Greetings to you, friend! I am Mack Lyon. The program is “In Search of the Lord's Way. It’s a Bible study program presented by some churches of Christ in the area that is served by this station. Say, we’re glad you have joined us today.
Welcome to our Bible study program In Search of the Lord's Way to become a Christian and His way to live so that when He calls your name, you will be ready to go. What a joy it is to have you among us. We pray we’ll all be blessed.
Awhile back we had Phil Sanders as guest speaker on the program. You received him well, so, we have him back today-- but not as a “guest” speaker. As of the beginning of this new year, he has joined the staff of our program to, among other things; assist me in research-- as well as to be preparing to be the regular speaker on the program when the time comes. He is no stranger to the brotherhood of churches of Christ; but for you to whom he is a stranger, let me tell you a little bit about him. He was born in Shawnee, Oklahoma-- lived there and graduated from Shawnee High School. He attended Oklahoma Christian College-- it was then and now University-- and he graduated with a major in Bible, with the tutorship of such men as Doctor Hugo McCord, Raymond Kelcy, Bill Jones and other such men. And he went on for his Masters and Doctoral studies elsewhere. He has faithfully preached and worked with churches of Christ in Oklahoma and Texas and Tennessee for 38 years. He must have started when he was about two, don’t you think? The last 13 of those 38 years, he has been with the growing Concord Road Church of Christ in Nashville, Tennessee area.
We’re happy to welcome him back to Oklahoma and we are especially happy to welcome him to the In Search of the Lord's Way program. He will present today’s message which he chose to title “The Lord’s Way.” If you think you would like a free printed copy of the message or a free CD or an audio cassette tape of the entire program, please address your request to In Search of the Lord's Way, P.O. Box 371, Edmond, OK 73083 or by e-mail to searchtv@searchtv.org. You may access it online at www.searchtv.org. Ken Helterbrand is going to lead us now as we sing. Then, Phil Sanders will be here for the Scripture reading and the prayer. Will you welcome Phil Sanders, please?
Hello, and welcome to this program today. We are going to begin our reading from the book of Philippians, chapter 2, verses 5 through 11. “Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus, who, being in the form of God, did not consider it robbery to be equal with God, but made Himself of no reputation, taking the form of a dying servant, and coming in the likeness of men. And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself and became obedient to the point of death, even the death of the cross. Therefore God also has highly exalted Him and given Him the name which is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of those in heaven, and of those on earth, and of those under the earth, and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.” That is a reading from the book of Philippians, chapter 2. Now let’s pause for prayer. Oh, Lord, we are grateful for Your love; and we are thankful that Your Son, Jesus, was willing to die in our stead. And, Father, we pray that we may please You in everything, and live and walk in the Lord’s way. In Jesus’ name, we pray. Amen!
Thank you, Mack, for your kind words. I appreciate your confidence in me, and I look forward to working with “In Search of the Lord’s Way” in the coming years. To those of you who watch this program regularly, I pray that our time together will bless your life. Mack Lyon has been my friend, my preacher, and a mentor for many years; and to work with him on this program is a great honor. No one can fill your shoes, brother Mack. I can only hope to do my best to preach the Word of God with the same kind of love and commitment that you have shown for the last three decades.
The name of this broadcast, “In Search of the Lord’s Way,” speaks clearly what this ministry strives to do. We want to please the Lord and follow his will in all that we say and do. The Lord Jesus set in motion a way of life when he came to this earth. This is a way of righteousness and of joy. His whole frame of mind was to do the will of the Father who sent him. Jesus said in John 8 and verse 29, “for I always do the things that are pleasing to him.” Jesus set aside his own will that he might do the will of the Father. We need to follow that path. We should make it our aim always to do the things that are pleasing to him.
Some folks follow their own way; some follow the ways of the world. Even some Christians are looking to the culture to see what people want or what people think. We are asking the question, “What is the Lord’s way? What is the Lord’s will for our lives? What does God desire from us?” We are not interested in inventing some new form of Christianity. Instead we are going to go back to the Bible and ask what pleases God. The Lord gave us his Word to teach us his will and his way. And if we follow that righteous way found in the Bible, God’s Holy Word, we will live the Lord’s way. We will please the Lord.
