Blue Jean Theology Part 3

Tom Shrader continues his exposition of James 1, focusing on how believers should respond to trials with joy because testing produces endurance and spiritual maturity. He explains that God allows various trials in our lives not to harm us but to refine us, and that we can ask for wisdom in the midst of suffering. Using personal illustrations and Romans 8:28, he demonstrates how God works all things together for good in the lives of His children.

“In your life, the fruit is not fruit you produce. The stuff you produce is like the tree we got in the backyard. It's got no value other than it might look good.”

— Tom Shrader

Series: Blue Jean Theology (2011)

Recorded: 1996

Duration: 43 min

Themes: trials, joy, endurance, wisdom, suffering, perseverance, testing, maturity, going through hardship, facing persecution, new believer, struggling with trials, seeking wisdom, feeling overwhelmed, experiencing loss, questioning god's plan

Scripture: James 1:2-5, Romans 8:28, 1 Corinthians 10:13, 1 Thessalonians 4:3-7

Theological Themes: sanctification, spiritual maturity, divine sovereignty, providence, biblical wisdom, christian growth, spiritual testing, perseverance

Full Transcript

We are working our way in a chapter-by-chapter, verse-by-verse way through the book of James. Today, we continue along this same path that I frankly thought we'd be out of last week, and I thought we'd be out of it this week, but my gut instinct is that we'll take just one more week to try to tie all this together.

The Author and His Audience

We're dealing with a book written by James. James is the half-brother of Jesus Christ. He's a pillar of the early church, an important player in that church, was in fact a leader of the early church. In the midst of all of this, we discover, just through his introduction, that he's a man of great humility, for he identifies himself as a bondservant, that is, as a slave of the Lord Jesus Christ. He's writing to the twelve tribes that are scattered abroad.

These twelve tribes represent the Jews, the operative word here, Jewish Christians, who've been scattered. They're scattered for either a very good reason, which would be they've been scattered in obedience to the Great Commission, or they're scattered because of persecution. In either case, and this is really important to understand, in either case, for no reason of their own, they are experiencing enormous hardship.

If they remain in Jerusalem, in that area, they have lost their family, they have lost their economic network, they've lost their social connections, they are experiencing enormous persecution. If they're scattered abroad, the same thing is in place. There's no network system yet, there's no way of delivering economic and spiritual and emotional support that they would need as missionaries. In either case, James is writing with a clear understanding of who he's writing to and their situation.

Consider It All Joy

Therefore, he begins by saying, "Consider it all joy." In other words, I want you to consider, reckon—it's an accounting term. Reckon it, consider it, put it in there, take it to the bank, that you are to be joyful when you encounter various trials.

Now, on the surface, first glance, you've got to say, this guy is sick. There's got to be something seriously wrong when this guy is saying, you're to be happy and joyful when you encounter trials.

The Nature of Trials

Just a couple of things that we looked at last week, as James talks about trials, what he tells us right here at the very beginning is, these things are inevitable. He says, "when you encounter them." If you think, because you're a Christian, you're not going to have any hardship, you're wrong. It is inevitable. In fact, I'm not even going to go one step beyond that. You must encounter trials, and we'll see why in just a second.

They are varied. Again, this is really important. As we look at trials, what God is doing is putting us in the fire, taking us out of the fire, putting us in the fire, taking us out of the fire, putting us in the fire, taking us out of the fire. He's cutting a little of this, clip a little of that, prune a little of this, whack a little here, beat a little here, but He's doing it for a reason. He's doing it so you will become the man or woman of God that He desires you to be.

Well, what Mark needs and Barb needs and George needs is way different than what Dave needs or Chuck needs or Bud needs. So the trials are going to be varied. One area that's already clearly communicated and it's working in his life, God may say, that's fine, but I need to come over here and work at it. So the trials are various trials in various areas. They come unexpectedly and they have a grand design and a grand purpose and that's to test your faith and develop your perseverance.

