From His Heart

Speaker 1: The Lord says in his word, you shall be holy for I am holy. You're different as a Christian. Problem that we have in our world today is you can't tell the difference between those who claim to be Christians and those who openly say they're not. You know, divorce is just as rampant among Christians as it is among non-Christians. There's just no difference and and the sins of the world are the sins that God's people commit and and the Lord says, hey listen, I can't bless your life if you keep stepping out on me and going after false gods.

You need to get yourself on blessing ground.

Speaker 2: God wants to shower you with blessings. But has it clearly dawned on you that the blessings of God are dependent upon your obedience to him. It's not like you can say to God, I really want to do it my way or I'm never going to tell her I'm sorry or I'm going to cut corners at work to make more money so I can have more fun in life or I'm not going back to church because I don't get anything out of it. It's only a little sin, God. Doesn't really matter, does it? Do any of those hit home with you?

This is from his heart with pastor Jeff Schreve and in today's eye-opening message, we'll learn how to get on blessing ground with God and enjoy a life filled with incredible joy and meaningful purpose. Now today we'll have part two of this lesson called when blessings abound. It's from the eight message series, do you want to be blessed? How to experience the goodness of God. If you miss any of these along the way, go to promiseheart.org and click the listen link. But get ready now to learn what God wants us to memorize about obedience so we can enjoy life when the blessings abound.

Open your Bible to Deuteronomy chapter 28. Here again is pastor Jeff Schreve.

Speaker 1: Now it shall be if you will diligently obey the Lord your God, being careful to do all his commandments which I command you today, the Lord your God will set you high above all the nations of the earth and all these blessings shall come upon you and overtake you if you will obey the Lord your God. Deuteronomy 28:1-14 four times we read the word little word if. If God is going to do amazing things for his people if they will obey him. Now it sounds pretty simple. But you know what? They didn't do it. They didn't do it.

They said we'll do it and they did it for a while but the history of the children of Israel is that they kept going after other gods. You know, obedience seems really simple but they didn't do it and so often we don't do it. And so I want to take that just that thought about obeying the Lord and I want to unpack that a little bit and I want to show you three steps that are involved in this thing called obedience. Three key steps you can't leave any of them out. Step number one, to obey God, you have to know what God says to do.

You have to know what he says to do. You can't obey him if you don't know what he wants you to do. How well do you listen to God? How well do you listen to the commandments? And you know where we get the commandments is in the word of God. How much time do you spend in the word of God? The word of God. You say, well I want God to speak to me. Then spend time in the word of God cuz God speaks primarily through his word. So that's the very first part of this thing called obedience.

To obey God, you have to know what God says to do. Very simple but it's the first step. Step number two, to obey God, not only do you have to know what God says to do but you have to yield to what God says to do. This is a critical step that a lot of people struggle with and a lot of people miss. You have to yield to what God says to do. Now listen, in life in life there are two ways to go. There is God's way and there is your way. There's a way that seems right to a man but its end is the way of death.

Two questions that are so critical for you to ask yourself or me to ask myself. Question number one, do you believe God's commandments are good and right? Do you believe they're good and right? Good and right for you and for your life? The psalmist said in Psalm 119, therefore I love your commandments above gold. Yes, above fine gold. Therefore I esteem right all your precepts concerning everything. I hate every false way. I esteem right. Lord, your way is pleasing. Your way is straight. Your way is smooth. Your way is the right way. Concerning most things?

Uh-uh. Concerning everything. Everything that God commands is right. So that's the first key question in this yielding to God. Do you believe his commandments are good and right? Second question, have you surrendered to his commandments? Psalm 119 goes on to say this and I shall lift up my hands to your commandments which I love and I will meditate on your statutes. I'll lift up my hands to your commandments which I love. I think everyone in the world would agree that lifting up your hands is the universal sign for surrender. Have you lifted up your hands to the commandments of God?

Have you surrendered to the commandments of God and say, Lord, your ways are right and I surrender. I'm going to yield myself to what you say. That's the second key step. If you're going to obey God, first of all you have to know what he says to do. You have to spend time in his word. You have to listen. Secondly, you have to come to his word with a heart that says, speak, Lord, your servant is listening with a heart that says, not my will but thine be done with a heart that says, I yield to you your ways are right.

And when I'm at a crossroads and it's your way versus my way, I choose your way because your way is right. My way may seem right. It may look right. It just like the tree looked good for food and looked like, yeah, that was the way to go. It's not the way to go so I choose your way. And then the third step in obeying God and in experiencing his abundance and his blessings. To obey God, you have to do what God says to do. See, just knowing about it is not enough. Just saying, yes, Lord, your ways are right, not enough.

