Richard Ellis Talks

Guest (Male): Today on Richard Ellis Talks.

Richard Ellis: Jesus is at the end of that run. Last Adam, he dies on the cross. He is buried, raised from the dead. He is raised as what? The second man. First guy screws it all up.

Richard Ellis: I would suggest to you that you need to get in touch with the second guy, not the first guy, because most of us are really in touch with the first guy and that is our problem.

Guest (Male): You are listening to Richard Ellis Talks with Richard Ellis. Richard's style is unlike anyone else, where he shares the life-changing message of the gospel in a way that is real, refreshing, focused, and fun. We know that life is pretty challenging these days, but these talks will help you meet those challenges head-on with biblical truth, encouragement, and direction.

Guest (Male): Now, if you are not able to stick around with us for all of today's talk, you can always listen to, download, and even share this entire message with a friend right from our website, RichardEllis.com. So, let's jump right in with today's talk. Here is Richard Ellis.

Richard Ellis: The title of today's message is seconds. If someone does offer you seconds, it means there is an abundance of something they are offering you. And they are willing to share.

Richard Ellis: Because just because you have more than you need, does not mean you are willing to share what you have. And that can be a whole another problem. You say, "Yeah, there is plenty. If someone really was hungry, someone had not eaten in a long time and we fed them." They say, "Would you like some more? Would you like seconds?" They would say, "Yes." "Well, you know, we are trying to hold back here and keep that for us."

Richard Ellis: Let us start in Jonah chapter three. Now, I am not going to read you this whole thing about Jonah, but the story of Jonah, if you go back and read this short little book in the Old Testament, God goes to Jonah and says, "Go to Nineveh," and Jonah basically says, "No."

Richard Ellis: And the reason he says no is because he knows why God wants him to go to Nineveh. He wants him to go to Nineveh to preach to them. And if he preaches to them, they will repent. And if they repent, their city will be saved. And he does not like it that God is that kind of God. He thinks Nineveh deserves to be destroyed. So he is tired of God's compassion. He is tired of God offering second chances to cities even.

Richard Ellis: And so he bolts and it creates a lot of problems for him, for the ship that he is on. It is not a good thing. You think, "Well, I am sinning in a vacuum. It is not affecting anyone." Listen to me closely. You are jacking with everybody around you when you sin. You cannot.

Richard Ellis: You say, "Well, I am out here. I am just, I am not hurting anyone. I am not even hurting myself really. I am just living the life I want to live." You are taking out people around you without even knowing it. So this is what happens to him. So, it gets swallowed by a big fish. God prepared a big fish. Swallows him. And people say, "Well, I just don't think that's possible."

Richard Ellis: Then how in the world are you going to come up with God creating the heavens and the earth? If he can create a universe, you think he could keep a guy alive in a fish for a few days. Not complicated, okay? So, he spits him out on a beach and then chapter three begins this way.

Richard Ellis: "Now the word of the Lord came to Jonah the second time." Thank God for second times. Because what if he tells you to do something and you disobey and there is consequence, but he never comes back around? Thank God for the second times. Now in some of our cases, we are on the third, the fourth, the fifth, the sixth. He says, "Do this," we go do what we want to do, consequence. We come back. He says, "Do this," we go do what we want to do, consequences. We come back and he says, "Over and over."

Richard Ellis: The problem is you are going to run out of chances because you are going to die. And it is better not to die in your sin. It is better to let God deliver you from your sin and just obey him. The word of the Lord came to Jonah the second time saying, "Arise, go to Nineveh, that great city and preach to it the message that I tell you." So, Jonah arose and went to Nineveh. It is that simple.

Richard Ellis: According to the word of the Lord. Now, Nineveh was an exceedingly great city, a three-day journey in extent. In other words, just to cross it would take you three days. And Jonah began to enter the city on the first day's walk. Then he cried out and said, "Yet 40 days and Nineveh shall be overthrown." How did he know to say that? 40 days and the city will be overthrown. Because what did God say? "I will tell you what to say."

Richard Ellis: Stop telling people something that God did not tell you to say. Little Holy Spirits running around trying to fix the world, do not work. "Oh, I think you should be doing that." That may not be where they are at all. Go to Matthew chapter five.