The Purpose Behind Trials

Now that's what He says to us here at the very beginning. "Consider it all joy, my brother, when you encounter various trials." And here's the reason why. It's not because I'm a sick guy and somehow I get my jollies through these trials. He says, "I want you to count it joy because you know that the testing of your faith will produce endurance."

So we put it in a form of an equation. Here it is: Faith plus testing equals endurance. We'll come back and talk about it.

A Personal Testimony

I want to read you just some portions of a letter that I received a couple of years ago. I will tell you up front, there's a sense in which part of this is very self-serving. I do not, and that's why I even hesitate to use it as an illustration. But it accurately makes the point. It seems to me that frequently we look at these things and we say, "yeah, that's fine," but we can't get it out of our own grid or we have a hard time accepting that maybe it really happens. Or we take these principles and then look at a biblical character and never make the transition to today.

"Before I started coming to your study, I guess you would have asked several hundred people if I was a Christian, and I'm sure the answer would have been a resounding yes. But after attending a couple of your studies, I started feeling really uncomfortable. My husband, daughter, and myself attended church regularly and we're active on committees. We do lots of volunteer work. My husband and I are good parents, kind and passionate people. We were all the things that seemed and appeared to be right, but something was missing."

"A friend of ours loaned us years of your tapes, probably weeks of tapes, but they seemed like years of tapes. We devoured them, which is part of the problem because you're supposed to listen to them, not eat them. But still, nonetheless, they seemed to work. Many hours were spent, and still are, discussing the tapes, the scriptures that were involved. You made it so easy, repentance and faith. Through these words, our lives were changed. Funny, but 45 years of attending church"

and no one presented it so clearly. It's a wonderful feeling that followed. I get it now. I understand it. It makes sense.

Again, I know that sounds self-serving. That isn't my point. I want you to see where this lady is. She's somebody who's been in church. Regardless of that, church membership means zero in terms of conversion. But now you have somebody who's come to Christ.

Here's the point. And then when our family was riding at an all-time high, and it's never going to get any better than this, the best it's ever been, cancer struck. I kept remembering what you said, that everything is either caused or allowed by God, even Bill Clinton. That was supposed to be a joke. Suddenly, there was such a feeling of confidence, knowing that He had control over even this in my life. I think my family would have fallen apart if all of the above had not happened. Your tape on why God allows suffering is truly the best. It helped me understand and accept.

Listen to this. It helped me understand and accept, which is a big part of it. We don't put you through this and have you go through this fire just so you can understand and accept it. What is terrific to me is she doesn't say, "I look for my healing." Because she isn't healed in this, by the way. The healing wasn't the point here. May happen, may not happen.

From Test to Witness

So now you're sitting there trying to figure out why you're going through all this. It seems to me the answer is right there. To understand it, to accept it. It's a real, live application of what you're seeing here. Her faith comes in and with it comes one of the most gigantic tests a person can experience. It's going to be suffering and pain and physical hardship and ultimately, perhaps even death.

But that faith is tested. And now, here's this gal who didn't know anything and within a few years, she becomes a witness to many of the people around her. How and why? Let me submit to you, it's because of the test and the fire. Now, you understand why James says... That's a key word in verse 3. You know something. It's a certainty to you.

The Most Comforting Verse

If we go back to try to find a verse that perhaps is the most comforting for the Christian in the time of trouble, we would frequently land on a verse that's identified in the book of Romans in the 8th chapter and the 28th verse. Now, we've done this exercise with you many times. But let's do it again. Because there's lots of new people here and maybe they'll fall for it.

So, if I say to you, Romans 8, verse 28, what does that say? And again, some of you have been around a long time. You know that verse. What does that verse say? Here's what He says: "All things work together for good to those who love God and are called according to His purpose."

Now, does the verse say that? Yes. Is that all the verse says? No. Very, very important. And I'm not picking on anybody because for years when somebody said to me, "quote Romans 8:28," I would have said, "All things work together for good for those who love God and are called according to His purpose."

Problem is this. There's a phrase there. There's a phrase at the beginning that's dropped off. What's the phrase at the beginning? "And we know," this is everything, "that God causes all things to work together for good."

