Warmest greetings to you, friend! I’m Mack Lyon. The program’s In Search Of The Lord’s Way. People have been heard to say “knowledge is power.” So, if you could closely and personally know someone who could give you eternal life, wouldn’t you want to meet him today? Phil Sanders is going to introduce you to Him. So stay tuned.
Hello, I’m Phil Sanders! Welcome to “In Search of the Lord’s Way.” This program is brought to you by your friends in churches of Christ in your viewing area. I want to thank you for spending your time with us in a study of God’s Holy Word!
Ah, eternal life can be yours, if you let it. Eternal life! Amazing! If we could live forever with good health, joy, peace, and love, we would feel truly blessed! The fact is: while this life on earth is temporary, there is an eternal life beyond filled with joy, and peace, and love. And you can have this eternal life and much more; it’s free! It comes by the grace of God and by coming to know Jesus Christ. The Lord Jesus in a prayer to His Father said, “This is eternal life, that they may know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom You have sent” (John chapter 17, verse 3).
Now eternal life is not merely living forever and ever; eternal life is a quality of life built upon a relationship with God who gave us life. We have eternal life because we know, that is we have a close relationship with, God! To know God well and to bring about love and devotion, that’s life. To let God’s wisdom permeate your heart and life brings about the greatest of blessings. Eternal life is not merely living forever. God’s life is the best life forever, true life forever, love forever, peace forever, and joy forever! Eternal life can be yours, if you let it.
The inspired apostle Paul said in Romans 14, verses 7 to 9, “For not one of us lives for himself, and not one dies for himself; for if we live, we live for the Lord, or if we die, we die for the Lord; therefore whether we live or die, we are the Lord’s. For to this end Christ died and lived again, that He might be Lord both of the dead and of the living.” Eternal life means I belong to the Lord in this life and in the one to come.
Now if you would like a free printed copy, or CD or an audio cassette tape of this program, simply mail your request to In Search of the Lord's Way; P.O. Box 371; Edmond, OK 73083 or you can e-mail us at searchtv@searchtv.org. Or, if you prefer, you may use our toll-free telephone number. That number is 1-800-321-8633. We also stream this program on our website at www.searchtv.org. On the website you can download the transcript, hear the program, or watch it on video.
Well, Ken Helterbrand, he’s going to lead us and the Edmond church in a song and then we’ll have a Scripture reading and prayer. Our Scripture reading today is John 17:1 through 5.
Looking into God’s Word today we are reading from John chapter 17, the first five verses. “Jesus spoke these words, lifted up His eyes to heaven, and said: ‘Father, the hour has come. Glorify Your Son, that Your Son also may glorify You, as You have given Him authority over all flesh, that He should give eternal life to as many as You have given Him. And this is eternal life, that they may know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom You have sent. I have glorified You on the earth. I have finished the work which You have given Me to do. And now, O Father, glorify Me together with Yourself, with the glory which I had with You before the world was.’” That’s from John chapter 17:1 through 5. Let’s pray together. O Lord, we are thankful that You are our God and we praise You as our Father. And we pray that You will bless us as we study from Your Word today. In Jesus’ name, Amen!
Today we are talking about knowing the Lord. Jeremiah 9, verses 23 and 4 says: “Thus says the LORD, ‘Let not a wise man boast of his wisdom, and let not the mighty man boast of his might, let not a rich man boast of his riches; but let him who boasts boast of this, that he understands and knows Me, that I am the LORD who exercises lovingkindness, justice and righteousness on earth; for I delight in these things,’ declares the LORD.” I tell you more than wisdom, more than might, and more than riches, God wants you, each of you, to understand and know Him. In God’s mind, this is the greatest blessing and the greatest need of our time. My friend, can you say honestly that you understand and know the God of Heaven and His Son Jesus?
The Lord Jesus said in John 17 and verse 3, “This is eternal life, that they may know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom You have sent.” There are different levels of knowing. We might say we know Mack Lyon, but many have never met him face to face or shook his hand. We know a little about who he is, but we don’t know him personally. You know the next level is that of an acquaintance, someone we’ve met but aren’t necessarily close to. Then there are colleagues, who share some part of our lives. Now a colleague may or may not be a friend. A friend is someone that you truly care for and that you are interested in. You want to be around a friend because you like him. Then, there is family. Families live and work together; they know each other at a very deep level. Well, the Lord Jesus wants us to know Him on a deep family level.
We cannot say we are really close to the Lord, however, if we don’t know and obey His will. The Bible says in 1 John 2, verses 3 to 6, “By this we know that we have come to know Him, if we keep His commandments. Now, the one who says, ‘Well, I have come to know Him,’ and doesn’t keep His commandments, is a liar, and the truth is not in him; but whoever keeps His word, in him the love of God has truly been perfected. By this we know that we are in Him: the one who says that he abides in Him ought himself to walk in the same manner as He walked.” Now, many people claim that they are close to the Lord but you know what, they show by their lives that they are deceiving themselves. Knowing God is the same as loving Him; and our love for God is perfected by keeping His commandments.
