Real Life Radio

Jack Hibbs: And this is a tremendous discipline for us as Christians to learn tonight. That those areas that we think we want to cover up, those areas that we think we want to hide, are those areas that God says, "Move over. I'm going to use this."

David J: This is Real Life. Welcome to Real Life Radio with Pastor Jack Hibbs. I'm David J. Thanking you for joining us today as we listen, learn, and are challenged by God's word, the Bible.

Jack Hibbs: Hey everybody, have you ever thought about what's after life? Do you know that the Bible teaches life is after life? If you know the Lord Jesus Christ, my good friend Philip De Courcy has written a great book and that's the title, *Life After Life*, exploring the Bible's wonderful promises about heaven and eternity, published by Harvest House Publishers. Get a copy for yourself.

David J: *Life After Life* by Philip De Courcy. Exploring the Bible's promises about heaven and eternity. It's available for a gift of any amount at jackhibbs.com. That's jackhibbs.com.

On today's edition of Real Life Radio, Pastor Jack continues his series called *Disciplines of Life* in a message titled *Disciplines of Dependence*. Self-reliance is a pretty popular way to live these days. But for believers, our lives are rooted in a dependence upon God.

As people who follow Christ, we're called to trust Him in all aspects of life, as opposed to depending on our own wisdom and control. True dependence means that we're not to navigate through life's challenges or responsibilities all on our own, but we're to lean on the Lord for our strength and guidance.

Today, Pastor Jack teaches that the less we depend upon ourselves, the more we depend upon God. It takes discipline to live a life that's opposite the world's point of view. The world relies upon its own strength, but for the Christian, it's all about living every day in reliance upon God. Now, in his message called *Disciplines of Dependence*, here's pastor and Bible teacher, Jack Hibbs.

David J: So Pastor Jack, a lot of folks naturally associate dependence with strength. So why do you think God so often allows difficulty as a place where dependence actually forms?

Jack Hibbs: Yeah, because the Scripture's clear, we find our strength in the Lord. The Lord tells us that He will cover us under the shadow of His wings. This doesn't mean that God has wings. He's talking about like a chicken gathers her chicks under her wings, they're protected, they're safe. God does that same thing with us.

When we are dependent upon Him and not the world, it's a good thing for us to be independent of the world, right? Because I believe that's the only real true independence you can enjoy is when you are dependent upon God, if that makes any sense. The more I'm leaning on Him, the more independent I am. When I look to the world, if I'm independent from God, the more dependent I am upon the world to take care of me, feed me. Think about it. It's either the little G for god is government. The big G for God is the Lord Jesus.

David J: So why do you think it's easier to trust God? It seems like it's easier to trust God when things are going well than when they're not.

Jack Hibbs: Because in reality, we're not trusting God when things are going well. It's not that it's easier. It's that we're not. We only trust when we're in a crisis of some level.

Listen, I'm sitting here right now in this studio. I'm not anxious about my flight that's coming up. I didn't think about it until you just said this. But that day's coming and I'm going to get on that plane. And then I'm going to be thinking, "I hope that pilot slept good last night. I hope they put real fuel in this plane. I know the wings have worked before, I hope they work today."

But when I'm not thinking like that, it's because I have the luxury of really not trusting God because everything is going easy. I shudder to see professing Christians who say, "I've never had any rough spots in my life." That's one of the saddest things I can hear because I wonder, wait a minute, God told us we're going to have difficulties in this world. That's how we get close to Him. So yeah, that's a nerve-wracking thing if life is smooth and easy. Let's get into it.

Jack Hibbs: Let's pray. Father, we ask Lord that You would cause Your word tonight to absolutely conquer us, Lord. To rule over us, to reign over us. Father, we pray that Your very Bible, the eternal Word of God that we have, Lord, before us, invincible, forever. So much so, the Word became flesh and dwelt among us.

And Father, as we look around at this world and we see all that's going on, Father, we just ask You to pull us in a little closer, pull us in a little tighter. And Lord, just remind us again, remind us afresh, even tonight in this gathering together of Your people. Father, may there be a renewal of our relationship with You. We ask it in Jesus' name. And all God's people said, amen.

Well church, listen. Grab your Bibles tonight and turn, as you know by now as we are in this series, turn to Matthew chapter 28. Matthew chapter 28. You come on Wednesday nights, you mark Matthew 28. I'll read that portion of Scripture to you and then we'll go tonight over to 1 Peter 2:20. Tonight's message is the *Disciplines of Dependence*. Being dependent upon God. And that is a discipline that you and I need to work on in our series of the *Disciplines of Life*. A discipline of being dependent upon God. It's all part of being a disciple, being a follower of Jesus.

