Reflecting His Character: Lessons from Zambia– Sermon Audio 2621

Jesus said in Matthew 28:19, Go, therefore and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost. Welcome to Go Teach all nations, bringing you Christ's teachings through Australian and international speakers. And here is today's presenter, Pastor Brad Moodie. SPEAKER B 00:00:32 - 00:40:45 So I'm just going to kneel and I just invite you to just bow your heads as we seek the Lord in prayer. Father in heaven, Lord, we come to you with our hearts open, our minds removed of every distraction so that we can hear you speak to us. Lord, you know that I have nothing to offer these people, but you have a word to give each one. And that somehow by the foolishness of preaching, You might reach each one of our hearts and that we might be drawn closer to You, as my dear brother Jason was praying just now. And that we would not leave these precincts of Your holy dwelling place, Lord, this church that You have given us to be a part of. We would not leave the same as the way that we would— that we have come, but that we would go with newfound compunction to do that which You have called us to do as Your people, because we have You as our sure foundation. We have nothing to depend upon but the blood of Jesus Christ. And so, Father, we just pray for Him to be here with us in the person of His Holy Spirit, His representative, that it might speak, He might speak to our hearts, and that we would be changed into His image as we behold His beautiful character. Is my prayer and our prayer. Let everybody say, Amen and Amen. It was a couple of years ago that I had one of those conversations with my brother. That sticks in your mind and that you never forget because of the emotion, the gravity behind the things that were discussed. And I remember this conversation clearly as my brother who had just come back from a 10-year missionary stint in Africa. And he told me with tears choking his voice how he had gone on this missionary venture anticipating that God was going to make him a beautiful reflection of His own character. That he was going to use him to touch the lives of the people in outback of Zambia and that he was going to make a difference in their lives. But in so doing, it was going to help him because he had so many things that he could see in his own character that he struggled with and that he longed to have removed and corrected by the blood of Jesus Christ. And he went with this mindset, but he had come back 10 years later and he felt as though he was the same ugly, selfish man that he was when he left. And he was grieving the fact that he could see no development in his Christian journey. And he was saying to me, "Brad, I wonder whether it has all been in vain." And my heart broke for him as it even gets me emotional just talking about it now. As I remember the emotion as he shared with me his sentiments of just longing to be better reflecting Jesus than he could see in his actions and in his life. And then just a couple of weeks ago, I had a conversation with one of my closest friends and they were sharing with me how they can see everything going on in the world stage and they feel as though they're not ready for Jesus to come back. Not because they don't want Jesus to come back, but they just don't feel like they're ready to face the crisis that's coming that has been prophesied for 160 years, that we know is coming and that we are wanting to be ready for. And they could see only ugliness in their character. And they pray and they read their Bible, they were telling me. And with tears in their voice, they were saying, "I just don't feel like I'm ready for Jesus to come. I don't reflect Him like I feel like I need to, like I long to. I don't see it." And I remember just feeling the weight of it as they were sharing with me because not only did I see that the struggle was real for them, but it echoed a strain in my own heart as I realized that this had been my experience and is so many people's experience in their Christian walk. Walk. Where I felt as though I'm not good enough. I can't do enough. I can't strive enough to better reflect Jesus like I want to. I just don't see his character in me and I'm broken and I'm hurting and I want to reflect Jesus instead of my ugly inherited and cultivated tendencies towards evil. And so I could resonate with these dear friends of mine as I just longed to better show Jesus' character and all I could see when I reflected on myself was the ugliness, the flaws, the imbalances. Maybe you can resonate. Maybe that has been your experience at times. Maybe not right now, but at times you have felt that. You have felt as though you've just— you've been a Christian for 10 years, 15 years, however long it is, and you wish that you could just reflect Jesus' character, but you still find yourself lashing out at your children. And you struggle because you want to show Jesus to them. You know that they are living by your example and you want them to be like Jesus, but you can't seem to show him in your actions. Maybe you've been faithfully holding on to worship morning and evening with your family. You're gathering them around the altar and praying with them and reading some devotional so that you can help inculcate spirituality into your family. And yet you still feel the strain of your relationship with your husband or your spouse. Maybe you just feel as though you read your Bible and you pray every day, but you still feel like you're struggling with the same sins that you've been struggling