In Touch Ministries

Dr. Charles Stanley: God desires to establish communication with us. So, what does he do? The first call of God in anyone's life is the call to salvation, to trust him as personal savior. That's the first call. That's how he sets up his relationship with us because you see if you've never trusted Jesus as your savior, you don't have a relationship to God. Now, you may say well, I believe he's up there somewhere and I can talk to him and he talks to me. If you have rejected his son, you have rejected the means by which you and I establish a relationship with him.

Guest (Male): One of the joys of a relationship with God is being able to communicate with him. And while we're not listening for an audible voice, the Lord has clearly promised to answer our prayers. So, today on In Touch, the teaching ministry of Dr. Charles Stanley will be challenged to take the time to be still and listen carefully. Here's guidance on hearing and answering the call of God. Let's listen in to Dr. Stanley's message.

Dr. Charles Stanley: When you think about God, do you think about him as a power or a person? And when you think about him, do you think about him being distant or do you think about him being close? Well, the way you and I view him is the way we're going to respond to him. And the truth is God isn't just a power. He's a powerful person. He's only distant to those who have distanced themselves from him. He is a God of mercy and love and goodness and kindness. He's a God who seeks the best for us. He is a God who desires the best for us.

He is a God who expresses his love and kindness towards us in every way possible. In fact, one of the most wonderful things about God is that he is not so distant that he cannot speak to us, but he desires to communicate with us, to speak to us, and to have us to speak to him. We think sometimes that praying is we do all the talking and that's sort of the way it is, but God desires to communicate with us. And he communicates with us in ways that we don't even understand probably. And sometimes we give the credit to someone else when truly it is God who is in the process of communicating with us.

And when I think about all the aspects of God, the fact that he's willing to do that is one aspect of his character and his love for us that we need to examine. And when I think about for example, all the way back in the Old Testament, the Bible says in Genesis chapter 12, the first verse that God called Abraham to separate himself from his people and his family and go into a land that he would show him. Later on the book of Exodus, he calls Moses on the back side of the desert at a burning bush to go and lead the children of Israel out of Egyptian bondage.

Then if you turn to 1 Samuel chapter 3, you will find God speaking to a little lad, not only to grown men, but to a little lad. And he says in 1 Samuel chapter 3 that the boy Samuel was ministering to the Lord before Eli. And the word of the Lord was rare in those days. Visions were very infrequent. And it happened at that time as Eli was lying down in the place as eyesight had begun to grow dim and he could not see well. This is what happens. And the lamp of God had not yet gone out.

And Samuel who is just a lad now was lying down in the temple of the Lord where the ark of God was. That the Lord called Samuel and he said, here I am. Then he ran to Eli and said, here I am for the for you called me. But he said, I did not call. Lie down again. So, he went and lay down. So, the Lord called yet again, Samuel. So, Samuel rose and went to Eli and said, here I am for you called me. But he answered, I did not call my son. Lie down again.

Now, Samuel did not yet know the Lord nor had the word of the Lord yet been revealed to him. So, the Lord called Samuel again for the third time and he rose and went to Eli and said, here I am for you called me. Then Eli discerned that the Lord was calling the boy. And Eli said to Samuel, go lie down and it shall be if he calls you that you shall say, speak Lord, for your servant is listening. So, Samuel went and lay down in his place. And you know, I do believe that God does work in people's hearts and speak to them in such a way that sometimes they don't even realize he's speaking.

You and I could go through the Old Testament for example again. He called to Gideon to go and deliver the people from the Philistines. We could go to the New Testament and find Jesus as saying to the disciples as he walked by the Sea of Galilee. He said, follow me and I'll make you fishers of men. Then you could go all the way to the book of Acts and find that here's Saul of Tarsus persecuting the Christians, throwing them in jail. And all of a sudden, he is struck down on the Damascus Road, blinded. He hears a voice and God is calling him.

Now, once in a while I'll hear somebody say well, once when I was saved I had a Damascus Road experience then I want to say I'm grateful to God. He didn't have to knock me down and blind me to get me to listen to him. So, when you think about his call in your life, let me ask you a question. How have you responded? Well, you can respond yes, no, wait, or you can ignore the call. But remember this. When you say yes, that's very clear. When you say no, that's very clear. When you say wait, what you're really saying is no.