A Verse About God, Not Us

If I start with "all things work together for good," that verse is a verse about me and my problems and my circumstance. If we start with "and we know God," all of a sudden we see that verse isn't about us. That verse is about God. It tells us about God. It says God causes all this stuff to work together for good.

Now, if I gave you a Bible, and it was really a thin Bible. You've seen ultra-thin. This is an ultra-thin Bible. It's so thin, it's only got one verse in it. Romans 8:28. If I gave you a Bible and that was the only verse it had in it, and you didn't know anything else, what must be true about God if that verse is true?

He's sovereign. He's going to do whatever He wants to do, and He's going to do it for His purpose. What else? If that verse is true, that God causes all things to work together for good, what else is true? He's omnipotent. He's got to know what's going to happen. He can't cause them to work together for good if He doesn't know what's going to happen in the future.

And what else? He's omnipresent. He's in control. He's good. He's got a plan. None of that matters if He doesn't love us. He's omniscient. He knows all this stuff.

The Essential Missing Piece

There's one more thing that He's got to be. None of that matters. He's eternal. He's all-knowing. All of that is great, but it's got nothing to do with this one other thing. He's got to be all-powerful.

If He's not all-powerful, how pathetic it is if He looks down in heaven and He goes, "Oh, I see what's going to happen. I know what's going to happen. I'm a God of love. I'm a God of justice. I'm fair. I know all this." But if He can't do anything about it, what a pathetic situation that would be.

So we don't know anything but Romans 8:28. We know it's true because it comes out of that word. That verse, by the way, this is how you ought to study. Look at how much you got out of that verse. You didn't even spend any time on it. It just explodes off the page. He's an all-powerful God because He causes all things to work together for good. It doesn't say that He causes all things. We're going to look at that in two weeks. For we know from this book we're studying that He doesn't cause evil.

Even evil or sin is used by Him for good. So here we go. Right where you live. We know that God is in control. We know that in our life He will bring test after test after test after test. And He does it for a reason. He does it to produce in our life endurance or perseverance or patience.

Here's a verse. 1 Corinthians 10, verse 13. And this is from the modern translation, the message by Eugene Peterson. And here's what he says: "No temptation, no test that comes your way is beyond the course of what others have had to face. All you need to remember is that God will never let you down. He'll never let you be pushed past your limit. And He'll always be there to help you come through it."

The Difference Between Tests and Temptations

In the midst of this testing, and this is subtle here. This is one of those parenthetical inserts where we're going to get in and we're going to get out real quick. Test or temptation. In your life comes a bunch of stuff. If it's from God, it's a test. If it's from Satan, it's a temptation.

And the difference is this. God is doing it to produce good in your life and to help you become what He wants you to be. Satan's doing it to destroy you, to kill you, to murder you, to annihilate you, and to make you one of his. That's what he would do if he could.

Three Things You Need to Know About Testing

When this stuff comes, three things you need to know. Number one, whatever you're going through, others have been down this road before. There's a great tendency as these things start to happen to us to say, "Nobody's ever suffered like this. Nobody's ever had a wife like this. Nobody's ever had a husband like this. Nobody's ever had a boss like this." Every time I get sick, I say to Susan, "No one's ever been this sick. No one's ever hurt this much." And God says, "That's a joke." Whatever road you're on, a bucket load of people have been down that road before.

So there's great comfort in that. Let me give you two aspects of that. Number one, there's great comfort. You're not in uncharted waters. Number two, even this can be used by you.

A perfect example. A few years ago, we had a lady in our Sunday school who was pregnant, and she was jacked. She's a perky, bubbly, she's just a neat gal, man. She was excited. And she called, and she was on her way to the hospital to have the baby. And then the phone rang the next morning, and she was on the phone, and none of that joy was there. And I said, "What happened?" She said, "The baby died."

And I went to see her, and there was not much I could do. I kind of held her hand a little bit. I hugged her husband who was hurting. I said, "I'm going to send somebody up to see you." Then here's what she said. By the way, if you're ever in positions like this, don't ever say these words. She said, "I don't want to see anybody." That's your natural instinct, but that's the time you need people most.