Some folks think that they can know God by getting out into nature. But, you know, nature won’t tell you all you need to know about God. The way a person really comes to know God is through a study of God’s Holy Word, the Bible. The apostle Paul by inspiration wrote in 1 Corinthians 1, verse 21, “For since in the wisdom of God the world through its wisdom did not come to know God, God was well-pleased through the foolishness of the message preached to save those who believe.” You see, it takes hearing God’s word, the message preached and recorded in the Bible, to really know God. The Bible helps us understand who God is and what His will is for our lives.
The Bible says in Romans 10, verses 14 to 17, “But how are they to call on him in whom they have not believed? And how are they to believe in him of whom they have never heard? And how are they to hear without someone preaching? And how are they to preach unless they are sent? As it is written, ‘How beautiful are the feet of those who preach the good news!’ But they have not all obeyed the gospel. For Isaiah says, ‘Lord, who has believed what he has heard from us?’” So verse 17 says, “Faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the word of Christ.” You see, we come to trust in God by hearing what He has to say in the Word of Christ.
The book of Acts speaks of the noble-minded Bereans who were hungry to find out about God. Acts 17, verse 11 says, “Now these were more noble-minded than those in Thessalonica, for they received the word with great eagerness, examining the Scriptures daily, to see whether these things were so.” You see, the Bible helps us distinguish what is and is not true about God. Many articles and television programs say things about God that are simply not true. But you can always trust your Bible to tell you the truth; and you should check what you hear by the Scriptures.
You see, without the Scriptures we would have a great loss spiritually. There is a significant difference between people who know the Lord and people who don’t. The Scriptures describe the difference in Ephesians 4, verses 17 to 24. It says, “Now this I say and testify in the Lord, that you must no longer walk as the Gentiles do, in the futility of their minds. They are darkened in their understanding, alienated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them, due to their hardness of heart. They have become callous and have given themselves up to sensuality, greedy to practice every kind of impurity.
“But that is not the way you learned Christ!—assuming that you have heard about him and were taught in him, as the truth is in Jesus, to put off your old self, which belongs to your former manner of life and is corrupt through deceitful desires, and to be renewed in the spirit of your minds, and to put on the new self, created after the likeness of God in true righteousness and holiness.”
People who don’t believe in God or love God don’t realize what they lose in rejecting God. They become futile in their thinking, selfish, callous, and confused. People who ignore God turn to sin and ruin their lives. It ought to be obvious to all of us. When fleshly things run our lives, control us, we are in a terrible mess. The Bible says in Galatians 5, verses 19 to 21: “Now the deeds of the flesh are evident, which are: immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmities, strife, jealousy, outbursts of anger, disputes, dissensions, factions, envying, drunkenness, carousings, and things like these, of which I forewarn you, just as I have forewarned you, that those who practice such things will not inherit the kingdom of God.” My friend, you can’t have sin as the focus of your life and expect to find favor with God.
The love of God in the heart of a person makes a big, big difference in how he lives! There is a mindset difference between a people who don’t care about God and a person who lets God’s love work in his life. One is selfish and apathetic, while the other is caring and generous. One lets sin enslave him, while the other finds freedom in Christ. One lets his desires rule his life and the lives of those around him, while the other lets Christ be the Lord of his life. Our society is morally confused because it has forgotten God; and people who are wicked begin ignoring God to their own destruction.
God spoke through the prophet Hosea in Israel, who had forgotten Him, these people had, and they had begun to follow pagan nations. They no longer knew God, and their apathy toward God ruined them. And God said, “My people are destroyed for a lack of knowledge. Because you have rejected knowledge, I also will reject you from being My priest. And since you have forgotten the law of your God, I also will forget your children” (Hosea 4 and verse 6). When people forget God, they rob their children of an opportunity to know the truth about God and about the life God gives.
A recent survey said that eighty percent of American adults recall attending church regularly as children, but many have wondered away from their spiritual roots. They have been lured by the worldliness of our culture that has pushed God out and brought in an anti-God, anti-church mindset. And this mindset confuses children morally and spiritually. We constantly teach our children that moral truth is relative and not to judge anything as right or wrong. And what happens? We have more immorality and confusion than we’ve ever had. In a world without God, people do unspeakable things. Without God reigning in their hearts, you can be sure that sinful, destructive things will control their lives.
The Bible says in Romans 1, verse 18 to 26: “For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who suppress the truth in unrighteousness, because that which is known about God is evident within them; for God made it evident to them. For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes, His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen, being understood through what has been made, so that they are without excuse. For even though they knew God, they did not honor Him as God or give thanks, but they became futile in their speculations, and their foolish heart was darkened. Professing to be wise, they became fools, and exchanged the glory of the incorruptible God for an image in the form of corruptible man and of birds and four-footed animals and crawling creatures. Therefore God gave them over in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, so that their bodies would be dishonored among them. For they exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and they worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever. Amen.”