Some people suggest Jesus was a rebel. Well now, while it is true that he challenged the religious establishment of his time, the Lord Jesus never went against the wishes of his Father in heaven. The Lord kept the Father’s commandments. That’s the Lord’s way. And even when the Father commanded Jesus to bear the cross, Jesus obeyed. You remember that scene in the Garden of Gethsemane. Jesus knew his hour had come. Crucifixion was long and agonizing. The Lord Jesus knew the kind of death that he would die. He predicted in the book of Matthew chapter 20, verses 18 and 19 that he would “be delivered over to the chief priests and scribes, and they will condemn him to death and deliver him over to the Gentiles to be mocked and flogged and crucified, and he will be raised on the third day.” My friend, facing death on a cross was the most difficult thing that Jesus ever did.
Jesus told his disciples in the garden, “My soul is deeply grieved, to the point of death” (Matthew 26 and verse 38). The Bible says in Luke 22, verse 44, “And being in agony he prayed more earnestly; and his sweat became like great drops of blood falling down to the ground.” What do you think he prayed that night? What would you pray if you knew that you would be killed in a painful way the next day? Well, here is what the Lord prayed, falling down on his face, He said, “My Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me; nevertheless, not as I will, but as you will” (Matthew 26 and verse 39). Jesus wanted to escape the horrible pain of crucifixion, but the will of the Father was more important than his personal will. And the will of God is also more important than our desires. This is the Lord’s way.
The Lord wants us to follow in his steps, to bear our own cross. Now, Jesus is not saying that we should be physically crucified; but following Christ demands that we have a spiritual dying to ourselves. This means that I no longer live for myself but for the Lord. The Bible says in 2 Corinthians 5, verses 14 and 15, “For the love of Christ controls us, because we have concluded this: that one has died for all, therefore all have died; and he died for all, that those who live might no longer live for themselves but for him who for their sake died and was raised.” Now if I am to live for Christ, I must quit living for my selfish desires. And instead of pleasing “me,” I must live to please the Lord. Serving him is bigger than my wants and bigger than my ways. Jesus lived for his Father, and we must live for him. That’s the way of the Lord.
The Lord taught in the Sermon on the Mount, “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven” (Matthew 5, verse 3). God will bless the poor in spirit, and that is the person who is not full of himself. A person poor in spirit knows that he needs God; he does not have to get his own way. He does not think he is more important than others. He doesn’t think he knows more than God knows. Rather he looks to God and to His Word. He knows that he needs God’s help and is willing to listen to God speak through His Word to get the spiritual help that he needs to save his soul. The Lord Jesus said in John 12, verses 49 and 50, Jesus said, “For I have not spoken on my own authority, but the Father who sent me has himself given me a commandment-- what to say and what to speak.” Jesus said, “I know that his commandment is eternal life. What I say, therefore, I say as the Father has told me.” My friend, that’s the Lord’s way.
People are not always willing to walk in the Lord’s way. We each have a selfish and rebellious streak in us. We want to run our own lives and follow our own desires. And you know what; this makes us vulnerable to what we want to hear rather than what we need to hear. Like Eve, people are easily deceived. God’s Word in Proverbs 14, verse 12 says, “There is a way that seems right to a man, but its end is the way to death.” We must be very, very careful what path we choose. The Lord taught in Matthew 7, verses 13 to 14, “Enter by the narrow gate. For the gate is wide and the way is easy that leads to destruction, and those who enter by it are many. For the gate is narrow and the way is hard that leads to life, and those who find it are few.” Now the broad, popular, easy way is not the Lord’s way; it leads people away from God.
The prophet Jeremiah lived when people were rebellious against God. And the prophet of God called to the people in chapter six and verse sixteen; he said, “Thus says the LORD: “Stand by the roads, and look, and ask for the ancient paths, where the good way is; and walk in it, and find rest for your souls. But they said, ‘We will not walk in it.’” My friend, I hope you are not like them. The good way leads to joy; it leads to peace; it leads to righteousness, and it is filled with love. That’s the way of the Lord! That’s the way that I pray you’ll walk, because it leads to eternal life. You can never go wrong when you choose the Lord’s way.
Most people assume they can walk any way they want religiously, but human paths don’t lead to God. God’s Word in the book of Isaiah chapter 55, verses 6 to 9 says, “Seek the LORD while he may be found; call upon him while he is near; let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts; let him return to the LORD, that he may have compassion on him, and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon. For my thoughts are not your thoughts, God says, neither are your ways my ways, declares the LORD. For as high as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my (that is God’s way) higher than your ways and God’s thoughts than your thoughts.” Well, if we wish to find life, we have to give up our own thoughts and come to God to find his thoughts and his ways.
