Focal Point

Pastor Mike Fabarez: Our courage was limited by our desire to please people. "What is this going to do to my reputation? What are people going to think if I do this?" And that was the dominant thing. Whereas now, we're consumed with wanting the approval of God. I want God to be happy with this. So, therefore, I'm going to please Him even if I don't please you.

Dave Druy: And welcome to Focal Point with author and pastor Mike Fabarez. I'm Dave Druy. You know, Scripture is full of amazing men and women who can serve as role models in our own walk with God. Their stories of victories and failures have a lot to teach us. But today, Pastor Mike says we can also draw inspiration to follow Jesus from our own stories. As we learn how to walk closer to the Lord, we can be motivated by earlier days of devotion. Here's Pastor Mike.

Pastor Mike Fabarez: It's interesting that in Scripture, that is so big on us finding good role models for the Christian life, it's interesting that in Hebrews chapter 10, before we get to Hebrews chapter 11, which is full of great examples of the Christian life, he starts in speaking of examples and he says, "You know what? You really can serve as your own role model because you have done it right and you know what it feels like to do it right." And he says, "Here's the thing. All you've got to do is remember that and do more of that stuff."

Hebrews chapter 10, if you have your Bibles, open up and see this interesting take on role models in the Scripture that says really what you need to learn to do, at least in part, is learn to mimic yourself, at least the highlights and victories of your Christian life. And here in this text, it says not only can you learn from other great Christians as we'll see in Hebrews 11, but you can learn a lot from your own testimony.

You can learn a lot about succeeding in the Christian life and drawing closer to God because you've had experiences of forward progress, and you need to look back and remember that. Remember. If we're drawing near to God, we need to remember our victories in the past, and it will be a motivation for future growth. Look at verse number 32. Let's read the text together. He says, "Those earlier days, remember those, after you'd received the light," and look at this victory, "when you stood your ground in the great contest in the face of suffering."

Apparently, some big thing that had happened, this series of events that had tested their faith and they succeeded. They stood their ground. And he says sometimes it got really tough, verse 33, "You were publicly exposed to insult and persecution." The early church often was pulled out as followers of the Way and of Jesus and this whole sect that they called it, and they were made fun of. They were ridiculed. And he says, "You went through that."

And not only did you go through it, there were times when you didn't just have to endure it, you willingly stepped out of the crowd and you stood side by side with those who were so treated. And not only that, your heart was involved, verse 34, "You sympathized with those in prison." You felt for them. And when they came to take away your property because you were followers of Christ, you were like, "Okay, fine."

You joyfully accepted the confiscation of your property because look at your perspective: "because you knew that you yourselves had better and lasting possessions." That's a great resume. And if you think that these guys are stellar Christians with no room for growth, that's not the context. The context is you've got to grow. You've got to get closer to God. But the point is you have had victories that should convince you that you are someone who knows what it is to have those victories, to show the expression and fruit of God in your life, and build on that.

Remember your past. And what's the whole point of it being here? So that you can keep moving forward. Verse 22, to draw near to God. That's the point. And you and I need to do that. Now, I say six things because if you look at this carefully, the things that are addressed in this passage about my life have really changed prior to Christ, now as a Christian, and then the question is, how am I doing now in all these areas?

So let's just do the work of that and let's start with the first thing that comes from a very interesting word, a participle here in the very first phrase of verse 32. He says, "Remember those earlier days." Now, what about them? Well, here's the first thing he says, "after you'd received the light." That's how the NIV translates it. After you received the light.

Now understand that's a total metaphor. It's an analogy of something. And it speaks to the arena of my mind, that something has happened to my mind. Put this down for letter A: We need to think about the change that took place in our mind. Jot down your mind. Our minds were darkened before we came to Christ. And then Christ did something to our minds that could be rightly addressed as being enlightened. Something changed there.

Well, what happened? I know that's just a description of what's happened, they've been enlightened, they'd received the light as the NIV puts it. Verse 32, Hebrews 10. When that had happened, you were new in that new mind, you had that new responsiveness to God. Here's one thing that was going on in your life. When the suffering came, you stood your ground. I love that. You stood your ground in the great contest.

If you've got your Greek New Testament, what is that word? It's the word for athletics. It's like an athletic event. It was the struggle of facing suffering. It's the picture of some kind of athletic competition like a wrestling match in the Greco-Roman world where you stood your ground and they weren't going to take you down. You were going to stand tough. And you did it even when there was pain coming your way.

Now, that is something that happens in the Christian life that as a non-Christian doesn't quite happen like that. You have capacity as a Christian that you didn't have before: your strength. Let me illustrate this for you in Matthew chapter 13. Now, Matthew chapter 13, as you turn there, we're going to look at what non-Christians who are exposed to the truth, that have some connection with the church or some connection with the teaching of God's word, how they respond when they face the contest of suffering.