with for decades. I want to just encourage you, friend. I want to just encourage you. If you have been feeling the weight of that, if you've been feeling the heaviness of that kind of sentiment, I want to encourage you that that feeling is a good thing. You might be shocked to hear that, and I don't want you to run away with this. I'm not suggesting that despondency or discouragement is any way from God. No, we are not called to be self-deprecating. We are not called to be negative. We are called upon to reflect Jesus. But when we see our own character, it is an evidence that He is revealing something to us that He is longing to correct. And I want to just encourage you that that feeling is a good thing because it is a platform for which He can start to work. And this is something that you may not be aware of, but I want to share with you. The closer you come to Jesus, the further away you'll feel like you are. Does that resonate with you? I want you to say that with me. The closer you come to Jesus, the further away you'll feel like you are. So I just want to just warn you first up, if you feel as though you're exceptionally close to Jesus, You might need to check your spiritual barometer. Because the closer you come to Jesus, you see this exemplified in the Scriptures with Daniel, with Isaiah. When they come face to face with the character, the glory of God, and they fall on their faces in shame. Daniel says, "The comeliness," or the beauty, "was turned into corruption. I realized that all of my good was filthy rags." If you're experiencing that, friend, I want to just encourage you, the closer you come to Jesus, the further away you'll realize that you are. In other words, the closer you come to Jesus, the more you'll realize you don't reflect Him naturally. Why is that? Because Jesus is the light of the world. Somebody say, "Amen." And the more light you have, the more the defects will be revealed. Does that make sense? So praise God in the sense that the defects are becoming more apparent to you. And this is why Paul, with sincerity in his letters, wrote that he was the chief of— Now hang on a second, this is Paul, the man that wrote two-thirds of the New Testament, and he says that he's the chief of sinners. Do you think he's just being poetic? Do you think this is some sort of, you know, pseudo-humility? No, Paul is with sincerity crying out from the bowels of his heart as he says in Romans chapter 7, talking about his state of spirituality, and he feels like it is just nothing but declension, that it is far from representing Jesus Christ, and he says, "I am the chief of sinners." If he believed himself to be the chief of sinners, I want to just encourage you that perhaps if you are sensing that same weight, that same gravity, that perhaps you're not far from the direction you should be on. But I don't want to leave it there. And at the same time, I need to give warning to those who feel nothing of the sentiments that we've just been discussing. I need to give word of caution to those out there who do not relate to this, who do not genuinely deep within themselves feel anything like we've just described. I'm talking about those who spiritually, subconsciously say, "Yes, the Bible says that all my righteousnesses are as filthy rags, but certainly my righteous rags are better than the righteous rags of that person who thinks differently to me. Certainly my righteous rags are better than the people who I am superior to." It echoes of the prayer of the Pharisee who the Bible said prayed thus with himself. He said, "I am so grateful that I am not like this publican over here. I do my Sabbath school every day. I go to church every week. I have a leadership role in the church and I'm certainly grateful to be nothing like that sinner over there." If you feel as though you don't feel your need, Let me say that again. If you feel as though you don't feel your need and that this in some way relates to you, I want to encourage you as well. At times I can resonate where I don't feel the gravity of it all the time, but I want to just encourage you as well. This message is for you. So don't tune out. Jesus describes it like this in John 15. He says, I am the true vine and my Father is the husbandman. And then in verse 5, He continues, "Ye are the," what? I'm sorry, what are you? The branches. Absolutely. "He that does," what? This is key. This is our whole sermon. "He that does," what? "He that abideth in Me, and I in him, the same bringeth forth much," what? "For without Me you can do," how much? I'm sorry, I want to hear that a little bit louder. Without Me you can do? How much can we do without Jesus Christ? Thank you. Let that sink in clearly and distinctly as we go on this journey together, that without Jesus you can do nothing. There's some odd comfort in that, isn't there? It's like, okay, well, look, you already know that I can't do anything, Lord, so do through me what I cannot do for myself. Paul describes this interchange, this exchange, uh, in Galatians chapter 2 where he says, "The life that I now live, I live by faith in the Son of God who loved me and gave himself for me." When you have become a Christian, you have joined yourself to Christ as the branch attached to the vine and now his life is coursing through yours. Praise God. Do we have any gardeners in church today? Raise your hand. Don't be shy. I know there's a few. There's more than that. Come on now. You know I'm gonna ask you a question, but don't be shy. The gardeners out there, I want to ask you a pointed question. What