Three Ways Christians Are Changed

OK, good morning. It's a blessing to share the word of the Lord with all of you. It's just a privilege to be here in California. And with my friend Pastor Irwin and Vincent and anybody, if you're on the fence.

We've needed help for years in the Philippines. We've got so many eager men. Wanting to be trained. And the only thing that's prevented us is having the manpower.

We've actually had to tell groups no or sorry, not now. We can't come and train you yet. As soon as we get our team in place, we've got Vincent and two other men that are raising support to join us. We're going to really take off and even move from a Bible college level more into a a seminary level, so we're excited to do that.

Well, for the last 8 years I've been living in the Philippines, but God did a lot of work in me over the years to get me there. I didn't, some people, maybe, I grew up in the church, but some people will hear a missionary when they're young and go, oh, that's what God wired me for, that's what I want to do. Well, that wasn't my case. I grew up in the San Fernando Valley.

not too far from here, I suppose. I was actually born there. I went to DeVry University, got a degree in electronics, and I got hired right out of school, worked at Hughes Aircraft, which is now Boeing. I worked there for about 10 years.

had a pretty decent job. My wife and I at that time had 2 kids. My best friends that I grew up with lived about 1520 minutes away from me. My family was, we'd see them at least once or twice a month, living very close.

Had a nice church. We had no intention, no thought of going any other direction. Well, God had different plans. Something changed.

Something caused us to desire to leave everything that we were comfortable with, everything we loved, all of our, favorite foods, and I, I'm missing the Mexican food. That's my favorite. And you don't find too much of that in the Philippines, and, but God worked in us that we were excited to leave and go somewhere different. And my wife was born there, but she left when she was about 6 or 7.

God had changed both of our hearts. As a matter of fact, we went there on a short term trip when I told my wife, initially that I wanted to go to the Philippines as a missionary, very calmly, she said, oh, if that's what the Lord puts on your heart, wherever you go, I'll follow, and we went on a short term trip and I learned later that in her thinking the whole time is, what are you talking about? You got, we got a good job. We got house insurance.

We got medical insurance, we got car insurance. We've got insurance, insurance, we're all safe. Everything's covered, why would we leave all of that? So she thought, oh, this trip will be good.

He'll see how hot it is in the Philippines and the humidity. He'll see the poverty. She'll, we stayed at her family's house and they live in a, in a poor area and she thought, oh, God will change his mind, or at least that will change his mind. What God did is changed her mind.

As she saw all the needs, she grew up Catholic and she came to Christ and then she started connecting with girls and then a few gals came to Christ that she was sharing with them, it just, the light bulb went on and God has suited and wired and made both of us for this. What am I thinking? And so God changed both of us. Well, for me, that change really began to accelerate when I started to be faithful to God's leading.

When God put it on my heart, he was very kind. He just asked me just little things, he didn't speak to me, but I, I sensed his spirit directing me towards going to college, finishing my bachelor's degree, and, so I was working at Hughes Aircraft and heard oh master's College has a night program, where I can finish it there. I want to be more skilled to serve in my church. That was all I was thinking.

OK, Lord, I'll do that. I went to the master's college and then I had a teacher, Dr. Mark Tatlock, who wasn't a doctor then but a class on missions, and he started sharing how most of the world's wealth, big percentages here in this country with this small percentage of the world's population, and as I'm driving past all these churches, when I go through the valley and I can count the Bible bookstores and the radio programs, I just, wow, we've got all the resources here and most of the world.

Doesn't enjoy these things or hasn't even heard the gospel in some places or the churches are so weak.

Yet we have a plethora of all this stuff here. Why would I want to stay here? the Lord's wired me for this. I've married a Filipina, so we were excited to go and leave our comfort zone.

God rocked my world with that class and changed our direction. He graciously kept moving us forward, so I went to the college. OK, I can do that. And then that class, I just felt God's calling towards missions.

And then God put it on my heart and through some counsel of some people, you should go to seminary first. I would have never gone to seminary before and left my job to do that, but because of small steps at a time, just saying, OK, I'll do that. When I did that, he broadened me a little bit. OK, I'll do this.

