{"id":151164,"date":"2023-08-25T05:21:06","date_gmt":"2023-08-25T09:21:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/effectsofanxiety.net\/archives\/151164"},"modified":"2023-08-26T13:38:51","modified_gmt":"2023-08-26T17:38:51","slug":"the-musts-of-god-what-he-wants-from-you","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/effectsofanxiety.net\/archives\/151164","title":{"rendered":"The \u201cMusts\u201d of God: What He Wants from You"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"jetpack-video-wrapper\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"The \u201cMusts\u201d of God: What He Wants from You\" width=\"660\" height=\"371\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/glhlNmsFDVY?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/div>\r\n\r\nWhen people talk about, \u201cWhat\r\nmust I do to be saved?\u201d I don’t; I’m going to speak for this\r\nchurch and I’m going to tell you this very simply put. God\r\nexpects that once you have an encounter with Christ through\r\nHis word, that you come to a place of faith, to a place of\r\namen where you say, \u201cThat happened. He is Lord,\u201d not\r\nrobotically, to come to know Him in reality. Not some box I\r\ncheck, but something that suddenly the word of God is no\r\nlonger a book with words.\r\n\r\nIt is alive and comes alive to me.\r\n\u201cWhat must I do to be saved?\u201d Okay, the answer is to believe on\r\nthe Lord Jesus Christ and be saved, have faith in Him, trust in\r\nHim, that He is the Messiah, that He is the Deliverer, that\r\nHe has the power to save because He did what He did at\r\nthe cross, that He’s coming back, that He’s promised you and\r\nme eternal life.\r\n\r\n\u266a \u266a\r\nNow many years ago I delivered a message about the musts of\r\nChrist, the use of the Lord’s words, \u201cone must,\u201d \u201che must,\u201d\r\nall right? It’s quite a significant word in the Greek,\r\nthe word die, and I’ve got my Theological Dictionary of the\r\nNew Testament in front of me, Erdmann’s, and they’re in so\r\nmany volumes, so I mentioned it, all right? But if you look under\r\nthe Greek word dei, it says, \u201cThe character of necessity or\r\ncompulsion in an event. In most cases, the word bears a weakened\r\nsense derived from everyday processes. It thus denotes that\r\nwhich is given, which in a given moment seems to be necessary or\r\ninevitable to a man or to a group of men.\u201d Then if you move\r\non, there was something that I found very interesting and that\r\nis that there are 102 occurrences of the word either\r\ndei, which translates to our English word \u201cmust,\u201d or deon\r\nesti, which would be the equivalent of \u201cone must\u201d or \u201cyou\r\nmust\u201d; 41 of the 102 occurrences are found in Luke’s writing.\r\nThat’s pretty significant, significant in the way we\r\nknow how Luke used words.\r\n\r\nSo this is what I want to actually\r\nfocus on a little bit, a dining in of a word which I think is\r\nvery helpful for us a lot of times, not so much in the\r\ntechnical, and linguistic, but in the actual applications and\r\nexamples. So let me give you examples to kind of set the\r\nstage for the message. Let’s start with the boldest of the\r\nmusts of our Lord coming out of the mouth of a young boy,\r\npossibly no older than 12 years old, and He says, \u201cWist ye not\r\nthat I must be about my Father’s business?\u201d Now this statement is\r\nmade in conjunction with Him going into the temple,\r\nHis parents leaving and leaving Him behind.\r\n\r\nWell, we’ll leave\r\nthat part alone for a bit. I don’t know how you’d leave your\r\nkid behind, but whatever. Okay, so what’s interesting about what\r\nHe says, \u201cWist ye not that I must be about my Father’s\r\nbusiness?\u201d coming out of the mouth of a young person like\r\nthat is the fact that He didn’t, He didn’t say, \u201cDon’t ye know\r\nI’m just a kid and I should be able to play and do whatever I\r\nwant and get a trophy for showing up,\u201d right? But at this\r\nyoung age He says, \u201cI must be about my Father’s business.\u201d Now\r\nhere’s my thinking. How could a child be so focused\r\nand say, \u201cThis is what I must do, and don’t you know that this\r\nis what I must do?