do you need to help a plant grow? What does a plant need in order to grow? Yell it out. Water, sunshine. What else? Soil. What kind of soil? Nutrient-rich soil. Absolutely. And then what's gonna happen when you place that plant in those conditions? With water, with sunlight, with good soil, what is gonna happen to that plant? It's gonna grow naturally. Now getting back to the problem that my brother and my friend face and that we all too often face as Christians, we like to think, or perhaps we don't like to, but either way, we often fall into the trap of thinking that the growth is dependent upon us. You understand? We think that the growth is dependent upon us. Now this little plant that you can see on the screen, how much is the growth dependent upon itself? Nothing. It has been given the inherent principle, don't get me wrong, but it is not without the right conditions will it grow at all. Imagine if you were to take this little plant and take it by the leaf and start pulling it up in order to help it to grow. Is that gonna help it? Absolutely not. You're not going to benefit the plant by trying to force it to grow. What about if that plant sits in the soil and attempts to just grow itself up by concentrating and flexing its muscles? Is that going to help it grow? You're not sure. I'm here to tell you, friend, it is not going to help it grow. The plant grows when it is in the right conditions and it grows by itself. It cannot speed up the process. Hear me now. We are told that the work of sanctification is the work of a— a lifetime. Some of you know the quote. It's the work of a how long? So you cannot speed up the process directly. Now, I'm going to talk about some things that you can do in order to assist that growth process, but you cannot control the growth process. So stop attempting to pull those fragile leaves up. What the plant needs to do is plant its tender roots deep in the soil and keep them there. Now again, for those gardeners out there, as things progress, will the plant always grow the direction that you want it to grow? I'm getting some shaking of the heads. Are you sure? You've never had a plant that grew exactly where you wanted it to grow every time? Is that what you're telling me? I agree. What do you need to do in order to get that plant to grow in the right direction? Sorry? Train it. Thank you. That's the word that encompasses all the rest. I heard staking. Did I hear staking? No? What's another thing you need to do? Nurture it. Oh, thank you, sister. What else? Support it. Through what mechanisms? What's a mechanism you can use to support a plant as it grows? Sorry? A trellis. Thank you. A trellis, a stake, something that can hold the plant in place. And sometimes you need to bind a limb. Sometimes you need to stake its stem so that it will remain growing up upward and the right direction, you understand? But let me ask again, if the plant is growing— now don't hear me wrong here, let me clarify, don't throw me out just yet— but if the plant is growing in the wrong direction, is it still growing? That's interesting. The plant is still growing when it's growing in the wrong direction. Now let me clarify very distinctly, very clearly, do not miss this, this is critical, or you'll cast me out as a heretic. When we are growing in the wrong direction, I am not talking about growing in the wrong direction morally. I'm going to come to that in just a second. What I'm talking about is circumstantial misdirected growth. What did I call it? Circumstantial misdirected growth. Let me give you an example. You enter into a business agreement that wasn't the best choice and it ends up costing you something. You understand? Or you purchase a car that you probably could have more thoroughly investigated before you bought it and now you've got a car with problems. You understand? This is a circumstantial misdirected growth, but it's still growth. Why? Because God is going to train you. You're going to learn the lesson. I can testify of having to fix that car again and again and again. One day I'll tell you the story. The point is that you will make honest and sincere mistakes because you're growing, but you're growing in the wrong direction. What is the gardener going to do? He's going to stake you. He's going to bind you. He's going to help you to grow in the right direction, to redirect that. Now, There are times when you will be growing in the wrong direction morally. What happens in those scenarios? Well, I want to liken this to a plant that has a limb that has died. What do you do with the limb that's dead? You do what? Sorry? You cut it off. So I want to just make that distinction very clear. When we might make decisions that are not the best decisions, God can train us. But when we make decisions that are against moral principles, God is going to have to cut some things off. Is that a pleasant experience? Some of you might be able to resonate with that. You've had that experience. You know what it's like to be pruned. You know what it's like to be guided and trained. And some of you might very well right now feel a little bit bound. You might feel as though you have been staked and it's an uncomfortable experience. But I want to just encourage you that God is doing a work in you. Now, as far as the good soil is concerned, I want to make things very practical. I want to give you a list of things that you can do to enhance the soil that you are abiding within. So I've made a very simple list for God to help you grow in your journey of things that you can do to