In Touch Ministries

Dr. Charles Stanley: If you and I walk in step with him, you will make a positive impact. That is when you're walking in step with him, you have the Holy Spirit living within you. You're walking in step with him, the Spirit of God within you is available and able to speak to other people through you. Your character, your conversation, and your conduct, listen, they see and they hear from you before you open your mouth. You can have an impact on someone's life by the way you live.

Guest (Male): It's natural for us to think about our interests first. But Christians are to move beyond self-centeredness and should become increasingly concerned about others. Today on In Touch, the teaching ministry of Dr. Charles Stanley, you'll discover how your life and the lives of your friends can be positively affected when you walk in step with God. Let's listen in to Dr. Stanley's message.

Dr. Charles Stanley: Well, I want to catch you up for a moment and just remind you that we are talking about walking in step with God, walking in step with him. And when Paul uses the word walk, he uses that term to mean to walk about in your life, that is, to live your life out.

And he says in Ephesians chapter four, and I want you to turn there for a moment if you will, he tells us how we are to walk. In the first three chapters, he talks about our salvation experience and how God has blessed us. He tells us how rich we are as a result of our salvation experience. And then as a result of what we are and who we are in Christ, he begins this fourth chapter by saying, "Therefore, I, the prisoner of the Lord, implore you to walk in a manner worthy of the calling with which you've been called, with all humility and gentleness, with patience, showing tolerance for one another in love, being diligent to preserve the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace."

Now when he says to walk in a manner worthy, that is, we should walk the way we profess we are. Walk in a manner worthy of our calling. What's our calling? We have four callings: a calling to salvation, a calling to sanctification, that is, to live a godly life, a calling to service, and a calling to accountability. And so he says we should live it out as we have been called.

Now, so let's say, for example, that you've trusted Jesus as your Savior, and here you are maybe a young Christian or maybe you've been one a long time. And the only thing you've ever done really is go to church, maybe read your Bible a little bit and pray some and maybe give a little bit. But what should you be able to expect? What should you be able to anticipate when you trust the Lord Jesus Christ as your personal Savior? When you become a Christian, what can you anticipate? What does God say? So that's what I want to answer in this message. What can you anticipate how God can work in your life once you trust him as your Savior?

He says he saved us, so he's our Savior. He's our Lord and our Master. He's our guide. This is what you and I can anticipate once we receive him as our personal Savior. And so the first word is an intimate relationship. Intimacy is an awesome thing because it really reaches the stage of being beyond our description. How do you explain love? If you can explain love, more than likely you've never been loved and never loved anybody. It's beyond human explanation. And to think this, that God loves you and me. And watch this, this is a sinless, holy, righteous God who is perfect in all ways, that he loves you and me perfectly, sinlessly, absolutely, totally, eternally, and unconditionally. You can't explain that. Those words just give you aspects of it to say how impossible it is to put in words the Father's love.

So what does he want? He saves us in order to listen, to develop this relationship with us. The second word I want you to notice is this, and that is clear guidance, because every single one of us needs it every day of our life. Why do we need his guidance? Because we don't know all the facts. Oftentimes we have opportunities and we have offers. And the people want to do this or offer us that or offer us them or come to us wanting a relationship. God knows what's in every person's mind.

God knows if the person who wants a relationship with you is either good for you or not good for you. He knows that every deal that gets offered you is either good or bad. He knows which way you and I are to walk. He knows when we're coming to the fork of the road. He's willing to show us which way to go. God is the one who has wisdom to show us what to do, where to do, how to do it, and when to do it. He will never lead you to go the wrong way. He will never direct you in such a way that is not pleasing to him. He's not going to lead you along a path where you're going to trip and stumble and fall and destroy your life. We can anticipate his divine guidance in every single aspect of our life if we are walking in obedience to him.

The third word I want you to notice here is this, and that's a phrase, it's his adequate provision. Well, most of the time we want to put that in a monetary capacity. All my needs are not financial. We all have physical needs, emotional needs, financial needs, needs in our relationships. We have all kind of needs. He says, "My God will supply all your needs according to his riches in glory," which means, and I'm glad he put that part in there, most people stop when they read "all my needs." He says according to his riches in glory. What does that mean? It means this, first of all, his resources are inexhaustible. But he says according to his riches.