Richard Ellis: Now some of these types of seconds that I am going to talk to you about, this one in particular, these run totally contrary. So whatever you naturally are prone to do, there is a good chance that supernaturally God is going to do the complete opposite.

Richard Ellis: Now you say, "But are not there nice people in the world?" There are nice people in the world that do seemingly Christian-looking things. But what is the difference in trying to help someone just for the sake of helping them and being a Christian doing it? When you do it as a Christian, you do it in Jesus' name and you don't get the credit. He does.

Richard Ellis: And what they see is, "This person cares about me. Why do they care about me?" And you explain to them that the ultimate reason you care about them, you are not a bad, mean person maybe, but you care about them because you understand that Christ cared for you, came after you, and that he has sent you to them. And it is not you being nice to them, it is you doing what you do, letting him do something in and through you in his name.

Richard Ellis: And then he gets the glory and that is when the world changes. Because if you are just a nice person, you go out, do nice things, and let's say somebody is starving, you feed them. Okay, they are still going to die and where are they going to spend eternity? Separated from God. They do not have clothes, you give them clothes.

Richard Ellis: I am not saying these are bad things, but you have got to get beyond just the surface tangential things of people's lives and get to the heart stuff. Sometimes when you meet a physical need, it gives you an opportunity to speak to them about a spiritual need.

Richard Ellis: All right, so Matthew chapter five, verse 38. "You have heard that it was said, an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth," Old Testament, "but I tell you not to resist an evil person, but whoever slaps you on your right cheek, turn the other to him also. If anyone wants to sue you and take away your tunic, let him have your cloak also." You say, "Oh, you are suing me for my tunic? Here, here is my cloak." You say, "This is crazy stuff."

Richard Ellis: "And whoever compels you to go one mile, go with him two." So you have heard about the second mile. What is the second mile? A Roman soldier on his way, wherever he is going, reassigned, whatever he has got to pack, he has got all his gear and he comes across someone that is going the other way, he can conscript that person and say, "You carry my stuff a mile that way," and by law, that person had to stop their journey, take on all his gear, turn around, and that soldier walk with that person, but that person is carrying their gear a mile that way.

Richard Ellis: So, you think, "Well, now I am going to go a mile, I am going to turn around, come back a mile, I am two miles out of the way and I am trying to go that way." Jesus said, "When you get to the end of the mile that by law he can conscript you to take, you say, 'You know what? How about we go another mile?' Let's go the second mile." Now you are four miles out of the way.

Richard Ellis: You say, "Well, who would do that? What is the point of this? Because who would do that?" This person is either an idiot or they are trying to say something. If you have nothing to say, you have no reason to obey. You say, "What do you mean I have something to say?"

Richard Ellis: Let's say that we are still law today. I am on my journey, someone comes along, "Here's my stuff." I go, "Okay, Lord, it's game on." I have got two miles to talk to this guy where I only had one before. So I am going to walk slow. You say, "Dude, but what about your inconvenience?" What about the person you get to spend two miles with? See, we are trying to get out of situations. We are trying to save ourselves and he is trying to use us to save someone else.

Richard Ellis: Then verse 42, "Give to him who asks you and from him who wants to borrow from you, do not turn away." So it is this giving yourself away, not holding on to me, me, me, me, me. Go to Matthew chapter 22, just a few pages to the right.

Richard Ellis: Verse 34, "But when the Pharisees heard that he had silenced the Sadducees, they gathered together. Then one of them, a lawyer or a teacher of the law, asked him a question, testing him and saying, 'Teacher, which is the great commandment in the law?'" And they had like 600, I can't remember, 613 or 35, whatever it is. They had laws for man, 365, just one for each day. They had come up with all this stuff. So he is trying to trick Jesus and say, "There are 600 something of these things, not just the ten, which is the greatest?"

Richard Ellis: So what does he come back with? Jesus said to him, "You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind. This is the first and great commandment." Sites the Old Testament, quotes it, that's it. But then he said, "And the second is like it. You shall love your neighbor as yourself." On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.

Richard Ellis: Okay, what if he had said just the first one? "Hear, O Israel," what he is quoting in the Old Testament, "you shall love the Lord your God with all your soul, with all your mind, heart and mind, soul, strength" in passages. What if he had said that was it? Because it never ends there. If you love God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, with all your strength, how do you even do that? You have no love for God unless you have received love from God.