get into the good soil. I'm not sure if you can see that up on the screen there. At the top it says, "Good spiritual soil." Can you guys read that okay? Good spiritual soil. Giving you some examples of what good spiritual soil looks like. Prayer. This is going to get you into connection with the vine, right? Studying the Bible, is that going to be helpful for your spiritual nourishment? For your spiritual development? Absolutely. What about Bible memorization? Is that going to be helpful? Some of you aren't quite sure. Is Bible memorization going to help you? Ideally, right? Let's not forget that the Pharisees memorized the entire Old Testament and they missed Jesus. But at the same time, Bible memorization has a purpose and a place that can help you spiritually. What about confessing and forsaking sin? Is that going to benefit you spiritually? You get the point. This is the means by which we can abide in the soil. These are the mechanisms. I'm not suggesting that instead of work time, you spend time memorizing the Bible. No, no, no, we're talking practical here. We're talking about those times in between activities that you are required to use your hands or your brain. In those times, what are you doing with your leisure time, with your activity time? These are the things that you can be doing to grow your journey. And if you have felt the weight, the gravity of what we were talking about earlier, then that will be a motivating factor, you understand. But let's not forget that on the flip side, it is also true, bad spiritual soil. There are things that we can do that are going to be detrimental or that are going to hinder our development heavenward. Let me give you some examples. Neglecting prayer. Is that going to help our spiritual development? No. Are we abiding in Jesus when we are avoiding prayer? No. What about when our prayers become self-centered? Is that going to draw us closer to God? I'm not suggesting that we don't pray for things that we need. I'm just suggesting when they become pharisaical or self-centered. Absorbed? What about avoiding Bible study or immersing ourselves in secular literature or texts that undermine Scripture? Is that going to be helpful or hindering to our spiritual development? Likewise, memorising our grievances rather than memorising something positive. Memorising what it is that people have done to us years ago, memorising what it is that I'm struggling through and all of our problems, maybe memorising our failures and becoming self-deprecating as we talked about, or memorizing worldly philosophy? Bad spiritual soil. What about ignoring our sins or covering them up? Not spending time in self-reflection, not spending time in confession of our spiritual declension and depravity. What about meditating on negativity or meditating on distractions? Whatever it is, scrolling Instagram, I don't know what it might be for you. What are you doing with those in-between times? Are you abiding in the soil that is going to help you to grow? Maybe instead of sharing the Gospel when you have that person at the checkout that opens up something spiritual and you avoid it rather than sharing with them something that God has placed upon your heart to help them in their journey towards heaven. Maybe sowing discord and gossiping, is that going to help you or is that going to decline in your spirituality. Or listening or watching sin in media or listening to false teachers. Now this is a big one. I just need to hone in on this. I'm just going to be honest. I don't really know most of you very well just yet, so if this is you, don't feel like I'm pointing at you because I don't really know. But I just know that in a general sense, this is the reality. People will spend a little bit of time reading their Bible in the morning, maybe catch a promise, maybe do their Sabbath School lesson or something like that, and then throughout the day they might catch, I don't know, 6 or 7 hours. I remember when I was a kid, I used to spend 4 hours in front of the television. Now it's YouTube. Now it's Stan. Now it's all these other platforms that take our attention away and we spend 2.5 hours just with one movie as opposed to spending the 3 minutes in the morning catching a promise. We're good with Jesus. I want to challenge that. I want to challenge you. What soil are you abiding within? Galatians tells us quite candidly, 'Be not deceived, God is not mocked, for as a man sows, that shall he also reap.' How can we expect to grow to be more like Jesus when this is the soil that we abide within? We need that good soil, friends. We need to be spending that time with Jesus. Where is it, I ask you again, that you are spending your leisure time? You are spending your time in between activities that take you, that take your focus. Now, I want you to notice something encouraging. Probably one of my all-time favorite verses in the whole of the Bible. Philippians 1:6, and in this particular instance, I prefer the New King James rendering because it highlights something remarkable. I want you to notice this verse. This is my— one of my favorite verses and it says, "Being confident." This is Paul talking to the Philippians and he says, "Being confident of this very thing." What thing, Paul? What are you confident of? "That he who has begun a good work in you will complete it until the day of Jesus Christ." Can somebody say amen to that? Amen and amen. The work that he has begun, he says, "I am promising to complete." But did you catch that word, "until"? I don't know if it caught in your mind. Maybe