Richard Ellis Talks

Richard Ellis: So God comes along and says, "Okay, here's what I'm trying to do with you. Here's what I'm saying to you. Here's what I'm trying to teach you, trying to get you to take some action in." And we go, "Well, but what if? And I'm afraid, and what if it doesn't happen? I don't want to make you look stupid, God." God doesn't need our protection. He needs our faith.

Guest (Male): Welcome to Richard Ellis Talks with Richard Ellis. So many of you have shared how important this program is to you and how Richard's messages have impacted your life. We also know that there are many others who have positively influenced your life and how to be a better Christ-follower.

We are devoting this entire month to celebrate and give honor to those in our life who have made a great impact and how we want to do the same in the lives of others. So we're introducing a new feature on our website to help you share that story. More on that later, but for now, with today's talk, here's Richard Ellis.

Richard Ellis: The title today's message is the Five-Second Rule. All right, the Five-Second Rule. Everybody know what the Five-Second Rule is? Believe it or not, there is research been done about this. The substance of the rule is that if food falls on the ground, it may be safely eaten as long as it is picked up within five seconds, right? Some people have a three-second rule, seven-second rule; usually, it doesn't get past seven. I think five is the international standard.

In 2003, intern Jillian Clark of the University of Illinois found in a survey that 56% of men and 70% of women surveyed were familiar with the five-second rule and determined that a variety of foods were significantly contaminated by even brief exposure to a tile inoculated with E. coli. On the other hand, Clark also found no significant evidence of contamination on public flooring. Clark received the 2004 LG Nobel Prize in Public Health. It's a parody award; it's not really a Nobel Prize or anything, for all his work.

Another little bit of research tested that after eight hours exposure, the bacteria could still contaminate bread and bologna in under five seconds, but a minute-long contact increased contamination by tenfold with tile and carpet surfaces only. So there's a little research. So I'm getting ready, going over my notes last night, sitting at the computer, and I'm eating some crackers and some Swiss cheese.

So I'm thinking about all this. I bite into this Swiss cheese and crackers, and a piece of it flips off—you know how you're biting and it crumbles or cheese went somewhere? It flew, and instinctively I reached down, picked it up, blew it off, and put it back in my mouth because I was within the five-second rule, of course. And then I realized how silly is this? We all do this thing.

Now let me tell you how we're going to apply it today. Go to Proverbs 28:13 to begin with. As much as I try to do this, I think I can pull it off today. We're going to go left to right. So you find Proverbs, then I'll jump to the New Testament, and we'll kind of go sequentially so it'll make sense. The first verse here, Proverbs 28:13, says this: "He who covers his sins will not prosper, but whoever confesses and forsakes them will have mercy."

Now here's one of the things I'd like to talk about in terms of the five-second rule. I think all of us know when we sin. I would guess that even people who are not Christians, when they do something wrong, if you still have any kind of meter whatsoever about guilt or shame or can monitor those things, you go, "Ooh, that was not so good. Shouldn't have done that, shouldn't have said that." You have some remorse.

The best thing to do as a Christian specifically is when you screw up, when you do something wrong, you sin, is apply the five-second rule to your sin and don't let the thing go. You say, "Oh, well, I'm an idiot and I said that." Quit making excuses about it. Just say, "God, look, you're right, I'm wrong, I'm back." Because if you keep confessing—if you sin and you confess, you sin and you confess—if nothing else, you're going to be exhausted from confessing.

And people who do a sin and then let it go and don't immediately make it right, well, then it starts, "Well, maybe that wasn't so bad," and then you forget and you go on. Then there's another situation, and now you're thinking your judgment is clouded. You say, "Well, now this isn't so bad," and before you know it, you're just gone. Stay on top of your sins. Don't let it go for an hour, a week, a year.

And some people get so much compounding interest on their sin that by the time they do get to a place where they've got to do something about it and repent and say, "Okay God, I'm wrong, you're right, I'm back," then there's this whole inventory of going back and saying, "Oh my gosh, I did that and I said that," and making things right. So first of all, when you sin before God, confess it immediately.

You say, "Well, this is a no-brainer." It's not a no-brainer; that's not what we're doing usually. We let it go and say, "Well, that'll wait, I'll do it later." Every step you take outside the will of God is a dangerous step. And the book talks about walking in the spirit and you won't fulfill the lust of the flesh. So if you don't want to live an ungodly life, you want to live a godly life, then keep the relationship open, keep the pathway clear. And the way to do that is to let there be no unresolved sin between you and God.