Matthew chapter 28 verse 18: "And Jesus came and spoke to them saying, 'All authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth. Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.' Verse 20: 'Teaching them to observe all things that I have commanded you. And behold,' or be very wide-eyed, 'I am with you always, even to the end of the world.'" And then turn to the right and go to 1 Peter chapter 2 verse 20. Peter says, "For what credit is it if when you are beaten for your faults, you take it patiently? But when you do good and suffer, if you take it patiently, this is commendable before God. For to this you were called, listen church, because Christ also suffered for us, leaving us an example that you should follow in His footsteps."

Now, I've got to tell you right now, there's a high probability that if you go down to the Bible bookstore someplace and you buy the little memory packet of verses, they're great verses. And if you don't own them, go buy them. They're great to have. But usually you don't get those kinds of verses where it says, "Hey, cheer up. You're going to have a rough life. It's going to be difficult. People are going to spit on you and hate you and shake their fist at you and they're going to wish you to be dead." That's not the most encouraging memory verse to maybe memorize, but I've got to tell you this, it sure is practical. It sure is real.

And so as we look at our study tonight, we are looking at this discipline of dependence upon God. Nothing reveals for you and I our sonship in Jesus Christ than how dependent we are upon God. How dependent are you upon God is a very, very important question to ask yourself. Can you do that? Can you ask yourself in the recesses of your heart, of your mind? Be honest. Lord, am I very, very dependent upon You? And here's the tremendous thing about Christianity: The weaker we are in self-strength, the stronger we become. The less dependent we are upon self, the greater dependent we are upon God. It is a kingdom that is upside down according to the way the world thinks.

If you were to look at a business chart or flowchart of a corporation, you've got the president of the corporation at the top and then you've got all the people that make all the money for the president of the corporation down at the bottom. You take that pyramid and turn it, what we would say as Christians, right-side up. It's all about God's people, all resting upon the focal point of one set of shoulders. And you know whose shoulders those are. Those are Jesus' shoulders. It's a kingdom that is in reverse than what we know from this world. When we're weak, then we're strong. By the way, we did not rehearse that. That's very cool that they sang that song.

When I'm threatened to be panicking about something, it's that moment where God's peace and strength and comfort is most available, if I discipline myself to recognize that. Oh my goodness, what news have you heard this week? What is going on in your life? Stop. What is it? Record it. It's this, Pastor Jack. It's the other thing. It's finances or it's health or it's relational. Whatever it is, that thing that troubles your heart is an absolute open door to drawing closer to God.

It's the way His kingdom works. And it's a discipline that you and I need to understand as believers. Some verses for introduction, very important. Again, the more that we are weak, the better off we are. 2 Corinthians 12 verse 8 says, concerning these things, Paul the Apostle said, he's talking about his physical ailments. He says, "These things I pleaded with the Lord three times. Three times I asked the Lord that it might depart from me." And He said to me, mark it church, 2 Corinthians 12:9, "My grace is sufficient for you." Have you ever heard from God and He says, "I'm not going to take that thing away from you"? I have. "My grace will be sufficient. My grace will be enough. All you need is Me in this situation, Jack. For My strength is made perfect in weakness."

Paul then says, "Therefore most gladly will I rather boast in my infirmities." The world wants to cover up their infirmities. Paul says, "No, the believer, we rejoice in those because," look at what he says, "that the power of Christ may rest upon me. Therefore, I take pleasure in my infirmities, in reproaches," that is being rejected, "in needs, persecutions, distresses, for Christ's sake," he says, "for when I am weak, then I am strong."

And this is a tremendous discipline for us as Christians to learn tonight. That those areas that we think we want to cover up, those areas that we think we want to hide, are those areas that God says, "Move over. I'm going to use this." Let me tell you by personal experience, those weaknesses will be things that you dare not take glory for, whatsoever. It will be incredibly obvious that He'll get all the glory. And He will constantly remind you of those weaknesses. And rather than that pull you down, it actually lifts you up because He speaks instantly and says, "I'll be stronger in that thing." For me to stand in front of you publicly to be speaking, as many of you know, three years into my Christianity, Jesus radically healed me. I stuttered so bad all my life, I couldn't even get through the vows on our wedding without stuttering. I always wanted to be able to tell somebody about God. I always wanted to tell somebody about the Word of God, but I dare not. But the Lord touched my life. He takes those weak things and He makes them His strengths in you.

