Telling the Truth

Jill Briscoe: Would you say you're seeking God with your whole heart? Are you spending time reading what He wrote, the Bible?

Guest (Male): Jill Briscoe today on Telling the Truth begins a new series about how the Bible is as life-changing and relevant today as it always has been. She begins in just a moment.

Guest (Female): Today's culture is a revolving door of ever-shifting views and beliefs. That's why it's so important to test new ideas against the timeless truth of Scripture. It's the best defense against the world's confusion. We want to help ground you in the foundations of your faith by sending you Stuart Briscoe's six-message series on the book of 2 Peter, Six Things We Must Never Forget.

The Six Things We Must Never Forget series is our thanks for your gift to help keep Telling the Truth going strong, sharing life-giving teaching from Stuart and Jill with more people all over the world. So request your copy when you give today and get help staying grounded in truth in today's shifting culture. Call 1-800-889-5388. That's 1-800-889-5388, or you can give online at tellingthetruth.org.

Guest (Male): Now, if you can, turn with Jill to the Psalms as she starts her message, Getting on Track.

Jill Briscoe: In Isaiah 40 it says if we wait on the Lord, He will renew our strength and we'll mount up with wings like eagles. We'll run and not be weary and we will walk and not faint. In my session today, I want to talk a little bit about how. How do you live in the word? How do you hear His voice? What's it sound like? How can we be sure it's His voice and not our imagination? And when I'm reading the Bible and trying to listen to His voice, what does that sound like?

I just want at the beginning to try to throw out a whole lot of practical stuff as we walk through some of Psalm 119. My great heart cry is that you and I find ways to so live in the word and let the word live in us and through us that that is what we give to our community, to our family, to our world, to our church.

I'm going to take much of what I say from Psalm 119 and Psalm 139 and 2 Samuel chapter 3, and it's basically in those three places that I will be camping, if you wish, with what I want to say to you. The first of my sessions is going to be getting on track. That's obviously why I've gone to Psalm 139. "Search me, O God, and know my heart. Try me and know my reins or my inner life. And see if there's any wicked way in me and lead me in the track, lead me on the road, lead me on the way to everlasting, the everlasting way." And of course, that's the last verse in Psalm 139.

Before we begin, let me talk about some very practical things. First of all, you need to listen with all of you. What do I mean by this? It's amazingly possible to sit through a whole sermon or a whole anything and listen with a little bit of you while the rest of you is very busy doing other things. All of us fight this, and all of us must learn how to fight this because the devil doesn't need to do anything dramatic. All he needs to do is distract you, just distract you from the very thing God has brought you here to hear.

What do I mean by living in the word means listening with all of me? Well, first of all, you need to bring your heart. It isn't a wholly academic exercise, although we must bring our mind as well. But we must bring our heart, we must listen with all our heart. Over and over again in Psalm 119, verses like this come: "I called with my whole heart; answer me, O Lord, from your word. I called to you with my whole heart; answer me." If your heart's not in it, you won't get much out of it.

There will be times in your life when there isn't a heart hunger to get the word, where you drift or there's distance or it's not the same as it was when you first found Jesus. There will be those times. Bringing your heart is something you can pray about. You can say, "Lord, I need to concentrate. I need to focus." What happens if you just begin the conversation, "Lord, help me, my mind is scattered; I'm all over the place." Maybe you find it difficult in all sorts of ways to focus. So ask the Lord, "Focus me, Lord, help me to give you half an hour of my time, Almighty God." That's not too much for Him to ask from us.

The Bible says, and especially in Psalm 119, do it heartily with all your heart. Bring all you are to church or to anywhere, to your group. Pray all the time. Pray about it. When you have a problem in prayer, pray about it. It never occurs to us. We think we better go and get a book or maybe we'll talk to somebody about it, but if you have a problem in prayer, anything, say, "God, I really have a problem with this." Talk, begin the conversation, and then invite Him from His word to address it. It won't be absolutely specific, but it will be principle from the word. You're looking for principles you can then apply.

Pray before you start. Ask Him to help you focus. Bring your mind along. Spurgeon said a little girl said to him once—well, he said to her, "What do you think your soul is?" And she said, "My soul is my think." I like that. My soul is my mind, my soul is my think. Spurgeon's comment was, "Methinks many have very little soul." Anyway, my soul is my think. Well, she got it right: mind, soul, heart. It's difficult to define and split it up, and we shouldn't try.

You do need to bring your mind. You do need to be listening not with a critical situation but listening carefully to the Scripture being unfolded. It says in Psalm 119, "Unfold your word." I love that. God wants to unfold His word. Just unfold, fold after fold after fold until you see the whole piece of what He's trying to do or trying to say to us. So bring your think, okay? Bring your heart and bring your will most importantly.

