Richard Ellis Talks

Richard Ellis: This isn't some spiritual shot glass you can come in here and get a fix and go back and it'll all be okay. Gathering as a church helps, the church body coming together, encouraging, challenging, loving on one another, but somehow unless you're going to do this every day, you're going to have to find some way to connect with God consistently throughout the week or you won't make it.

Guest (Male): Welcome to Richard Ellis Talks with Richard Ellis. Thanks for allowing us to share this time with you. You may be stuck in traffic or stuck in life. Either way, today's message is going to help you get on the right track as you learn how much God loves you right where you are.

Richard's unique style checks all the boxes, with a lot of hope, insight, truth, and of course, humor. Today's talk with Richard will get our conversation started, but we want to keep it going with you. So let's stay in touch through our website, RichardEllis.com. But right now, let's go ahead and get right into today's talk. Here's Richard Ellis.

Richard Ellis: The title of today's message is "Keep the Change." Turn to Psalm chapter 85. Psalm 85 verse 8 says this: "I will hear what God the Lord will speak, for He will speak peace to His people and to His saints; but let them not turn back to folly. Surely His salvation is near to those who fear Him, that glory may dwell in our land." And the phrase I'm after here, and we're going to track this, is "let them not turn back to folly."

In all these years, and myself included in this process, it is very frustrating—and I'm going to speak primarily today to people who are Christians—at some point you made a decision, and maybe everything's been great from the day you became a Christian, no bumps in the road, no going back to anything, and you're just walking with God without a hitch from the get-go.

There are other people that I come across who become a Christian and they start walking with God, and everything's great and everything's exciting, and then either they don't stick together with other believers or they start listening to somebody—and I'll address this in a minute—they start listening to some preacher or some teacher, somebody who either doesn't use any scripture or, as I call it, they use jerk-a-verse theology, where they go grabbing verses out of the Bible.

These people get all confused, they get disheartened, they get frustrated, and they start to fall away. They go, "Well, this doesn't work, and I don't feel the stuff I felt anymore, and I can't do this anymore, and no one seems to be able to do it, it doesn't make sense," and then you just drift off and it doesn't work.

Ezekiel chapter 3. This is more a warning for me, and I'm going to read this for us, but really for someone like myself whose responsibility is to try to put this stuff out here. Ezekiel chapter 3, let me jump down to verse 16. Again, there's plenty of stuff before that, but 16, for the sake of time, let me hit this.

"Now it came to pass at the end of seven days that the word of the Lord came to me, saying: Son of man, I have made you a watchman for the house of Israel; therefore hear a word from My mouth and give them warning from Me. When I say to the wicked, 'You shall surely die,' and you give him no warning, nor speak to warn the wicked from his wicked way, to save his life, that same wicked man shall die in his iniquity; but his blood I will require at your hand."

I'm going to tell you what motivates me partially. Part of what keeps me on the straight and narrow, even when I get way off, is that I'm going to have to answer to God personally for myself one day, if not every day where I realize I've got to live for Him, not for myself. But way beyond that, as an elder in a church, as a pastor of a church, as a preacher, there is this huge tendency.

We are so busy trying to make Christianity cool instead of hot or cold that we try to say whatever we've got to say to get people to come. If we don't say the right things and water it down a little bit and scratch their ears just a little bit, nobody will come. But if you can get them to come with all that, what are they coming to? What are they going to do with what you're giving them? If whatever you use to get them, you've got to use to keep them.

And there is clearly biblically—you say, "Well, you're talking about hellfire, brimstone, scaring people kind of stuff." If you get afraid every once in a while, it's not all bad. You should be a little in awe of this God and a little aware that you can't mess with Him. And I'm going to get to some heavy-duty verses today in regard to this. But here Ezekiel is warned: if I tell you what they're doing can end in death and you don't warn them, their blood is on your hands.

