The Declaration Of Dependence

Real life presents the Jack Hibbs podcast with intention and boldness to proclaim truth, equip the saints and impact our culture. Well guess what? God wants to be with you, God likes you, God loves you. I don't know how to say it. He died for you. He rose again from the dead for you and for any man, woman, boy or girl who puts their trust in him, there should never again be the cloud of condemnation suspended over your life. You can get the outlines of this podcast by going to jackhibbs.com slash 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 one of 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. Number one, mark it down if you wouldn't you guys. It's this. The declaration of dependence is that there's now this absolute freedom that's available to us. Now I'm going to really lay it down to you guys because I have to. I'm very excited about this portion of scripture because it transformed my life personally. When he says there is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus, we all start with this right here right now. It's because that coming out of this condemnation, there's a great weight that is lifted. Mark that down. That our declaration is from condemnation and its weight. condemnation is and I'm going to give you the definition of it here from the Bible in a moment. condemnation is this overwhelming sense of hopelessness that there's no there's no hope for you. There's no hope and you can't find the answer and you're struggling and you know what's wrong but you can't fix it. There's no place to go and there's a big weight. condemnation is a great weight that weighs upon so many people today and people choose how to deal with it. Listen up everybody. The reason why there's drug addiction, the reason why there are these personality issues and violence and and drunkenness and the pursuit of materialism. Think of it. All of these pursuits literally come back to one single point of the human soul and that is that there's something wrong. Somewhere along the route there's something wrong that somebody realized I got to find an answer for my life and they go on the pursuit of money. They go on the pursuit of power or drugs or sex or violence or whatever it is and they're empty and this is universal. No matter where you're at in the nation or in the world. It's the language of the soul. The Bible says our souls are separated from God and we're wondering without God and we know that what we're doing is wrong and the condemnation comes. The word as we'll see here condemnation and I'm going to ask you a question so get ready. It's going to be a true question condemnation. This is the Greek meaning to the word to be under the sentence of I talked to a young man two weeks ago and he said pastor I want you to pray for me watch this I want you to pray for me I committed some crimes and I got arrested and there's a court hearing there's a trial all this well now I'm going to go be sent my sentence in this coming but during that time I realized I'm too young to run my life and he said I started watching your messages online that I started coming to the church I gave my life to Christ and I'm ready to face the judgment he said I'm going to go I'm guilty but now I'm a new creation but I'm still responsible for the things I did to people so I'm going to go to jail and I'm going to find out for how long but I'm new God has forgiven me I'm going in there I pray God uses me you know what's happened he was condemned but Christ said him free you and I were condemned in our sins but Christ has listen I trust Christ has set you free watch this man this young man every unbeliever and I you certainly once had this issue to be under the sentence of to be pronounced guilty to be worthy of all penalties all judgments all leans all warrants all ordinances against you resulting in condemnation to bring you what to the place where there's no hope of being delivered now this guy in a sense it doesn't exactly apply because he's been forgiven in heaven this young man is free are you with me and inside he's free but he's going or he's in jail and into prison his body will not be walking the streets of LA anymore but he's free sounds like a contradiction but listen you can be walking the streets of LA and think you're completely free but inside you're completely imprisoned by guilt and by condemnation and by shame but the grand declaration is this there is therefore now these are emphatics in the Greek language it's an announcement Paul the Apostle is you can almost see him jumping with glee there is therefore now he's so excited about the announcement listen this is a message of hope today but I want to make sure you have it that you have hope don't say you're a good person you're not going to have it this i'm going to tell you a little story here real quick condemnation the world when it's condemned when that when an individual is experiencing the condemnation and they don't respond to it they harden their heart against it until they don't feel it anymore and then they live life thinking watch this they live life thinking they're okay but you're the problem you know what you know what's happened to them in fact if you know somebody who's very religious but they're good you're the problem you're talking about a person who does not understand any longer the sense of condemnation that this world heaps upon them they've hardened their heart you see Jack you see you can be a religious person with a hardened heart yeah totally completely but as we've mentioned in previous studies when you look into the word of God that word of God looks inside of you and reveals who you are and it causes you to either harden your heart or to melt your heart so i'm going to ask you this question to trick question tell me the difference of feelings between condemnation and conviction i've studied this for 46 years in my own life number one condemnation is the sense of heaviness guilt-ambusted condemnation conviction is heavy guilt conviction condemnation i'm in trouble i'm convicted what i did was wrong and it needs to be reckoned with what i'm submitting to you is this the feelings are exactly the same condemnation conviction you see wait a minute pastor Jack they have different wait wait no no no watch watch when a believer is convicted that sense of heaviness is weighing upon the believer i'm talking to you don't look at me like that i'm talking to you when you and i sin we displease God as a child of God our names are written down in heaven we're going to heaven he's our God we're his child but when we sin we break fellowship with God and there's a sense of big heaviness guilt shame i just want you to know it's the will of God that you experienced that literally for the duration of seconds did you know that she said what do you mean by that if you have a bad thought you look look at me right now i could be look at me look you would never think look at him he's having a bad thought you're judging me from the outside look so angelic hands lifted praying doesn't that look holy my mind could be a thousand miles away from my outward appearance if i'm a Christian God will say what are you doing Jack knock it off bad thought that is not approved and then i say Lord you are so right i'm busted God please forgive me that's