I said, "No, I'm sending somebody up." "I don't want to see anybody. I don't know them." I sent up a couple who six months prior to this had lost a baby. And they walked into the room, and as awkward as I felt, that's how comfortable they felt. And they hugged, and they loved, and within a second, they could say, "We know how you feel."

They shared later, "Tom, six months ago, we couldn't see any possible good in the midst of what we were going through. And today, God used us in a mighty way in the lives of those people." Suffering and pain gives you a kinship, and if you're willing, it allows you to serve other people in a way that's absolutely unique. So whatever you're going through, I don't know what it is. Whatever you're going through, there's others that have been through it. And God will use that in your life, use them, and use you in other people's lives.

God Knows Your Limits

Here's the second thing. God will never push you past your limits. He knows what you can take. And the phrase we use is, He knows the maximum elasticity of your faith. He knows how far you go.

So He will take you, and He will pull you. And you'll immediately begin to resist. And you'll say, "No, God, no, I don't want that. And I know." And He'll go, "Oh, God, I got the point. I got the lesson. No, I can't take any more." And you'll go, "Oh, God, I can't take any more. This is it. Father, we're at the limit. We can't go any more." And He says, "Really?" You go, "Oh, that's it." And He said, "That's right. That's it. You can't take any more."

Now, two things. Number one, my tendency is to go, "Glad we got the suffering over. And I'm glad that's behind us because we've got a lot of life to live, and I don't want to go through that again." No. Here's what happened. All we've done is loosen up the band, so we just start out here next time. We don't go back in here and go, "No, no, no, no." We just start right here. That's one side of that.

Removing Our Excuses

The other is what God does is take away as many excuses as you have, and we all have a tendency to use them. God takes away the devil-made-me-do-it excuse because there's no test, there's no temptation, there's nothing in your life that is beyond your capacity as a Christian to endure it so that when you sin, you say, "It's my fault and my responsibility."

The devil didn't make me do it. My spouse didn't make me do it. My mom didn't make me do it. I'm not a victim of my socioeconomic background. I did it because I wanted to do it. I like sin. I love sin, and that's why I'm in it. That's why I did it.

Strength Through Weakness

Here's the third thing that we find in this verse. God is the one who gives you all sorts of strength. It's interesting because it's one of those paradoxes. In the Christian faith, until I am weak in myself, until I reach that point, I cannot be strong in Him.

As long as I'm saying, "God, I can handle this. God, I'll take care of this. God, kind of move aside. I may need just a little crunch there every once in a while, but get out of the way." God's going to say, "Go get them, tiger. Go for it, buddy." It'll be like that old cartoon where you're into this about 5% of the way, and you're going, "Help, Mr. Wizard. I need to get out of this. I'm in way over my head. Help me get out."

of it. And He'll come along, if you're His kid. He'll come along, and He'll help you. He may not get you out of it. See, that verse doesn't say He's going to get you out. That's the way we think. I'm in the middle of this. Either I created it or I'm in it. Whatever it is, it doesn't matter. I'm in the middle of this thing. So I'm thinking, okay, if God's really going to work, here's what's going to happen. He's going to get me out of this. He's going to take the circumstances away, or better yet, He's going to make an omelet out of these scrambled eggs and broken eggs or whatever.

That's not what it says. In fact, the word patient means to stand up under. What He's saying is, I may not take these circumstances away, but I'll join you in them. Very significant to me, anyway.

The Holy Spirit's Work in Trials

As Jesus is getting ready to say goodbye to His disciples, and recorded for us, especially intimately, by the one, the disciple that He loves so dearly, John, as we record the last words of Christ, it is interesting to me what a large percentage of them are devoted to the work of the Holy Spirit in your life. And that work that the Holy Spirit does in your life as a believer is primarily to convict you of your sin, but to guide you, to lead you, to strengthen you, and to enable you to live.

