It’s Time You Quit

00:00 - Speaker 1 Real life presents the Jack Kibbs podcast with intention and boldness to proclaim truth, equip the saints, and impact our culture. 00:09 - Speaker 2 I can't wait to break open the bible. I can't wait to find out what God might say next in the message. I can't wait to see what God's gonna do this week in my life. Listen, when that is in your life, that means the holy spirit is in control. He's leading and why is that true? Because you are now indebted to him. You didn't even know that. You wanna know why you were set free by his salvation, which brings you in the depths to his love. 00:38 - Speaker 1 You can get the outlines of this podcast by going to jackibbs.com/podcast. Today, if this podcast lifts you up and encourages you to live a more fulfilled life in Christ, then make sure you leave us when those five star ratings. To us, that's like saying amen or yes, then that rating will encourage others to listen. Now open your hearts to what God's word has to say to you. Here is Jack Hibbs. 01:07 - Speaker 2 How do you know that you're a child of god? Do you wanna prove it to yourself? Ask yourself this question number one is, are you being led by the spirit of God? Ask yourself that question number two, Is the spirit of adoption within us or within you crying out, Abba, father? Do you want to draw closer to god? Don't answer out loud. Just answer on a piece of paper, these are things that must be proven in your life. This is a diagnostic test for all of us as a church. Am I being led by the spirit? In other words, do you sense the spirit of God leading you, frankly, on a daily basis? And here's the scary thing about what I just said. If I have to explain it to you, the answer is no for you. Do you have a desire to call him father? Listen, if you're Jewish right now, You're offended by what I just said. You'll never hear in the Old Testament scriptures. The Jew being invited to call God Father. Because we say the word father about that's aramaic, I like it in Italian. The aramaic word in Italian is papa. The Bible is telling us Jesus said it himself when addressing the father he called in papa. Can you inside say, yes, when I speak to him, when I call out to him, I have that desire and he's papa. Now some legalist is gonna they're gonna say, oh, that's so irreverent. Well, you need to read your bible. Is it possible that god would want us to have a relationship with him so close? Oh, yes. Thirdly, is the witness of the holy spirit happening to our spirit. Third thing is the is the witness of the holy spirit speaking to your internal spirit Fourthly, and finally, it's this, can we agree with the Bible that because we follow Jesus, there's a sense of suffering in our lives. Are we in any way shape or form suffering for the name of Christ? Now, this is not a weird statement and I don't want to bum me out. It means this, guilty by association. Your mom and dad told you be careful who you hang out with. You might say, well, I was never like my friends. Well, you that's amazing. Usually birds of a feather get in trouble together. No. I'm kidding. But you had it right. I just changed it just now. But it's true you know. And so the fact of the matter is regarding you and I knowing Christ. Are we the only ones who know that we know Christ? In other words, do you know that? I know Christ, you say Jack. Yeah. You talk about him every week. Yeah. I make that assumption. Sure. I get it. I get it. But does the world know that Jack belongs to Christ. Does your world know that you belong to Christ? The moment they do, there is a beautiful, wonderful, holy appointed, suffering. People are gonna not invite you because you're a Christian. They're gonna exclude you because you're a Christian. Whatever it might be. So churches, let's dive into this together. The the title for this series is It's time you quit. How's that? Just quit. So, well, pastor, I was thinking about that today. That's why I came to church. I'm just if I run it as a doll. God. Maybe it's time you just absolutely quit because that's what God wants us to do, is to absolutely quit doing it on our own and to wake up to the realization that we belong to his family. And when you're in the family of God, there is nothing. Listen carefully, there is nothing that you do to put you in that family and keep you in that family. This is gonna be some challenges to our legalism today. We are Listen. We are no longer obligated to rules and regulations. Hang on. We are no longer obligated to do anything for god. Listen. Obligate. Did God ever say, you do this and I love you. No. You do these five things or these ten things and I will approve of you. No. We are not obligated to do anything for God. Number one, he doesn't need us. To poster, what do you mean? He doesn't need us. He doesn't need you. He doesn't need me. He lets us get involved with what he's doing. It's like your two year old one in the mow the lawn with you. It's the worst thing ever. If you wanna get the job done, but it's the most beautiful thing for a photo moment or remembering, oh my gosh. Because here's what God says to mom and dad trying to mow the lawn with a two year old who wants to mow they want to push the lawn more is, it's gonna take me forever, and then God says to you, that's exactly That's exactly what you're causing me to do with your life. We Jack, we could go from from zero to a hundred in a second. If you would just stop trying to move them on and let me do it, Jack. Just hang on. Or better yet, I'll hold you. I'll carry you. And this is vitally