Now I can tell you at least in my house, and I'm trying to think before I even say this, if something is unresolved between myself and my wife, there is awkwardness. Anybody understand what I'm talking about? If you're dating somebody, married to somebody, I mean you can be sitting in a church gathering and something not be right and you know it and she knows it, and you just put the smile on and drove in two cars and faking out everybody else so nobody knows what was happening.

But you just—something's not right. And you say, "Well, how does that apply to God?" Something's not right. If things were right, you wouldn't be hesitating. You'd say, "I'm wrong, I admit it." But pride and we want to do what we're doing, or we wouldn't be doing it, and we don't stay up to date with our sin. So the first thing there is confessing to God and don't cover the sins, because the second you don't confess it, then you've got to start covering up and rationalizing your way.

And while we're on that, then let me say this about the five-second rule with other people. You say, "Well, it may not always work this way." I would encourage you to apologize as soon as possible, if not immediately, when you're wrong in a situation. Not flippantly, "Okay, I was wrong, I'm sorry, I'm sorry," not one of those, but stop and say, "Look, I am completely out of line. I'm wrong. I'm sorry. Will you forgive me?" and resolve it and move on.

Now, I understand if you are one of these people that has to hold a grudge for an hour or whatever your time limit is, you've got to get a little weird for a while. You know what I'm saying. Don't let this stuff fester. And you say, "Well, women are proud and won't ever say they're wrong." Whatever, everybody's proud and won't say they're wrong. Guys are the worst, right? It's just hard to be wrong when you're not wrong, so I understand that challenge. But you can find an opportunity along the way, I'm sure.

Go to Mark chapter two. New Testament: Matthew, Mark, Luke, John. That's in the front there of the New Testament. And there's a little story here about Jesus healing a guy, and I do want to read this to you and give you a context for this as well. Mark chapter 2, verse 1: "And again he entered Capernaum after some days, and it was heard that he was in the house. Immediately many gathered together, so that there was no longer room to receive them, not even near the door. And he preached the word to them."

"Then they came to him, bringing a paralytic who was carried by four men. And when they could not come near him because of the crowd, they uncovered the roof where he was. So when they had broken through, they let down the bed on which the paralytic was lying." I mean, this is buddies going to bat for you. I mean, these four guys had carried this guy all the way to Jesus. Just because we can't get in doesn't mean we can't get in. We'll knock a hole in the roof if we have to. We're getting him to Jesus.

So Jesus is teaching, and all of a sudden through the ceiling comes this guy being lowered down by these four buddies from the roof. "When Jesus saw their faith," not the paralytic, he's like, these guys believe I can do something, they're going to tear the roof up trying to get to me, "he said to the paralytic, 'Son, your sins are forgiven you.'"

Now, this is a little bit of a disappointment. We didn't haul him all the way in to get his sins forgiven. He's a paralytic, do something, right? I mean, you think, that's not why we tore the roof up. We want our buddy to be able to walk. "And some of the scribes were sitting there and reasoning in their hearts, 'Why does this man speak blasphemies like this? Who can forgive sins but God alone?'" Well, the point is Jesus is God, he just is God.

"But immediately, when Jesus perceived in his spirit that they reasoned thus within themselves, he said to them, 'Why do you reason about these things in your hearts? Which is easier?'" Now see, Jesus said your sins are forgiven you first because he knew where they were going to end up going. He said, "Okay, which is easier? To say to the paralytic man, 'Your sins are forgiven you,' or to say, 'Arise, take up your bed and walk?'"

Easy to say your sins are forgiven you, because if that's just blasphemy, nothing happens anyway. But if you look at somebody and say someone in a wheelchair, someone who's blind, someone who's whatever—especially this guy, paralytic—"Get up and walk," you better have some game or nothing's going to happen. "Which is easier? 'Your sins are forgiven you,' or 'Arise, take up your bed and walk?' But that you may know that the Son of Man has power on earth to forgive sins," he said to the paralytic, "I say to you, 'Arise, take up your bed and go to your house.'"

Now you think, well, that's it. There is still a missing component to this in the story, in this house where this happened, and in this paralytic's life. What has to happen still? Verse 12: it says "Immediately he arose." Five-second rule applied. He didn't go, "Well, but what if I try to get up and my legs don't work? Or what if, what if, what if?"