\u201d Now, wouldn’t you be surprised, moms\r\nand dads out there, if your kid turned around and said, \u201cHey, I\r\ngot business to take, I got the Father’s business to take care\r\nof,\u201d you know, you’d be kind of like, \u201cWhoa, what happened\r\nthere?\u201d But I think the big thing is to see there is no\r\nharm.\r\n\r\nAnd I will probably take a lot of flack for this, but I do\r\nnot care. There is no harm in teaching a child the Bible.\r\nThere is no harm in steeping and raising your child in the Lord’s\r\nword. There is no harm in opening up the horizons\r\nto be able to sit down and talk about, even if they are done in\r\nmore simplistic ways, what God does how He does it, and who\r\nwe are in Christ. So it’s interesting, this must be the\r\nfirst one that kind of caught, my mind. Now, we have\r\nanother one of Christ’s musts. He says, \u201cThe Son of man must be\r\nlifted,\u201d and this passage directly tells us, this is now,\r\nHe’s much older, which tells us that He knew exactly what His mission\r\nwas. He was not confused. I wish that we would even just take; I\r\ncould make a whole message just out of these two verses.\r\n\r\nI\r\nwonder what would happen to the church if two things, if we all\r\ntook it seriously as in we all have something to do in the\r\nFather’s realm, like Christ, said, \u201cDon’t you know I must be\r\nabout my father’s business?\u201d if we all took that as, we all have\r\na part in that, number one. And number two, the fact that when\r\nChrist said He must be, He must be lifted, He must die, that\r\nwe also come to accept we have a mission too. I often feel like a\r\nlot of Christians don’t see the vision and the value of what God\r\nhas placed in front of them. And that mission and that value, if\r\nyou will, is not just so that you can be infused and imbued\r\nwith information, but you also become a beacon of light for\r\nother people. And I’ve said this before, I am not a proselytizer,\r\nI don’t like people coming up to me and talking to me about, you\r\nknow, \u201cDo you know God? Do you know who God is?\u201d But I am a big\r\nfan of conversation at any place, at any stage, if someone\r\nis open to having the conversation.\r\n\r\nAnd that makes\r\nevery one of us if you just took these two musts, that\r\nmakes every one of us kind of understand these musts,\r\nthey are for Christ, they are His work. But we also have a\r\npart in it. If you remember last week I talked about fellowship.\r\nThis is almost directly tied into that in some way, shape, or\r\nform. Before He says, \u201cThe Son of man must be lifted\r\n,\u201d He says, \u201cThe Son of man must suffer many things.\u201d Now\r\nwho walks around telling other people, \u201cThis must,\u201d out of\r\nnecessity, according to this dictionary, \u201cThis must come to\r\npass,\u201d this \u201cI must,\u201d can you imagine walking around town\r\nsaying, \u201cYeah, I’ve got to suffer. I must suffer\u201d? You’d\r\nhave people looking at you going, \u201cYeah, okay, all right.\u201d\r\nBut if you understand in the context of what He was saying,\r\nthat this is inevitable, it must happen.\r\n\r\nAnd I think as I\r\nsaid, just looking at these, it actually kind of could make you\r\nsee how we are kind of, we’ll say, a little bit laxer when\r\nit comes to the kind of digging in, seeing what His musts were. Now\r\nHe also gave musts to us, which I will get to later on in the\r\nmessage. But back to when He said, \u201cThe Son of man must\r\nsuffer many things,\u201d this was in direct connection to Him saying,\r\n\u201cThe temple must be destroyed.\u201d He made all these statements.\r\nAnd what I love about this is, that it’s not just, \u201cThis is what\r\nmust happen.\u201d You read the book and you realize that is exactly\r\nwhat happened.\r\n\r\nSo His musts that He declared were, we’ll call\r\nthem, of necessity. Not \u201cmust\u201d as in a mandate that may or may\r\nnot, but \u201cmust\u201d as in there is no way, shape, or form that this\r\nis not going to happen. So you get that emphasis, I think, is\r\npretty important. Now, why did it become a must, this is self-evident, for Christ to go to the cross, why not? We could have\r\njust said, \u201cYou know, whatever happens, happens,\u201d but there was\r\nsomething else said. You remember repeatedly, \u201cThe\r\nScripture must needs be fulfilled.