Now how do we tap into his riches? I only tap into his riches when I follow him. That is, when he's my Savior, I have the right to tap into his riches. Whatever it is, if it's something emotional that I need, something physical I need, something material I need, according to his riches in glory. His riches in glory, listen, can only be tapped by his children.

Not only that, the Holy Spirit, our helper. Now think about this, you and I are dependent upon him every single day of our life. He is the one who, listen, who gives us divine spiritual and physical energy to do what the Lord Jesus has called us to do. You can't do it without him. You can't understand John 3:16 apart from the Holy Spirit. When you got saved, listen, who do you think helped you understand what it meant to confess your sins, repent of your sins, and receive Jesus Christ and how his death at the cross could provide for your forgiveness? It was the Spirit of God. What we can expect, we can anticipate the awesome work of the Holy Spirit in our life.

Then of course, we can anticipate confidence. Listen, we can anticipate confidence to face the trials of life. Why? Well, number one is because we, listen, we're walking in step with him. Nothing can come into your life unless Almighty God allows it. He keeps out some things, he allows some things to come in. Some things hurt us, some things bless us, and when you and I walk in step with him and we respond correctly, even the things that bring us pain and hurt, what does he do? He uses it to do what? Strengthen us, build us up, grow us up, mature us, and equip us to help other people who are going through difficulty and hardship in their life.

Let me tell you something, the lowest moment of my life, I was there. And I remember on a Sunday afternoon, I was kneeling down by the sofa in my house and I was telling God how hurt I was. And I'll never forget this, I told him all the things I felt. This is what I heard, "You still have me." I'm telling you from that moment on, I laid down a lot of my pain, I laid down my loneliness, my frustration, my anxiety, and probably some anger. You still have me. And I'm here to tell you you can't name anything. And sometimes people think, "Oh, Pastor, you don't know." Yes, I do. "You haven't been there." Yes, I have. How would you understand? I understand. I also understand this, the promises of the word of God stand absolutely true.

He says, "I will never leave you nor forsake you." Then of course, the sixth word I want you to get is that there will be, you can expect inescapable conflict. If you and I live a godly life, we're not going to be understood. You speak the truth, oftentimes you're not going to be understood. Where you work, they won't understand you. Where you live, they may not understand you or don't like the way you live. When Jesus said, "I am the way, the truth, and the life, no one comes to the Father but by me," they can't stand that. Why? Because it brings salvation down to face the Son of God. That my listen, religion won't get you to heaven. Good works won't get you to heaven. It is a personal relationship with God through his Son Jesus Christ. Listen, that isn't to be ugly toward other people. They just don't know the truth. Some people don't want to know the truth. Some people know it's the truth but they don't like it because it means they'll have to change their lifestyle. And what I want you to see is this, you live a godly life in Christ Jesus, you are going to face conflict. But remember what he said, he said he's going to be with us every step of the way.

Then of course, the positive impact that you and I can make. If you and I walk in step with him, you will make a positive impact. That is, when you're walking in step with him, listen, you have the Holy Spirit living within you. You're walking in step with him, the Spirit of God within you is available and able to speak to other people through you. Your character, your conversation, and your conduct, listen, before you open your mouth, you can have an impact on someone's life by the way you live.

Listen, you don't want to end up one of these days and look back in your life and say, "Well, what was my life all about? Was it all about getting up and going to work and making money and having a little pleasure and going to bed at night and watch TV till midnight and getting up the next morning to go to work and on and on and on and on and on and on, now I'm 60, now I'm 65, now I'm 70, 75, and now life's over?" That's not what life's about. I love this verse and maybe you ought to turn to it. Look if you will in Acts chapter 13. Listen to the 36th verse of this 13th chapter of Acts. "For David, after he had served the purpose of God in his own generation, fell asleep and was laid among his fathers and underwent decay." What did he do? He served the purpose of God. He had an impact. We're still talking about him. Look at the Psalms. Look at all that he went through and when you want to be comforted and strengthened, you go to the Psalms. Why? He served the purpose of God in every aspect of his life.

So, there will be conflict. You can make it listen, sometimes we make our greatest impact in the midst of conflict. And then of course, a couple other things, and if you'll just jot these down, and I want you to notice what we just referred to and that is, if you walk in step with him, you're going to serve him. If you walk in step with him, you're going to serve him. Jesus said, "I came to give my life a ransom for many. I came to serve, not to be served." Listen, to be a believer walking in step with him, you will serve him. And David, he said he served the purpose of God, then he laid down his life or the Lord took him.