Then when it came time to say when God is putting in my heart, you need to quit your job if you want to go to seminary, you've got to quit your job. Well, I've got a house in the valley making payments on it. We've got 2 cars. Our kids are in private Christian school.

I go mountain biking every weekend up in Angeles Crest and How can I afford that? And so we prayed about it and My wife goes, Let's, let's do it. Let's just go for it and get it done. I don't want you to be in college in the next 10 years.

Let's just knock it out. And she goes, the Lord's blessed me with a good job. Let's just, let's just, you quit, finish school for the next few years. So I did that.

I quit, changed our lifestyle. We, sold our cars, sold my mountain bike. I was in a band, as you mentioned, I quit my band, sold my music gear. And then we went to the school and said, yeah, we love you guys, we love the school, but we have to take our kids out.

So then we just started seeing God confirming as he was changing us and as we were responding to it, we saw him confirming we're going the right way. The school said, we love your kids, we love you guys. We'll call you back. We're like, What do you mean you'll call us back?

We're just telling you we're leaving. So they call us back the next day and say, we're going to scholarship both your kids and and you can leave them here after school if you're studying at the Masters seminary, you can pick them up after school and we were just blown away. Another missionary says, hey, we're going back to the fields, you want our van? We have a van.

My dad says he's had an auto shop, he goes, hey, some kids drove across the state in a, what is it, a Jetta, I forget who makes the Jetta, but VW, I think they blew the motor and they gave it to me. I fixed it. Do you want it? Also, we have two cars, the kids are still in school and my wife gets a raise and we just said, OK, Lord, we, we think you're saying yes, we're, we're going the right direction.

Again, that took a long process and when God changes us, some changes are instantaneous, but some come over the rest of your life. So prior to all this, where I'm at now, I was a very different person as, as Mike mentioned and I'm I'm embarrassed to admit, but my dream used to be I wanted to be a rock star. And so I was the band, we played all the clubs in Hollywood for 5 years. We had a great time doing that.

But now looking back, I was seeking glory for myself, not for the Lord. And I'm glad that the Lord said, no, I've got a different path for you. Well, scripture is clear. That all believers will be changed over the courses of their lives.

It's not just the most holy, the special few, all of us will be changed, and the apostle Paul serves as a great example of this. He was a very different person before he became the man he became. wrote 2/3 of the New Testament, was such a, he's he's one of my heroes in scripture, and I'll I'll share some of the context and remind you of some of his past. He was committed to destroying the church.

He believed that Jesus was a liar, that he was a false teacher, a false messiah, and the dead founder of a radical movement where he was encouraging people to blaspheme the God of Israel. That was the thinking of Paul. His hatred for Jesus and his followers was so intense that he was not content to simply remove them from Jerusalem. He wasn't content after watching Steven be killed and removed from his city.

He got permission to go to other cities and arrest and drag back Christians to imprison. And try as well for blasphemy traveled by foot, many miles to do this. Scripture described him as a persecutor of the innocent, as a violent man. Both of those are from 1 Timothy 1:12.

Also describes him as a blasphemer. Romans 7:7-8 talk about him being covetous. This is the old Paul. He was probably a murderer or at least an accessory to it.

And regarding his relationship to God, he was trying to earn God's favor by what he did through his good works. Listen to Paul's own testimony about himself as he describes how he used to be in Acts chapter 26 verses 9 to 7. I'm going to read that to you. Paul said, I thought to myself that I had to do many things hostile to the name of Jesus of Nazareth.

And this is just what I did in Jerusalem. Not only did I lock up many of the saints in prisons, having received authority from the chief priest, but also when they were being put to death, I cast my vote against them. And I punished them often in all the synagogues. I tried to force them to blaspheme, and being furiously enraged at them, I kept pursuing them even to foreign cities.

If we would have been alive around that time, Paul would have been chasing after people like us. He was focused on destroying Christians, however, he was changed. He was changed radically. And that started when he met Jesus Christ while he was on his way to arrest Christians.