It just says immediately, on the spot, he got up, took up the bed, and went out into the presence of them all, so that all were amazed and glorified God, saying, "We never saw anything like this." But the piece of it for the paralytic was he had to do something. He had to test his new legs. He had to get up.

So God comes along and says, "Okay, here's what I'm trying to do with you. Here's what I'm saying to you. Here's what I'm trying to teach you, trying to get you to take some action in." And we go, "Well, but what if? And I'm afraid. And what if it doesn't happen? I don't want to make you look stupid, God." God doesn't need our protection. He needs our faith.

And when he tells you to do something, I'm telling you, if especially if he's told you to do it, there ought to be some immediately that goes with it. Do it. And there is no story here, by the way, without the guy standing up and trying to walk and walking out of there, doing what Jesus said. So apply the five-second rule to being obedient. Stop rationalizing, delaying, wasting time, arguing. You say, "Well, I'm going to go ask some friends what they think about it."

If God has told you to do something, you say, "Well, what do you mean? Jesus told this guy to do this. If Jesus told me to do something, I'd do it." Oh, really? Read your Bible every day. He's going to tell us to do stuff every day. My favorite one is the old 1 Thessalonians: "In everything give thanks." There's no suggestion there. That's what he said to do.

If you want God's will for your life, it says even your sanctification, that you avoid sexual fornication. People say, "I want to know God's will." It's here. You don't want to know God's will or you'd read your Bible. The problem is not knowing God's will. The problem is we read it and we go, "Well, I don't like that," and that's our problem. And I'm suggesting that when you read it, you say, "Okay, God, I see it. I'm going to do it now. I'm going to do it today," instead of contemplating it.

"Oh, I'm going to meditate on this scripture." You know what? There's a time to stop meditating and do something, especially on the stuff where it says something for you to do to take action. Philippians chapter 4, turn over there. Some of these verses you say, "Oh, well, I know where he's going. I memorized that verse." You know what? I don't care what verses you have memorized. I care what verses you have memorized and you're living by.

Everybody tells me they can quote scripture. Well, good for you. If there's no fruit from the scripture you've memorized, then what good is it doing you? So you can memorize anything, but if you memorize it and don't use it, it's not helping you. And people try to impress you. "Oh, Philippians chapter 4, oh, I know that verse." And I'm like, "Okay, let's see it in your life. That'll impress me." And this is one that a lot of people memorize, and I think it's a great thing to memorize and apply.

Just for context, let's jump in at verse 4. Philippians 4:4: "Rejoice in the Lord always. Again I will say, rejoice! Let your gentleness be known to all men. The Lord is at hand." Then simple stuff here, verse 6: "Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God." And then look at what happens when you do verse 6. Verse 7 kicks in: "And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus."

So how do you apply the five-second rule? You start getting anxious, then if you don't want to be anxious—and that's not what God has intended—then jump and do what it says here: in everything in prayer and supplication with thanksgiving. And what happens? The peace of God, which surpasses understanding, will guard your hearts. In a literally second, you can go from anxiety to peace if you'll do what the book says.

But if you let anxiety—the book says God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power and of love and of a sound mind—it's a one-to-three ratio. If you take the fear, if you take the anxiety, you're toast, because once it starts to take over, once it starts to get a hold of you, then you're afraid. And then you go, "Oh my gosh, and if that happens, that could happen, and if that happens, that could happen," and you've just run all these speculative traps, and nothing's even happened.

Instead of within five seconds, or if not immediately, saying, "You know what, God, I am not going to be anxious. I choose not to be anxious. So what am I going to do to prevent that? Prayer, supplication, with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God." Go to him and say, "God, I'm terrified." God wants the anxiety gone before he answers the prayer, not after he answers the prayer, or there's no faith needed.

He wants us to come to him and say, "You know what, God, I'm worried." He says, "I know you are, but I got help coming." Yeah, but what about now? "Well, now you're going to tell me how you're feeling, what you're thinking, pray, and thank me for what you don't even have yet, because you trust me and you know it's coming."

That's where this "with thanksgiving" thing kicks in: prayer and supplication with thanksgiving. And I've used this illustration before. If we're going out of town and I've got a pet that I need you to watch and I say, "Would you come by and feed our dog or our cat or whatever pet you got?" and you say, "Yeah, I'll do that."