Back to the text. Here's what He says. Go ahead and get this testing done, knowing that it produces endurance, and let endurance. The idea is that that endurance will just kind of happen out of that. It is the natural consequence of what you're going through. He says, let endurance have its perfect result, that you may be mature, complete and lacking nothing.

The Process of Spiritual Maturity

So here's what He's saying. Number one, this testing produces endurance. As the endurance comes, you become perfect. And the word perfect in the Greek here does not mean that you're without flaws. What it means is you're maturing.

So that I take this thing, I take this metal, and I know I've got some gold in there, but I know I've got a lot of other things as well. I put it in the fire, I take it out of the fire. I put it in the fire, I take it out of the fire. As I put it in and take it out, I'm beginning to melt away those impurities.

Now here's the difference between you and a lump of gold. We can keep going through this until we get rid of all the impurities in the gold. I'm never going to accomplish that in you. You're going to go in the fire and out of the fire, and in the fire and out of the fire, and in the fire and out of the fire, and every time you're going to come out different. Not perfect, but different, mature, complete, lacking nothing.

Complete and Lacking Nothing

Lacking nothing doesn't mean that you're going to have everything you want, but it means you have everything you need, especially in this area of trials, and especially in this area of understanding what's going on, because you have the Holy Spirit in your life.

Let me make just one point. He says, let endurance. And the idea to me is that endurance is the natural progression of this process.

I finished teaching Sunday, and a guy came up, and he said, I got an idea for a bumper sticker, which tells me probably the lesson wasn't that good if this guy's thinking of entrepreneurial ideas. But who knows if it's a good idea, we'll all make money on it. So I said, well, what is it? He said, well, it's just two words. I said, what is it? And he said, fruit happens. Well, you know what? He's dead right. He walked away. I said, that's pretty good. He walked away. I thought, I can make a lot of money on this. And this guy, remember, no one hit him.

Fruit Happens

See, that's exactly what it is. In our life, fruit, in a Christian experience, the fruit of the Holy Spirit, it just happens. That doesn't mean there isn't discipline. But I can't produce fruit. I get into this situation where the fruit is there.

We've got these trees I've mentioned to you before in the back of our yard. And they're decorative. You can't eat them. And they are prolific in their capacity to produce decorative fruit. Thousands, and I am not lying, thousands and thousands of oranges. And I hate these things, and I hate the trees, and I don't ever go out there anyway.

And Susan said the other day, she said, you know, these are citrus, and it's been a while. We need to paint the bottom of these trees white. I said, listen, if you feel a compulsion to paint those trees white, I'll drive you on over there, and you can get some white paint. But I have no desire. I hate these trees. I don't care if you paint them or not, okay? Honey. And so, she said, I'll get to paint on my own. So she came in, and I said, are you going to really paint these trees? And she said, I'll be kind of fun, and it's a nice day. I'm going out there.

Well, I went out there, and there she is. Here's this tree. And I am not exaggerating. Thousands of these oranges. They came in, we had some guys come in, and they just cut branches of these things out of there. Because these things are so, there's so many of them, they just break the branches. I hate this tree.

The Point About Natural Fruit Production

And so, I'm going to make a point to her. So she's painting. I said, listen. She said, what? I said, shh, shh, listen. She said, Tom, I don't hear anything. I said, that's my point. Fruit happens.

You don't hear the tree going, today's a fruit day. I'm going to produce fruit today. Today's a fruit day. No. I get all of these things in place, and then the fruit just happens. The tree's got nothing to do with producing the fruit.

In your life, the fruit is not fruit you produce. The stuff you produce is the tree we got in the backyard. It's got no value other than it might look good. The fruit that the Holy Spirit produces is fruit that is genuine and real. It's legitimate. And it just happens. That doesn't mean it doesn't take discipline, but it means if your idea is to produce fruit, produce fruit, I'm going to love, love, love, love, love, love, love. You can't do it. When the fruit of the Spirit comes along, love, joy, peace, patience, kindness,

goodness, gentleness, patience, self-control, and those things just begin to happen. They don't just come one day. They happen through a process most frequently like this.