"Yet, if you warn the wicked, and he does not turn from his wickedness, nor from his wicked way, he shall die in his iniquity; but you have delivered your soul. Again, when a righteous man turns from his righteousness and commits iniquity, and I lay a stumbling block before him, he shall die. Because you did not give him warning, he shall die in his sin, and his righteousness which he has done shall not be remembered; but his blood I will require at your hand. Nevertheless, if you warn the righteous man that the righteous should not sin, and he does not sin, he shall surely live because he took warning; also you will have delivered your soul."

"Then the hand of the Lord was upon me there, and He said to me: Arise and go out into the plain, and there I shall talk with you. So I arose and went out into the plain, and behold, the glory of the Lord stood there, like the glory which I saw by the River Chebar; and I fell on my face. Then the Spirit entered me and set me on my feet and spoke with me and said: Go, shut yourself inside your house. And you, O son of man, surely they will put ropes on you and bind you with them, so that you cannot go out among them. And I will make your tongue cling to the roof of your mouth, so that you shall be mute and not be able to rebuke them, for they are a rebellious house. But when I speak with you, I will open your mouth, and you shall say to them: Thus says the Lord God. He who hears, let him hear; and he who refuses, let him refuse; for they are a rebellious house."

And that's who he was sent to. The dilemma I have is that the rebellion begins with me. And then I am not standing up here as though God were transmitting information and I say, "Okay, wait, He's saying this." I'm not some kind of spiritual psychic that waits for God to speak and then I deliver some message. We've got the message. You've got a Bible.

You say, "Well, what is God thinking? What does He say?" What these people back then didn't have, they didn't have printing presses. Very few scrolls existed. It was copied meticulously. These were precious things. The priests would get up and read out of them. The prophets, God would literally speak through them. Things would come out. They didn't have the word of God in written form. You've got the Bible.

And I say to people sometimes, "You say, 'Well, I worked at this job and I did something and I got fired. And then they brought up when I got fired, if you'll read your manual—your HR manual we gave you when you started this job—you see right here clause whatever-whatever says you can't do that, and if you do, you've violated the terms of this and you're gone.'" Well, that's not fair, I didn't know it was in there. You're responsible for everything in the book.

You say, "But I don't get it." Then get off of it and ask somebody who does get it to help you get it, because we are all responsible for what it says. You say, "Well, that's too hard. I just want to go to heaven. I don't want to study. I don't want to work. It's going to take discipline and time, and what about American Idol? You don't think God would want me to miss that?"

This isn't some spiritual shot glass you can come in here and get a fix and go back and it'll all be okay. Gathering as a church helps, the church body coming together, encouraging, challenging, loving on one another, but somehow unless you're going to do this every day—and we resort to that when we barely get people to come on a Sunday—you're going to have to find some way to connect with God consistently throughout the week or you won't make it.

And you wonder why you feel so spiritually anemic and weak, and it's not working, and the devil comes along and he picks you off, picks me off just easily. It's because we don't know what God's word says. We don't have it in our hearts. We're not walking with Him, or this stuff would work.

Matthew chapter 13, New Testament. Let me also throw this in, and I've said this throughout the years. I grew up under preachers that were not mad at hell, they were mad as hell. I'm just convinced of it. They were just angry guys. When I get all passionate and louder or whatever, I'm not mad at you—or I may be a little mad at myself for being so stupid half the time or a lot of the time.

But I think I'm angry at what happens out there to us as Christians. We just drift along and somebody comes along teaching some newfangled thing and pulls a verse out, writes a whole book about it, and we chase the new fad. There's enough solid stuff in here to keep you busy for a lifetime without chasing some new cute little thing that's going to make you rich and healthy till you die.

It's not in there. There are blessings, but if you've got a ticket to heaven and God's love and His Spirit living in you and the fruit of the Spirit being manifested in your life, you can die broke and sick and be better off than you would without Him.

Matthew 13, verse 1: "On the same day Jesus went out of the house and sat by the sea. And great multitudes were gathered together to Him, so that He got into a boat and sat; and the whole multitude stood on the shore. Then He spoke many things to them in parables, saying"—and this first parable, and He interprets it in a minute, but let me read it to you and then we'll jump down to the interpretation.