All of us in our Christian testimony have that period where we start to warm up to the truth of God's word. We start saying, "Well, that's starting to make a little sense to me. And that sure is interesting and that might be helpful." And we start to embrace it, not yet regenerate, but God is doing a work. As the Puritans said, there was a quickening taking place. Something is happening where now all of a sudden you're starting to associate and attach with it. You're not converted.

What tests that and divides the two kinds of people is this thing called the great contest of suffering. And every Christian or every pseudo-Christian or every church-goer has to encounter this, and they will encounter this. And it will usually come early on in the Christian life. Jesus had just told in Matthew chapter 13 the parable of the four soils. Remember that? We often call it the parable of the seed and the sower.

Well, the real focus is really not that. I mean, that's the unchangeable thing. God is using His servants to cast out the gospel and the truth or the light of God's word. The real issue here is there's all kinds of people that the truth encounters. There's four kinds that Jesus delineates. The first one is the seed thrown on the path. The next one is the seed that ends up in the rocky soil, and then you've got the thorny soil and then you've got the good soil.

Now, there's nutrients that are different in the good soil. Some bear fruit thirty, sixty, hundred-fold, but really there're four kinds. There's this kind that bears fruit in an all-varying degree, and then there's the thorny and then there's the rocky and then there's the seed thrown on the path. You're familiar with the story. Look at chapter 13 when he starts to explain the parable and what it means, and I want to look at the second soil.

He says, "Listen," verses 18 and following, "to what the parable of the sower means. Anyone who hears the message about the kingdom, the truth, if it's preached to them and they don't understand it and they go, 'I don't get it at all,' it's like the evil one, like the bird that comes and snatches that seed away what was sown in his heart. He doesn't get it." That's the seed along the path. Interesting. We know that. We're not talking about that one.

We're talking about that stage when people encounter the word and they're responsive to it. They're not quite regenerate yet, verse 20. It's the one who receives the seed that falls on the rocky places. That's the man who hears the word, and at once receives it with joy. "Well, this is good. This is novel. This might be helpful for me." But since he has no root—and you've got to have that, you've got to connect here, there's got to be genuine life and connection to God—there's not in this case. There's just this interest in the truth.

Well, he only lasts a short time. Now, how do we divide this person out? How do we know? Well, here it comes. When trouble or persecution comes because of that truth, because of the word, what happens? "I've had enough." He quickly falls away. He is not interested, even though he might be intellectually interested in truth, he is not interested in maintaining or holding truth if it's going to cost him pain.

That's when he says, "I'm going to compromise. I'm going to step back. I'm not going to toe the line or heed it and be a fanatic about this. I mean, if it can help my marriage or help my interpersonal lives or whatever, but I'm not going to be a fanatic about it because it's costing me," and they pull back. And unfortunately, the church today seems to think, "Well, those are just nominal Christians." We've come up with all kinds of categories.

The bottom line is they don't bear fruit. They fall away. And unfortunately, the Bible says if you don't endure to the end, you're not a genuine Christian. If you're not bearing fruit, you're not real. And what we're saying is a lot of people have an intellectual interest in the truth, but they're not real. And the difference is when they face the great contest of suffering, what happens? They compromise when it hurts.

Let's put it down that way. Your strength will compromise when life hurts. It says, "I don't want to keep going. I'm not interested in going all the way. I can't hold on to this conviction or this commitment because it's starting to cost too much. I might lose my job. I might lose a client. I might lose a relationship." So, you know what? I just won't go any further with this.

And the Bible says that's not real Christianity. As a matter of fact, when you are a real Christian and converted, here's what happened to you. Back to Hebrews 10 in our minds. You stood your ground in the great contest in the face of suffering. When you hit that dividing line, when that test of your faith came, you passed the test and you stood your ground. That's a different kind of strength. It's a strength that doesn't pull back when the going gets tough.

It's what we call in Scripture—and if you're familiar with this word, jot it down—it's this thing we call *hupomonē*. Do you remember that word? It's worth jotting down. Just fun to say. *Hupomonē*. And if you want a word, what does that mean? Just put this underneath it: stick-to-itiveness, which sounds like a silly word, but it's in your dictionary if it's fat enough. It's in there. I checked it this week.

What's the point? Well, you've heard me preach on *hupomonē* before. It's a compound word. *Menō*, the part we get *-monē* from, that means to stay or remain. *Hupo* is the Greek preposition that means underneath. You kind of want to be the Tijuana donkey. And that's not generally what you want to be, but you want to be that in this case. Because I remember as a kid going down to Tijuana and seeing these donkeys and I could not believe the stuff they piled on the back of the donkeys.

