From His Heart

Speaker 1

You may know how to talk the talk and do it well, but are you walking the walk? Pastor Jeff Shreve would like your ear and your heart today.

Speaker 2

John says, "I was very glad to find some of your children walking in truth. When you walk in truth, you walk in love. When you walk in love, you walk in obedience to his commands. And his commands are to love him with all your heart and to love your neighbor as yourself."

I want to ask you this question: What changes do you need to make today so that you can start walking in the truth? Real truth, real love, real hope from his heart.

Speaker 1

There are many born again believers who want to walk in the truth, but so much of the time they're walking in darkness. They want to be somebody who pleases God because of what he has already done for them, and they take their faith very seriously. But walking that walk of faith faithfully each day always seems just out of reach.

You're listening to From His Heart with Pastor Jeff Shreve. We want to thank you for being with us today on this Thursday broadcast. We're going to encourage you to honestly answer this question: a tough question. How can you walk in the truth and please the Lord consistently?

Pastor Jeff explains just how that can happen in your life today with the message called "Are You Walking in the Truth?" It's one of three in the series "Nothing but the Truth." Open your Bible to the book of 2 John. Here now is Pastor Jeff with the question for all believers in Christ to answer: Are you truly walking in the truth?

Speaker 2

How can you be a person who walks in the truth and pleases the Lord? Insight number one: Understand the progression to walking in the truth. There is a progression to walking in the truth. Look at it again in verse four. I was very glad to find some of your children, this chosen lady, to find some of your children walking in truth, just as we have received commandment to do from the Father. There is great joy there for some that were walking in the truth. The people that were walking in the truth had joy. John had joy to hear that they were walking in the truth.

So, step number one is hearing the truth of God's love. The second step is to receive the truth of God's love. See, it's not just enough to hear it; you have to respond to it. You have to make a decision concerning the truth of the love of God. You have to receive that love. Ephesians chapter 1, verse 13 says, "In Him you also, after listening to the message of truth, the gospel of your salvation, having also believed, you were sealed in Him with the Holy Spirit of promise." So, you hear the truth of God's love, you receive it, and you respond.

Then, thirdly, you express the truth of God's love. What does that mean? I respond to God's love, and I repent and believe. God gives me His Spirit, and the love of God is poured out into my heart. The natural response is to love God back. What John is saying is that when you love God, you obey His commandments. And what is His commandment? That you love one another. So, understand the progression to walking in the truth.

Second insight: Understand the challenges to walking in the truth. There are challenges; there are struggles to walking in the truth. Every Christian feels it; every Christian knows it. You and I deal with three enemies: the world, the devil, and the flesh. The world is the world system, the culture. The Bible says in 1 John 5 that the whole world lies in the power of the evil one. The whole world is cradled in the lap of the evil one, and the culture is moving further and further away from God. We feel it in our country as we get further and further away from the Lord.

So, we deal with the world. "Do not love the world, nor the things in the world. If anyone loves the world," John says, "the love of the Father is not in him." Now, think of the world as an external foe that's out there. But Paul says, "Don't let the world squeeze you into its mold" (Romans 12). The world is the external foe. The devil is the infernal foe. Infernal means from hell. The devil is the hellish foe who wants to steal, kill, and destroy.

But then you have an enemy within, an internal foe, and that enemy is the flesh. When the Bible talks about the flesh, sometimes it uses the word to just refer to your hide and your hair. There's nothing wrong with your flesh as far as that goes. Your skin, bones, and tissues—there's nothing God made that I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Wonderful are Thy works, and my soul knows it very well. That part of the flesh is fine.

But when the Bible talks about the flesh (sarx in Greek), it also refers to the residual nature that you receive from Adam. In Adam, all die. When Adam and Eve disobeyed God and ate from the forbidden fruit, they died. Where did they die? Their body, soul, and spirit. They didn't die in their body; they didn't die in their soul; they died in their spirit. They passed along a dead spirit. The spirit is where you know God. In your body, you know the world beneath you, the physical world. In your soul, you know the world around you, the psychological world. But in your spirit, you know the world above you, the spiritual world.

They died in their spirit, in that part where they communed with God. When they had children, they passed along a dead spirit. So, man was dead on the inside. In the New Testament, what do we have? You have to be born again. You must be born again. When you're born again, the Holy Spirit of God comes into you. He makes you alive, and all of a sudden, you're alive, and you can know God. You're not dominated by the old nature anymore. That old self, that old man the Bible talks about, wants to do evil, but you still have the remnants from that.

Some people say, "Well, it's two natures." The Bible doesn't really indicate that you have another nature inside, but you have the remnants from the old nature, and that's called the flesh. What you need to know about the flesh is that it wants to sin. Your flesh—what is flesh? It's yourself. It's just self-effort, self-interest, all about me, the selfish self. That's what the flesh is, and it wants to sin. The Bible says this in Galatians chapter 5: "Now the deeds of the flesh are evident," which are listed as immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmities, strife, jealousy, outbursts of anger, disputes, dissensions, factions, envying, drunkenness, carousing, and things like these.