"Behold, a sower went out to sow. And as he sowed, some seed fell by the wayside; the birds came and devoured them. Some fell on stony places, where they did not have much earth; and they immediately sprang up because they had no depth of earth. But when the sun was up they were scorched, and because they had no root, they withered away. And some fell among thorns, and the thorns sprang up and choked them. But others fell on good ground and yielded a crop: some a hundredfold, some sixty, some thirty. He who has ears to hear, let him hear."

Well, everybody's listening. If they heard anything He said, they had ears to hear. Of course they heard it. He's not talking about hearing it just with your physical ears. He says, "If you've got spiritual ears to hear this, then listen to what I'm saying." Verse 10: "And the disciples came and said to Him, 'Why do You speak to them in parables? Why don't You just say it, Jesus? You keep telling these goofy stories. Just tell them what You mean.'"

He answered and said to them—now listen to what Jesus says to them: "Because it has been given to you to know the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven, but to them it has not been given. For whoever has, to him more will be given, and he will have abundance; but whoever does not have, even what he has will be taken away from him.

Therefore I speak to them in parables, because seeing they do not see, and hearing they do not hear, nor do they understand. And in them the prophecy of Isaiah is fulfilled, which says: 'Hearing you will hear and shall not understand, and seeing you will see and not perceive; for the hearts of this people have grown dull. Their ears are hard of hearing, and their eyes they have closed, lest they should see with their eyes and hear with their ears, lest they should understand with their hearts and turn, so that I should heal them.'

But blessed are your eyes for they see, and your ears for they hear; for assuredly, I say to you that many prophets and righteous men desired to see what you see and did not see, and to hear what you hear and did not hear."

Now let me throw something in here. If you even remotely understand anything in this scripture, that when someone preaches out of the scripture and you go, "Wow, I get that," you hear it, you read it, you see it, not just the words on the page, and you say, "I understand that." Don't take that lightly. You've been given eyes to see and ears to hear. That's a miraculous thing.

You can't just go, "Oh, yeah, well, everybody's got that." Everybody doesn't have that. Non-believers check into a hotel room, if they're not emptying the bar and watching porn on TV, sometimes they grab a Bible by the bedside. They open the thing up and start reading. They're hungry. Why do you think those Bibles are in there? Because people get in hotels and start thinking about their life and have something to read.

And they read it, and then you'll hear them say later, "Well, I read the Bible, I just don't get it. I don't understand it." They're hungry spiritually, but they can't make sense of it. That's what we're supposed to be about. We're supposed to break it down, explain it to them, help them understand, and be in a position because you know what's going on to help them know better what's going on.

Keep reading there in verse 18: "Therefore hear the parable of the sower: When anyone hears the word of the kingdom, and does not understand it, then the wicked one comes and snatches away what was sown in his heart. This is he who received seed by the wayside.

But he who received the seed on stony ground, this is he who hears the word and immediately receives it with joy; yet he has no root in himself, but endures only for a while. For when tribulation or persecution arises because of the word, immediately he stumbles. Now he who received seed among the thorns is he who hears the word, and the cares of this world and the deceitfulness of riches choke the word, and he becomes unfruitful."

And if there's any verse in the book that refers to the United States of America, it is verse 22. The word is going out all the time, 24/7, TV, radio, print, it's everywhere. And we receive it, but it's among thorns. We hear the word, the cares of this world, the deceitfulness of riches choke the word, and we become unfruitful.

"But he who received seed on good ground is he who hears the word and understands it, who indeed bears fruit and produces: some a hundredfold, some sixty, some thirty." Your life produces spiritual fruit. Something is changed, and everything around you is changed.

Go to Hebrews chapter 10. Hebrews chapter 10 verse 19: "Therefore, brethren"—and he's talking to Christians here—"having boldness to enter the Holiest by the blood of Jesus, by a new and living way which He consecrated for us"—in other words, this is not Old Testament sacrifice of animals, this is a new and living way—"through the veil, that is, His flesh, and having a High Priest over the house of God, let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water."

So he's talking about what happens to a Christian. A clean conscience. That was the most bizarre thing to me when I finally had a clear conscience. I had no idea what that was. And literally feeling clean—our bodies washed with pure water—and the Bible is described as the water in another passage.