Again the Bible says in Romans 8, verses 5 to 8: “For those who are according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who are according to the Spirit, the things of the Spirit. For the mind set on the flesh is death, but the mind set on the Spirit is life and peace, because the mind set on the flesh is hostile toward God; for it does not subject itself to the law of God, for it is not even able to do so, and those who are in the flesh cannot please God.”
God loves us so much, however. He wants to win our hearts and our minds away from what will destroy us to what will bless us. God wants to bring you back to Himself; and that’s why He sent Jesus into the world. Romans 5:6 to 8 says, “For while we were still helpless, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly. For one will hardly die for a righteous man; though perhaps for the good man someone would dare even to die. But God demonstrates His own love towards us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.” God was willing to go to that extent, to give His own Son, so that you might have a better life on earth and live with Him in love and joy forever.
We can’t know God by looking to the world; we can only know God by looking to Jesus. The Lord Jesus told his disciples in John 14 and verse 7, “If you had known Me, you would have known My Father also; and from now on you know Him, and you have seen Him.” John 1 and verse 18 says that Jesus explains God to us. We know a better way of life, the right way of life, because of the love and goodness of Jesus Christ. He’s the example of what righteousness and goodness is. He teaches us by his life what real life is all about.
Jesus can make such a meaningful difference in your life and mine if we are willing to let Him. The Bible says in Titus 3, verses 3 to 7, “For we also once were foolish ourselves, disobedient, deceived, enslaved to various lusts and pleasures, spending our life in malice and envy, hateful, hating one another. But when the kindness of God our Savior and His love for mankind appeared, He saved us, not on the basis of deeds which we have done in righteousness, but according to His mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewing by the Holy Spirit, whom He poured out upon us richly through Jesus Christ our Savior, so that by being justified by His grace we would be made heirs according to the hope of eternal life.”
God wants something better for us, lives full of hope and love; not sin and apathy. He wants us to free ourselves from the enslavement of sin, so that we can live righteous and productive lives. God knows how sin destroys our lives and homes and how it separates us from everything that’s good. And so He sent Jesus to us, to give us those wonderful things that will help us. My friend, I hope that you love the Lord and that you want to be close to Him, to love Him and to know Him. Let’s pray together. O Father, we are thankful for all the love and joy and peace that You give us through Jesus. And may our hearts ever set upon serving You. In Jesus’ name, Amen!
I’m so glad you have joined us today. Listen to me now! If you let Him, Christ can transform your life, your life here on earth, and can give you eternal life with Him in heaven. When I think of heaven, I think of Ephesians 2, verses 4 to 7: “But God, being rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in our transgressions, made us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved), and raised us up with Him, and seated us with Him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that in the ages to come He might show the surpassing riches of His grace in kindness towards us in Christ Jesus.”
Oh, God wants to lavish the kindness of His grace and love on you forever. And He starts that process on this earth by giving us the gospel, a message of good news about the Lord Jesus Christ. Jesus died for your sins, so that you might be forgiven; and God raised Jesus up from the dead, so that you might be justified and have the hope of eternal life. You can have this life when you put your trust in the Lord Jesus.
“Without faith,” the Bible says in Hebrews 11:6, “it is impossible to please God.” Out of this faith and love for God, you must turn away from sin in repentance and turn to the Lord. And when you confess the name of Jesus as your Lord and Christ, you are ready to be baptized—that is immersed in water—for the forgiveness of your sins. God will forgive your sins, He will add you to His family the church, and He will call you His son or daughter. It will be the beginning of a new life that can last forever. I hope you’ll be baptized this very day.
Now, if you would like a free printed copy, a CD or an audio cassette of this message, “Knowing Christ;” then you can have it free by mailing your request to In Search of the Lord's Way; that’s P.O. Box 371; Edmond, OK 73083 or you can e-mail us at searchtv@searchtv.org. You can call our Search office at 1-800-321-8633. Now, all of our programs also appear on our website at www.searchtv.org. You can access it in a printed, audio, or video format; and it’s available 24/7 to the whole world! Now, we also have something I’m excited about-- a free study sheet of today’s lesson. It’s available online for your personal study or a Bible class. These sheets have coordinated questions with our lesson so that you can look more closely into God’s holy Word. Now we do all of this free of charge, because we are not interested in exploiting anybody. We want people to know the Lord and to go to heaven.
And oh, it’s been such a pleasure to spend this time with you studying God’s Word. Please visit one of the churches of Christ in this area, the area where you live. They are so kind; they want to be close to you; they want to know you. And they are our brethren, so get to know them. They would love for you to attend worship with them, and so would we. God bless you; and we love you from In Search of the Lord’s Way.
|