\u201d I want you to think\r\nabout that. That’s another one of those mind-boggling things\r\nthat what was written afore time must come to pass. Now imagine\r\nmaking these statements. We wouldn’t be standing here. We\r\nwouldn’t be sitting here if the statements didn’t come to pass.\r\nThat’s, that’s the obvious one. Somebody says, \u201cThis must\r\nhappen. This inevitably must happen,\u201d and it doesn’t come to\r\npass. Christ said He must die. He must suffer many things. He\r\nmust die, \u201cDon’t you know I must be about My Father’s business?\r\nThese are the things I came to do.\r\n\r\nThe Scripture must needs be\r\nfulfilled.\u201d And then nothing happens. This is why when people\r\nargue about the veracity of Christianity in Christ, I have\r\nto say this is where faith kicks in. You either\r\nread this book with confidence that the writers were\r\nchronicling to leave us the information that we process,\r\nthat we take in, that we must somehow come to the faith in or\r\nnot. And so this is why I think it’s interesting. These words,\r\nand I’m emphasizing the word \u201cmust\u201d obviously, I think is\r\ninteresting because it keeps something in focus. Let me go\r\nback and reread this, in case you think I am just trying\r\nto kill something already dead. The emphasis on the\r\nword \u201ccharacter of necessity or compulsion in an event, and in\r\nmost cases moments that seem to be necessary or inevitable to\r\nman or a group of men,\u201d inevitable: this must happen. So\r\nthis is why I stand here because I’ve come to the place.\r\n\r\nYou read\r\nthis and you kind of go, it, it happened. There’s no question\r\nthat it happened. So if you take all of this information, if it\r\ndidn’t happen, we’re just a bunch of fools gathered talking\r\nabout imaginary stuff, but it happened. So let’s get back into\r\nthe musts because these actually will lead us to first His musts\r\nand then ours. He also says elsewhere, Christ says, \u201cI must\r\nwork the works of him that sent me, while it is day.\u201d And that\r\nbrings me to an interesting must for, even though this is a must\r\nfor Him. I want to make this a little license because\r\nthere are some things we can apply to us. When will people\r\nstop putting off for God? I want you to think about that. So, you\r\nknow, we, we’ve often had the caricature of the evangelist,\r\n\u201cIf you died today, do you know where you’re going?\u201d and all\r\nthat good stuff, all right? But the fact of the matter is there\r\nare so many people in the sound of my voice that procrastinate\r\nand put off what, if you think about and take a page out\r\nof Christ’s work, He says, \u201cI must work the works of him that\r\nsent me while it is the day,\u201d while we still have the time.\r\n\r\nThis is\r\nWhy Paul said we are to redeem the time, the days are evil,\r\nwhile you have the time; not when you’re on your deathbed,\r\nnot when you can barely see, but now, today, if you hear His\r\nvoice. So, you know, if you kind of start picking these apart, it\r\nActually may be a little bit of a conviction that we could get\r\nso complacent in a lot of our understanding, even Scripture we\r\nread regularly. There’s another interesting must of\r\nChrist, which I’ve referred to in the last two or three weeks,\r\nI’m sure.\r\n\r\nThat one is Christ referring to, He said, \u201cOther\r\nsheep I have which are not of this fold, them also I must\r\nbring and there shall be one flock and one shepherd.\u201d Now\r\nthat’s a future time, but He said there are sheep that He\r\nmust bring in that are not of this flock. So again, things\r\nthat have come to pass or things that will come to pass, and this\r\nspecific one I know scholars are all over the map on this. I’m a\r\nbig believer in the fact that this was God’s way of putting in\r\nthe book, Think of this, people that do not view Christ as Lord,\r\nfuture time, remember, we talked about this, will look on Him and\r\nknow He is Lord. There’ll be no confusion.