In case he left something out, he says, "Things like these, of which I forewarn you, just as I have forewarned you, that those who practice such things, those who walk after those things—that's the dominating practice of your life—shall not inherit the kingdom of God." Why would he say that? It's because if you're walking in the flesh and you're dominated by the flesh, and your life is characterized by the flesh, hey, news flash: you've never been saved. The reason you're practicing those things is that you don't have a personal relationship with Jesus. The Holy Spirit of God doesn't live in your heart.

But even as a believer, those things have a pull. Not all sin has the same pull to every single person. Some people find drunkenness a big pull; for others, it's no big deal at all. Some people struggle with drugs, some with lust. I had a friend who said, "You know, lust isn't really a big deal for me. You know what's a big deal for me? Greed." I was like, "I don't really have a problem with greed, but most guys have a problem with purity of mind." People have different issues. The flesh has all sorts of different things that can pull you away into sin.

The devil doesn't mind if you do good in the flesh or bad in the flesh; he just wants you to be in the flesh. The flesh wants to sin. The reason the flesh wants to sin is that the flesh wants to rule. But Paul says, "Walk by the Spirit, and you will not carry out the desire of the flesh. For the flesh sets its desire against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh, for these are in opposition to one another, so that you may not do the things that you please." What is the desire of the flesh? What is the desire of the Spirit? Control. They want to control you.

"Be filled with the Holy Spirit. Do not get drunk with wine, wherein is excess, but be filled with the Holy Spirit." Be controlled by the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit comes into your life to control you so that you can live a life that walks in the truth, that walks in the light, that pleases God. The flesh says, "No, I want to be in control. I want to do what I want to do." That is the battle inside of every Christian. The flesh wants to rule.

The Bible says this in Romans chapter eight about the flesh: "The flesh is hostile toward God. It does not subject itself to the law of God. It is not even able to do so. And those who are in the flesh cannot please God." God hates the flesh because the flesh hates God. We deal with that, and John dealt with that, and Paul deals with that. The difficulty of walking in the truth is that I have to deal with the flesh. The flesh is hard; it pulls me toward sin. The flesh wants to be in control, and the flesh is fighting the Spirit.

So, understand the progression to walking in the truth. Understand the challenges to walking in the truth. And thirdly, understand the keys to walking in the truth. There are keys to help you, to help me, to help us walk in the truth, walk in victory, walk in the light with the Lord.

Truth number one: Remember the cross. Remember the cross. So, what did we say? The progression is truth, love, and obedience. You hear the truth of God's love, you respond to the truth of God's love, the Holy Spirit, who is God, pours the love of God into your heart, and then it's obedience. Because that's how I show that I love God: I obey God. If you're struggling in obedience, you have to remember the cross.

Second Peter chapter one gives us seven virtues of a growing Christian. It says, "If these qualities are yours and are increasing, they render you neither useless nor unfruitful in the true knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ." Then it says this in verse nine: "But he who lacks these qualities is blind or short-sighted, having forgotten his purification from his former sins."

Second Peter chapter one lists all those things: "In your faith supply moral excellence, and in your moral excellence, knowledge. In your knowledge, self-control. In your self-control, perseverance. In your perseverance, godliness. In your godliness, brotherly kindness. And in your brotherly kindness, love." For if these qualities are yours and are increasing, they render you neither useless nor unfruitful in the true knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ.

Now, here's verse nine: "For he who lacks these qualities is blind." You've never been saved. The amazing grace, how sweet the sound that saved a wretch like me. I once was blind; I once was lost, but now I'm found. Was blind, but now I see. You're blind; you've never been saved, or you're short-sighted. The word "short-sighted" in Greek is where we get our English word "myopia." It means you have nearsightedness.

I had to get Lasik surgery to help me with my nearsightedness because I couldn't see far away. I couldn't read the alarm clock in the morning because I was blind as a bat when it came to seeing anything from any distance. I had reading vision, but I couldn't see past that. You're either blind or short-sighted, having forgotten your purification from your former sins.

Hey, you've forgotten the cross. You've forgotten what Jesus did for you on the cross. Why are you having such trouble walking in the truth? Because you're not connected to His love, that's why. Isaac Watts wrote that great hymn in 1707: "When I survey the wondrous cross on which the Prince of glory died, my richest gain I count but loss and pour contempt on all my pride. See from His head, His hands, His side sorrow and love flow, mingle down. Did ere such love and sorrow meet, o'er thorns compose so rich a crown?"

He is looking at the cross, and then he says, "Were the whole realm of nature mine, that were a present far too small. Love so amazing, so divine, demands my soul, my life, my all." I respond to His love. If you're having trouble walking in the truth, it's not about gritting your teeth and trying harder; it's about getting your focus on the cross. Fix your eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of faith, who, for the joy set before Him, endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.

