I’m saying? That’s God. God can do it any young man in this room, any young lady in this room.

Just stop living for self. Just get a hold of grace. Start living daily depending upon God. You’re going to see God get involved in your life, and you know what you’re going to know

the rest of your life? That was God. That was God.

I know me. That was God. Don’t you want to live your life that way, young person?

Could I ask every head-bound place and every eye closed? It’s time, friend. It’s time.

I don’t want anybody goof around, mess around. Some of you need to recognize it’s time. It’s time. Some of you kids here from this church, you’ve let familiarity breed contempt, and you’ve just sitting out there saying,

I’ve heard this before. It’s time, young lady. It’s time, young man.

You stop playing games with God. I’m going to ask people to listen carefully I’m going to ask Mike Fisher to listen carefully Everybody listen very carefully On how we’re going to conduct What we’re going to do in the next moment This is important I’m going to ask God’s people Who know how to pray, you pray I believe there’s some young man Some young ladies At a crisis point in their life It’s time friend God loves you

He’s for you I’m for you I want God’s hand to be on all your lives Heads are bound and eyes are closed And no one’s looking In just a moment I’m going to give this invitation You listen to it carefully I’m going to invite you if this week Let me ask you first of all I’m going to ask you to give a hand raising How many this week would say preacher publicly or privately

I’ve made a decision for Jesus Christ Best I know I’ve done all the business God’s wanted me to do And publicly or privately I’ve made a decision for Jesus Christ I am not ashamed of it And I do want my decision to last for Jesus Christ If that’s your heartbeat raise your hand high and hold it there I’ve made a decision for Jesus Christ And these days publicly or privately Not ashamed of it thank you and put your hands down

now some of you out here could not raise the hand because you’re right with the Lord came into the week right with the Lord hallelujah I’m for you I’m not looking down at you I have no idea the people kept their hands down I have no idea which category you may be in others you may God may have dealt with you and you may have said no to him I don’t know the difference I can’t see your heart

heads bowed and eyes are closed here’s what we’re going to do if this week you have made a decision for Jesus Christ publicly or privately and you’re not ashamed of the decision you have made for Jesus Christ and you want the decision to last in a moment i’m going to ask you to go to the into the lobby and i’m going to ask them all to go to one room as we

normally do one room i’m not sure which room it will be but it’ll be one room and there i’m going to ask you to get on your knees and i’m going to ask you to hope for grace everybody in one room all the guys girls one room and then i’m going to address you i’m going to ask you to get on your knees i’m going to ask you just quietly in

your own heart say god i need you god i can’t do it oh god i’m weak but god i’m expecting your grace I’m in union with Jesus Christ and your life is in me I’m dependent on grace my friend grace is simply Christ at work it’s another way of putting the message we heard this morning now if you’re out here and say preacher I’ve not made a decision but God’s hit me between the eyes

and I need to move and I know it you just join in we’ll have a way in just a moment of helping you so whether or not you’ve already made a decision or you know you’ve got God’s dealing with you and it’s time to say yes to God in either case I’m going to beg you publicly or privately if you’ve done business with God I’m asking you to go to the room

and you all go together, get on your knees and once you’re done praying then I’m going to address you as a group. I’ll ask Pastor Van Gelderen, my brother John and others to however they feel led with those remaining. We will send those back in here for a prayer meeting probably within 20 minutes or so. So we will have a prayer meeting eventually back in

this auditorium as the Lord leads. So heads are bound and eyes are closed and no one’s looking. You say, okay preacher, I made a decision for Jesus this week, publicly or privately, I’m not ashamed of it.

I want it to last. And I know it will never last without God’s grace, and I’m not ashamed of my decision, if that’s you. Right now, don’t be ashamed. Right now, stand to your feet, open your eyes,

and head to the lobby. They’ll tell you where to go. Open your eyes, head to the lobby.

Don’t go unless you’re dead serious about this. Now, if you know you’ve got a decision to make, go. If you know you’ve got a decision to make, you join.

You say, preacher, I haven’t made it, but I got to. You go. Sponsors, you’re welcome to join your young people.

And I’m going to ask Pastor Van Gelderen to continue as he sees fit. We may have a singspiration or a prayer time, I’m not sure, but if you need to go, go. It’s time.