David J: You're listening to Real Life with Pastor Jack Hibbs. To learn more about this ministry or to catch up on some previous episodes, go to jackhibbs.com. That's jackhibbs.com. And now, let's get back to today's message. Once again, here's Pastor Jack.

Jack Hibbs: And so we revel, as Paul says, "I revel. I take pleasure in those infirmities." Think about it physically. Well, what about emotionally? That's in 2 Corinthians 10 verse 5. Our dependence upon God is an indicator, it's a barometer. In 2 Corinthians 10:5, it says that we're to be casting down arguments and every high thing that exalts itself against the knowledge of God, bringing every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ. Let me tell you, that is emotional stability. Are you stressed about your thoughts? Are you being tempted? Do you hear this song, or do you hear that thing and it puts this image in your mind? Or when you hear that name, does this happen in your head? Or emotionally, how are you affected?

The Bible says that you can bring every thought under the captivity of Christ. Again, I remember being so convicted of my lost condition that for so many years in my life, that verse, 2 Corinthians 10:5, was the only thing that I could hang on to. You guys, they didn't have Bible programs in computers back then. I'm not sure if they had computers back then when I got saved. I think we had smoke signals. But I took my Bible and I made photocopies of that verse and I put them in my bathroom in the mirror where I shave. I put them on my dash of my car because of my thought life. Your thought life affects your emotions. And then your emotions, if they're not reined in, they'll affect your entire life.

Physically, emotionally, what about spiritually? Proverbs 3 verse 5 to 7 is a great verse regarding the Spirit of God at work in us spiritually. Proverbs 3:5 says, "Trust in the Lord with all of your heart and lean not on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge Him and He shall direct your paths. Do not be wise in your own eyes. Fear the Lord and depart from evil."

So we've got a physical aspect of the disciplines of life and our dependence upon God. We've got an emotional understanding and we've got a spiritual power to apply to our lives that we are to be fearing God. Let me tell you, if the fear of the Lord is upon you and I, that is if we love God... We could post up a bunch of rules: Thou shalt not, thou shalt not.

Some years ago, I went to a church and they had red curbs. Of course, every building does. By law, there's red curbs painted for places that you cannot park. And what they did was they painted the curbs red and then in white lettering, it said, "Thou shalt not park here." I thought that was kind of cool. But we could have a list of things that say thou shalt not.

And do you know what that does? That winds up breeding within you either a wall of separation between you and God that you can never scale. Instantly you're defeated. Or, if somebody can begin to think that they're keeping some of the rules, their head begins to get as puffed up as a cream puff as they think, "Boy, look how good I'm doing." And that's equally as dangerous.

We are to fear the Lord, meaning we are to love Him, that sin and the things of this life will cause us to be so sickened and terrified of it that we will depart from evil. Evil will come up and go, "Hey, look, take a bite of me," or "take a drink of this," or "come run do the other." And you will run from it because you love God more.

A dependence upon God. Church, mark it down as we go through this discipline tonight of dependence upon God. Number one is wake up. Write that down. Wake up, your life is too big. Our life is too big in this sense, that for you and I to wake up and be dependent upon God is to face the facts that life in and of itself is too big for you and I.

We need to understand that. There is no way that mankind was created to deal with this life's situations. Let's be honest. You and I were designed to live in the Garden of Eden until Adam and Eve blew it. You and I were designed to live in perfection. You and I were designed to live in fellowship with God. And now we find ourselves in a fallen world and we find ourselves trying to cope with this age in which you and I live in and this flesh that you and I live inside of. And in the beginning, it was not what God intended. Life is just too big for you to do it on your own. You can't do it.

That's why there's drugs, alcohol, all the stuff that people invest their time into trying to find meaning or trying to fill a void in their life. Trying to somehow be somebody else or somebody more because life's too big. And then if that weren't enough, life throws its curveballs at you. Difficulty, challenges. You know all about them. They're even on the headlines of the papers as the world is in such a terrible condition.

Life, at times, can be completely overwhelming, even too big. In John chapter 6 verse 67, it says then Jesus said to the 12 disciples, "Do you also want to go away?" This is when the ministry was heating up and Jesus said to them, "Do you guys want to leave too? You want to quit?" But Simon Peter answered Jesus and said, "Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life."