And as a result of that meeting, he didn't just ease up or calm down a little bit. He was transformed. He went from being one of the church's greatest enemies to one of its greatest soldiers. The God that he was fighting against and the church that he was trying to destroy became his God and his church.

Paul went from being a persecutor of the church to a prisoner for the church, and scripture revealed that immediately after God had saved Paul, he began to preach the gospel. He also went on to take up collections for the poor and suffering Christians. He healed the sick and he continued preaching the gospel in many places including Jerusalem, Greece, Macedonia, Rome, in synagogues and in various homes. When just prior to that, he's killing and arresting Christians.

Now he's preaching the message of Jesus Christ. Paul trained up leaders as he took men with him on mission trips to share the gospel, and as he was going to plant churches and equip the saints and he was even in prison for Christ multiple times, he was beaten, he was persecuted, shipwrecked, he was even willing to die for the one he was trying to destroy. When some of his friends tearfully tried to prevent him from going to what looked like imprisonment and even possible death, listen to what Paul said, the new Paul.

In Acts 21:13, he says, What are you doing weeping and breaking my heart, for I am ready not only to be bound, but even to die at Jerusalem for the name of the Lord Jesus.

Paul joyfully gave himself for Christ in the church because he had been transformed into a new man. And today, in 2 Corinthians chapter 5 verses 15 to 17, we will see that Paul was changed in three ways. Three ways that all true followers of Jesus Christ will be changed. You see, being saved should change our reason for living.

It should also change our worldview. And thirdly, being saved should change our very nature. So let's turn to 2 Corinthians 5. 15 to 17.

And listen as I read along and we can see. How the transforming power of the gospel of Jesus Christ worked in Paul's life. He wrote. In 2 Corinthians 5:15 to 17.

Jesus died for all. So that we who live might no longer live for themselves, but for him who died and rose again on their behalf. Therefore, from now on, we recognize no one according to the flesh. Though we have known Christ according to the flesh, yet now, we know him in this way no longer.

Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, They are a new creature. The old, the old things have passed away, and behold, new things have come. Excuse me. All right, so if you're truly a follower of Jesus Christ, you can expect Be looking for changes in your life.

And from verse 15, we'll see that one of them is being saved means that our reason for living will change. Following Jesus Christ will change how you invest your life. Now I admit, and I want to emphasize this. That change in the timing and how much is going to be different for everyone.

Some people get saved and all of a sudden they're just on the street like Paul preaching and they're, to who he has been forgiven much or loved much or I guess it's the other way, forgiven much loved much. I think I'm, that's why I should always stick with my notes, but what. I guess if you're forgiven much, you're loved much or love much forgiven one, either way is both is true. God is a radical change.

I had a friend of mine who was a who was a biker and he was Planning on killing his landlord. His marriage was ending. He had a house that he was fixing up and the landlord made a deal with him that if he's put a lot of money to fix the house up, then we can do a rent-owned type of deal. He changed his mind and my friend says, My marriage is ending.

This guy cheated me all this money. I'm going to kill him and maybe take out a few cops before they take me out. That was his plan, and his wife came home. And she knew they were having problems.

She says, look, Let's just talk to this one pastor. I heard he's a real nice guy. Let's just one last chance, let's try this one last thing, and they went and, this pastor just clearly, passionately shared the gospel with this guy, coupled with just loving on him and it just gripped his heart and changed him. And this guy is just, from the big biker guy, drug abuser and all, list of sins was just a transformed man.

And when I see him now, he gives me this big bear hug. People would see him on the street and be afraid. You don't know he's a big teddy bear. And he's a plumber and so everyone he talks to, he's sharing about Jesus.

He's just transformed. There's people like that and there's other people who are saved and the transformation is more gradual over their lifetime as they as they're growing in the word. They begin to give more things up. They begin to put off certain sins and put on new practices and change.

So it's different for everyone, but what I'm saying is if you are a follower of Christ, you will change. I thought about putting in my notes, you should change. But I believe you will change this radical transformation, a new nature. Now our patterns may catch up to that, but we will change.