you're not as worried about communication and semantics as I am. But in my mind, the word "complete" implies it's done. It's finished. The word "until" implies something that's going to happen in the future. So how can the work be completed until a future day? It seems almost illogical at first. But here is the profound truth. In God's eyes, I want to just encourage you, friend, the work is already complete in you. Wow! The work is already complete in you. He looks at you as though He's looking upon Christ Himself. I could give you quote after quote, Bible verse after Bible verse. This is righteousness by faith in one single verse. The work in you, God sees. I'm dwelling on this because you need to understand this. As Adventists, we can tend to flip the other way, and don't worry, I'm coming there to give some clarity. But we as Adventists tend to be so caught up in the, the second part of this, that there's a work that I need to do. But Jesus already sees you as perfectly reflecting Him if you are abiding in His soil. If you are connecting yourself with Jesus Christ, He says, "I see you as if you are the perfect reflection of me." There is still a work to be done. He is still doing that work in you. It is being carried forward day by day, maturing and growing you so that you better reflect Him in verity. But all the while, He sees you as perfectly righteous in Jesus Christ. Do you understand me? Is that clear? Do I need to say it again? God sees you as perfectly righteous through the blood of Jesus Christ on your behalf because you have connected yourself with Him. We witnessed a baptism last week. This is the perfect example of a couple of precious souls who have committed themselves to connect with Jesus from here until eternity. God sees them as already righteous. While He continues to produce that result day by day. This is essentially what Paul is saying. The work is complete, yet being completed. Now I'm going to get you to say this with me because if you forget everything else, I want you to remember this. The work in you is complete, yet being completed. Ready? 1, 2, 3. Is complete, yet being completed. Come on, I need some more traction than that. The work in you is complete, yet being completed. One more time, the work in you is complete, yet being completed. Somebody say, "Praise God." And somebody, you might be asking, "Well, how is that possible?" It's a great question. Does God just overlook our defects and ignore them? How does this work? Well, the Bible doesn't leave us ignorant. Genesis chapter 2 explains this as it uses the illustration of marriage. And here's what it says, Genesis 2 and verse 24, it says, shall a man leave his father and mother and he shall cleave unto his wife and they shall be one flesh. Now don't let your imagination run away with me, but what does it mean, one flesh? We're not talking about the practical implications here or the physical implications, we're talking about what one flesh means in the eyes of God. What does it mean to be one flesh in that sense? Sorry? United. Someone's been married for a few years. United. What else? Give me another word to describe what it means by one flesh. 'Flesh,' describe it to me, please. To be as one mind, right? One mind, I hear. Absolutely spot on. Any other words? Come on, another adjective. What does it mean to be one flesh? United. These are all great adjectives to describe what God is describing in this situation. Now, is there anyone here that's married? We've got a couple that have just recently been married, praise the Lord. A couple of other people that have been married for a couple of years. Anyone raise your hand that's game to answer? Anyone been married for more than 15 years? Anyone been married for more than 30 years? Praise the Lord, praise the Lord. That is a testimony of the Lord's work in your life, I know. Praise the Lord for marriage, particularly for this illustration. Let me ask those people who have been married for 30 years or more, when you first got married, was it your natural inclination to do what the other person would do in the situation? Would you naturally be inclined to do exactly as your spouse would do when you are first married? I'm getting some shaking of the heads. A couple of people can resonate. I can resonate with this. Let me give you an example. My wife is very fastidious. I am not. Naturally, I'm messy. I'll leave things in a pile on the floor just because I've got other things that are more important. But do you know, in my 7 wonderful years of marriage, I've come to adopt some of the the principles that my wife uses to organize herself, and I'm grateful for it. It's actually more efficient to be fastidious. It feels inefficient. This is what I've learned. It's actually more efficient to be particular with keeping things organized. Not to run to extremes, but just to be organized. And so I praise God for that. She has been rubbing off on me, and now I am more organized. I find myself naturally picking things up and putting them away. I'm like, "Where did that come from? That's not me." Praise the Lord! This is what it means that we are becoming one, but it certainly wasn't that when we first got married. So at what point is this suggesting that you become one? If you read the text as it reads, it seems to imply, or it could imply, both. And I want to put it to you that that's exactly right. God sees you once you are married as one flesh. You understand? But you're not yet. He has an ideal in mind for you. He wants you to be united. He wants you to