So let me ask a question: whose purpose are you serving? Most people are serving their own purpose through their own life. My money, my time, my family, my pleasure, my this, my that, and have no thoughts for God whatsoever. Serving the purpose of God. Listen, serving his purpose, whatever he called you to do, wherever he called you to do it, honors him, brings him great honor. And as a result, you're impacting other people's lives, bringing about change in their life, bringing about listen, by your testimony and your witness and your lifestyle, they get saved. And watching you, listen, they're encouraged in their Christian life as a result of being right with God.

So the truth is if I'm walking in step with him, I'm going to serve him somehow. And I want you to think about this, when your life is over and you look back, what do you want to see? Anybody you led to Christ? Anybody you helped? Anybody you picked up? Anybody you got out of drugs or alcohol? Anybody that you helped clothe, anybody that you helped feed? Anybody that you gave money to? Anybody that you prayed for? What are you doing? Serving the living God is his listen, serving the living God is being more of a Christian, more like a Christian than just coming to church. You can come to church and just forget it and walk away. Serving God, it takes a deliberate effort on your part. And I'm challenging you to do simply this: so live your life that each day you can say at the end of the day, "Lord, as best I know how, I have attempted to serve your purpose today." And you know what? You're going to sleep better. You're going to feel better about yourself. You're going to feel better about your relationship to God. You know why? Because all of a sudden you've stepped up on a higher level. Now you're living where God wants you to live and that is that you served him.

One last word and that's simply this. You walk in his ways and you can expect his eternal, unconditional love for you all the days of your life. Nobody can love you like God can. You have a right to anticipate it. He's going to listen, he's going to love you when you look good. He's going to love you when you don't look so good. He's going to love you when you just woke up. He's going to love you when you wake up in the middle of the night. He's going to love you on your way to work, on the way home. He's going to love you when you're trying to testify to somebody else and when you're not. He's going to love you when you blow it and he's going to love you when you do a fantastic job. His love is eternal. But you will not be able to experience that love really and truly unless you're walking in step with him because it's then that the Holy Spirit makes us aware of how awesome his love is for us.

Now, don't you wish that the day you were saved, the next day somebody said to you, "There's sit down, I want to tell you something." And they sat and told you everything I just told you? You'd have catapulted into the Christian life. Now you've been told. And it's not a matter of me telling you something, it's a matter of simply sharing with you the word of God. This is the textbook. It's a holy book. It's the way to live. It's the way to die. It's the way to be happy and peaceful. Jesus put it this way, "My peace I give unto you, not as the world gives, give I unto you because that doesn't work. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid."

And I want to encourage if you've never trusted Jesus Christ as your personal Savior, listen, it's not going to get any better without him. If you want things to get better in your life, you surrender your life to him and tell him that you're confessing your sin to him, that you do believe he died on the cross and paid his blood for your sins. You're accepting him as your personal Savior, you're receiving the Holy Spirit into your life because that's what he promised. And now by the Spirit of God living within you, he will enable you to live a godly life, a holy life, a peaceful life, a happy life, and when conflict comes, he'll be there to walk you right through it. Now you can't beat that for living, amen? And Father, how grateful we are for your awesome love for us, and I pray the Holy Spirit will sink this message very deep into the heart of every person who hears it. They may not like it, they may reject it, sink it deep. So deep they can't get away from it. That in desperation, they'll turn to you and receive Jesus Christ as their Savior is my prayer in his name, amen.

Guest (Male): You're listening to In Touch, the teaching ministry of Dr. Charles Stanley. Only Christians can walk in step with God. So to learn more about living your life in harmony with Jesus, visit us today at InTouch.org and click the link to today on radio to hear this message again. And you can order a copy of today's complete message over at the bookstore. The title is What to Expect. Or order Dr. Stanley's teaching set entitled In Step With God. You'll find these resources and more at InTouch.org or call or text us, the number is 1-800-INTOUCH. To write to us, address your letter to In Touch, Post Office Box 7900, Atlanta, Georgia 30357. And again, the number, 1-800-INTOUCH. Are you staying in step with God every day? Things to consider are coming up in today's Moment with Charles Stanley.

In Touch Plus is streaming on Local Now, featuring all the best of Dr. Charles Stanley. We need to have strong convictions based on the word of God. He's working out things that you and I would never know about in our future. In Touch Plus, your streaming network for quality Christian programming 24/7. Now watch this. In Touch Plus, streaming free on Local Now.