Richard Ellis: And if you meet someone who does not have a relationship with God, they are trying to generate commitment and worship and trying to say, "Oh, he is great, whatever, whatever," but if it is not coming from within you and you don't have it from him in the first place, you cannot generate love for God unless you have received love from God.

Richard Ellis: So once you are in a relationship with him and that love begins to fill you and flow his direction, it is impossible then to not have a second commandment. So this is where it falls apart for a lot of Christians. We have church services. We go to these buildings. We gather wherever we gather and the songs we sing, hands raised maybe. "Oh, great is God." And then we don't even see people. It is like they don't even exist.

Richard Ellis: Forget the second mile, we see someone that does not have food, clothing, whatever we go, "Oh, go in peace, be blessed." Now how is that possible? Because something is not working. If you have Christ living in you, you cannot move through the world and not see what he sees and be mobilized to do something. So what is the second one? "You shall love your neighbor as yourself."

Richard Ellis: Now not everybody agrees with this, but I believe there is that implicit there, you are loving your neighbor as you love yourself. So you say, "Well, should I love myself?" I did not think very highly of myself and the scripture says, "Do not think more highly of yourself than you ought," but it does not say, "Don't think highly of yourself." How can't you not think highly of yourself when God picked you?

Richard Ellis: I am a servant of the Most High God. I am a child of the King. How can I not at least be thankful for that? So if I walk out going, "God has loved me. Now I have love for him." And then I realize, "Wait, if God can love me, why can I not love myself? If I can love myself and be okay with me, then I look at you and I am not trying to put you down to put me up or put you up to put me down." I just walk in healthy and say, "Wow, how are you? Who are you?" and interact with the person.

Richard Ellis: So the second commandment becomes very important, but you can't do the second without the first. Once you get the vertical circulation, God loving you, you loving him, you get personally healthy and up and running. Then you love your neighbor the way you love yourself and that is what changes them. Because they go, "Wow, this looks healthy. How do you do that?" And then you are always ready to give a reason for the hope that is within you. And the hope is not, "Well, I am just nicer than you."

Richard Ellis: It is that God himself lives in me and can live in you. Now go to John chapter three. Some of you can almost quote this, but we have people here and beyond that have never even heard these words. So John chapter three, verse one, "There was a man of the Pharisees, the religious guy, named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews. This man came to Jesus by night." So I don't know if he was just after work or I am thinking like he didn't want anybody to see him having this conversation.

Richard Ellis: He goes to Jesus by night and said to him, "Rabbi or teacher, we know that you are a teacher come from God, for no one can do these signs that you do unless God is with him. It is not possible. We know that. I know that and we know there is no way you could be doing this unless God is involved." Jesus answered and said to him, "Now, what did the guy ask?" He didn't really ask anything. He just told him, "We know you must be from God."

Richard Ellis: But Jesus doesn't address the signs. He looks at him and says, "Most assuredly, I say to you, unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God." So one birth will never work. There are things you can never see if you have only been born once. Now, let's assume you have been born physically, you are listening, and let's assume you are born physically and you can see.

Richard Ellis: I know everybody can't see, but the reason you can see is that you have eyes to see. Unless you are born a second time, this is simple, but it is profound. You have no eyes to see with. So there are people who have had a second birth experience and are spiritually alive that see things that you don't ever see. They just don't pick up on them. They don't show up.

Richard Ellis: You say, "Well, what would it be like to be able to see spiritually?" I can help you find out. So he says, "Most assuredly I say to you, unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God." Nicodemus said to him, "How can a man be born when he is old? Can he enter a second time into his mother's womb and be born?" So he is thinking physically, being born again would mean climbing back in a womb and a very painful experience for mom, clearly a C-section at best.

Richard Ellis: He is thinking physical, physical, physical. Okay, so that is how we think. It is all physical. It is not all physical. You start out physical, but if it doesn't transition to something spiritual, the spiritual is what is going to live forever. The physical is not going to live forever. Jesus answered, "Most assuredly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God."

Richard Ellis: Now, what is the kingdom of God? It is the rule and reign of God. You say, "Well, the kingdom of God is in heaven." No, the kingdom of God is here and you are either born into that kingdom and you see what is going on in his kingdom and you are experiencing the rule and reign of Christ in your life or you are not. So who is running your life? You say, "Well, I am." It is not working then. So keep reading.