be of one mind, continually singular in your purpose, one with another, so that you would naturally just do as your spouse would do in the situation. That's what He wants. And this is why— I just want to just go on this tangent for 2 seconds— this is why the Bible warns against being unequally yoked together with unbelievers. You understand? Because you cannot expect that you're going to grow in the right direction if you are uniting your purposes with somebody that's going the opposite. It's going to drag you down, friend. We cannot be unequally yoked for our own benefit and the benefit of the other person. But getting back onto our point, I remember this oneness, just another example. Maybe for you it's not that you find yourself developing the same characteristics as your spouse, but just want to hone in on this a little bit. You see, with my wife, um, I remember just the other day, uh, I found myself finishing her sentences. Has anyone ever had that? Where you've been married for a little while and you just naturally just respond the way that they would be about to say, but they haven't brought out of their mouth yet. This happened to us the other day. And then just the other day, we were talking about something. I can't even remember what, but I was going to use this illustration way out of left field about horses. And I mentioned it to her and she smiled. "I knew you were going to say that." What? There was no rhyme or reason. The horses had nothing to do with what we were talking about, but somehow she picked Connect it. This is the one flesh that God is talking about. We're not there yet, friends, but God is working. Praise His name. And this is His ideal. And I want to just encourage you, if you are a studier of the Bible, if you are a Bible student, I want to just encourage you, when you come across a verse like this and you're like, I'm not sure whether it's saying that they're one flesh at the time of marriage or that that's the end result of their marriage after decades and decades, I'm not quite sure. Or it seems paradoxical, like the verse in Philippians 1:6. If you come across a verse that seems confusing at first or paradoxical, I want you to just lean in, meditate on that, because those verses are often the ones that produce the most profound truths, as I found in just these two verses myself. So praise God for the oneness that He is seeking to produce between the husband and the wife. But the reason why I'm even bringing this up is because God calls those things which are not as though they were. Do you understand? God sees down the annals of your history as to what He is going to make you if you continue to abide with Him. That is His end result. That's what He wants to make you. And you might feel bound, you might feel staked, you might even be pruned, but He is going to produce that in you. This is what He is bringing you to walk. But you're not there yet, necessarily. But the more time I spend with my wife, the more it becomes the natural outflow. Complete, but not yet. He says, 'You may not know it, you may not see it, but I'm telling you that it is the case.' This is what Philippians is saying, that God sees us as perfect in Christ even now, yet He continues to bring this to greater completion day by day until its perfect completion. At His second coming. Notice how Jesus describes this in John 17. This is His last prayer. John 17, a powerful chapter, powerful chapter worth memorising. That's not just me, that's inspiration that says that. John 17 is worth memorising. But in verse 11, Jesus talking, He says, 'Holy Father, keep through Thine own name those whom Thou hast given Me, that they may be what? One, as We are. Who's He talking to? His Father. Now, I'm not sure if you can articulate this and I'm not sure if this is going to sound right, but how one is Jesus with His Father? Somebody tell me, how one is Jesus with His Father? Totally, absolutely. There is not a shadow of variance between the two, not an ounce of dissonance. The Bible says that you are already considered one with God if you have accepted Him as your Lord and Saviour and are being made more and more one with Him as time progresses. Now you might be thinking, this is an outlandish idea, Bradley, I don't believe it. Well, let me show you just one further witness to establish this as a biblical concept. The book of 1 Kings 14:8. After David has died and there's been king after king that has rebelled and just done despite to God and His cause and absolutely demoralized the nation, God speaks to one of them and He says, "You are not like my servant David." You guys familiar with King David? He was the greatest king according to the Jews that existed in their nation. King David. David and Goliath might be a story that you're familiar with, but it says David kept God's commandments and followed Him with how much of his heart? Notice this is the caveat for the next statement. He followed Him with how much? All of his heart. You've seen that text in Jeremiah 29:11 that's posted on posters everywhere around our Christian homes. It says that, that I have plans for you to prosper you and to give you an expected end. People miss the context of that verse that it says you will find me when you search for me with what? All of your heart. At that point in time, you will find me. At that point in time, you will be declared as David was to have only done that which is right in God's eyes. Now, did David do only that which was right? Far from it. God calls those things which aren't as though they are. And