God doesn't usually say 10 years now here's what I want you to do, but he speaks in today. He says for example, behold today is the day of salvation. God does not speak in sort of questionable, unclear, garbled language. He makes it very very clear. It's not always as clear to us as it is to him at first, but it is his responsibility to make what he says very clear, whatever that call may be. So, when he calls you, you can say yes, no. You may say wait, but what you're saying is no. Or you can just ignore his call which is always very dangerous.

You can say no to God's call, but what you're saying no to is you're saying no to the sovereign of the universe who created you. You're saying no to the best blessings that God can possibly create for you. You're saying no to the one who knows you perfectly, who has your life all planned out, who has promised to bless you, promised to fill you with himself and to go with you every single step of the way wherever he may call you. Would you not agree that it would be very foolish to ignore God? It is very foolish to ignore the calls of God.

So, you say well, if he 's called me, I 'm not sure. At least it seems to me that I 've never heard. So, what I'd like to do is I would like to sort of share with you the four ways and the four reasons God calls us because he does. God desires to set up a communication with us, to establish communication with us. So, what does he do? The first call of God in anyone's life is the call to salvation, to trust him as personal savior. That's the first call. That's how he sets up his relationship with us because you see if you've never trusted Jesus as your savior, you don't have a relationship to God.

Now, you may say well, I believe he's up there somewhere and I can talk to him and he talks to me. If you have rejected his son, you have rejected the means by which you and I establish a relationship with him. And so, you may be hearing things and you may be placing words in the mouth of your God, whoever this God is. The truth is you have not heard from the God of the Bible until first of all God begins to speak with you. So, here's what happens. The spirit of God begins to convict you.

You begin to realize you need the living God. And you face up to to the point that you begin to speak to God that you've never seen him, never felt him necessarily, but you know God is trying to speak to you. You begin to confess your sins. You repent of your sins. You do have a deep abiding sorrow for the way that you've been living. God brings you to the realization that when his son Jesus died on the cross that there was something about that death that made it possible for God to forgive you of your sins.

And you begin to realize that God is helping you to understand what his death is all about. That he died and paid your sin debt in full. You may not use those terms. You may not understand very much about it, but there's something about the cross, something about his death you can't get through to and yet the Holy Spirit is working on the inside of you. What is he doing? He is enlightening your mind, enlightening your heart to help you understand that if you ask him to forgive you of your sins, that the Lord Jesus Christ who went to the cross and died for your sins, he's the one who paid the debt for your sins so that you don't have to work for it.

Cry and beg and plead for it. It is offered to you as a gift. And that's what we call the gift of God's grace, his love and mercy and forgiveness. And so, what happens? You have just enough understanding to cry out to God and to ask him to forgive you of your sins and to cleanse you and that you're receiving his son Jesus Christ as your personal savior and you're saved. That was his first call in my life. That's his first call in your life. He's calling. He's been calling. And the truth is you say well, God has never spoken to me.

Yes, he has. You just didn't recognize it. He will use somebody, something you hear, something you read to do what? To bring back to your mind that you need the Lord Jesus Christ as your personal savior. You know what? You may blast away at God, ignore God, call yourself an atheist an agnostic, you may hate the things of God. You know what? Does that mean that God isn't saying anything? No, it doesn't. Because you see sometimes people are saved with the awesome resistance, everything in them. They do not want this. And the power of God is so strong they have to break down and yield and say oh God have mercy upon me and forgive me of my sins.

His first call in your life is the salvation. You say well, there's some people who die who are not saved. That's correct. And you know why? Because they say no, no, no, no, no, no, no. You can say no so long that finally you can't even hear. You can't even sense the spirit of God. You can harden your heart so deeply, so long until finally you have absolutely no desire whatsoever for God in your life. You know what the Lord says? When somebody says to me well, I'm going to be saved one of these days, you don't know whether you will or not.

The Bible says behold today as the day of salvation. He warns us against having a hardened heart. Eli listen, it is a dangerous thing to hear the gospel and say no to the living God. It is a dangerous thing to hear someone share that testimony and invite you to receive Christ as your savior and you shun them and shut them out and criticize them for telling you all about their religion so called. God calls us and he begins to call us early. There are few people that I've known, very few people that I have known who never heard the gospel message.

The first time they ever heard it, they were so convicted of their sin. They were saved the very first time they heard the gospel. But you think about how many times you've heard it and you've said no or you've said wait or you've said I'm not ready. And the Bible says behold today is the day of salvation. How are you going to stand before God one of these days and say I said no, I said no, and I said no, but I meant no. You see to say no to the gospel of Jesus Christ is the most deadly thing you can possibly do in life.