So if you say to me, what I really want to do more than anything else is I want to grow in spiritual maturity. If you want to grow in spiritual maturity, here's the prayer that God hears. God hears you say, Father, there's a lot of stuff in my life. I want You to do whatever You need to do to take all of the junk out of there. And I know that what that means is You're going to have to slice me and dice me and prune me and shear me and cut me and put me in the fire. Father, go to it.

Now, that may not have been the prayer you wanted to say. And you may want to now stop and say, I've been rethinking this. I don't want to grow. But those are the choices. I don't think there's any other choice. Those lessons of the most significance are going to happen when He cuts and cuts and cuts.

The Need for Wisdom Over Knowledge

Now, verse 5 is a classic verse. If you've ever been involved in any Bible memory, you've memorized verse 5. So much so, we don't even need to put it on the overhead. If any of you lacks wisdom. Now, notice the diplomacy there. We all lack wisdom. If any of you lack wisdom, let Him ask God.

You want to understand life. We're not talking about knowledge. We're talking about wisdom. I found a great quote the other day. The librarian at Yale said, "We have too many books." You know, when I came in today, there was a guy downstairs doing a little work and we were talking. And he said, this email and this voicemail and this stuff is killing me. Knowledge is not the problem of our generation. Wisdom is. We've got all these facts. Now, what are we going to do with them?

I had the TV on this morning while I was getting ready. And it was the National Press Club. And they had a professor of psychiatry at Harvard University who was talking about presidential politics and mental health, which I thought was interesting. And the question was, do you think we ought to have some mental health standards for the president of the United States? So all of a sudden now, we're going to have a baseline IQ, a baseline mental health. This is goofy.

And he went on to say that in his mind, he really thinks Ronald Reagan would not have tested out in those last four or five years, in this baseline process, just because of what you could see as the beginning. That's nuts. I'll take Ronald Reagan and those six years of whether he was in or out or not is irrelevant to me. I'll take six years of that over the mental health guy that we may or may not have now. In the middle of this process, what I need is wisdom. What do I do?

Understanding Context in Scripture

Now, understand this. The context. In real estate, we say three things, the most important things are what? In biblical interpretation, the three most important things are context, context, context. It's the same process.

I've gone and used James 1, verse 5 in my own life to say I'm going into this meeting. I don't know what it's going to have. So I say, Father, give me wisdom. Help me understand it. Father, You tell me that all I have to do is ask You. Give it to me generously and without reproach. Father, I'm asking for wisdom. I've got to tell you, in my own gut, I think He answers that prayer, but I don't think that's what that verse is about.

The context of this is in the midst of suffering and trials. In other words, I'm so intimately involved with this hardship. It's one thing. I have found counselors to be able to give great counsel to others, but now they've got to go and do this in your own life. It's a lot tougher. It's one thing to blow into a business and be a consultant, someone who takes your watch and tells you what time it is.

It's one thing to come blowing into your business and tell you all these things you need to do. It is way tougher to do it. In the middle of all this hurt and in the middle of all this pain, sometimes I'm saying, even though I know what I need to do, it's hard to do. And, God, sometimes I don't even know what to do. And He says, when that happens, ask me for wisdom. That's what He's saying.

God's Generous Supply of Wisdom

When these hard times come, all you've got to do is ask. All you've got to do is tell me what it is you need. All you've got to do is pour your heart out, and I will give it to you. And He says, I will give it to you generously. I will give it to you without reproach.

Living Bible, very important to explain to you, this is not a translation. This is a paraphrase. This is Ken Taylor's commentary on James 1:5. But many times, I think he illumines accurately what the verse says. He paraphrases it this way: "If you want to know what God wants you to do, ask Him. And He'll gladly tell you. For He's all ready to give bountiful, from a bountiful supply of wisdom to those who ask. And He won't resent it."

He said, when you come, all you've got to do is ask Him. And, number one, you're coming to an infinite supply. Number two, He gives without reproach or without guilt.