he called David as only right in his own eyes. Let me just explain to you what this is like. I'm not sure if it was Plato or Socrates that had a protégé come to him, a student student that wanted to glean from his wisdom. And he said to him, "How is it that I can get the wisdom that you have?" You might be familiar with the story. And the wise man, the philosopher, grabbed his head and pushed it underneath the water. They were near a creek or a river or something. And held his head under the water until he was floundering about and striking his hands around to try and release himself. So that he could get a gasp of air. And this philosopher held him under the water until just enough time passed for him to feel as though he was about to die. And then he pulled him back up. And the protégé said to him, "What are you doing? Are you crazy? You're trying to kill me." And the philosopher said to him, "When you desire wisdom as much as you desired air just now, then you'll find it." Friend, that is what it means to search for him with all of your heart. That is what it means to abide in him every chance you have. To pray, to memorize, to study, to just get into his presence, to come to church. This is all conducive to your spiritual growth. And when you have that same dedication, that is what it means to search for him with all of your heart. And in that space, when you have that motivation, he says that you have done only that which is right 'You're a delight in my eyes.' Somebody say, 'Amen.' Praise the Lord. Are you seeking Him with that much determination? This is how God sees you when you are abiding in Him. You know, the irony of my brother's situation and my close friend that I was talking about earlier is that I could see the changes in them. My brother was not the man that he was when he went to Africa. That 10 years had done wonders in his character. He was so much more gentle and kind and benevolent, so much more others-focused, but he couldn't see it. And my friend, likewise, they don't know that I knew them from 7 years back and they're vastly different to who they are today. Praise the Lord. The Lord had been doing the work in them that they could not see and it's to their own benefits that So that your pride doesn't swell. God withholds your awareness of the things that He's doing in you for your own benefit, friend. But don't think that He's not if you are seeking Him from all your heart. And I'm telling you, only you know if you're seeking Him with all your heart. There might be something in your life that you know you need to give up. It might be a relationship, a friendship. It might be a, a profile on Instagram. It might be a some other— I don't know what it is for you, but you know. God is touching your heart and saying, "You want that experience. You want to be declared completely and entirely righteous before me, but you're not prepared to surrender everything." Give it up, friend. It's not worth it. But I want to just encourage you, friend. I want to just encourage you. You do not need to worry about the progress. God is doing a work in you that you cannot see. See. Your job is to get and stay connected with Jesus Christ. It's His job to produce the growth. Whose job is it? It's Jesus' job to do the growth in you. It's not your job. So stop getting caught up on it. You just focus on getting connected with your Lord and Savior as often and as much as you possibly can. He will do the work as you abide in in that good soil. Can I pray with you? Father in heaven, I want to just pause before your righteous and holy throne and say thank you. For a fountain has been opened up, Father, that we can partake of freely. And that, Lord, you have said that you will complete the work in us until the day of Jesus Christ. Let us never forget, Father, that the work— you look upon us as though we are complete in Jesus, even though we are far from reflecting him as much as It says a husband and a wife are declared one from the moment that they are married and that, that becomes more and more apparent as they abide in each other's space. Father, I pray that you would please help us. You know that we have things in our lives that we need to surrender. You know them. I pray that you'd touch them, each one. That each one of us would sense your Spirit telling us where we need to make reparation in our experience and our relationship with Jesus Christ. That he might do the work in us. May nothing hinder his entry. Entrance into our heart. May nothing hinder His, His use of us into the future and His development of our experience to better reflect Him. And we pray this, Father, not because we have anything to recommend us. Our filthy rags, Lord, they are just that. Our best efforts are nothing more than that. So we surrender them to You and ask, Father, that You would just take the load off our shoulders. Give us that peace that transcends understanding as we seek to abide in You. May it be the case that You make us like Yourself, as only You can, because without You, we can do nothing. We surrender to You, we praise You, and we thank You. In Jesus' name, amen. Amen. This message was made available by the Wauchope Seventh-day Adventist Church. For more resources like this, visit their YouTube page, Wauchope SDA Church. This program has been brought to you by 3ABN Australia Radio. SPEAKER A 00:40:46 - 00:40:59 To listen to our Australian programs on demand, visit both of our YouTube channels, 3ABN Australia Radio and Creation Conversations, or search for us on your favorite podcast directory.