I have to do it. That's what he says in Deuteronomy chapter one or 28 verse one again. Now it shall be if you will diligently obey the Lord your God, being careful to do all his commandments which I command you today, being careful to do it. Obedience requires action. It always requires action. You can't obey God if you don't do what he says do. And you can say all day long, well I know what God wants me to do. You can say all day long, yeah, I believe God's ways are right concerning everything. But are you doing what he says do?

Jesus's first miracle at Cana of Galilee was when he turned the water into wine and Mary, his mother, was the one who said they have no wine. They run out of wine. This is going to be a big social faux pas and and help them, Lord. And he said, you know, my time is not yet come. And she turned to those servants and she said to them seven words that will change your life and change my life. Whatever he says to you, do it. do it. Whatever he says to you, don't argue with him. Don't postpone it.

Don't ponder it for later. Do it. Whatever he says to you, do it. Obedience requires action. Now if you're not going to do it, Jesus said, why do you call me Lord, Lord and do not do the things that I say? I'm not really your Lord if you're not obeying me. I'm not your master if you're not obeying me. How long do you think a slave lasted in the first century if a slave said, I 'm not going to do what my master says do? Didn't last long at all. You'd be killed if you didn't do what your master said do.

You're a slave. That's your job to do what I say. I'm your master. Listen, we've tried to water it down in the New Testament because we don't like to use the word slave. That just doesn't sound very good so we take the Greek word doulos and we turn it into the word servant. That sounds a little better. Servant is kind of toned down. A doulos wasn't a servant. A doulos was a slave and a slave does what the master says. And listen, if you want God to pour down blessings on you, you have to do what he says.

Obedience requires action and obedience is what puts you on blessing ground. It's obedience that puts you there. Man, you want the blessings to fall upon you? You want God's blessings to be unleashed and run you over and run you down? Obedience. Jesus said, if you know these things, you're blessed if you know them. No, that's not what he said. If you know these things, you're blessed if you consider them. If you know these things, you're blessed if you do them. If you do them. You're not blessed if you know them. You're not blessed if you read about them.

You're not blessed if you've been to to 10 Beth Moore conferences and you have notebooks stacked to the ceiling. Just because you know stuff doesn't mean anything unless you do it. As a matter of fact, knowing stuff and not doing it is sin. James chapter four verse 17. Therefore to the one who knows the right thing to do and does not do it, to him it is sin. To him it is sin. Man, it's dangerous to come to church. You said, I thought church was a safe place. It's dangerous because you receive truths and you hear truth and you say, okay, now I'm hearing what God wants me to do.

But if I don't do it, I'm not getting on blessing ground. I'm not experiencing the blessings from Deuteronomy 28:1-14. I'm more on the side of Deuteronomy 28:15 through 68. Man, I it's the curses. It's it's God saying, hey, there's you you're on your way to the pigsty. There are no blessings at the pigsty. I can't bless you there. There are blessings when you're on blessing ground which is the Father's farm. That's where you need to be. That's where you need to be. If you know these things, you're blessed if you do them. Whatever he says to you, do it.

Now very quickly, I want to just mention some things that the Lord says for us to do that we so often don't do and we wonder, God, why aren't you blessing me? Cuz you're missing out on what God tells you to do. Number one, he says to you, you are to love. You are to love and I am to love. The greatest commandment when Jesus was asked what is the greatest commandment, he quoted Deuteronomy chapter six verse five, to love the Lord your God with all your heart and all your soul and all your might.

This is the great and foremost commandment, to love God. To love God. And see, when you really love God, you obey God. You obey God because your heart is so in love with him. Whatever he says to you, you're going to do it cuz you love him. And not only love God, Jesus said the second greatest commandment was to love your neighbor as yourself from Leviticus. And Jesus said, by this all men will know that you are my disciples if you have love for one another. Love is huge. Have you ever gone to a church where you felt like, I don't think they wanted me here.

That's a that's a bad feeling. I want our church to be a place where people say, man, these these people love God and they love me. So that's a a big area. How are you doing in that area? He says you're to love.

Speaker 2: Well, we're certainly missing out on what God tells us to do when we fail to love others. Pastor Jeff will return in just a moment. But first, this month pastor Jeff aired an incredibly poignant series called Beyond Amazing, Understanding the Grace of God. And in it he shared an important truth about the idea that those who treat God's willingness to forgive and his amazing grace as permission to live however they please without any consequences. Of course, that's contrary to what real grace should produce in the heart of everyone who truly loves Jesus. Now through these messages on Promise Heart, he systematically helps us understand what God's grace really looks like and how we could and should live it out every day.