This is great as a parent. Because I've had girls come in and say, hey, Dad, I need five bucks. And I give them five bucks. And the next day or two, they're back in, and they'll go, I need five bucks. And I'll say, you know, I just gave you. Didn't I just give you five bucks yesterday? And I'm not sure, but I thought I heard your mom say she gave you five bucks. I gave you five bucks, and she gave you five bucks, and now you want another five bucks? I'm not giving you any more. Over the limit.

When you come to God, I don't go in there and say, Father, I'm in the middle of this trial and tribulation, and I need wisdom, and He doesn't go, Tom, you were in here yesterday asking

for wisdom, and the day before asking for wisdom, and the day before. Get out! You're over the wisdom limit. That's not what He says. He says, I'll give and give and give. As long as you'll come and ask, I'll give and give. I'll give you as much as you want from a limitless supply that I have. All you have to do is ask.

So in the middle of whatever plane you're on, and whatever pain and suffering you have, in the middle of this, your way to grow in the midst of it is to turn to God, and to ask Him, and to ask according to what He wants for you. According to His will.

What Does God Want For You?

What does that mean? What's God's will? Well, let me give it to you real quickly, because this is not the point, and it's another parenthesis, but here are five or six things God would have you do.

Number one, His deepest desire for a person is that they would know Him. If you're here today, and you don't know Christ, you're a non-Christian, you're a non-believer, all of this stuff may or may not be interesting to you, but it's fundamentally of no value to you, because your biggest problem is, you're going to die one day, and you'll spend eternity in a place called hell.

I was talking to a guy yesterday about dying. I do that all the time, and he said, I just went to a great funeral. He said, it's crazy, I thought of you during the funeral a bunch of times, because everybody I now know knows my philosophy on that, and that is, no matter who the dead person is, the preacher gets them to heaven quickly. And the worse they are, the quicker they get them there.

So he said, we're five minutes into this, and he said, I know the guy. The guy is just, there's no way. This guy's a pagan, even. So I'm testing your thing, your theory, to see how they're going to get them in heaven, or to see what somebody's going to say. He said, so they couldn't find nobody to talk to but his sister, and her opening line was this. How good is this? He said, I just laughed when he said it. He said, old Bob here was no saint, but he was no sinner either. What the heck was this guy then? I mean, you only got two options—he's either a sinner or a saint.

But I'll tell you, in our minds, I believe, even with a lousy, stinking, rotten, derelict, and it's somebody we know, and maybe it's an ex, or maybe it's a brother, or maybe it's a parent that just, you know this person is a pagan, even. I think, in our mind, eternal punishment is so great that we try to find a way to get them there. For two reasons. Number one, even in that case, we hate to see them go through it, but more importantly, number two, we don't want to imagine we're going to go through this. God's deepest desire is that you be saved.

Filled with the Spirit

Here's the second thing: that you be filled with the Spirit. What does that mean? That means that the Holy Spirit would be in your life, alive and working. J. Vernon McGee used to say it this way: being filled with the Spirit is like taking my car to the gas station, where I drive in and say, fill her up. He said, I start every day by saying, Father, fill me with your Spirit. Just fill me up with your Spirit, so that it's overflowing.

Sexual Purity

Here's the third thing. He wants you to be sanctified. That means set apart. And the verse that we've used, 1 Thessalonians 4:3-7, speaks specifically about sexual purity, that you are set apart to act differently in many ways, but especially in the area of sexual purity.

So that if you're here and you're single, I had a guy—this is a great example—this guy is sleeping with half of the women in Phoenix. And so he calls, he wants to get together, and somebody shared with me that this guy is sleeping with half the women in Phoenix, so I'm figuring I'm going to hear some really interesting stuff. So we get together, and we talk, and he said, I've got one thing I want to ask. And I said, that's fine, ask away. And he said, I really want to know what God wants me to do in my life, and I don't seem to be able to get a read on it.

And I said to him, you're never going to get a read on it, as long as you can't keep your pants up. If you're involved in sex outside of marriage, or if you're married and involved in sex with somebody other than your married partner, and you're going, I don't seem to hear God, the reason you don't hear God is, you're steeped in pursuing what you want more than Him already, and He's not going to waste any more time talking to you. I think it's as simple as that. And sex is a huge deal in this process.