And as Paul was sharing about the changes that happened in his life, he became, when he became a believer in Jesus Christ, he first he responded to some critics who mistook the changes that happened in his life among many things, they, they thought he was insane. They literally thought this, this guy's lost it. They thought Paul. Like Governor Festus said in Acts 26:24 that his teaching, he says, Paul, you are out of your mind.

Your great learning has driven you mad. It's not, it shouldn't be a surprise, at least that the world might look at us this way. They might mistake. Our transformation is insanity.

They might persecute us for it. Scripture tells us in 1 Corinthians 1:18 that the word of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved is a power of God. You might have family, Or friends, coworkers. Who see the change and they think, wow, you become one of those fanatics, one of those nuts.

Well, I'm proud to say I am a Jesus freak, and I think Paul was as well. He responded to his critics who thought he was insane by basically telling them in 2 Corinthians 13 and 14 that the only thing they could call him crazy for was his obsession for knowing God and making him known. He even said that his supposed insanity controls him or compels him. The love of God was causing him To make him known.

So what was it that so radically changed Paul? What was it that caused him to leave his career, his home, his family, his reputation behind? See, sometimes when we read about Paul. Unless you really think about the background, it almost seems like it was so easy and he left nothing but I think he left much.

Why was he so consumed with making God known that the world would confuse his zeal for insanity? Well, I think we see that in verse 15, where he wrote 2 Corinthians 5:15, Jesus died for all that they who live might not Who will no longer live for themselves, but for him who died and rose again on their behalf. And in this verse we see the reason why he was changed. It was his realization that the Father loves us so much that he was willing, maybe, maybe we can say joyfully gave His Son to die in our place to pay the penalty of our sins.

Paul realized that, and the gravity of that blew him away and changed his life. He explained that. He said Christ died for all. Can you imagine God's Son in the flesh died for us.

In other words, Jesus' life is the one and only sacrifice provided by God to save mankind, and all who believe will be saved. It was faith in that truth that caused Paul to change, and as a result, he wrote in verse 15 that those who live Those who believe Those who truly love and follow Jesus change. Their purpose for living changes. Salvation causes people to no longer live for themselves.

Their lives are no longer just spent on the sole pursuit of self. They no longer focus on their advancement, their success, their fame, their interests, I guess we could say our advancement, our success, our fame, our interests. Let's change. We, before you knew Christ, if perhaps you came to Christ when you were older.

You'd see that more obviously maybe before, my goals were to make money, have a good job, a nice house. Now, OK, I still want to have a good job, money, and a nice house, but now I want to use them to glorify God. Now I want to use them to bless my neighbors and my family and my community, my church. You change.

Instead, Paul said, speaking of believers, they live for him now who died and rose again on their behalf. So believing that Jesus sacrificed Himself to save us should motivate us to spend our lives serving, and I want to highlight this, enjoying Him. So I think those two things come together almost synonymously. It should cause us to invest our lives in things that are important to God and His people.

I remember moving to the Philippines when we were looking for a house, very different than when I used to look for houses. I'd look for a house and, OK, there's a nice big backyard to barbecue and where am I going to put the pool table, the fish tank, and the garage? I got enough room for my music equipment. Now I look at the house, OK, is there big enough room, will this be good enough for Bible study?

OK, now if we have the men and women break off into different groups, are there rooms for that? Do I have rooms for visiting teams that come through? I look at things different. it might be different for me than from you, but if you're saved, you'll look at even the little things, different.

Paul understood what God had done for him and that his life was no longer his own. He said in 1 Corinthians 6:20. For you have been bought with a price and therefore glorify God in your body. I could probably add to that, glorify God in your body, and with all the things that, that he has given you.

Paul recognized, he's not his own anymore. But it's sad that many profession Christians don't live in light of this truth. A lot of people are content to spend their lives amassing gadgets and collectibles. Some are consumed with sports and hobbies and other activities while making little or no effort to live for God and others.