\r\n\r\nYou know, right now\r\nPeople can fight about which prophet or which deity, but when\r\nYou stand and you’re standing before God, I don’t\r\nthink you’re going to have too much more to argue about, but\r\nThat’s just my opinion. What do I know, right? Then you have, as\r\nI said Jesus’ many statements that He makes that He must lay\r\ndown His life for the sheep. He says He must rise again from the\r\ndead, of course, He did. Just if I was preaching on a\r\nmessage about the Resurrection, this one-word\r\nwould be important. And the reason why? Because if He\r\nsaid, \u201cThe Son of man must die, the Son of man came to suffer\r\nmany things, this is what must happen\u201d and it didn’t, again,\r\nwe’d be reading, we’d be quoting Paul, but not for Christ, \u201cOur\r\nfaith is vain,\u201d right? Because Paul said, \u201cIf Christ has not\r\nrisen, our faith is vain.\u201d So I want you to think that they must\r\nare tethered essentially, all in all, to Christ’s death and\r\nResurrection, because of all the other stuff that was said, \u201cI\r\nmust\u2501don’t you know, I must be about My Father’s business,\u201d\r\ncould have just been a statement if these other things didn’t\r\nhappen.\r\n\r\nYou’ve got to start with those musts, death and\r\nResurrection, then everything else becomes clear. So\r\nI would say there are a lot of musts from Christ that we should\r\nbe cognizant of. Now there are other musts, and I’m going to\r\ntouch on this one real quickly, but I’m going to come back to\r\nit, because, I want to finish the message with this for\r\nanother reason. If you remember in the passage in Luke, don’t\r\nturn there, because we’ll turn there in a little bit. Christ,\r\nupon seeing the tax collector Zacchaeus, and says, \u201cMake\r\nhaste, and come down; today I must abide in thy house.\u201d And I\r\nwas thinking about this must. See, Christ is still doing this,\r\nbut we don’t have these, you want to call them vignettes or\r\nstories; Christ is still doing this. He’s not saying, you know,\r\n\u201cHey, you up there come down and you must,\u201d No, but He’s still\r\nsaying, \u201cI must come and abide in your house,\u201d this tabernacle.\r\nHe’s still saying that, and that’s what’s important when you\r\nread this to recognize that these musts are still in force.\r\nThey’re still applicable, they’re still powerfully moving\r\nif we are analyzing them right.\r\n\r\nAnd of course, I, as I\r\nsaid, we’ll come back to this, but Zacchaeus was going to be\r\nsaved. We have that crystal clear in that passage, and I\r\nalways think it’s thrilling because something about that man\r\nwho we know had to be ripping people off\u2501he is a tax\r\ncollector. Come on. And Jesus focuses on him, calls his name,\r\nand says, \u201cI must abide with you.\u201d And that tells me that, you\r\nknow, again, when people say, \u201cWell, how does salvation occur?\r\nHow do these things happen? What is the process?\u201d Let’s read\r\nthat. God finds you right where you are. Now granted, Zacchaeus\r\nwas curious, and he went to look. He wanted to see about\r\nthis Jesus.\r\n\r\nBut when Jesus said, \u201cI must abide,\u201d essentially in\r\nhis house, it wasn’t as though\u2501how many houses were\r\naround Jesus. He could have taken up anywhere, but it was\r\nthat one that He wanted. Again, I’m going to come back to this,\r\nbecause this is the picture I want people to\r\nunderstand. I’m tired of the whole idea somehow that we, we\r\nplay, we have a fa\u00e7ade. If this isn’t where the rubber meets the\r\nroad, and if this isn’t helping you to live out your life as a\r\nChristian, then as I said, maybe Christianity isn’t for you. And\r\nyou might say, \u201cHow could a pastor say that?\u201d I did. I just\r\ndid. Do you want me to say it again? I mean what I say, and I\r\nsay what I mean. So the reason why this is important, as simple\r\nas it is, is you can understand He had a focus, and He repeated\r\nhis focus, \u201cI must.