You've seen that? And you look at the swayed back of the donkey sitting there looking stupid. He's fine by the tamale cart. He's not going anywhere. And you're thinking, "Wow, if you piled that stuff on me, I'm going to say, 'Get me out from underneath this.'" *Hupomonē* is the ability to stay under that pressure, under that pain, and you're not going anywhere.

And if it costs me to adhere to the word, guess what? I guess it's going to cost me. I've got the ability to stick with it even when the truth costs me pain. And that's *hupomonē*. And now here's the contrast. Before I was a Christian, if anything that was true or virtuous cost me, I backed off from it. But then I became a Christian and God worked something in my heart. He gave me the ability to stand there in the face of difficulty and not move.

And now the question is, third column, that's your homework. How's it going now? Still got that kind of zeal, that ardent passion? You got that kind of stick-to-itiveness, that kind of strength? And the question that we've got to be asking is, if not, don't say you don't know what it's like. Don't say you're not that kind of person. I have people tell me, "Well, that's not me. That's you."

No, it's you too because every real Christian can look at a time in their Christian life when that test came and you stood the test. So if you're feeling weak right now, don't tell me you don't know how to do it. You've done it. God has worked that in your life. Don't distance yourself from the great people in Hebrews 11 and say, "Well, I'm not like them."

No, but you can look back right now and remember when you did not give in and you did not compromise when your faith was tested. Then why in the world would you think you can't do it now? Do it now. Remember that. Remember where you've been. Remember the enlightenment of your mind. Remember the *hupomonē* of your strength.

Thirdly, letter C, verse 33. "Sometimes," he says, thinking back on your early Christian life, "you were publicly exposed to insult and persecution." Why? Because you're a Christian. "At other times you stood side by side with those who were so treated." Now you've got to tear this apart. There're two parts to this. The first phrase looks a lot like verse 32. I was there holding up, standing firm when, because of my Christianity, people were making fun of me. They were insulting me. They were persecuting me.

Now, you'd say if that was all there was to this verse, then you'd say it kind of goes with strength. You had the ability to stand there and be strong. That's great. But look at the next phrase. Here's the other part of this. "You also, at other times, stood side by side with those who were so treated." Now, that's different. It's one thing because of my commitment to Christ or my commitment to God's truth to incur ridicule for that and say, "Okay, I'm going to stand up under. I'm not going to move off my commitment and my resolve for the truth of God. I'm not moving." That's one thing.

It's a different kind of virtue. It's a different kind of work of God that when I see it happening in someone else, look at the phrase, "I am willing to stand side by side" with the person that's being persecuted. Can you see the difference? That's something else. We call that courage: the ability to say, "I don't care. It may not even be my issue or my struggle, but I'm going to stand right next to this person because I'm not afraid. And if you're going to ridicule him for being a Christian, you can ridicule me too."

That takes courage. That's more than strength. That's something that has to do with my bravery. That has something to do with the fact that I am not afraid. And if it's going to incur more ridicule, insult, or persecution, I'm not afraid of that. And as a non-Christian did you have that? No, not at all. As a matter of fact, that's not a part of the non-Christian virtue. You don't have it.

You may have some courage, but you don't have courage when it relates to this kind of thing because there's always in a non-Christian mind something else floating around that is not extricated, it's not taken away until God does a work in your life at conversion. And it is illustrated best in Galatians chapter 1. So let's look at the contrast in Galatians chapter 1 and we'll spell it out.

I don't have that kind of courage as a non-Christian because really in my earth-bound, myopic perspective all I'm really concerned with, or at least as a part of the composite of my concern, is something that Paul delineates and spells out here. Take a look at what he says in Galatians chapter 1. Galatians chapter 1. Paul's talking about the gospel. He says, "Don't sway, don't compromise. Stand firm, no matter what people say. Stand firm on the gospel."

And then he says in verse number 10, Galatians 1:10, he says, "Am I now trying to," look at this phrase, "win the approval of men? Or am I trying to win the approval of God? Am I trying to please men?" Look at this: "If I were still trying to please men," which seems to be the linear experience of non-Christians, he said, "then I wouldn't be what a Christian is, a servant of Christ." They are mutually exclusive.

God does a work in a heart that changes that. So let's put it this way. When it comes to courage, there's always a limiting factor in a non-Christian mind. And it's because we're a part of the human race and because we don't have God in the equation. Here's the thing. Let's put the column next to your courage. Let's make it say this: We need to recognize that there were limits to our courage and it usually included a composite of this, that we were afraid of what people may think.

It was part of the equation in our decision-making. We were afraid of what people may think. Our courage was limited by our desire to please people. Now I know we may have wanted to please ourselves, we may have wanted to please our principles, but always there haunting us in the back of our unregenerate mind was, "What is this going to do to my reputation? What are people going to think if I do this?"