important. It may sound crazy to you for me to say You are not obligated to do anything for god. But read the fine print. You are now church obligated to God. That's far broader. That's much deeper. And so we note this in verses twelve to fourteen It's time you quit. Don't just do something. Stand there. Don't just do something. Stand there. God might be speaking to some of you today saying, I just want you to stop and just stand there and let my truth wash over you. You need to hear this so that you might be liberated. And the first thing is this, stand in his debt. Can you write that down? Stand in his debt. The word debt, like financial debt, are when you're indebted to somebody. Stand in his debt. Watch this. Verse twelve says, therefore, circle the word therefore, very important, very key point. David and McGee would say, That's why it's there for. Therefore, we are debtors, circle the word debtors, not to the flesh, to live according to the flesh verse thirteen. For if you live according to the flesh, you will die. We already know this as believers. If we live according to the flesh, it's gonna kill us. It's it's heartless. Our flesh wants to do its own thing, but it's hard to live like that. Before you were a Christian, you survived, maybe you didn't. Weekends. It's probably better for you to go back to work on Monday because you didn't treat yourself well during the weekend. What was going on? Your pleasure is in control. Right? And all of that sinning and living for self and I want this and that your expense, I'm gonna have it. Leads to death, the bible says. And we become indebted to sin. We become indebted to our passions. But there's an ending that is holy and pure. And that is to stand in his debt. What do I mean by that is understanding this market down if you would. The word debtors is a a word in meaning both, listen, in Greek or in English, it's it's colorful, but look at the Greek meaning of the word debtors. This is what Paul is saying. This is what you need to do, not in the flesh, no more, but to god. It means in the negative, we are culprits together. Because it's plural, debtors. It's not I'm a debtor. It's that we were all once children. The bible says, listen to this. Again, why would man write this if man wrote the bible? We were once all children of the devil. How's that for a strong cup of coffee this morning? That's plurality. We were all in debt to the things of the world. We were culprits together and living out fleshly appetites. In the positive, meaning this, being a dead or two or indebted to owned by or under the obligation of another. Do you see the difference? Listen, you don't you don't do anything for god to earn his acceptance. Because of what he's done for you and I, we are now in debtors to god because of his great love wherewith he's loved you. What he has done causes us Not to be grabbed by the ear or twisted. Not to be grabbed by the neck and drug to church. And you sit down and you learn this. No, listen. The world is probably more full of people like that, tragically maybe by ignorance, than by what God would have. And that is, I can't wait. Watch, I can't wait to meet up with God's people. I can't wait to worship like we did a moment ago. I can't wait to break open the bible. I can't wait to find out what God might say next in the message. I can't wait to see what God's gonna do this week in my life. Listen, when that is in your life, that means the holy spirit is in control. He's leading And why is that true? Because you are now indebted to him. You didn't even know that. You wanna know why you were set free by his salvation, which brings you in the debt to his love. You know this on a on a earthly plane when you're in love, Listen, when you're in love and your your girlfriend or your fiance, she she says, you know, I would sure I'd love to have I don't know. I would love to have a fish taco. You know, and I know the stores are probably closed. Listen, what do you do when you hear your sweetheart say that? Oh man, you're looking, you're calling, are you guys open? Can you stay open? I'll pay you twenty blocks extra if you just stay open. Why would you wouldn't do that for you. You wouldn't do it for any of your friends. You wouldn't do it for anybody else on the planet. But listen, because she wants it, you love her, and so you'll bribe the store owner, keep an open twenty bucks, up either along my way. And you'll go through that for her. And that is true on both sides of the equation regarding God's love for you. He did it all. And our love for him now. Hit that love displayed to us. Remember the Bible says, listen. We did not first love him. He loved us first. He first loved us. That's how we are able to love him. You don't You don't work. I gotta do this. What are you gonna do? I've gotta I gotta get some more love going on in my heart for God. Every single one of us are in some way ashamed to say we love God. Because why? The moment we say it, we know how bankrupt we are in saying it. It's not enough. We wanna say, I love you God and bring in a bouquet of flowers. I wanna say, I love you God and bring in gifts. Right? The only way we can do that rightly is say, God, I love you. I quit. I quit all the stuff of me trying to impress you. I quit all this stuff with me trying to earn your favor. I quit doubting your love for me. I, god, believe exactly what your word says that you love me. And he listen, he doesn't love us because he looked down from heaven and saw something in us and said my my heaven would be so much better if Jack were here. No. That's