The Lord Jesus said in the Sermon on the Mount, “Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven” (Matthew 7, verse 21). Now, this is an important principle to Jesus. In fact, he illustrates it with a comparison between two men who built houses. In Matthew 7, verses 24 to 27, the Lord Jesus said, “Everyone then who hears these words of mine and does them will be like a wise man who built his house on the rock. And the rain fell, the floods came, the winds blew and beat against that house, but it did not fall, because it had been founded on the rock. And everyone who hears these words of mine, He says, and does not do them will be like a foolish man who built his house on the sand. The rain fell, the floods came, the winds blew and beat against that house, and it fell, and great was the fall of it.”
I must tell you. There was a time when I didn’t understand this passage. I thought that the difference between the two men was that one did something and the other didn’t do anything. But that is mistaken. The difference is not between doing something and doing nothing. You see, both men did something. They both built houses. The difference is that one did what he heard Jesus say and the other did something else. Now he may have followed his own heart; he may have followed the crowd; but he did not follow the way of the Lord. He followed something else, and that something else led to his destruction. I couldn’t do that, because I want to follow what the Lord wills. And when a person does not do the will of God, he can not stand the Lord’s test. My friend, you are also doing something, and I hope you are following the Lord’s way.
When people forget God and they go their own way, they hurt themselves in ways they never imagined. They not only sin against God, they also sin against themselves. You see, without God’s way in our lives, things become very chaotic. Selfish ways only lead to heartache, to disease, to broken homes, confusion, and despair. The Bible says in Proverbs 13, verse 15 that the way of the transgressors is hard. And when people choose the way of sin or selfishness, they make their lives unnecessarily hard. We need the Lord’s way! And every law of God is for our good. God is wise, and He knows what will bless and what will hurt us. He gave his laws to us to bless us and to keep us from hurting ourselves. And when we walk in the way of the Lord, we avoid the pitfalls of life that hurt and destroy.
Psalm 19, verses 7 through 11 says, “The law of the LORD is perfect, reviving the soul; the testimony of the LORD is sure, making wise the simple; the precepts of the LORD are right, rejoicing the heart; the commandment of the LORD is pure, enlightening the eyes; the fear of the LORD is clean, enduring forever; the rules of the LORD are true, and righteous altogether. More to be desired are they than gold, even much fine gold; sweeter also than the honey and drippings of the honeycomb. Moreover, by them is your servant warned; in keeping them there is great reward.” Now this is why we must never get away from God’s Book, God’s Holy Word, the Bible. That’s where the truth is, the truth that leads to eternal life! Now, friend, that’s where God’s wisdom and his promises are; don’t ever settle for anything less than the Lord’s way or anything other than God’s Word. Jesus wouldn’t settle for any of those things. He wouldn’t settle for following the crowd; He wouldn’t settle for following the traditions of men; He wouldn’t settle for doing what this one thought or that one thought. His focus of heart and mind in everything that He did was to follow the will of the Father. “Not my will, but thine be done.” That was his prayer when it was easy, and that was his prayer even when it was so very difficult on the cross. You see, Jesus wouldn’t go the feeling route. He only wanted to follow his father; and I pray that you in your life will do as Jesus did-- that you, too, will follow the father; that you will live for him and love him and walk in his way, and do his will when it is easy and when it is hard. Love the Lord with all your heart and stay with him.
Thank you, thank you, thank you, brother Phil Sanders for that excellent message on what our program’s all about-- searching the Scriptures for the Lord’s way in matters of faith and morals and our walk with Him everyday. You know, next week I will be speaking on a very similar subject; and this one seems to be an excellent introduction to what I am about to say next week when we discuss, Walking with the Lord. And the Lord said, “How can two walk together, except they be agreed?” You know, the Lord asked a long time ago that question, unless they be agreed how can they walk together? It’s obvious, then, that at least God knows we are not walking with Him unless we believe, and what we believe is in agreement with what He is saying. Oh say, friend, we need to know that, too, don’t you think? Of course, we do!
If you would like a free printed copy of today’s message, “The Lord’s Way,” by Phil Sanders, you may have it simply by writing to In Search of the Lord's Way, P.O. Box 371, Edmond, OK 73083 or by e-mail at searchtv@searchtv.org. Or you may access it online at www.searchtv.org. And our toll-free telephone number for you use is 1-800-321-8633. You might want to enroll in our correspondence course. It is free, also. And it has eight lessons; the introductory lessons be. And you just request that you would like to be as one man did this last week, and that you want to be enrolled in it. We will send you the first two lessons and while you are doing the second one, you mail in the first one; and while you are doing the second one our workers will be grading that first one and send it back to you with lesson number three. And you will go on and on through the eight lessons. Thanks for being with us today. And we plan to be back next week with another study from God’s word. We hope you will be with us, too. God bless you now. We love you.
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