And that was the dominant thing that kept us from doing other things we might have done. There's always that non-Christian peer pressure that's not just a teenage phenomenon, it's an adult phenomenon, and we start going, "Well, I don't know, what will people think?" And then all of a sudden God does something in our heart that changes not only our mind and our strength, it changes our courage.

It moves us from worrying about that. Look how Paul says it where now we're consumed with wanting the approval of God. I want God to be happy with this. We all of a sudden now, as we said last week, we have this fear of God as opposed to my constant concern about what men will think. I'm no longer afraid of this, I'm afraid of that. So, therefore, I'm going to please Him even if I don't please you.

And I love the example in Scripture of Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah. Do you remember those guys? Aka Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. And when it came down to it, they said, "We're standing with Daniel. You know what? We're not afraid." As a matter of fact, we'll step out of the crowd and if you, Nebuchadnezzar, want us to bow down to your idol, here's what we have to say: we're not going to do it.

And he says, "Well, look at this. I'm going to throw you in this fiery furnace and I'm going to kill you." Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah said to the king, I love this in the book of Daniel, "Listen, God is able to save us from your fiery furnace," and I love this phrase, "but even if He doesn't, we're not bowing down to your idol." We're not going to do that. We're not going to do that. And you know what? We're not afraid of you.

We're more afraid of God and being idolaters and we're not going to do that. We wouldn't be an idolater because we answer to God. So if you want to think we're stupid when you blow the trumpets and everybody's bowing down and everybody's on their forehead before the idol, you can find us, Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah, and we're going to be standing shoulder to shoulder going, "Hmm-mm." We're not going to bow down because we're not afraid of you anymore.

If we were like everybody else and didn't have this resolve and this work of God in our hearts, I'm sure we would be bowing down because we're more concerned about what people think. We're very pragmatic as non-Christians. But as Christians we say, "I'm pleasing someone else." There's an audience of one in my life now that is starting to captivate my thinking to where I'm not afraid of you anymore. That's different.

God does that work. It is—let's jot it down—we are, and this is a great word, zealous to please God. We are zealous to please God. And you and I can look back at our conversion, can we not? That first six months? How about those first 15 months of your Christian life? Weren't there times when you said to those who would think less of you because of your stand for Christ, "I don't care what you think. I care what God thinks."

You've had that experience. Don't say that's just those really ardent, fanatical, zealous Christians. No, no, that was you. That was you in the early days of your Christian life, wasn't it? You know that feeling. You know what that's like. Don't say you can't do that. You've done it. And the Bible says remember that. Remember that. And that's all God wants: just keep doing that stuff. Keep saying, "I'm going to be zealous to please God."

The distinction is so clear in Scripture, and I know we don't see it as a Christian virtue, but we should. Because you know when the list is made in Revelation chapter 21, right near the end, the second to last chapter of the Bible, when God is talking about the people that will inhabit the lake of fire, He doesn't start with idolaters, He doesn't start with sorcerers, He doesn't start with adulterers. You know who He starts with? The cowardly. That's what He says.

The cowardly. That's the first thing on the list. Why? Because they weren't afraid of God. They were afraid of man. They were afraid, they wanted to fit in, they thought about what people would think of them, and those are the people that end up populating the lake of fire. And that's why when Paul wrote to Timothy in 2 Timothy chapter 1, he said God did not give us a spirit of being a coward. He gave us a spirit of *dynamis*, of power, of love, and of discipline.

See, when you become a Christian, all of a sudden now you start to see the cowardice of caring what people think and it starts to go away. But the real question is, are you still getting tempted right now to kind of fall back into caring about what people think? Oh, I know I was kind of zealous there early on in my Christian life, but you know now... You know what the Bible says? You should be zealous for God. And you should know what it feels like because you've done it.

And every real Christian can stand up and say, "I have a testimony where I remember doing that." And I could open up the mic and you could stand up and you could say, "Yeah, I was a six-month-old Christian and I remember standing... I didn't care what people thought." Then why do we care now? The Bible says remember the height from which you fallen and do the things you did at first. I'm quoting Revelation 2:5. That is the picture. Look back and see it, and let's recapture that. Live there and build on that and move forward. You want to draw near to God? Don't say you can't do it. You've done it. Let's do it some more.

Dave Druy: When we came to Christ, we were forever changed. And thinking back on our transformation will only encourage us to press on toward an even closer relationship with God. You're listening to Mike Fabarez on Focal Point, and if you missed any part of today's message or want to find more, just go online to focalpointradio.org or download the free Focal Point app and take it with you wherever you go.

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Pastor Mike Fabarez: Pastor Mike here. You know, we live in a culture where every point of view demands affirmation. It would be easy to tell people what they want to hear. But we must teach the Bible accurately, unapologetically, and without compromising and without editing it. God's word is truth. If you want to send me a question, I encourage you to get in touch with us at focalpointradio.org.

Dave Druy: Today's program was produced and sponsored by Focal Point Ministries.