I'm not knocking gadgets and sports and hobbies. I've got my gadgets. I'm a gadget freak, but We want to have and enjoy those things the Lord blesses us with, but not be consumed by them, and we want to use them for His glory. Many others enjoy the privilege of having great Bible teaching and resources, and yet, Go unchanged by it and live for themselves.

It's sad to see Christians who've been going to great churches like this for many years, have a library full of Bibles and good books and sermons. They take all of that in. Yet they're not serving in the church. They're not sharing the gospel with their neighbors or their coworkers or their family.

They're like sponges. They take it all in. But don't use it for God's glory. I'm training pastors that are so excited and we give them a Bible or a few books, they're blown away and they're excited and they're sharing those resources that they're hard to come by.

It's funny is we're, we're encouraging these pastors, when you study, a passage to preach it, you want to compare it in 5 translations, compare the text and make sure you're not missing anything in the translations of the different authors or having a, maybe a different synonym and sometimes I feel inside, oh, I know some of these guys only have one Bible, and I'm telling them, you look at it in 5 different translations for checking and We're so blessed with so many resources.

And even resources now that are much easier to get in the Philippines because you can get them online. You have to have a computer for that. And even if you have to, I have some pastors that I'm working with that even have been blessed with a computer.

But then you have to have a credit card to be able to download the books. So we're so blessed with all these resources, but don't just take them in if you have been changed. Then you've got to use those for God's glory and make Him known like Paul did. Don't feast on God's word and then go on with your lives unchanged, living for yourself and being unwilling to disciple and mentor others.

The natural change that we should expect to occur in our lives when we believe in Christ, it is, is a desire to live for him no matter what or where he might ask us to do or take us. However, the change in our lives does not stop there. Being saved also changes our worldview. And when we become followers of Jesus, he transforms the way We evaluate the world and life.

One term they use in the Philippines is for a guy who's likes the ladies, is a, is a, what do they call, a womanizer. So I tell guys, if you used to be a womanizer before you came to Christ, you should be different now. Doesn't mean you don't like women anymore, but something happens where you start admiring a pretty gals walking by and you're, now it's like, wait, I've got a wife. That would dishonor the Lord and my wife.

Doesn't, OK, you still observed that. But something is talking to the heart now that didn't happen before. A a new nature and a conscience has been awakened and his worldview is changing the way he, the way we would look at and evaluate life that would affect politics, abortion is illegal in the Philippines and I'm sad when I tell, talk about America, oh yeah, a lot of people in America are fine with that. I've got family that are Christian and say, well, I wouldn't do it myself, it's wrong, but I wouldn't tell anybody else what to do, and they're shocked by that.

But shouldn't that transformation also include the way we think and evaluate all of life? Well, verse 16, we can see that Paul, when he was saved, his worldview was radically altered. He said in verse 16 of 2 Corinthians 5. Therefore, From now on we recognize no one according to the flesh since Paul believed that Jesus is the savior.

The way he viewed everything changed, including the way he saw people. He said that he no longer recognized people according to the flesh. Well, we learned two things from this statement. First, that those who have untransformed minds, that would be unsaved.

They evaluate people according to external human and worldly standards. The second thing we learned from that is that the minds and judgments of God's people are changed as they believe and understand the word of God. And Paul realized that before he was saved, his thinking about who Jesus is was totally wrong. He wrote that even though we have known Christ according to the flesh with worldly thinking, worldly judgments and valuations, He said, even though we have known Christ according to the flesh, now we don't see him that way any longer.

And like Paul, many people have a wrong understanding of who Jesus is and what he did. And this is the result. Of viewing Jesus and others according to worldly human fleshly standards, which means coming to a knowledge about them using human reasoning. And human desires or worldly desires, it's an attempt to evaluate things with a fallen sin cursed mind.

We can see an example of this when the scribes refused to believe that Jesus is the savior, even though he did many, many miracles right before their eyes, right, they could see him, they saw him raise the dead, heal the sick, they saw so many things like that. But they reasoned that he must have been able to do them because, as Mark 3:22 records, oh well, OK, yeah, he did a miracle, can't deny that. But what, it was by the power of Beelzebub. He cast out demons by the ruler of demons.