Obedience and Service

Here's the fourth thing: you need to be obedient. You need to be doing the things He says, so that whatever God says to do, you do it, whatever He says to avoid, you avoid it. And part of that process is, you will be serving.

Now, when you're in that position, I think you do whatever you want to do. If you're a man or woman who knows Christ, and in the middle of all that, you're filled with the Spirit, your life is pure, you're obedient to Him, you're serving others, then I think God says, do whatever you want to do. That's His will.

The Job Decision Dilemma

And see, here's what we do. Oh, I got a job decision. Should I go to Motorola? Should I go to Intel? Should I go to work for myself? So we pray, and we groan, and we waste a bucket load of time thinking about it, and we take the job at Intel. And the minute we start at Intel, immediately we have problems, because you have problems everywhere. And the minute we go, I knew I should have gone to Motorola. I knew I should have gone to Motorola. I knew God wanted me to go to Motorola.

So then you quit, you go to Motorola. And you're there, and you're about a day into it, and it becomes a problem. Interestingly, very similar to the problems you had at Intel, because they're the problems of life. And you go, God wants me to go to work for myself. God needs me to go to work for myself. That's what He wants more than anything else. So you quit Motorola, and you start your own company, and now you have hardship, and you go, Oh, God's punishing me for this.

That's life. Where does God want you to be? Well, He wants you to be saved, and filled with the Spirit, and sanctified, and obedient, and serving Him. And I believe with all my heart, at that point, He doesn't give a rip whether you're at Motorola or Intel. And whichever one He wants, if He does care, He's going to communicate it to you, because you'll be so in touch with Him that it will be obvious to you that's where He wants it. And wherever He has you, it is not going to be trouble free.

Faith in God's Character, Not Circumstances

Now, in the midst of this, He says, when you ask, ask in faith. The opposite of faith is doubting. So He says, when you ask, I want you to ask believing. Believing what? Believing that the condition will be changed? I don't think so.

We had a guy in one of the studies who came in one day, and he was all beat up, all gimped around. I said, how are you doing? He said, I've been healed. I said, you don't look very healed to me. He said, I've claimed my healing, I believe I'll be healed. How do you know? What a faith healing deal that is. You come in, and you're sick, and I go, you're healed. And you go, well, but I'm still limping. You don't have enough faith. I mean, it never comes back to me. When you're healed, it's just time and space that needs to get caught up.

God may want, and this kills some people, God may want you sick, and He may want you poor. It's the way life is. What He's talking about there is not faith that this will work out. It's faith that He's who He said He was. It's faith in the body of truth here.

The Danger of Being Double-Minded

And when you begin to doubt that, what happens is you're blowing all over the place. And you are a double-minded man. In other words, you're playing God's stuff one time, man's stuff the other. So you're going to all this Christian counseling to understand what's supposed to happen, and then you get God's view of your life, and then you kind of move down that track for a day or two, but you can't get away from this guy, so you go over and pay 150 bucks an hour to tell him what Freud would have you do.

Or you find out God's plan for financing. So here's what happens. You got God's plan for financing, and you got the Ron Blue deal, and you got the Larry Burkett going, and you got debt free, and then you go to some CPA and says, you're getting killed with taxes, you need shelter, you need debt. One of them's right, one of them's wrong. I'm banking on God. But now you're moving all over the place. That's what He's saying. How do I stay focused in the middle of that?

What's the inevitable outcome of this? What's the motivation in the area of this? Next week we're going to look, and I hadn't planned on doing this at all until I started teaching this yesterday. Next week we're going to look at a biblical character who absolutely fleshes this thing out right in front of us. And you will see how God works in a person's life.

Father, we pray that we would be men and women that would bring honor and glory to You. Father, we know there's hurt and pain in this room and in our life. We pray You would give us a spirit of submission and humility and obedience to come to You and to ask for wisdom so that we might know how we're to live. God, let us live lives that bring honor and glory to You. We ask it in Jesus' name. Amen.