Sit your will down and make it listen. Just sit it down, take the wristwatch off your soul when you settle into your quiet time or your sermon time or whatever it is. Don't read selectively. Don't read just for you. Read for whatever God wants to say to you about you or the world or nothing to do with you because the temptation is only to look for what you're interested in, which is you. Have you noticed that?

Think back to your last prayer time. Did you go to prayer? Who was there? You, right? When I step into the waiting room, or whatever you want to call it figuratively, I'm all over it. It's horrible. I'm just everywhere, and I can't wait to start and talk about me and mine and all my problems. I rush through all the things I should do first: praise and thanksgiving. Now me. We are so me-focused.

What we have to do is learn silence and solitude. You can interpret that any way you wish, except to say we don't know and this generation doesn't know anything about silence and solitude. That is sad. I mean, if the Trinity knocked on the door physically, like angels, and you opened the door and you said, "Oh do come in, such an honor to have you," and you took them into the sitting room and turned the radio down? Would you do that? No. That's what kids do. Or the TV or whatever it is on. And not just kids.

Find out what silence is all about. There's so much in Scripture about, "Be still and know that I am God." What's that? Do you know that? Do I know that in the depth we're supposed to know? Somehow you can't be still if there's a lot of noise and a lot of distraction.

Guest (Male): More powerful teaching from the Briscoes is headed your way, so don't go anywhere.

Guest (Female): We've made a wide array of resources and content available to you online for free at tellingthetruth.org and on the Telling the Truth app. There, you can listen, read, and watch powerful teaching from Stuart and Jill on relevant topics like the sovereignty of God, the importance of the church, and how to grow closer with Jesus Christ. You can also request this month's featured resource as thanks for your gift of support to help share the abundant life Jesus offers with more people around the world. Visit us online or download the app today and experience life with Telling the Truth.

Guest (Male): Let's head back to Jill Briscoe now for more.

Jill Briscoe: Bring your heart, bring your mind, but bring your will. Because if you don't bring your will and attend to the obey word, you may as well quit praying. God says, and you read I hope Psalm 119 right the way through, just find out how many times it says obey. Incredible. "Unfold your words and I will obey you. Give me light of understanding and I will obey you. Lead me in the path."

If you look at the first few verses of Psalm 119: "Blessed are they whose ways are blameless, who walk according to the law. Blessed are they who keep his statutes and seek him with all their heart. They do nothing wrong; they walk in his ways. You have laid down precepts that are to be fully obeyed." And then the next part, 5 to 8, is "Oh that my ways were steadfast in obeying your decrees! Then I wouldn't be put to shame when I consider all your commands. I will praise you with an upright heart as I learn your righteous laws. I will obey your decrees; don't utterly forsake me."

He begins in future verses to say, "Don't let me stray from your word. I just want to fully obey it." If you don't want to fully obey it, you will never hear His voice. If you read selectively, or if you don't dare go deep with God in case He tells you something you don't want to hear—be honest—you won't hear His voice. There's no way. If you read right through that Psalm, that theme comes over and over and over again.

He's asking lots of things and thanking God for answering his prayers, but it's as if God is saying, "If I answer this prayer, what will you do with your life, David?" If I'm going to hear God's voice, I've got to say anytime, anywhere, anyplace, anything, and my commitment and surrender must be without conditions. Then I'll hear it. But if I am coming with all these hidden agendas—boy, I'd really like to get better so I can go on with my selfish, sinful life—don't expect to hear. When you read that Psalm, pick that theme up. "If you show me your word, I will obey you. You know my heart." And God says, "I will, if you are fully willing to do whatever I tell you to do."

I don't know what your prayer life looks like. In Samuel, let me remind you of that story without turning to it. Actually, I will turn to it because there's a fabulous word in here. Samuel chapter 3. Remember the boy Samuel is in the temple, given by Hannah, who never thought she could have a child. God gives her a child, she weans him, he's probably four years of age, takes him to the temple for training and gives him as she promised to the Lord.

The only problem is old Eli is far away from God. His two sons, as you can read in the Scriptures, are sleeping with the women that worship at the door of the place and are so far away from God it says that they do not know God and were wicked men. This little baby child is given into the hands of old Eli, far away from God, and his two unrepentant, undisciplined kids, who are horrible. It says they don't know the Lord and they are wicked people. And this is his training. There was nowhere else to send him. Hannah trusted and she gave him into the hands of Eli.

I think the little boy must have loved that old man. Now he was given at the age of four; they say that he was probably about 12 when this happened. So he'd been in the temple learning. His bed was just by the ark of the covenant, think about it, near the holy place. Old Eli had been doing his best and one night he goes to sleep and his job is to make sure the lamp of the Lord never goes out all night. It's about dawn and that's when he has to make sure that it keeps going because of all sorts of spiritual reasons and laws in the Holy of Holies.