"Also, we have come to believe and know that You are the Christ, the Son of the living God." That's a great word. The temptation today, listen church, it's huge. The world is pressuring against the church, and that's okay. The discipline of being dependent upon God, it's okay for the world to hit us and come against us. It's okay. That's what we expect from the world. But why do Christians cave in? Because they have failed to remember that Jesus Christ is the Lord, the Son of the living God, the absolute power in your life. We don't have to do this on our own. Life is too big.

And God steps in and says, "I'll tell you what. I want My life to flow out of your life in abundance." That is absolutely true. Jesus said in John chapter 7 that the Holy Spirit is to gush out of your innermost being. Torrents of living water, He said. That's the work of the Holy Spirit coming out of the life of the believer. That's what He wants in our lives. But we need to wake up to the fact that so many people today are trying to hold up life and they can't do it.

This great discipline of dependence is not something to run away from, it's something to embrace. People will say, "I can't take life, I can't put up with it anymore." Good. You've come to the right moment in time of your life. It's time to quit this world and join His world. It's time to absolutely give up in your own strength. I don't know why, I don't know where we get this idea that we're so strong anyway.

Our world is broken. Sin is rampant. We are fallen creatures. But Jesus Christ came, died on the cross, rose again from the grave to give you and I eternal life and strength. And then if that weren't enough, He gave the Holy Spirit to empower the believer until He comes again. All of us are going to go through life. You're going through life right now. You're sitting down, but you're flying through life right now. You're going through life, and the question is, how am I going to go through life? And to whom and with whom am I going to go through life? There'll always be the God-factor in the life that we live.

You may be here tonight and you may be kicking against God. "I don't want anything to do with God. I don't like God." But you find yourself here. "Well, that's because my friend invited me." But you're here. And God is speaking. He'll speak to your heart. He'll say, "Who are you running from? You don't believe in Me, so then why are you running from Me? You don't believe in Me, so why are you so angry at Me?"

A friend of mine was telling me the other day about his friend. He's an older man and he said, "I will not accept Jesus Christ into my life until God accepts certain things according to my rules." Wow. But you know there's people like that. Best thing to do is to wake up and realize how big life is, that it was never intended for you and I to live it alone and in our own strength.

Psalm 55 verse 4 says, "My heart is severely pained within me." Do you find yourself ever in that place? "And the terrors of death have fallen upon me. Fearfulness and trembling have come upon me, and horror has overwhelmed me." Boy, isn't that a commentary on our age? So I said, listen to verse 6, "So I said, 'Oh, that I had wings like a dove! I would fly away and be at rest.'" Is that not the cry of the world? And even the life of the believer, we might want to cry that cry. But as the Lord comes in and says, "I'm here. I'm with you."

David J: Pastor and Bible teacher Jack Hibbs here on Real Life Radio and his message called *Disciplines of Dependence*. Thanks for being with us today. This message is part of Pastor Jack's series called *The Disciplines of Life*. It's a series that highlights the disciplines of a Christ follower and the high cost of sharing our faith with others in a lost and broken world. And we'll continue on the next edition of Real Life Radio.

Jack Hibbs: Hey everybody, listen. All of our happening now events are amazing, but this one's special. On April 22nd, on a Wednesday night starting at 7:00 PM Pacific Time, I'm going to sit down with Chris McKenna. He is an expert on internet pornography and how it gets into your home, how it destroys your children, how it destroys your marriage. And you're going to want to be brave enough, I stress brave enough, you mention this topic and people don't want to show up. Show up and save someone's life.

David J: That's happening now with Chris McKenna and Pastor Jack Hibbs. Wednesday, April 22nd at 7:00 PM. Learn more at jackhibbs.com.

Jack Hibbs: Hey, thank you again so much for listening. And if you'd like to hear or see more of what we do here, you can always go to jackhibbs.com for all the latest on what's going on with this ministry. And please, if you're ever in the Southern California area, come see us at Calvary Chapel Chino Hills. We'd love to see you there in person. It has been so good to be with you today, and I pray you find yourself in the grace and mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ. See you on the next episode.

David J: This program is made possible by the generous contributions of you, our listeners. Visit us at jackhibbs.com. That's jackhibbs.com. Until next time, Pastor Jack Hibbs and all of us here at Real Life Radio wish for you solid and steady growth in Christ and in His word. We'll see you next time here on Real Life Radio.