exactly what put you on the cross i'm so sorry Jesus and the Bible says in first on one nine if we confess our sins he's faithful and just to forgive us of our sins and to cleanse us from all in righteousness all right so that's what the believer does so when you sin Christian you don't plan on it but when you do that's how you deal with it and so look that weight should only be on you for seconds don't let it sit there don't let it don't get away get it done the non-believer the condemnation is there and either a they wind up groping as it were searching for an answer they find Christ or they harden their heart against it today you and i live in a world that is hardened their heart against God harden their heart against conviction and against condemnation and so the world that's hardened looks and says you're the problem you're the issue it's that group it's this government it's that person it's that thing and they do not see they cannot see that they themselves are completely without feelings and that is manifested by justification self justification not biblical justification and that weighs on them the Bible tells us in Psalm 91 verse 14 because listen to this this is God speaking to you i trust as a believer in fact you you should mark up your bibles always mark up your bibles and i'm going to show you how in a moment this is kind of fun so in your Bible you should do this because he jack put in your name Sue or whatever your name is because you you've said because he has said his love upon me you want to love God therefore i will deliver him this is God talking do you like that kind of i like it i will set him on high because he has known my name like dear friends listen i'm a bumbling nincompo but verse 14 that's me is it you you should be able to say today that's me i love him only the believer can experience this verse 15 he shall call upon me and i will answer him i will be with him in trouble aren't you glad about that i will deliver him and honor him with long life i will satisfy him and show him my salvation that's an awesome verse that's my verse i'll let you have it but it's my verse and you should have in your Bible your name written next to that passage and say well it's my verse as well condemnation will lift from you the christian should never be walking around in the sense of condemnation oh i'm never good enough to please god oh i think i've upset him oh i don't know you know i know god is supposed to love me you ever feel like that well god has to love me he's god he said he loves everybody but basically what you're saying is god has to love me but i don't think he likes me well guess what god wants to be with you god likes you god loves you i don't know how to say it he died for you he rose again from the dead for you and for any man woman boy or girl who puts their trust in him there should never again be the cloud of condemnation suspended over your life now if you're not a christian you should be worried sick and if you're worried sick you should thank god that you care enough about your own soul to cry out to him because god helped the man or woman who is so callous who says things like i'm fine i don't need any of this god stuff i'm better than most people your past feeling and that's a tragedy in proverbs chapter 28 verse 13 the bible says he who covers his sins will not prosper so nobody knows god knows you have had nothing's ever happened to me just wait he loves you he's not going to let you continue like that are you flirting around with the secretary or are you you flirting around with the boss is it the neighbor is it the husband's wife she's something or the wife's neighbor the what what's going what has got telling you right now you see pastor who told you nobody nobody told me is it the money they won't know they won't miss it little decimal point here or there listen god knows and listen if he loves you and he does if you can hear him and i hope that's the case you feel a little bit of a sting right now and i highly recommend you talk to him about it don't talk to anybody else about it talk to him about it go to him about it because here's what will happen he will forgive you if you bury it look at this verse he who covers his sin will not prosper but whatever but whoever confesses and for sakes them will have mercy happy as the man who is always reverent or mindful of god but he who hardens his heart will fall into calamity listen the bible god is so kind i'm talking just to the believer right now if the believer doesn't take it to god if in that 30 seconds you're convicted it's best i don't you talk i don't understand i have a pretty good life so get in your car if you have any doubts getting a car go drive go drive right now to like LAX or downtown LA that ought to bring out the flesh if you think you're so saintly i dare you drive drive to LAX circle around it and come back and see if you're see if your temper is not touched and when that listen when you cross the line and god says jack uh for sake it in that instant lord forgive me in Jesus name it doesn't have to go any further but if you bury it and bury it and bury it you and god says in the book of numbers he says if you don't forsake it i'm going to shout it Jesus by the way referred to that in the gospels he says if you everything that you do if it's not covered by the blood of christ he said i'm going to someday shout it from the rooftop the bible says be sure of this if you don't forsake your sin it will call you out you know how people get caught exactly what god said would happy so nobody knows next thing you know there's a big red sign with a finger on it at the point right over your head why would he do that he loves you he wants you to go to heaven and the Christian he wants you to be forgiven because you are going to heaven he wants to have that communication open and then listen conviction itself we learn that from conviction after it takes hold conviction is a beautiful thing one of the scariest things ever is if you can commit some crime against god in thought or deed and have no feelings about it oh my goodness that would be the worst thing in the world but the sad thing is the people who feel that don't know that it's the worst thing in the world because they can't feel it we look at a world right now that we're coping and trying to do our best with a culture of self-mutilation not sure if you're aware of this but how many young people today because of pain and sorrow and abuse are self-mutilating they're cutting up their torsos they're cutting their inner thighs they're cutting their buttocks with razor blades they're cutting their arms why because they'll tell you I had my life taken from me by some way shape or form and I lost all contact with myself in this feeling is the only thing I can feel it allows me to have some sort of say about my life it makes no sense unless you feel so lost and that happens because of man's soul and god changes our lives he transforms us he gets us out of that just that act alone and that burden and that pain and the conviction of it all upon your life should tell you that god is real we talked about darkness recently but we would never know darkness unless we knew what light was run to the hope run to him this Jack Hibbs 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