\u201d And when you start looking at all of the\r\nmusts that He declared for Himself that He must do in His\r\nbrief ministry on earth, and then what He must do, be raised, obviously reappeared, and then ascended, and will return.\r\nBut this is all part of these musts.\r\n\r\nAnd again, for somebody\r\nwho’s just starting, you might say, \u201cWell, okay, He said all\r\nthis for Him.\u201d Yes, and, we should learn of that, by the\r\nway. Remember where I started. If we all took the position, \u201cI\r\nmust be about my Father’s business,\u201d it doesn’t mean that\r\nyou spend all day in the things of God and the things of the\r\nchurch, but a commitment like that says, \u201cI’m serious about\r\nGod.\u201d Now I’m not suggesting we walk around and say, \u201cI must be\r\nabout my Father’s business.\u201d People are going to say, \u201cOkay,\r\nyeah.\u201d But this is my commitment as a child of God.\r\n\r\nI’m not just\r\nin, I’ve not just been thrown into some little play universe.\r\nGod expects something of me. And whether that’s my simple faith\r\nor whatever else He requires of every one of us as He\r\nreveals His plan and His will for you in your life, some musts must\u00a0be applied. So we’ll start with the first\r\none. It’s the one, and now we’re going to talk about us, not Him,\r\nbut us. So the top of my list, and I’ve preached this many,\r\nmany times, but I’m going to talk about this real quickly and\r\nmove through it, so the first one at the top of my list is\r\nJesus tells Nicodemus, \u201cYou must be born again.\u201d And I love\r\nto talk about this, and I cannot talk about this enough. I\r\nwant you to think about this. Nicodemus was a religious man.\r\nHe knew God. He at least knew the God of the Old Testament;\r\nLet’s put you this way. There was no New Testament yet. So\r\nit’s not as though he was godless.\r\n\r\nChrist says, \u201cYou must\r\nbe born again.\u201d That translation strictly word for word from the\r\nGreek, \u201cYou must be born from above,\u201d because the question is,\r\n\u201cWell, how can a man when he’s old go back into his mother’s\r\nwomb?\u201d And what Christ was saying there, and I’ve preached\r\non this many times, \u201cYou cannot will yourself into the kingdom.\r\nYou cannot act yourself into the kingdom. You must be born again\r\nfrom above.\u201d And I don’t care how religious you think you are.\r\nIf that Spirit of God does not descend and take up residence in\r\nyou, you are not born from above. And I’ve said this\r\nbefore. I used to listen to Dr. Scott’s comments,\r\nI believe it was Jimmy Carter, and he used to\r\nsay, \u201cI believe in the born-again experience.\u201d No. I believe\r\neveryone must be born again. Period. No experience. Period.\r\nThis is a must and a mandate of God.\r\n\r\nIt is a necessity. When you\r\nput it that way, it becomes clear. It’s not an experience.\r\nIt’s not a choice. You either are receiving your salvation and\r\nall the motivation that comes with it, that power to change,\r\nthat power to have faith, that power to understand, the desire\r\nto learn from above or nothing at all, or you’re operating in\r\nthe flesh, which a lot of people do. They don’t understand this\r\npassage and they think, \u201cOkay.\u201d So that’s number one.\r\n\r\nSo to be\r\nclear, for those people who maybe don’t think, you know,\r\nthey think, \u201cHow, how spiritual, a very religious, self-righteous\r\nNicodemus,\u201d when in fact Jesus said, \u201cNo. All that info that\r\nyou have is info in your brain, but you need something from\r\nabove.\u201d And without that, you ain’t going to do any musting,\r\nall right? All right. The next one is out of the book of Acts,\r\nand there’s a statement there that says, \u201cWe ought to obey God\r\nrather than men,\u201d and this verse says, \u201cWe must obey God\r\nrather than men,\u201d if you read the translation aright.\r\n\r\nSo\r\nWhat does that mean? It means you must be a follower of Christ\r\nand a learner of Christ to be a Christian, and when we talk\r\nabout this, this is quite relevant today. You\r\ncan decide that you want to be in on the latest trends, and you\r\nwant to identify as a giraffe today, and that’s fine. Or you\r\nunderstand you’re a child of God and you identify with the\r\nheavenly Father and in that identification, I must come to\r\nan understanding. God has a plan for my life which is revealed in\r\nthis book, which is why the great commission is \u201cGo into\r\nevery corner and make learners, make disciples.