Verse 23: "Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for He who promised is faithful. And let us consider one another in order to stir up love and good works, not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as is the manner of some, but exhorting one another, and so much the more as you see the Day approaching."

Realize where you stand, what you've got, stick together. Do this together. And you say, "Well, is that talking about church?" It's talking about assembling anywhere as the body. So it's not just a Sunday; it could be a Bible study, it could be any day. But stick together because there's consequence in not doing so. And here's part of the consequence, verse 26 and following.

Now, if you've ever read this and go, "Whoa, I don't even want to think about this. I'm out. I'm not even going to look at this anymore," then let's take a light look at it today: "For if we sin willfully after we have received the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins."

Now I want a show of hands here. Anyone that claims to be a Christian and since you became a Christian, you have sinned willfully, premeditatedly, raise your hand. It's everybody. So whatever this says, we're in big trouble unless there's some different category here, okay?

"For if we sin willfully after we've received the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins, but a certain fearful expectation of judgment, and fiery indignation, which will devour the adversaries." That doesn't sound good. You say, "Well, that can't be talking about me. I did one time, or every once in a while, or maybe every day, but that's not me, is it?" I see if I said raise your hands again and say how many of you pretty much are sinning willfully every day. There's a lot of hands that would go up and go, "Yeah, I'm struggling with some sin, and it's every day. And I know it's coming and I choose to do it anyway." How does this apply to you?

Verse 28, keep reading: "Anyone who has rejected Moses' law dies without mercy on the testimony of two or three witnesses. Of how much worse punishment, do you suppose, will he be thought worthy who has trampled the Son of God underfoot, counted the blood of the covenant by which he was sanctified a common thing, and insulted the Spirit of grace?" You say, "Well, I'm not doing that, am I?" And that's my question. Is that exactly what we're doing?

"For we know Him who said"—now this is one of these little phrases in the Bible that gets pulled out and applied to everyone who's ever done anything wrong to us. Let me tell you who this is written to. Look who it's written to. It's quoted in the context of apostasy, someone going away from Christ: "'Vengeance is Mine, I will repay,' says the Lord. And again, 'The Lord will judge His people.' It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God."

Now, I do not believe that this is written to non-believers, and I don't believe that you can lose your salvation. But somewhere between becoming a Christian and dying and going to heaven, I believe biblically it is possible for a person to get so far from God, reject hardhearted, coldhearted, stiff-arm God so long as though Jesus were on the ground and you're just kicking Him and stomping around in Jesus' blood and flipping off the Spirit of grace and saying, "You know what? I don't need you people anymore. I don't need any of this anymore. Jesus died for everybody else, whatever, I don't believe any of that anymore," and you completely reject all of the gospel and go your own way.

And people say to me all the time, "Well, look at so-and-so. How can they say they became a Christian when they were 12 or whatever, but look how they're living?" The Bible talks about these people. And you can get to such a bad place that God Himself is the only one, and creating circumstances in your life that would cause you to repent, is the only one going to get you back.

And I've talked to people who claimed to have made some profession of faith and honestly looking at their life from that point to a certain point, I would believe it. Then what happens? They walk away, they get away, they start listening to false teaching, all kind of nonsense out there, and slowly but surely they slip away, and they get to such a bad place they can't get back.

It doesn't mean they'll burn in hell. It just means all hell breaks loose on them in this life. Now listen very closely to me. If you are playing around with the grace of God, the mercy of God, the blood of Jesus, all this stuff, the Spirit of grace, and you think ain't no big deal, I can do what I want to do, you are dealing with a holy, righteous, awesome God who can drop the boom on you and get your attention.

And you say, "Well, that doesn't sound very loving." The book says if you love someone, you chasten them. But this is past even discipline. This is getting to a place that you will not treat My blood that way. You will not treat My Son that way. You will not treat My Spirit, the grace of God, that way. This is too valuable. And we coast along.