Richard Ellis: "That which is born of the flesh is flesh, that which is born of the spirit is spirit. Do not marvel that I said to you, you must be born again. The wind blows where it wishes and you hear the sound of it, but cannot tell where it comes from and where it goes." Okay, so let's stay with that a minute. You are outside, you hear the wind, you feel the wind, but you have no idea.

Richard Ellis: You say, "Well, it is coming from over there." Over there where? What have we got some guy behind a wall blowing? I mean it's just, "Here it comes." "Well, where did it start?" You don't know. So it blows, you hear it, you feel it, and then it is gone. You say, "But I can't see that." You see the effects of it, you feel the effects of it, but you can't touch, you can't see that wind. And what does he use that example to demonstrate? "So is everyone who is born of the spirit."

Richard Ellis: Now, I have never converted anyone. I have seen it happen a bunch of times, but it is a work that only God can do. Another thing that is confounding to people is you say, "I am going to go plant a seed in the ground." You plant a seed in the ground, you cover it up. It is in the dark and something happens. It germinates. You can't make what happens happen to that seed. God just built it into a seed that when it is in the ground in the dark, it germinates and something completely different comes out of the ground than that you put in the ground.

Richard Ellis: So let's go to that. First Corinthians chapter 15. Now in First Corinthians chapter 15, there is a huge discussion here. There are people, even religious people, Jewish people in that day that did not believe in the resurrection of the dead. Like you are crazy. No one can be raised from the dead. And this is after Jesus has been raised from the dead.

Richard Ellis: And by the way, you think, "Well, is he the only one that was raised from the dead?" You got other people raised from the dead in the New Testament. You got plenty of people in the Old Testament raised from the dead. So it is not like there is not precedent for this. Miraculous raising from the dead has happened all along. So this discussion goes back and forth. First Corinthians chapter 15, we will jump in at verse 35.

Richard Ellis: "But someone will say, 'How are the dead raised up and with what body do they come?' Foolish one, what you sow is not made alive unless it dies. And what you sow, you do not sow that body that shall be, but mere grain, perhaps wheat or some other grain, but God gives it a body as it pleases him and to each seed its own body."

Richard Ellis: Most people unless you know what a seed is, you go, "Well, this is corn seed." Unless you know what corn seed is and what corn is, you would have no way in the world looking at a tiny corn seed and be able to say, "Oh, I know what will happen. We will put this in the ground. This huge stalk with these ears of corn on it and all this strange stuff you have to peel off to cook. This is what it will look like." You don't know that.

Richard Ellis: Until you have seen that, you don't know that. So people say, "Well, how do you know what you are going to look like in a resurrected body?" We don't know, but you die, you are planted, so to speak, and boom, you get a new body, resurrection from the dead. I know most of us are hoping it is going to be different, something way different than what we got right now. It will be better and it won't die.

Richard Ellis: Verse 39, "All flesh is not the same flesh, but there is one kind of flesh of men, another flesh of animals, another of fish, another of birds. There are also celestial bodies and terrestrial bodies. But the glory of the celestial is one and the glory of the terrestrial is another." In other words, things in the skies and things on the earth. "There is one glory of the sun, another glory of the moon and another glory of the stars, for one star differs from another star in glory. So also is the resurrection of the dead. The body is sown in corruption."

Richard Ellis: In other words, this rotting, decaying body, corruption, "it is raised in incorruption. It is sown in dishonor, it is raised in glory. It is sown in weakness, it is raised in power. It is sown a natural body, it is raised a spiritual body. There is a natural body and there is a spiritual body and so it is written."

Richard Ellis: Now track with me. "The first man Adam became a living being," a physical being. "The last Adam became a life-giving spirit." Okay, so what is the difference in the first man and the last man? A life-giving spirit. "However, the spiritual is not first, but the natural and afterward the spiritual. The first man was of the earth, made of dust, the second man is the Lord from heaven." What do you need? You need a second man. The first man screwed this all up for us.

Richard Ellis: So we are all descendants of the first man Adam. Adam and Eve, all these kids come out and here we are. If you die in Adam, you are dead. And we will see this in a minute, twice dead. So how do you get in Christ? He dies on the cross as the last what? The last Adam. Is that right? So if he is the last Adam, there are no more Adams. So that means Jesus is at the end of that run.