\u201d He didn’t say,\r\n\u201cGo make entertainment.\u201d He didn’t say, \u201cGo make fans that\r\nare, \u201cWhoo, Jesus, yay!\u201d No; make learners.\r\n\r\nNow how many of\r\nyou, I, I want to hear you on this because\r\nI think a lot of people think the church is an entertainment\r\ncenter. It’s to be taken lightly. It’s a game. How many\r\nunderstand that learning takes effort and is\r\ndifficult? Do you know the worst part of learning? Learning\r\nthings you don’t want to learn and you’re not interested in.\r\nTrust me, been there and done that. You don’t go through a Ph.D.\r\nprogram without being subjected to having to read stuff. You’re\r\nlike, \u201cOh, I would rather watch paint dry than read this stuff\u201d”\r\nokay? But it’s opening up your mind because if you’re going to\r\nget an education, that’s how you get educated. You don’t just\r\neducate yourself on, \u201cI want to become a mechanical engineer so\r\nI only learn about this dimension.\u201d No, there are other\r\nthings that you would want to secondary or tertiary subjects\r\nthat will complement and give you a better understanding,\r\nmaybe beyond that even.\r\n\r\nSo when it says we must obey God rather\r\nthan man, even in the current climate of things.\r\nImportant for people to get this right, We are not\r\nfollowing the multitude and what the multitude does. Now, if you\r\nwant to do that, that’s your business. I’m not interested.\r\nI’ve seen what the multitude is going for and I’m, I’m just not\r\nthere. I don’t want it, okay? So, but if I’m going to say this\r\nright, I’m going to say what the book of Acts says that we\r\nmust obey God rather than man.\r\n\r\nWe must learn about God. We must\r\nunderstand, process, and take it in and that requires effort. Don’t\r\ncome to a church, this church, or any other church and think, \u201cOh,\r\nI’m going to learn. Oh, I’m going to learn like it’s going\r\nto be a great hour-long massage and I’m going to walk out of\r\nthere and I’m just going to feel like a bag of marshmallows.\u201d No,\r\nlearning is tiring.\r\n\r\nIt’s exhausting. It makes your\r\nbrain hurt. If you’re listening, I told you this\r\nbefore, your heart rate goes up. You do not necessarily break out\r\nof sweat, but your body temperature does get hotter.\r\nThere are different components in your body happening as you\r\nreally if you’re listening versus the people that\r\nI’m just talking right now and they’re going, \u201cWah wah wah wah\r\nwah wah,\u201d right? Or she said, \u201cMust. Oh, I must go to the\r\ngrocery store later.\u201d That’s those, you know, undisciplined,\r\n\u201cI’m not here. I’m here but I’m not here\u201d type\r\npeople. All right, so I’ll move on to the next one because I\r\nthink I killed that one. The question that is always asked in\r\nthe Bible is, \u201cWhat must I do to be saved?\u201d And the reason why I’m\r\ngoing down there is I realize with so many new people, there\r\nare so many people asking questions and coming in with all\r\nkinds of weird ideas.\r\n\r\nSo I just figure, you know what, this is a\r\nmessage that can cover a lot of the problems. It’s,\r\nit’s pretty, it’s pretty simple. Let me ask you this. What would\r\nyou do if you were dropped on a desert island? You’re all alone.\r\nYou don’t have a Bible. You don’t have a Bible teacher. But\r\nyou suddenly decide, you cry out and you say, \u201cI want to know You\r\nand I want to be saved.\u201d Now faith says, you know, God can\r\nopen up your mind and God can through the Spirit do stuff. But\r\nI want you to think about this.\r\n\r\nWe are so distracted that when\r\npeople talk about, \u201cWhat should I do to be saved?\u201d they go down\r\na laundry list so that the person who thinks, \u201cWell, if I\r\ncheck all these boxes, I will have arrived.