Now I have not gone on a trip, I haven't left town, I've done nothing yet. All I've done is asked you to take care of my animal, right? And you said, "Yes." And then I look at you and I say what? "Thank you." Why am I thanking you? You haven't done anything yet. The thank you is out of faith and confidence and trust that what I've asked you to do, I trust that you're going to actually do it. So I can thank you for doing something you haven't even done and leave town and know that when I come back, my animal's going to be fine. My pet's going to be fine. You see that?

You say, "Well, that makes sense." Then do it with God. Don't sit there worrying, "Well, let's call back and see if they fed the dogs, fed the cats, fed the horses," you know, whatever it is you got them doing. You don't even have to call. You just know it's okay because you trust the person you asked. If you're asking God, you can thank him and you can trust him, and then what happens? You have the peace of God that it says surpasses all understanding, keeps guard of your hearts.

You say, "Well, how do I know I'm really doing the right thing?" You're not anxious anymore. You've got peace. So my statement is if you've applied the five-second rule to this, you've got peace. I don't know what's going to happen. I don't know where it's coming from, but I know he knows, and I'm asking him and I'm thanking him in advance and it's going to be okay.

That's what the world is looking for. They don't have that. You've got to make something happen. You've got to do it for yourself. Pull yourself up by your bootstraps. You can't be waiting on God, do something, dude. And here we're told not to be anxious, but to trust him for it. Go to Colossians chapter 3. Let me read you another one out of this. Philippians and then the next one is Colossians, just go one book over.

Colossians chapter 3, let's jump in at verse 12: "Therefore, as the elect of God," or the chosen people of God, "holy and beloved, put on tender mercies, kindness, humility, meekness, longsuffering, bearing with one another, and forgiving one another, if anyone has a complaint against another; even as Christ forgave you, so you also must do. But above all these things put on love, which is the bond of perfection. And let the peace of God rule in your hearts, to which also you were called in one body; and be thankful."

Now, the Bible talks about letting the peace of God rule in your hearts. Here's the dilemma with my Christian life for a long, long time. The five-second rule was about—that's about how long I let Christ rule in my heart, about five seconds and then I went back to my life. And every once in a while, somebody'd preach or I'd hear something or read my Bible and I'd let him take over for about five more seconds and I'd go, "I can't do this," and some sin, some temptation, I'd jump back into my old world.

And for some of you, you say the Christian life doesn't even make any sense because I've been living by the five-second rule. He's only ruling about five seconds every once in a while instead of all the time. And this talks about letting the peace of God rule in your hearts, let him dominate all the time, not just every once in a while, to which also you were called in one body and be thankful.

It is possible to actually walk with God and talk with God and have your sins confessed up to date and not be anxious and not be afraid, and your heart and mind and everything be clean and just live. The way I explain this to people is you don't have some kind of sin quota. "Oh my gosh, I'm off. It's almost four o'clock and I haven't sinned enough today." Somewhere along the way, we think we've got to keep sinning to meet some quota.

You don't have to sin. You say, "Well, but I do." I understand that, but you don't have to max it out every day. And there's something about when you do sin, confessing it immediately, you go, "Wow, why did I do that? I don't want to live that way anymore. That's not who I am. That's who I was. I don't want to be that person anymore."

Go to Hebrews chapter 3. A few pages to the right. And without reading the whole chapter here, you know, there's something about this—this Old Testament passage that's quoted here—that is just amazing. Let's go to verse 7. Hebrews 3:7: "Therefore, as the Holy Spirit says," now look at the wording here, "'Today, if you will hear His voice, do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion, in the day of trial in the wilderness, where your fathers tested Me and tried Me, and saw My works forty years. Therefore I was angry with that generation, and said, "They always go astray in their heart, and they have not known My ways."'" Is that God's description of us?

What if God said, "Well, here's how I describe your life: they always go astray in their heart and they have not known my ways"? Do not be that person. You don't want God describing you that way. The people that God described that way, he stuck them in the wilderness for 40 years and they died out there. That was the consequence of their choices.

He said, "So I swore in My wrath, they shall not enter My rest," in other words, the Promised Land. Then verse 12: "Beware, brethren, lest there be in any of you an evil heart of unbelief in departing from the living God; but exhort one another daily, while it is called 'Today,' lest any of you be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin."