His first call is a call to salvation. And you may not have recognized what's been going on in your life till this very moment when you began in to think about it right now and you were saying you know what? I've had these feelings you're talking about. When so and so witnessed to me, I had this funny feeling in my heart. You see it may be a funny feeling, it may be a strange feeling, it may be a difficult feeling, it may be a very disturbing feeling. That's the work of the Holy Spirit doing what?

Cultivating and stirring you up so that you will hear and receive the message of the gospel. And let me say to you as parents, when you're five or six or seven or eight or 10 year old teenage kids come to you and say you know I want to trust Jesus as my savior just because you're a child, maybe five or six or seven years of age doesn't mean they don't understand. There are many people who saved at the age of five. You know what? They may not understand much, but they may have more faith than you do.

For the simple reason they heard the pastor say if you ask the Lord Jesus Christ to forgive you of your sins, he'll forgive you for your sins and your child believe the testimony of the word of God and was saved. And here you are coming up with all the excuses of why you can't be saved. Never listen, never hinder a child. You say well, but suppose they make a mistake. You know what? God loves children so much he'll correct the mistake. He'll get that straightened out at the right time. Don't ever hinder a child from coming to Jesus early in life.

God is speaking to them. Isn't that the normal way? For example, you raise a child in a home where mom and dad read the Bible. The children hear the word of God. They see their parents praying. Is it strange that at the age of five or six years of age when you've been talking about Jesus all about known life and that he's the son of God and that he loves us and he forgives us of our sins and he walks with Is it strange that a child would want the same Jesus in their heart? No, it's not strange.

That's a normal natural way it ought to be. But if you live like the devil in front of your children and then wonder why they don't go to church, blame yourself. You wonder why they're not saved, look back in your life and ask yourself the question, what kind of testimony was I? Because that's the most awesome testimony of all, that of the life of a parent. God's first call is the call to salvation. Now, for a lot of people they say well, I'm saved and that's it. That is not it. That is only their first call.

Now, watch this again. You do not grow into salvation. You become more and more enlightened and more and more understanding until the moment you receive him as your savior. That call finally is answered once and for all. Your sins are forgiven. You become a child of God. Your name is written in the Lamb's Book of Life and you are forever secure. Call number one. Call number two is a call that most people never even think about. I want you to turn if you will the first Thessalonians. And this particular call of God is specific about something, but it is an example.

First Thessalonians chapter 4 and verse 3 says for this is the will of God your sanctification. And then he narrows it down to that is that you abstain from sexual immorality. And then he says in verse 7, for God has not called us for the purpose of impurity, but in sanctification. All right? And remember that turnover keep going to 1 Peter and look if you will in verse 14. Listen to what he says. As obedient children, do not be conformed to the former lust which were yours in your ignorance. That is here's what he's saying.

As obedient children, don't let the world shape you back into what you used to be like. Don't go back into that. First Peter chapter 1 verse 14. Listen. As obedient children do not be conformed to the former lust which were yours in your ignorance, but like the holy one who called you be holy yourselves also in all your behavior because it is written, you shall be holy for I am holy. Now, you say well, does that mean what what do you mean by holy and sanctification? Well, sanctification simply means this, that you have been set apart by God for the purpose of God to live a holy Godly life.

And the word sanctification and the word holy both come from the same Greek root. Now, does that mean a sinless life? No. And often times we want to take words like sanctification and relegate them to some denomination and so. No, listen. Sanctification, it is a process. Salvation is an act, no process. Save once and for all. What does he do? You receive him into your life. Listen, set you apart as a child of God for the purposes of God. Now, the Bible says we to live a holy life. What does that mean? Here's what it means.

It does not mean a sinless life because all of us have a little carnality in us and we're going to falter at times and sin against God at times, not because we want to, because we are weak in certain areas of our life. Probably everybody has some area of weakness. But sanctification is a process. It begins the moment you're saved and it lasts for the rest of your life. What is that? That is the Holy Spirit who came into your life the moment you were saved and sealed you as a child of God doing what?

Beginning to work and to conform you to the likeness of Christ. So, he's the one who begins to show you this in your life needs to go. This you need to add to your life. So, what happens? Little by little God begins to work righteousness and holiness as a way of life into our life. When you not trust the Lord as our savior, the Holy Spirit begins to do what? He begins to bend our wills and our desires, our hungers and thirst in life toward the living God. We want what he wants. We desire what he desires.