\u201d If you watch any of\r\nthese religious programs, they will go through their shtick, and\r\nat the close of the shtick, they will say, \u201cNow, if you want to\r\nbe saved, you must repeat this prayer. And once you repeat this\r\nprayer, you are saved.\u201d I have a problem with that.\r\n\r\nAnd the\r\nThe reason I have a problem with that is that no two people\r\nare alike. Somebody watching that same person on TV may be in\r\na terrible crisis, in terrible torment, and they’ll latch onto\r\nanything because they’re desperate. And you’ve got other\r\npeople who may just go through this kind of rote, \u201cI’m a sinner\r\nand I know I’m a sinner.\u201d And there’ll be people who’ll say,\r\n\u201cWell, how could you even criticize that, because that’s\r\nshowing people who don’t know?\u201d Well, here’s my problem with\r\nthat. There are a lot of people who don’t know who didn’t have\r\nthe auditorium or the front row experience or who come up and\r\nsay the sinner’s prayer. They were just saved by hearing the\r\nword of God. No one coerced them. No one kicked their shins,\r\n\u201cYou’re kicking my shins! You’re kicking my shins!\u201d When\r\npeople talk about, \u201cWhat must I do to be saved?\u201d I don’t;\r\nI’m going to speak for this church and I’m going to tell you\r\nthis very simply put. God expects that once you have an\r\nencounter with Christ through His word, you come to a\r\nplace of faith, to a place of amen where you say, \u201cThat\r\nhappened.\r\n\r\nHe is Lord,\u201d not robotically, to come to know Him\r\nin reality. Not some box I check, but something that\r\nsuddenly the word of God is no longer a book with words. It is\r\nalive and comes alive to me. \u201cWhat must I do to be saved?\u201d\r\nOkay, the answer is to believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and be\r\nsaved, have faith in Him, trust in Him, that He is the Messiah,\r\nthat He is the Deliverer, that He has the power to save\r\nbecause He did what He did at the cross, that He’s coming\r\nback, that He’s promised you and me eternal life.\r\n\r\nNumber four\r\non my list, \u201cHe that cometh to God must believe that he is\r\nand that he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him.\u201d\r\nHave you heard the word must again? You must believe that. You must believe\u00a0that. It’s not enough to come\r\nand say robotically, \u201cI follow Christ.\u201d No. I believe that not\r\nonly He is God, but He is also a Rewarder. Now, that shouldn’t\r\nmake you think, you know like you just pulled the jackpot in\r\nVegas or something. Don’t\u2501it’s not like that. He is a Rewarder\r\nof them who diligently seek Him. He rewards people who are\r\nseeking Him out, and how does He reward them? Some, with some, in\r\nfavor, with others, it may be extra faith, and some are extra\r\nblessed in other ways.\r\n\r\nI can’t tell you, maybe it’s a spiritual\r\ngift, but whoever comes must believe that He is and that He\r\nis a Rewarder. You don’t just come and it’s like, \u201cOh, I just\r\nshowed up now.\u201d No, I’m standing in line. God told me to come\r\nhere today and I’m standing in line until my number is\r\nultimately called and I’m, and I’m not only faith, trusting,\r\nand believing all that He said, but He has also promised to reward\r\nthe ones seeking Him out. And whatever that might mean to\r\nsome, I can tell you what it means to me. You may say,\r\n\u201cWell, do you think that’s a reward?\u201d Yeah, I do actually. My\r\nreward is God’s given me extra faith.\r\n\r\nHe’s given me, the\r\nsurety that I’m not alone. He’s given me the surety of eternity.\r\nI can keep building on these. They all come back to the same\r\nplace, very repetitive. All right, we’ll go to the next one\r\nand I think this one is also an important must. \u201cHe must reign,\r\ntill he hath put all his enemies under his feet.\u201d This is why\r\nit’s important for the church of Jesus Christ right now to get\r\nits groove back: \u201cHe must reign,\u201d He must reign until\r\nwhat? \u201cHe hath put all his enemies under his feet.\u201d Now we\r\nknow that that last act is death. The last enemy is death.