Dr. Charles Stanley: Let your time and your schedule and everything about you revolve around this: that you and I are to develop and continue to develop this ongoing, intimate, wonderful, exciting, satisfying, indescribable, wonderful, incomparable relationship with a personal God. Dr. Stanley devoted his entire life to helping us get closer to Jesus, as we all want to do. You can learn how at CharlesStanleyInstitute.org.

Guest (Male): From the Pastor's Heart is an in-depth teaching letter inspired by the teachings of Dr. Charles Stanley. To receive In Touch's From the Pastor's Heart letter, call 1-800-INTOUCH or visit InTouch.org/pastorsheart. Every believer can use a little advice on how to faithfully walk with God every day. Here's a moment with Charles Stanley.

Dr. Charles Stanley: What can we do to make sure that we walk each day in step with God? Well, first of all, I think we need to realize that being busy and fruitful are not the same thing. And I remember on one occasion I said to my friend, I said, "Well, how do you deal with a certain situation?" And he said, "I just keep busy." And I thought to myself, that is not the solution to living above temptation and staying right with God, but that's the way some people attempt to do it.

When I think about how does this work? I can tell you how it best works for me and that is the same thing Jesus did. The Bible says in Mark 1:35, early in the morning while it was still dark, Jesus got up, left the house, went away to a secluded place and was praying there. That is, he began the day talking to the Father. And so he sought the Father's will. The scripture says in Psalm 5, and I love this passage: "In the morning, oh Lord, you will hear my voice. In the morning I will order my prayer to you and eagerly watch." Beginning the day with him, listening to him. And what I try to do is I just tell him in the morning very early, "Lord, I submit my total will to you." And so the word of God and talking to him early in the morning is the best way to start if you're going to stay in step with him all day long for the simple reason it reminds us to whom we are responsible and who is there to help us no matter what.

Now, another suggestion I'd make and certainly has worked for me and that's this, to make a list of what you believe God's priorities are. Each day when I get up, I use my three-by-five card. This is what I believe God would have me to accomplish on a given day. So each night, I try to list all those. Most of the time in the middle of the night, around 3:30 to 4:00, somewhere thereabouts, I'm going to add probably one or two or three of these. But as I look at these and then I lie back down to sleep, I'll start sort of going over these in my mind and making sure, "Lord, does this fit your will and your purpose for my life?" And I can tell you from about 3:30 to 4:30 or 5:00 is some of the most profitable times in my life because it gets me started right with him, listening to him. And oftentimes when I'm in the process of trying to determine the theme of a message, out of the night in God's goodness and love and mercy, there he tells me exactly what it is. So you start the day off with him, you're going to end up a lot better.

Now, there's something else I'd mention and that's this. When you are facing a decision before you make a snap, quick decision, just stop for a second and ask yourself the question: "Does this fit what God wants me to do today? Because I have my list and I was sure this is what God had me to do." And so instead of quickly reacting, just stop and pause and ask yourself the question: "If I'm walking in step with the Father, is this going to keep me in step or get me out of step? What are the consequences?" The truth is God will help us to pause and to ask the right question.

And then I think one of the greatest keys to me personally when it comes to walking in step with him is this, and that is to affirm the fact that he's my life. If I am continually affirming this is your life, then he's continually reminding me of what fits his life within me and what does not fit his life within me. And one of my favorite scriptures is in Ephesians, and in this fifth chapter, here's what he says: "Be careful how you walk, not as unwise men but as wise, making the most of your time because the days are evil." Making the most of your time, be wise how you walk. So I just want to challenge you. You want to walk obediently before God, walk in his steps, you can. You can walk in his steps every day simply ask him to teach you how to do it and he will teach you. And I've just given you a few suggestions that I know worked for me and I think they'll work for you if you'll try them.

Guest (Male): Learn more about walking in God's steps when you visit us at InTouch.org. Are these truths impacting your walk with Jesus? Tell us your story. Coming up on In Touch, it's one thing to follow God when things are going well, but it can be harder to keep the faith when times are tough. Get help staying in sync with Jesus through times of trouble when we return on In Touch, the teaching ministry of Dr. Charles Stanley. This program is a presentation of In Touch Ministries, Atlanta, Georgia, and remains on the station through the grace of God and your faithful prayers and gifts.