The new Beyond Amazing series is our gift of thanks to you for your support of any amount to Promise Heart this month. To get your copy and support the outreach of this ministry around the world, call 866-400-bible 866-400-bible or go to promiseheart.org. We also pray that you'll consider joining this ministry's efforts with a financial gift this month of any amount. And when you do, we'll send you the series Beyond Amazing. Again, call 866-400-bible or go to promiseheart.org. And remember what Paul wrote in the book of Corinthians chapter 15 verse 10. By the grace of God, I am what I am and his grace toward me did not prove vain.

That one should sink deeply into our hearts and minds. Now back to part two of the lesson When Blessings Abound.

Speaker 1: He says you are to be holy. Verse nine, the Lord will establish you as a holy people to himself as he's sworn to you if you will keep the commandments of the Lord your God and walk in his ways to be holy. That means to be separate for God, to be God's own possession. Jesus or the Lord says in his word, you shall be holy for I am holy. Says it in Leviticus. Says it in first Peter quoting Leviticus, you shall be holy for I am holy. You're different as a Christian. Problem that we have in our world today is you can't tell the difference between those who claim to be Christians and those who openly say they're not.

You know, divorce is just as rampant among Christians as it is among non-Christians. There's just no difference and and the sins of the world are the sins that God people commit and and the Lord says, hey listen, I can't bless your life if you keep stepping out on me and going after false gods. You need to get yourself on blessing ground. We have more and more people today who are living together. They don't get married. They just start living together. More and more people who just they just you know, first date, second date and it's no big deal.

We're just going to have sex. What does God say about that? Oh well, you know, I mean the Bible is an old book. As I had one lady tell me in the early '80s when she was going to go off with a boyfriend to Cozumel and I said, well you you're a Christian. He claims to be a Christian. Where are you guys going to be staying in Cozumel? She goes, well in one hotel room. Come on, this is the '80s. Silly me. I thought you know, I didn't know it was the '80s. Well I'll tear that page out of my Bible.

Hebrews 13 verse four, let the marriage bed be undefiled for nicators and adulterers God will judge. Hey, you want to be holy? Start doing what God says to do. Don't just drag in your sin and say, I'm going to be like this and and man, I demand the blessings of God. I like this this idea of blessings. So God, here's here's my paramour God. Rain it down on me. The Lord says, get yourself on blessing ground. You're holy. You're to be holy. I had the privilege one day of talking to a guy and his girlfriend and he told me he said, man, we really messed up in this this dating thing and we were living together and and then we we started coming to church and got our lives right with the Lord but still had this issue and that was wrong and we knew it was wrong and then we separated but we were still having such trouble with the physical part of our relationship and and he told me he said, I want to be right with God.

He said, I want to be on blessing ground. And I can't be right with God if I continue to fall into this sin. He said, would you marry us? I said, yeah, I'll marry you. He said, how soon can we get married? We got married in a few days. I said, you get the license and and I'll fire up the wedding ceremony. I mean we'll we'll go to town. And I remember seeing him not too long after his marriage, big smile on his face. He said, man, I feel so good. Cuz he's on blessing ground and he knew that he got things right with the Lord.

The Lord says, hey, you are to love. You are to be holy. He says you are to forgive. You are to forgive. I think unforgiveness is the the biggest sin in the church of Jesus Christ is holding on to grudges, holding on to bitterness. I'm not going to forgive this person because they hurt me. I'm not going to forgive that person because they hurt a friend of mine and you pick up another person's bitterness. You have all this bitterness in your heart. The Lord says, hey, whatever he says to you, do it. God says, you cannot harbor a bitter heart, an unforgiving heart.

If you do, Matthew chapter six, the Lord says, I won't forgive you. If you don't forgive your brother who offends you, I won't forgive you for offending me. And you're going to be in a world of hurt in trying to live a Christian life if God says I'm not forgiving you. You you can't you can't do it. Adrian Rogers used to say, I wouldn't trust the best 15 minutes of my life to get to heaven. I mean you know, and you're thinking I can go for for months, weeks, months, years with the harboring an unforgiving heart and that it's not going to affect my relationship with God.

As one preacher told a man who said, well I'll never forgive so and so for what he did from to me. And that preacher said, well then I would say to you, don't ever sin again because God's not going to forgive you if you don't forgive them. Ephesians 4:32 says, be kind, tenderhearted, forgiving one another just as God in Christ also has forgiven you. So you're to forgive. Remember how much God has forgiven you and forgive others. And then he says, you are to give. You're to give. This is another big area where it keeps people from blessing ground and Jesus talks so much about money in his ministry.