Do you know what happens to you if you sin and you don't confess it immediately? You sin again, you sin again, you sin again. It starts piling up. And all of a sudden, your heart gets callous, it gets cold, it gets hard, it gets deceived, and then another sin seems easier and easier. And within weeks and months, you're gone because you let it go. Stay confessed up to date. Five-second rule, confess it immediately. "For we have become partakers of Christ if we hold the beginning of our confidence steadfast to the end, while it is said," and again he says it here, "'Today, if you will hear His voice, do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion.'"

Now, I don't know, we got people listening here and beyond this place where we are today. I mean, if you're sitting here and you know what the issues are, do it now. You're driving down the road, pull over somewhere, stop your life, stop your car, go somewhere in a closet someplace if you're at home, wherever you are listening to this, and say, "Enough, God. My heart doesn't even care anymore, but I know what the right thing to do is and I know what's wrong and I'm going to confess this. We have got to get back on track, because I'm going to end up in a very bad place. I'm already in a bad place."

You say, "Well, it can't be that easy." It's that simple. Let me read you another verse. Go to 1 John chapter 1. While you're looking for 1 John, let me read you a quote by Leonardo da Vinci. He said, "I have been impressed with the urgency of doing. Knowing is not enough; we must apply. Being willing is not enough; we must do."

1 John chapter 1, let's read verse 5. Let's start there: "This is the message which we have heard from Him and declare to you, that God is light and in Him is no darkness at all. If we say that we have fellowship with Him and walk in darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth." You say, "Well, I'm a child of God and I have fellowship with God," and you're not walking in the truth. You're lying and do not practice the truth. You're walking in darkness.

"But if we walk in the light as He is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus Christ His Son cleanses us from all sin." Keep reading there, verse 8: "If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness."

Now it is that simple. The book says if we confess our sins, he's faithful and just to forgive us our sins. Now some people say, "Yeah, but what's the problem? The problem is I keep doing the same sin then I just say, well, I know he's going to forgive me. Oh dear God, I'm so sorry. I'll be back, I'm going to go do it again probably in a couple hours, so I'll be back. I'll see you in a couple hours."

You say, "Well, that's not even sincere." You're not confessing your sin in that case; you're just admitting you're going to continue to do it. I'm talking about saying, "God, I don't want to live this way. I don't want to die this way. Unless you help me, I'm going to end up in this cycle the rest of my life. I am sorry."

There's an old English proverb that says confession is the first step to repentance. And a lot of people say, "Well, if you don't repent, nothing ever changes," but if you never confess, you probably never going to repent anyway. So start there. Now I know this may seem very simplistic. Does everybody know what your sin is? If you had to confess it, what it's probably—okay, let me rephrase this.

If you were going to end up by midnight today confessing a sin, how many of you have a good idea what that sin is probably going to be? Would you raise your hand? Anybody got an idea? The rest of them are dealing with lying, so we'll pray for them. Now some of you say, "Well, there's really no main thing." That's good if you can't think of one. I'm not saying everybody's got to have one.

But we're all going to get hit, we're going to get sideswiped. And I promise you, the people who didn't raise their hand because they decided maybe not to sin before midnight and meet some quota, those people are five-second rulers. Because if they do get hit and something goes wrong, they are not going down that easy. They are not going to go away that easy.

Because what happens when you don't confess your sin, it's not that you're going to die and go to hell if you're a Christian. It's just that that fellowship is broken, and it's a horrible feeling. It's that awkward thing between couples or parents and kids or friends, coworkers. You don't want that awkwardness. And if you're walking with God and the fellowship is broken with sin, you want it back.

And the best thing about our relationship with God is if it's you and your husband, wife, in a relationship with somebody else, you kind of go, "Well, maybe she was wrong and I wasn't wrong. Let's talk about that a minute. Was I completely wrong?" With God, it's always us. You know, "Well, God, you know, it's your turn to apologize. I'm tired of apologizing." Oh, really? It's always us, and it's so simple just to immediately five-second rule it and say, "God, I'm sorry, I'm wrong. I'm not just sorry about this, but I'm asking you, Lord, to help me repent from this and not live. I'm tired of confessing this sin." So I get hit with another one. Let's not die on this one and begin to see some things change.

Guest (Male): Thank you for taking time out of your busy day to listen to Richard Ellis Talks. We know these programs encourage and inspire you because we hear from so many people about them. Richard has such a unique way of speaking right to the heart because it always comes straight from his own heart.

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