It’s time. I just feel burdened to say one of the things. Some of you young people right here from this church, you’re sitting in the pew and you know God’s on your front porch.

It’s time, friends, stop playing games, goofing around with the junk in your life. You know it’s there. I beg you, young person, if God’s dealing with you, please go.

Speaker 2: For those remaining, let’s just take a moment right now to let the Lord work. It’s hard to know exactly what to say. There are those who are here because you have been right with God.

And you are here because you did not need to go. And so I urge you to pray. and then there are those of you here that are at a crossroads and I remember as a teenager there was that moment in which the invitation was given and I was able to resist that pressure but then thankfully a little bit later the decision was made so the invitation is not over even though we’re praying here remember it doesn’t have a thing to do

with the preacher you just heard it doesn’t have anything to do with the Bible conference you heard the word of God and the presence of the Lord was here so I want to remind you it’s between you and God just forget about personalities right now and you do have a will I want to remind you that you are resisting God Almighty what I was saying earlier one of the best decisions ever made was when I resisted and finally said that’s it

in fact it changed my life if anyone feels led to pray feel free to do that in just a minute I’ll give us a break before we reconvene if you’d like to pray then I’ll close Lord we do thank you for your grace Lord I do pray you’ll be with every young person that was willing to step out by faith to allow you to work in their hearts I pray that you’ll be with the meeting that is going on now.

And Lord, I pray that you’ll do the full work that needs to be done. Now, Lord, you know the condition of all of us that are left here in this room. Lord, I pray that there will not be a false sense of security with any of us.

Lord, help us to be honest before you. Any that are resisting you, Lord, I pray that you’ll just awaken their thinking. And Lord, may they understand how much you love them and that this is dangerous to be in that kind of point.

Now, Lord, I pray that you’ll just encourage them. May they send your love. May the goodness of God lead us all to repentance.

Would you bless the time to follow? Would your presence and power be here, I pray? And we’ll thank you in Jesus’ name.

Amen. All right, we will recess for ten minutes and then come back in. I’m not sure when Dr. Jim will bring the other group in,

but that will just get us prepared for the next session. So I do ask that you stay away from probably the classroom halls, I’m just guessing. Please be very careful with wherever.

There in the fellowship halls? Okay, so stay away from the fellowship halls, if you would, and let’s show respect for the work that’s being done there. Let me just ask that there be appropriate talk.

If you do want help, if you’d like to talk to someone, that would be a good thing. So let’s recess for just about ten minutes here.

Find an issue in this transcript? Let us know at website@theegeneration.org.

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Thou therefore endure hardness, as a good soldier of Jesus Christ. No man that warreth entangleth himself with the affairs of this life; that he may please him who hath chosen him to be a soldier. 2 Timothy 2:3-4 In the year 1776 Lt, General John Burgoyne or “Gentleman Johnny” as he was called was one of the main generals

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In this episode, Dr. Jim looks at the crucial difference between conformity and true spiritual transformation. Learn how to avoid looking on the outside what you’re not on the inside, and how to let God change you into what you truly are inside through the Word of God and the Spirit of God. Listen and let God’s metamorphosis change you!

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When life squeezes hard, the gospel says you’re not losing—you’re winning. In this powerful opener from Romans 8, Pastor Bobby Bosler shows how God turns pressure into pathways and weakness into overwhelming victory. Trade your script for His and discover the blowout win that only Christ can write through a surrendered, dependent life.

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Success is not found in a platform, a ministry title, or a number on a dashboard. In this episode, Bobby Bosler opens John 1 and Galatians 6 to show that Christ’s simple call—Follow Me—defines a life of true success, whether it leads to a visible ministry or quiet faithfulness. Let go of the vision you have built for yourself and follow Jesus wherever He leads.

Dr. Jim Van Gelderen is president of Minutemen Ministries, vice-president of Baptist College of Ministry, and evangelist out of Falls Baptist Church. He and his wife, Rhonda, travel the country in evangelism. They have three daughters.

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Becoming A Good Soldier

Conformed or Transformed?

Saved to Win

Seeking the Presence of God

Follow Me

Supporting the Work of God

Be Moved By Jesus

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