Suddenly the Lord visits Samuel and calls him, says, "Samuel, Samuel." And so he runs to Eli. It must have been such a human sounding voice. Eli says, "No, I didn't call you; go to bed." So he goes back. "You did call me, I heard it again." And Eli says, "Oh go again." And the third time, the old guy gets it. "Probably God, hmm, okay. This time say, 'Speak Lord, your servant hears.'"

It's a wonderful story. It says in verse 7, "Now Samuel did not yet know the Lord." Interesting. The word of the Lord had not yet been revealed to him in reality. The Lord calls him the third time and he gets up and he goes and then he's told what to do. So he says, "Speak Lord, your servant is listening."

The Lord comes and He gives him a task for a 12-year-old that has seldom been given to a 12-year-old in Scripture. Unbelievable task. In the morning tell Eli: "It's done, it's over. Judgment is coming on you and your family because you did not restrain your sons. You have brought disgrace. They're even doing things with the sin offering that are unspeakable. And so they're all going to go. Samuel, did you hear me? That's what I want you to tell him in the morning. That's the word of the Lord."

When he gets up in the morning, it says he opens the doors and he's doing everything except going in to tell Eli what the Lord said. Eli calls him, "Samuel, come and tell me what he said." And it says he was afraid, the little boy was afraid. Eli offers him a curse. He says, "If you do not, if you hide it from me, may God deal with you be it ever so severely." He apparently is saying God will curse you if you don't tell me.

He tells him everything, hiding nothing from him. Eli says, "He's the Lord; let him do what is good in his eyes." Look, the Lord was with Samuel as he grew up and let none of his words fall to the ground. All Israel from Dan to Beersheba recognized Samuel was attested as a prophet of the Lord. The Lord continued to appear at Shiloh and there He revealed Himself to Samuel through His word.

Guest (Male): Now here's Jill to answer a few questions about getting on track with God.

Guest (Female): Jill, tell us about a time when you had a problem, prayed, and asked God what to do about it, and He showed you the answer in His word.

Jill Briscoe: There was a time hundreds of years ago when I was young. I was a teacher in the UK in a big castle, which was a Bible school and Christian outreach center. I had been working with young people who were gathering in the streets in groups or gangs from the local town. Many of them had come to Christ. I was getting quite a good reputation around the place for that nice lady that kept all those young people in her youth center and off the roads. I began to feel good, although I was unaware of that sense of self-gratification because I was considered a lady that did good things.

Until one day, one of those kids asked me to go into the pub with him, his pub, and talk to all his friends because he couldn't answer their questions about God. I remember my immediate reaction was, "Oh, I don't want to do that." So I said to him I'd pray about it, which was really not very honest. I did decide to pray about it and I said to the Lord, "Why do I feel uncomfortable about this?" My habit is when I have a question like that to read until I find a principle.

I know if I open my Bible, it's not going to say "Go into the pub, Jill." It doesn't do that, but it will give me a principle. I began to read the gospels and I came to things like "Go into all the world and preach the gospel," but it wasn't that. I wanted something really specific. It wasn't until I came to Philippians that night, I just read and read and read and just let it flow over me, looking for that principle that I read this from Philippians 2: "Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus: who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but he made himself nothing."

Actually the King James that I was reading said "made himself of no reputation," taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness, found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient to death. It's that huge graph of grace from heaven's highest to the lowest point. He came down, down, down, down. I realized I like going up, up, up in people's valuation of me, that nice lady that does good work. What would happen if somebody saw me go into the pub? I realized I was concerned about my new reputation.

That was easy then. I said, "Sorry, Lord," and got in touch with Trevor and said, "When are we going? What time should I meet you?" And in we went. What you do when you have a problem in your journal, you put the problem down and then during the course of the week as you just are in the word, you're looking as well as for other things for the answer, the principle that will show you what to do about a given situation. That's one way He answers you through His word.

Guest (Male): Thanks for listening to Telling the Truth today. We're so glad you've joined us, and we pray this message has helped you experience more of the abundant life Jesus promises.

Guest (Female): Today's culture is a revolving door of ever-shifting views and beliefs. That's why it's so important to test new ideas against the timeless truth of Scripture. It's the best defense against the world's confusion. We want to help ground you in the foundations of your faith by sending you Stuart Briscoe's six-message series on the book of 2 Peter, Six Things We Must Never Forget. This series will anchor you in six time-tested truths from God's word so you can stand strong in your beliefs as you remember the deep spiritual truths that are foundational to your faith.

The Six Things We Must Never Forget series is our thanks for your gift to help keep Telling the Truth going strong, sharing life-giving teaching from Stuart and Jill with more people all over the world. So request your copy when you give today and get help staying grounded in truth in today's shifting culture. Call 1-800-889-5388. That's 1-800-889-5388, or you can give online at tellingthetruth.org.

Guest (Male): Thanks for listening today. Tune in again next time right here on Telling the Truth with Stuart and Jill Briscoe.