That's, that's what it is. Rather than dropping to their knees and worshiping God, they use their human reasoning to evaluate their Messiah who was standing before their own eyes, and they didn't recognize him. So refusing to believe that the Father sent Jesus. Some of these Pharisees even accuse him of being illegitimately born.

As he's telling him the Father had sent me, I came to do the Father's will, they, they responded in John chapter 8 verse 41, well, we were not born to fornication. We have one Father, God. They're implying, oh, that he was born from an adulterous or fornication type of relationship. So many people like these Pharisees see Jesus incorrectly using human reasoning.

To evaluate him, Mormons say that Jesus is the spirit brother of Satan. The Jehovah Witnesses say he's the Archangel Michael. Many Jews and people today see him as a great teacher, but not the Messiah or God. Some atheists may grant that he existed, but only see him as a historical person.

And sadly some see Jesus as the Son of God. They recognize that. But they don't see him as worthy of living for. They might say that, oh yes, he's God and I go to church and yeah, we've got to follow him, but their lives say something different than the testimony of their lips.

As we saw earlier, the old Paul saw Jesus as a false messiah, as a liar and a blasphemer, but the new transformed Paul said, We don't see him like this anymore. The new Paul no longer looked at others or Jesus from this sinful human perspective. And once he realized who Jesus really is, and what he really did, To save sinners, Paul changed. He was ready and willing to lay down his life for Jesus and the church, and he dedicated his life to living for Christ and proclaiming Him to all people.

And like Paul, all people who are saved will be transformed. I hope by now, I'm repeating this enough, you're getting what I'm trying to emphasize. We want to look at our own lives, we need to be changed. By the gospel I would have never gone to be a missionary if God hadn't changed me.

If God would have asked me or put it on my heart. When I was like 20 years old to move from this country and go to the Philippines, I probably would have done a Jonah. And took the boat and gone the farthest opposite direction, the farthest away, the farthest place I could find from the Philippines. However, in this last verse, verse 17, Paul taught that our transformation goes beyond our reason for living and it goes beyond our worldview.

It also includes renovating who we are to the very core of our beings. Being saved changes our nature. Even our instincts, our feelings, our desires, you could call it our inner person is made alive spiritually to God, we are transformed. And Paul said it this way in verse 17.

Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creature. The old things have passed away. Behold, new things have come. Paul concluded that everyone who is in Christ is not the same anymore.

That is everyone who is in union. With him. That's another meaning of being in Christ. Everyone who has been accepted as God's own, everyone who has been granted eternal life, And an inheritance in heaven.

Everyone who enjoys the privilege of knowing God's heart, they have been and are being. Made new Paul says it this way, they are new creatures or new creations of God. The very desires of our hearts are changed and oriented towards God's ways and God's will. And since we are made new, the old things pass away.

Our value systems, our priorities, our beliefs, our loves, our plans are gone. Evil and sin are still present. But we see them in a new perspective, they no longer control us. As I said, I wanted to, my hope was to make it big in, in music.

I just got together with my old bandmates, we're lifelong friends, 20 plus years now. Kids, now we've all grown, added a few pounds since then. Now I look back and I see My priorities are different. My plans are different.

My values are different. It's even strange. I almost felt embarrassed. I don't know if it's because I'm continuing to be changed or because I brought Pastor Irwin with me, but I stayed with my friends and we had some dinner and I go, Wow, I told Pastor, they sure cuss a lot.

I don't know if I didn't notice that before or I'm just changing or it's you. I don't know, but I'll be honest, I was in the army and I had quite a mouth on me and I worked at Hughes. I had quite a mouth on me and I'm a different person. The, the jokes.

I'm, I'm embarrassed at some of the jokes that I understand. My wife will go, I don't get it. And I go, yeah, I do. I wish I didn't.

