Worship call 0723

In these days ... you have to listen (for yourself)! Exodus 20:18-20 Now when all the people saw the thunder and the flashes of lightning and the sound of the trumpet and the mountain smoking, the people were afraid and trembled, and they stood far off and said to Moses, “You speak to us, and we will listen; but do not let God speak to us, lest we die.” Moses said to the people, “Do not fear, for God has come to test you, that the fear of him may be before you, that you may not sin.” In the days of the wilderness wanderings, the children of Israel trembled in the sight of God … and said to Moses, "You go and speak to God for us; and we will listen to you." However, in these days, we can’t be like the children of Israel and say to someone else … "Go and speak to God for me, and tell me what the Lord is saying!" And though we don't ignore prophetic voices (we test them), if we are born again and have His Holy Spirit, we can receive communication direct... from the Lord, Himself. With troubles and dangers on the rise, we each need to cultivate a sensitivity to His Spirit, and the ability to hear His inner voice. No, I'm not talking (necessarily) about an audible voice but a spiritual sensitivity that will navigate us around the landmines which surround us. A dramatic personal example: When I initially moved to Israel, I was nearly in a bus bombing. It was an early morning as I was heading to Hebrew class in 2004. As I was about to board the bus I normally rode, something within prompted me not to enter that bus. It seemed that, suddenly, I found myself on another bus that actually dropped me off much further away from where I needed to go. But just as I was wondering to myself, "Why am I on this bus?", the bus I normally rode blew up a mere 100 meters in front of me. What prompted me to stay off that bus? I cannot explain, but there's no doubt in my mind that the Spirit of God was responsible. The Holy Spirit saved my life that day. Is it possible I could have ignored His prompting and boarded a disaster? I believe it was...but somehow, I listened and obeyed the voice of the Lord. Thank God I was sensitive to it. Just like Israel in those days of "Intifada," turbulent times are upon us, and while we may be hearing many prophetic voices claiming to mediate God's word to us, we need to be able to recognize and be sensitive to His voice for ourselves. He promised to be with us (and in us) to the end of the age, and for many, He will give divine guidance and protection from disaster if we hear and obey His prompting. Your family in the Lord with much agape love,

George Baht Rivka Elaina and obidiah

And this is another fine day in the Lord

Matthew 5:48 (NASB95) — 48 “Therefore you are to be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect.

Remember what Jesus said earlier

Matthew 5:20 (NASB95) — 20 “For I say to you that unless your righteousness surpasses that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will not enter the kingdom of heaven.

No, the only way we enter the Kingdom is God’s standard. There is no religious standard on earth that will see us into His Kingdom.

Matthew 7:13–14 (NASB95) — 13 “Enter through the narrow gate; for the gate is wide and the way is broad that leads to destruction, and there are many who enter through it. 14 “For the gate is small and the way is narrow that leads to life, and there are few who find it.

It is not by keeping the law that we become perfectly acceptable to God. It is by God’s work in us that we enter that perfection and it comes by three stages.

1. Justification

The Judication of Adam’s original sin and our sins which Makes us guilty before God. This happens at the point that we are born again. At this point we are made righteous in The Lord.

Isaiah 43:25 (NASB95) — 25 “I, even I, am the one who wipes out your transgressions for My own sake, And I will not remember your sins.

2. Sanctification

Being consecrated, as we are growing and maturing in the spiritual life. Shedding off the Old Man (sin nature). We are growing into the likeness of our Lord. Overcoming the power of the sin nature over our lives.

Ephesians 5:26–27 (NASB95) — 26 so that He might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, 27 that He might present to Himself the church in all her glory, having no spot or wrinkle or any such thing; but that she would be holy and blameless.

3. Glorification

Ultimate Sanctification is when we leave this body of Corruption taking on incorruption leaven our mortal bodies and receiving our new bodies free from the sin nature.

1 Corinthians 15:53–55 (NASB95) — 53 For this perishable must put on the imperishable, and this mortal must put on immortality. 54 But when this perishable will have put on the imperishable, and this mortal will have put on immortality, then will come about the saying that is written, “Death is swallowed up in victory. 55 “O death, where is your victory? O death, where is your sting?”

In Justification we are positionally perfect.

In Sanctification we are temporally perfect

IN Glorification we are ultimately perfect.

This morning we concerned with our lives between Justification and Glorification and that is our moving toward the objective of Spiritual maturity where our lives will be maximized for the Glory of the Lord.

Philippians 3:13–17 (NASB95) — 13 Brethren, I do not regard myself as having laid hold of it yet; but one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and reaching forward to what lies ahead, 14 I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus. 15 Let us therefore, as many as are perfect, have this attitude; and if in anything you have a different attitude, God will reveal that also to you; 16 however, let us keep living by that same standard to which we have attained. 17 Brethren, join in following my example, and observe those who walk according to the pattern you have in us.