false doctrine. God more accurately looked over a cloud so to speak and said, men are those people messed up and they're doomed for hell. If I don't rescue them, that's exactly where they're going. And he stepped off of his throne. And he took on human skin, absolutely epic. Remarkable. So as we look at this, we God is calling us to stand in this liberty and to do that is to stand in-depth to him I, you, we oh god everything. It's awesome. Listen to this. I mean, it's quite a read. We've got a chunk of scripture here. But listen about you and I being emancipated, set free. Galatians five verse thirteen will start there. For you brethren, have been called to liberty. Only do not use liberty as an opportunity for the flesh. Wow. I'm a Christianel. I can smoke pot. Really? I'm a Christian. I can do anything I want. Really? How about getting a heart transplant? Because when you become a Christian, you only wanna do those things that please God. It doesn't mean we're sinless because you know the battle. I still wanna do some things that I'm not supposed to do, and God says, don't do that. And I say, what I want to, and then he says, you're not don't do that. And here's the part that kills me. When God says this, I don't know if he says this to you or not, but he says this to me. Jack, you have the license. You can you can grab the license to do whatever you wanna do. But it's not good for you. Listen, Jack, I'm gonna love you no matter what you do. But because I love you, I'm asking you to do what I say to do. And then I have to drop the weapons step back and say, God, how do I wrestle with you like this? How do I how do you and I get an argument? Every argument we get in, I lose every time because of your sweetness, because of your kindness. He doesn't wallop me on the head with a hammer. That's the God of religion. No. My flesh is the problem. But through love, serve one another. Isn't that amazing? Every single one of us are commanded to serve one another. Why? Because that's the nature of God. For all the law is fulfilled in one word, even this, you shall love your neighbor as you yourself. But if you bite and devour one another, words, beware lest you be consumed by one another. Look at verse sixteen through eighteen. I say then walk in the spirit and you shall not fulfill the lust of the flesh. See the practicality of that. It means this the list of the flesh is constantly pounding on the believer's head. Just like it isn't anybody else. But the believer is fighting that. Non believers don't have a fight. They're suckers. There's no liberty for them. They've got no liberty. This temptation comes by. They grab onto it and they go and they're enslaved to it. They can't even say no. They're given over. We all know what that's like. We used to live like that. For the flesh, flesh against the spirit, and the spirit against the flesh, and these are contrary to one another. Oil and water, For that, you do not do the things that you wish. But if you are led by the spirit, you are not under the law. Why does the Bible say that? Turn commitments, the commandments of the church, the commandments of the fathers, the commandments of the oh, stop it. You can't keep the commandments. And I realize, listen, as I'm reading this, the only people in this room right now are those that are watching right now. The only ones that have a frown on their face are those who are not liberated. Because they're hearing this and they're going, I don't like that. Why? We love it. What's the difference? A big difference. And it has nothing to do with us. We're indebted to him because of what he's done. You can have it too, by the way. You can be indebted, but you wanna add some new debt onto your life? How about his debt? You'll never have to pay back. You will eternally be so indebted to him that you will forever be with him in worship in heaven forever. Amen. But verse twenty two, but the fruit of the spirit is love. By the way, if you're a student of the bible, the fruit of the spirit is only one thing and one thing only. It's not the other things. It's one thing. Notice it says, but the fruit singular. It's not the fruits. It's the fruit of the spirit is love. Period. In the English, it's got a comma and it suggests that the fruit of the spirit is joy, the fruit of the spirit is peace, long you see where I'm going. No. No. It's this. The fruit of the spirit is love. And when you have God's love, And that relationship is two ways between you and him and he to you. You are walking with him in love. And guess what? You can't You cannot but have joy. When you realize this theological fact, you cannot but have peace. Look, you can't have the fruit of the spirits, which is the love of God and have no joy. That doesn't work. Are you with me? Well, you know, I I have the fruit of the spirit. I've got love. I've got kindness My faithfulness is questionable. You see how funny that is? Listen, it's the love of God and his love for us, the spirit dwelling in our lives. Results enjoy, pace, long suffering, kindness. You don't muster these. You don't take a course for this. Goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self control. Against such, there's no law. Why is there no law regarding these things? Because it's not done by us. God has to do it. It's gotta be of the spirit of God. This is liberated 19:40 - Speaker 1 This Jack Kim's podcast as well as all the broadcast outreach opportunities are listener supported. Will you consider partnering with us through a special gift? Go to jackhibbs.com to learn more and stay connected.