And you know why I did that? Because no man can serve two masters. Either he will love the one and hate the other, cling to one, despise the other. You cannot serve God and riches. And the reason Jesus talks so much about money is because for so many people that's their God, money. Money is their God. And that's the one that they look to. That's the false God that they look to. If I'm in a jam, my money will get me out. And I'm worried and bothered somebody's going to get my money and this and that.

It's all about money, money, money. That's why it says in Matthew six where it says you can't serve two masters. Then it goes on to say they talk all about worry. People who serve money as their master, they're worried all the time about their money. Worried. Well the Lord says, hey, you're you're to give. You're to show that I'm master, I'm Lord by giving and by honoring me from your wealth. And God's people in the Old Testament, they didn't do it. I mean some of them did it just like in this room. There's some that honor God from their wealth.

There's some that are true to God and saying, yes, Lord, I'm going to obey you in that area. And the vast majority in any church don't do it. Look what it says in Malachi. Will a man rob God? Surely not. Nobody would rob God. Of course not. Will a man rob God? Yet you are robbing me but you say, how have we robbed thee? In tithes and offerings. You're cursed with a curse. You're not on blessing ground. You're on cursing ground. You're cursed with a curse for you are robbing me, the whole nation of you.

Bring the whole tithe into the storehouse so that there may be food in my house and test me now in this says the Lord of hosts, if I will not open up for you the windows of heaven and pour out for you a blessing until it overflows. God's way. Trust me. Test me, the Lord says. You do it my way and you see what I will do for you. Just this past week I had a dear lady come into my office and she said, I got to tell you this story. She said, just in the last uh several months, she said, we have been so faithful to tithe.

We have been taking God at his word and we don't have much but whatever we have, whatever comes in, man, that first 10% that goes to the Lord. And we've been faithful to tithe on every paycheck that comes in. And she said, we have bills and and we have one particular payment, a tractor payment and we owed several thousand dollars on this tractor and it was just one of those things that was like, oh, I wish we didn't have this thing because it's just another bill and and but they were faithful. Even when things were tough, they would write that that tithe check out and give it to the Lord.

And then they'd write the other bills. She said that paying that tractor, she thought she might be late on a payment and she was concerned that they were going to come back and say, well you you you know, you got to more payment because this came in late and all that stuff and and she went to the mailbox and she found a letter that they sent her from this uh financing company, from this tractor uh agency company and and she thought, oh, they're going to say I owe them more money or something like that. She opened it up and it said, we just want to thank you for allowing us to be your finance company.

Your account is paid in full. Thousands of dollars that they owed on the tractor. She told me that story. I said, well who paid? I don't know who paid. I'm not going to find out. I just I don't want to call them in case it was an error. You know, I mean it's just one of those things. I wouldn't call them either. It's like, hey, okay, you say it's good. That's good for me. But she was just rejoicing. What does she attribute that to? She was tithing. Test me now in this, says the Lord of hosts.

You go my way and see if my way doesn't bring blessings from me. Whatever he says to you, do it. What is the Lord saying to you today? Is there known sin in your life? He says, leave that behind. Confess that to me. I'll forgive you if you'll confess it. Like my friend who is living with his girlfriend and committing immorality said, I don't want to do this anymore. I'm going to get on blessing ground. I want God to be able to bless my life. And God wants to do that in your life. Will you let him?

Speaker 2: Are you willing to part ways with your sin in order to stand on blessing ground? That's the secret to enjoying the abundant life, the powerful life, the glorious life of one surrendered to God because of the deep appreciation of how much he loves you. Today's message was called When Blessings Abound from pastor Jeff's series Do You Want to Be Blessed? How to experience the goodness of God. And you can find out how to get this series when you go to promiseheart.org. Just click the listen link. Before we go, a reminder that pastor Jeff sends out a weekly devotional letter every Friday morning and you can get yours into your inbox when you go to promiseheart.org and click the Real Hope Email Encouragement Link Sign Up page.

And you can unsubscribe anytime but you'll be uplifted and encouraged each Friday. God bless you for coming alongside us. The time is gone for today. I'm Larry Nobles trusting you'll be with us tomorrow for the next lesson in pastor Jeff's potent series about how to be blessed. Join us next time for part one of the concluding lesson to the series Do You Want to Be Blessed? Join us for the message Never Let Go Thursday right here on Promise Heart.