Richard Ellis: Last Adam, he dies on the cross. He is buried, raised from the dead. He is raised as what? The second man. First guy screws it all up. I would suggest to you that you need to get in touch with the second guy, not the first guy, because most of us are really in touch with the first guy and that is our problem. We are living in the flesh, not in the spirit.

Richard Ellis: So when you are born again, the second man. Keep reading. "As was the man of dust, so also are those who are made of dust. And as is the heavenly man, so also are those who are heavenly. And as we have borne the image of the man of dust, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly man." Okay, so what is the promise? You say, "So Adam is a physical person, we are physical people."

Richard Ellis: If you know the second man, if any man is in Christ, what does it say? "He is a new creation. Old things are passed away, all things are new." So in the same way that Jesus died, buried, raised from the dead, new body, glorified body. The day comes when if you are in Christ, you die and you live forever spiritually.

Richard Ellis: Go to Revelation chapter two. I don't read you these things to scare you, but if it works, so be it. Revelation chapter two, verse 11. "He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches. He who overcomes shall not be hurt by the second death." What is the second death? Go to Revelation chapter 20. He keeps referencing this. Verse six, "Blessed and holy is he who has part in the first resurrection, over such the second death has no power. But they shall be priests of God and of Christ and shall reign with him a thousand years."

Richard Ellis: Revelation 20, verse 14, "Then death and Hades were cast into the lake of fire. This is the second death. And anyone not found written in the Book of Life was cast into the lake of fire," meaning what? Second death. Now the difference in the first death and the second death is this. When you die physically, you are dead. So physically you are unaware. It is over.

Richard Ellis: The problem is if you thought that there was only death and then you just went to dust and there was nothing after that, and all of a sudden you realize, "Wait, I thought I was supposed to be dust." And now I am confronted with an eternity and I am still alive, and now I just died and now I am going to die again, spiritually, forever.

Richard Ellis: But the problem with this second death is you are never really dead and unaware. It is just never ending death that has no life. It is misery. Who would pick this? Who would pick this? And what is it that you are trading in on this? What profit is a man, the Bible says, if he gained the whole world and loses soul, loses life, loses eternal life?

Richard Ellis: So what deal have you made with the devil? "If you will give me this." You people, "I haven't even made a deal with the devil." You haven't made one with Jesus either. If you haven't made a deal with Jesus, you've made a deal with the devil and said, "I am going to keep whatever you've offered me." And Jesus got offered a bunch of stuff if he would what? Just bow down to Satan. You say, "Well, I am not worshipping anybody."

Richard Ellis: You are. You are either worshipping him or yourself or something you have picked that you think is going to bless you more than God himself. Some people worship jobs, possessions, titles, children, husband, wife. You better find you a big G God to worship.

Guest (Male): Before Richard comes back to wrap things up for us today, I'd like to share a couple important things with you. Let me encourage you to take a minute and check out our website, RichardEllis.com. You will find today's talk right there in the talks page, along with all of Richard's audio and video messages. You can even forward them to a friend so they can hear them too.

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Guest (Male): And Richard's back now to wrap up today's talk.

Richard Ellis: One more, Revelation 21, verse 8. "But the cowardly, unbelieving, abominable, murderers, sexually immoral, sorcerers, idolaters, and all liars shall have their part in the lake which burns with fire and brimstone, which is the second death." You say, "Well, wow, I think I just made the list." It doesn't mean that you, you say, "Well, I am a Christian, I tell lies, that won't put you in the lake of fire."

Richard Ellis: But if these are things that characterize your life and you have only been born once, you are in trouble. Now the beauty of this is if you have survived this sermon and you are still alive, then you have a chance. Maybe your first chance, it might be your second, it might be your third or fourth, but you are going to run out of chances. But God is offering you seconds.

Richard Ellis: I read when David Cassidy died, his daughter said, maybe you saw this when he died, icon, teen idol, back way back. But these were his last words before he died. "So much wasted time." So if you are a believer, what are you doing with your life? And who is running it? Is he the King? Is he the ruler? Is it his reign or your reign pulling him back?

Richard Ellis: And if you are not a believer, so much wasted time for eternity. Experience a second death, there is no reason for you to experience it. If you are willing to be born a second time.

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