We want to behave. We want our conduct to be in keeping with who he is. So, what's happening? Little by little, day by day, year by year. And the truth is the longer you and I live as believers, listen, the more holy our conduct and our conversation and our character ought to be. Tragedy of tragedies that many many people trust the Lord Jesus Christ as their savior never thinking about that God wants me to live a holy life. Well, that's what the holiness do. No. Here's what the Bible says. Be holy even as I am holy.

And that we're to live a sanctified life. In sanctification that passage he says we're to be sanctified. Therefore, we do not commit immorality. We're to be sanctified. Therefore, we follow the will of God. And the truth is every single day of your life once you've been saved is a day of opportunity to walk obediently or disobediently, to live out a sanctified life, a holy life or unholy life. So that it isn't once and for all. It is once and forever a matter of living holy before God. Now, think about this. When you think about the kind of life that you live, that you get up every day saying well, do the best I can today.

I know I 'm going to sin because you know after all saved by grace, we're still sinners. Is that your attitude? Or should it not be thank God he's saved me and the Holy Spirit's living on the inside of me and Father today by your help and your strength and your divine guidance, I'm going to walk holy before you. I 'm going to be obedient to you today. I choose to live a sanctified life. And therefore, I'm trusting the Holy Spirit to guide what I say, God where I go, God what I touch, God what I think, God what I feel.

I want to walk holy before you today. Have you ever said to him you want to walk a holy life or have you been one of those persons who's never even dreamed of the idea of being holy because that is this pious pious kind of person who is Godly, separated from everybody else. No, you know what? We wear the same kind of shoes and socks clothes anybody else wears. We drive like Father folks drive. God's put us down here not to be pious and holy and live in some kind of a temple, but to walk among men and do what?

Demonstrate the life of Christ. He's in the process of conforming us to his likeness. And if that's true, is it not true that the longer we live the more of him people should be able to see in us. The softer our hearts, the more tender our hearts, the more willing we are to serve and to love and to be kind and gentle and understanding. Should not these characteristics of the spirit be more evident in our lives the longer we live? And when I think about people who are growing old and getting cynical, there's something wrong.

They've missed it somewhere because God has called us to salvation of once and for all call, to sanctification all of our life.

Guest (Male): You're listening to In Touch, the teaching ministry of Dr. Charles Stanley. If God is calling you to give your life to him, don't delay. When you place your faith in Christ, you'll be welcomed into the family of God and you can look forward to the day when you'll see him face to face. For help living the Christian life, stop by intouch.org and find many insightful resources. And if you'd like to hear this message again, click on today on radio. Head over to our online store to order a copy of today's complete message, The Call of God.

Again, you'll find these resources at intouch.org. To call or text us, the number is simply 1 800 intouch. And to write to us, address your letter to intouch post office box 7900 Atlanta, Georgia 30357 or toll free 1 800 intouch. Do you struggle to obey God when the task seems insignificant? Well, today's moment with Charles Stanley is on the way.

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Guest (Male): You're listening to intouch. Jesus washed his disciples' feet. So, a Christian has no business deciding any task is beneath them. Here's a moment with Charles Stanley.

Dr. Charles Stanley: Often times God's greatest experiences spiritually, his greatest blessings come as a result of our being willing to do something that appear to be very insignificant and unimportant. So, I want to ask you this question. What is it that God has been challenging you to do that seemingly is not really all that significant and someone else would think well, that's not all that important, but you are yet to do it. For some reason you've rationalized it, you've excused yourself, you've said I can't, I don't want to, it's too hard, too difficult, I'm not sure, got to pray about it.

Listen. When God says do something, responding by saying I'll pray about it is not the answer. Responding by saying well, I need to get some counsel is not the answer. When God says specifically, here's what I want you to do, the only right answer is to say yes, Lord. Yes, yes, yes to whatever he requires of us. I'm not saying you should never pray about God's request, but often times we know exactly what he's saying. It is very clear to us and so the right response is to do exactly what he says. Obeying God in small matters is often times the stepping stone, the beginning step to God's greatest blessings in our life.

Guest (Male): Visit us at intouch.org to learn more about the believer's life of obedience. How were you encouraged by today's message? Let us know about it. On the next edition of In Touch, you'll hear about four specific calls God extends to every person. I hope you'll join us for more of 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.