Note that Paul uses τέλειος different context. It is a adjective referring to one who has been initiated into a religious community of faith.

(a meaning which reflects the occurrence of τέλειος as a technical term for persons initiated into the mystery religions)[1]

Paul, His audience, you and I have been initiated into the community of faith when we believed in the Lord Jesus Christ for eternal life and entered into his eternal life. Those that are being perfected in time are already perfected positionally.

And as we are walking in perfection in these temporal bodies we are anxiously awaiting to lay aside the old model and obtain the new with our sin nature.

Philippians 3:18–21 (NASB95) — 18 For many walk, of whom I often told you, and now tell you even weeping, that they are enemies of the cross of Christ, 19 whose end is destruction, whose god is their appetite, and whose glory is in their shame, who set their minds on earthly things. 20 For our citizenship is in heaven, from which also we eagerly wait for a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ; 21 who will transform the body of our humble state into conformity with the body of His glory, by the exertion of the power that He has even to subject all things to Himself.

Paul speaks of the struggle

Romans 7:14–25 (NASB95) — 14 For we know that the Law is spiritual, but I am of flesh, sold into bondage to sin. 15 For what I am doing, I do not understand; for I am not practicing what I would like to do, but I am doing the very thing I hate. 16 But if I do the very thing I do not want to do, I agree with the Law, confessing that the Law is good. 17 So now, no longer am I the one doing it, but sin which dwells in me. 18 For I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh; for the willing is present in me, but the doing of the good is not. 19 For the good that I want, I do not do, but I practice the very evil that I do not want. 20 But if I am doing the very thing I do not want, I am no longer the one doing it, but sin which dwells in me. 21 I find then the principle that evil is present in me, the one who wants to do good. 22 For I joyfully concur with the law of God in the inner man, 23 but I see a different law in the members of my body, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin which is in my members. 24 Wretched man that I am! Who will set me free from the body of this death? 25 Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, on the one hand I myself with my mind am serving the law of God, but on the other, with my flesh the law of sin.

If the apostle Paul recognizes the issue what shall we do to reach the objective.

We as branches must stay connected with the vine which is the Lord Jesus Christ.

John 15:5 (NASB95) — 5 “I am the vine, you are the branches; he who abides in Me and I in him, he bears much fruit, for apart from Me you can do nothing.

It is our continually connection with that vine that strengthens and grows us to that temporal perfected quality in our Lord.

Perfect in this temporal life is Maturity in the faith and an occupation with the person of the Lord. It is not just in Church, on Sunday and Wednesday. It is not only Christmas and Easter but it is at home, at work, at any social gathering it is everywhere you are and whatever you are doing it is as unto the Lord in the cognitive presence of the Lord.

It is waking up one morning with the realization that the Lord Jesus Christ is your best and closest friend. It is malleability with the Holy Spirit that teaches us all things and recalls everything that we have learned that we might make the right application.

The Lord is saying what his audience of Jews are going to become. The Jews in their adherence to the Law remembered do this and you will be blessed and do that, and God will bring down curses. (Leviticus 26)

Just the very fact that they had to bring sacrifices to temple each year, year after year was an indication that they could not be perfect.

Year after year they had to take another innocent animal and have it murdered on their behalf. The Perfection sounded a little odd to their ears, especially when the Lord places the bar to an unimaginable height

Matthew 5:48 (NASB95) — 48 “Therefore you are to be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect.

This will rule out good.

Mark 10:18 (NASB95) — 18 And Jesus said to him, “Why do you call Me good? No one is good except God alone.

It is in this temporal life, you and I are perfect having first received the righteousness of God at our new births, and when we are walking in the light as he is in the light we are in that perfected state as the blood of Jesus continues to purify us from all wrong doing.

Our perfection is realized in our continual walking with the Lord.

Jude 24–25 (NASB95) — 24 Now to Him who is able to keep you from stumbling, and to make you stand in the presence of His glory blameless with great joy, 25 to the only God our Savior, through Jesus Christ our Lord, be glory, majesty, dominion and authority, before all time and now and forever. Amen.

Paul says I forget what lies behind. I can forget my failures for I will not allow my failures to define me. Nor does Paul allow past victories to cause him to claim something that he has not obtained yet. But I press on to that perfected state of maturity with an attitude that I have been already made perfect by the Lord’s redeeming blood.

[1]Louw, J. P., & Nida, E. A. (1996). In Greek-English lexicon of the New Testament: based on semantic domains (electronic ed. of the 2nd edition., Vol. 1, p. 123). United Bible Societies.

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