But that's got to change. See, before our minds were in bondage to sin. We were, it's also described as being in slavery to sin. We were slaves, we were unable to please God because without faith it's, it's impossible to please God.

Before we were unable to have victory over sin. Before we often enjoyed and approved of sinful behavior. We enjoyed friendships with people who practice sinful lifestyles. We were justly found guilty and we were condemned for our sins.

But now, those things have passed and are continuing to pass away. Now for those who are in Christ, new things have permanently come. New things are permanently replacing those old things. Now the Holy Spirit convicts us of sin where we did things before we felt nothing, maybe even joy, maybe even proud.

Now we feel conviction, even if we still may struggle and stumble on those sins, but now there's conviction. Now there's us trying to get out of that pit and asking God to rescue us from those sins, and we see the joy of Him rescuing us from one sin, and now you start thinking, oh, I'm pretty good. I got rid of that one. And then all of a sudden he, oh by the way, now let me direct you to another 10 shoot, yeah, then he starts working on that one and you begin to change there and become more and more like him.

Now we have godly sorrow over sin that leads to repentance. We have a growing hunger for God's word. I've been counseling a dear brother in the Philippines who struggled with sin of a sexual nature. He's a new believer.

And it's been very difficult for him to put those old things off, and he's, he's afraid to death. Maybe I'm not really a believer because I've still sin sometimes doing these things. I said, what, the fact that you're worried about this and you want to change and you hate it shows me that that's, that's evidence that God is convicting your heart. Hang in there.

He's going to help you change. He's going to continue that work that he started in you. Now we have a growing hunger not only for His word but a desire to worship Him, to serve Him, to glorify Him. I love what John Piper said.

I think it's in his devotional pierced by the word, but he talks about glorifying God, even in the little things like, he says, you can glorify God by drinking orange juice. I'm like, how do you do that? Come on now. Lord, thank you.

That you've provided something for me to drink. I'm sitting at a table in a, in a house with controlled temperature. I've got food, I've got clothing. You're so kind.

That's glorifying God, even in little things. In addition to that, now we are declared righteous and forgiven for all of our sins, and I love this Psalm, it's very encouraging 103 verse 12 says, as far as the east is from the west, so far he has removed our transgressions from us. What a beautiful picture. From the Psalms that he has removed our sins infinitely far from us.

No matter what our past was, God forgives us and makes us new. Some of these modern Psychologists and unfortunately Christians who mingle that, they say, oh, your, your past sins are gonna drag you down, you have to learn what they are and renounce them so that you can go on with life. And I just say, well, scripture is clear, we're new creatures. My past isn't gonna hold me down, I'm new.

God has removed that as far as the east is from the west. I'm just gonna go and serve Him and glorify Him. I'm gonna be like the woman caught in adultery. I'm just gonna sin no more.

God is in the business of changing people like the apostle Paul. People like you, people like me. God is in people changing business. And he makes us into beautiful new creations.

And through Paul's life, we have seen that everyone who has been saved changes. We change our, our reason for living. The goals that we make, the jobs we take, all that, we change our reason for living, our worldview changes, and our nature changes. Changing my reason for living and my worldview enabled me to serve God among the poor and the sick and the needy in the Philippines.

I never pictured myself. Sitting underneath a bridge. With about 100 poor people doing Bible studies when you could smell the urine, flies landing on you, you're swatting them while you're trying to teach the Bible, trash all over the place. Didn't even felt like home.

Glad to be with these dear people, put my arm around them, teach the word, pull out a guitar, I used to bring a chess set and play chess with them. God changed me. It keeps thinking, keeps my thinking. In regard to training pastors and, and preaching the word and ministers straight, I, I'm teaching men how to preach the word.

I believe God's way, rather than following all the fads and the trends because I have a biblical worldview. I can recognize. I can discern. No, that's not what scripture says.

That's that may work. It might be pragmatic, but God says do it this way. God changes us when we're in His word. He changes everything.

Taking risks for God and getting out of our comfort zones is much easier to do when the word of God. is transforming us. And like Paul, if you believe and receive the love of Christ, you will be compelled to know Him more and to make Him known. It will impact things like your choices you make on a daily basis.