Can you fill a church with this kind of preaching? I don't know, I don't care. I'd rather chop it down and end up with 50 of us—and I'm in the pile here, I'm telling you straight up—this stuff scares the bejesus out of me, whatever that is, it scares it out of me. I read this and sometimes sit by myself reading this and get really afraid, because I was raised and I've read and I know: I cannot lose this Jesus. There's no one that can pluck me out of the Father's hand. But what a scary thing to be in the hand of God when He's not happy with you.

And Christians get all screwed up and get caught up in all kind of mess, and they go, "Well, God, why are You doing this to me?" It's the dumbest question you can ever ask. Stop blaming God for all your crap. It's yours. You made it. You got yourself into this junk, so stop screaming at Him.

Cry out to Him for mercy and acknowledge, "I did all this. I got me in this mess. I need Your help. I can't even believe, God, that I still care what You think because I've gone so far, but if somehow Your kindness has given me repentance, then I'm coming back, God." Bad things happen to casual Christians. Bad things.

All right, then he tries to be encouraging. Verse 32: he says, "But recall the former days in which, after you were illuminated"—in other words, you got lit up with this, it made sense—"you endured a great struggle with sufferings, partly while you were made a spectacle both by reproaches and tribulations, and partly while you became a companion of those who were so treated; for you had compassion on me in my chains, and joyfully accepted the plundering of your goods, knowing that you have a better and an enduring possession for yourselves in heaven."

You know, when it gets a little heated and struggle and trouble, I'm out. I've got to get me a new church. These people got problems. Now if I've got problems, I can do it by myself, I don't need you people. And there are Christians, somehow they've got enough money they think, they've got enough whatever, family, and they isolate, isolate and they go, "Oh, no, no, I'm not like you people, I have a support system in place."

Your support system is supposed to be your church. And if you've got something besides that, you know what? Nice for you, it doesn't work for everybody that way. We've got people sitting here, people listening today who've got nobody but us.

"Knowing that you have a better and an enduring possession for yourselves in heaven. Therefore do not cast away your confidence, which has great reward. For you have need of endurance." Now read this word. You, I, we have need of endurance, "so that after you have done the will of God, you may receive the promise. For yet a little while, and He who is coming will come and will not tarry. Now the just shall live by faith; but if anyone draws back, My soul has no pleasure in him. But we are not of those who draw back to perdition, but of those who believe to the saving of the soul."

And the word "saving" here and "soul" is not about your eternal soul. "Soul" in the language meant your life. And the word "saving" is not what the writer used here normally about eternal life saving, it's just saving your life. In other words, not losing your very life.

Guest (Male): We'll get back to Richard in a moment to close out today's talk. But first, I want to share something with you about the program. Our mission is actually very simple: to take the planet. So it's our prayer that these daily talks from Richard aren't something you only hear and enjoy, but that they inspire you to share with others.

Together we can do this. The message of the gospel is something everyone needs to hear, and that's why it's a huge priority to us. And you can join us in this important mission. Call us at 855-6-RICHARD to say you're in. Or you can get on board with us through our website, RichardEllis.com. Well, here's Richard with some closing thoughts for us.

Richard Ellis: God overpaid for us with the life of His own Son. Once we accept His payment, He simply asks us to keep the change. Don't go back to whoever you were; there's nothing there. Don't stiff-arm God; it'll get you nowhere. Don't listen to just whatever pops up out there. Get you a Bible and read it.

And if you read it and it doesn't make sense, then come to me, come to one of the elders, come to somebody in the church that you trust and say, "You know what? I'm hungry. I can't get the can open. Could you help me get the can open? I know there's food in here, I don't know how to get it out."

And let someone sit down with you. And people say, "Well, you've got all these small groups, what's that about?" It's can-opener training. We are trying to open the can for you and feed you and help you. You say, "Well, I'm going to stick to my TV evangelist, it's easier." Yeah, because you do nothing. You sit and listen and then pick and choose what you're going to do. We need each other. We need the scriptures. We need to be church in order to keep the change.

Guest (Male): This has been Richard Ellis Talks with Richard Ellis. The message of the gospel is one we take very seriously in our mission to reach the planet, and you have a vital part of doing that along with us.

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