Remember the cross. Secondly, remember His love in the law. His love in the law. We think of the law as just harsh and cold, but that's not what it was. Why did God give His commandments? He gave them out of a heart of love. Everything God does, He does out of a heart of love. Romans 10:13 says this: "Love does no wrong to a neighbor. Love, therefore, is the fulfillment of the law." Love is the fulfillment of the law. Love and the law are connected.

Now, the Pharisees took the law of God, which was meant to be a guardrail around life. You know when you drive on a mountain road and you're taking a turn, a curve, there's a guardrail there. What's the guardrail there for? To keep you on the road. Because if you take that turn too fast, you can fly off the road. The guardrail is there to keep you safe.

God puts guardrails up; it's called His commandments. When God says, "You shall not do X," that's God's way of saying, "Don't hurt yourself." When God says, "You shall do Y," He's saying, "Help yourself to happiness." Every "thou shalt not" is just God's way of saying, "I love you too much to see you fly off the mountain."

What did the Pharisees do? They attached spears and barbed wire and all sorts of sharp metal objects coming off the guardrail. They turned something loving and good into something horrible. They took the command in the Ten Commandments, "Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy," which is a gift from God, and they turned it into a billy club. The people hated the Sabbath because the Sabbath police were there to say, "Hey, we counted. You took one extra step. You only can take so many steps on the Sabbath. You took one extra step; you deserve to die."

The law was given to remember the love in the law. Psalm 119 says, "I shall delight in your commandments, which I love, and I shall lift up my hands to your commandments, which I love." We're talking about keys to help you walk in the truth, to look at God's commandments and to delight in those, to lift up your hands to His commandments, which you love, and say, "This is what God wants me to do. God loves me, and this is a guardrail to keep me on the road."

Key number three: Remember, it's a walk in the light. What happens in our walk? We fall down. The best of us falls down. But a righteous man falls seven times and rises again. You don't fall down and quit; you don't give up. I remember going to a conference when I was in college, and they were talking about struggling with immorality, impurity, sensuality, and sexual sins. The college students really struggle with that. The Bible calls those youthful lusts. The teacher said, "Never quit fighting against that sin. Never give up."

So, if it knocks you down, you get back up and say, "I'm going to keep fighting against this." God is light, John says, and in Him, there is no darkness at all. If we say we have fellowship with Him and walk in darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth. You have to be honest. But if we walk in the light, as He Himself is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus, God's Son, cleanses us from all sin.

You're going to fall on the narrow road; you're going to struggle on the narrow road. You just don't stay down. You get back up and say, "Lord, I have sinned. I want to walk with You. Please forgive me of that sin, Lord. I turn from that sin. I confess and forsake that sin. I want to walk with You." The Lord will put you back walking with Him. You keep doing that and keep doing that. Remember that it's a walk in the light. Don't say you have fellowship with Him and walk in darkness, because you lie and do not practice the truth when you do that.

If there's bitterness in your heart, you need to get it right. If there's jealousy in your heart, you need to get it right. If there's sexual immorality in your life, you need to get that right so that you can walk in the light with God. John says, "I was very glad to find some of your children walking in truth." When you walk in truth, you walk in love. When you walk in love, you walk in obedience to His commands. His commands are to love Him with all your heart and to love your neighbor as yourself.

As we close out today, I want to ask you this question: What changes do you need to make today so that you can start walking in the truth?

Speaker 1

If you don't know Jesus in a personal way, would you invite him in today? Sincerely confess your faith in him, repent of your sin, and trust in Christ alone for salvation. When you do that, he will hear you and he will come into your life. Find out more about what that really means and how to respond to this call from God on your life right now. Go to fromhisheart.org and click the "Why Jesus?" link. It's right there on our homepage. God bless you.

You've been listening today to part two of the message "Are You Walking in the Truth?" from Pastor Jeff Shreve's series "Nothing but the Truth," and it's our special gift for your support from His Heart this month of any amount. The series and Pastor Jeff's booklet "Sticks and What to Do When the Going Gets Tough" are our two gifts of thanks to you for your support this month of any amount. The series comes either on a USB flash drive, immediate MP3 download, or on CDs or DVDs. You pick.

Call 866-40-BIBLE (866-40-BIBLE) or go online to fromhisheart.org. Thank you for joining us, and we pray that you'll be right back here each weekday listening to the uncompromising truths from Pastor Jeff Shreve on From His Heart.

Be sure to join us tomorrow for the final lesson in the series "Nothing but the Truth" with a lesson called "Are You Holding Firmly to the Truth?" Join us on Friday when we again open up God's Word and share real truth, real love, reality, and real hope. From His Heart.

Speaker 2

There is truth. There is hope that you always dream love he can heal every scars from.

Speaker 1

His Heart From His Heart is the listener supported Broadcast Ministry of Dr. Jeff Shreve speaking the truth in love to a lost and a hurting world.

Remember, no matter what, God loves you and has a wonderful plan for your life.

Find out more. Go to fromhisheart.org.