If you're a student, the classes you take. It'll impact the way you think about the person that you would date or marry, the words you use in conversations. It will impact the jobs you take. It will impact the things that you might have complained about.

Now you'll stop so as not to offend someone. the friends you make, the church you go to, the ministries you do or don't do, and I hope it has already impacted your plans for the future. This is why I wanted to share this passage with you, because I want to encourage you to intentionally pursue radical change in your life. If you've been saved, you can't be content with stopping there.

If you've been saved, you've got to examine yourself. Am I still thinking the way I used to? Am I behaving the way I used to? Am I planning for the way I used to?

I remember hearing a pastor saying he's trying to justify some of the gadgets he was getting, and again I'm not knocking gadgets. I have my share, but he got a jet ski. Oh, that's so I can evangelize. Never seemed to work out like that, but my home church in the valley.

They're talking about remodeling, doing a facelift to the church. It's a church looks about like this, so it's maybe the 50s, I'm guessing when this church was built, and they wanted to make it look more contemporary. And so I was talking to some guys, just challenging them about thinking about bigger picture in God's kingdom. I said, what, how about instead of doing fundraising the church to remodel and face lift the whole church, how about you do that?

But then in the end, you say, what, instead, let's take, we, we worked for the last 6 months or a year and we raised up this money. Instead, let's use that. To build some churches for people in the Philippines or in India or or reach our community here. This building, yeah, OK, it's old but it's nice.

It meets our needs. People in the Philippines and other countries wish they had churches like this. We're training men. In this, their church, their worship center, you take 3 American garages, stack them in a row.

That was their worship center. These pastors came out for the training. They traveled 10 to 12 hours, some of them by boats, bus, motorcycle, by foot, and then they get that far. They get in this little church, they pull out little mats, they sleep there in the morning or through the night till the morning.

I don't know how these 30, 40 guys are sharing the couple of showers that they have there, but they do it, they eat their breakfast there. And they're so grateful to have that facility. But I pray that you're encouraged to think about how God wants to use you and change you to live this life radically for His kingdom. We'll get our toys in heaven.

Let's think about sacrificing ourselves. And our resources really they're, they're gods, at least go to Him first. Lord, I have these. You've given these to me.

I'm the steward of these. I'm the steward, I'm not even my own. I'm the steward of this body you've given me. Help me to live in light of who you've made me and use it all for your glory.

Take what you will, whether it's me, or my resources, whatever, it's yours, Lord, guide me, and he'll do it. And I hope you will be excited to do that. I'll just one last thing in closing. Pastor Irwin, who came out with me, it's difficult for Filipinos to get visas.

They only let, they've got a quota. I don't know if it's a 1000 year or what, but, So they let him through and we were so excited. Last year they said no, I've had so many pastors come out and they said no, they turned, as soon as they hear they're a pastor, oh, they give you your slip of paper that is a rejection notice. Well, I posted on Facebook and just praise the Lord.

Pastor Irwin got his visa to come out. now we just trust the Lord to provide everything else to get there and I had, within 2 days, we already had all the money for his trip. One guy called me and said, Yeah, I prayed about it and the Lord has put it in my heart. I want to give you $2000 for your guys' trip.

And this is what I love what he said. He goes, I can't wait till tomorrow morning. I can't wait to go to the bank to get that money to send it to you, not just, OK, the Lord put this in my heart. I'm going to do it.

I can't wait. I'm excited to do this for the Lord. He's a changed man. This is the same man I told you that struggled with sexual sin in the past.

He's such a generous, godly man, and the Lord has radically changed him, and I pray that he will continue to change all of us like that. And Lord, Help us to see the opportunities that you give us to be like you. Help us to recognize. where we fall short.

Continue to conform us to your image. Continue to transform our words, our minds, our hearts, our reason for living. And I pray that we would bring much joy and glory to you, and that would be our greatest joy. I ask all of this in the wonderful name of Jesus.

Amen.