\r\nAnd if you want to think about it, it’s not just death,\r\nit’s also, if you read the last book or the last book of the\r\nBible, Revelation, you’ve got the devil. But for the\r\nChristian, think of it this way. What are people talking about\r\nwhen somebody who is not familiar with the book, somebody\r\ndies and goes into a depression?\r\n\r\nIt goes into what’s,\r\nwhat was and there’s no, there’s no hope, there’s no future. So\r\nthe last enemy being laid down, I love this one because it says\r\nvery clearly, that the enemies of the children of God and specifically\r\nthe last enemy, death, are vanquished. Now if this doesn’t\r\nmake you realize that all this other fretting stuff over here\r\nwasn’t worth too much because He says, \u201cThis, this must happen.\u201d\r\nAnd this is why the church of Jesus Christ, no matter what’s\r\ngoing on in the world, still must reign.\r\n\r\nThere still must be\r\na voice leading people and guiding people, not entertaining\r\nall of this woke garbage and all of this stupidity of the world,\r\nbut rather focusing on our Lord and Savior, focus on what He said,\r\nfocus on what He said must happen. And guess what? You’re\r\ngoing to find something incredible when you realize, you\r\nknow, sorry to say this, there are predictions from AI about\r\nwhen World War III will start. It’s kind of very interesting.\r\nIf you look these things up, it’s kind of like, \u201cOh, okay,\r\nthat’s, that’s interesting.\u201d And somebody said, \u201cWell, don’t,\r\ndon’t you care?\u201d Well, at the moment when I think about it, I\r\nwant to do all that I can for the kingdom, but if somebody’s\r\ngoing to launch a bomb that’s going to blow up the world,\r\nthere’s not too much you can do about it, right? Except for the\r\nChristian, because you understand God’s promises are.\r\nNow everybody must make the trip.\r\n\r\nI’ve said this before, but\r\nHe says that the last enemy’s death is vanquished. That means\r\nfor the believer, no matter what happens, we will be with Him. So\r\nI like reading these musts. They are not only informative, but\r\nthey enforce something about our faith where it becomes clear.\r\nYou, if you are worried about all this stuff to the point of\r\nhaving a meltdown, your focus is in the wrong place. Remember, I\r\ntaught out of Psalms 42 and 43 when people are depressed and\r\ndown, \u201cWhy art thou downcast, O my soul.\u201d Why are you looking\r\nthere instead of looking up to Him? Why are you looking at the\r\nproblems? It’s not like you weren’t warned as a Christian.\r\nI’m not saying that they’re effective now, but wars are the\r\nrumors of wars, tribulation, the Great Tribulation. Somehow, and\r\nthen people act like, \u201cOh, I’m surprised. I didn’t know this\r\nwas going to happen.\u201d Well, we’re not in it right now.\r\nThat’s number one.\r\n\r\nAnd number two, expect it; that’s what we\r\nare to expect. We’re to expect persecution. We are to expect\r\nthe world to hate us. There’s some, \u201cWhy do people hate us so\r\nmuch?\u201d Why did they hate Jesus so much? Okay, don’t answer the\r\nquestion. It’s all good. So next must, here we go, that \u201cGod is a\r\nSpirit: and they that worship him must worship him in spirit\r\nand truth.\u201d And I highlight this one because it is one of\r\nthese pieces of information that people just gloss over.\r\n\r\nHe must\r\nbe worshiped in spirit and in truth, which brings me back to\r\nwhat He said to Nicodemus, \u201cYou must be born again from above.\u201d\r\nThat’s your connection, to be able to worship in spirit. And\r\nif you think about it, Jesus said, \u201cI am the truth.\u201d So this\r\nwhole idea of how we worship, and I just want you to think\r\nabout this, and don’t take offense. Anybody listening to\r\nme, we all have different ideas on worship. Now somebody could\r\nbe listening during a music service, and they’re stirred in\r\ntheir soul by what they’re hearing, the words of the song,\r\nand they are worshiping in spirit and for their\r\nunderstanding and truth.\r\n\r\nAnd I don’t condemn that,\r\nand I don’t look upon that and say, \u201cOh, that’s a freak show.\r\nThat’s weird.\u201d But I don’t like the idea somehow that if you go\r\ninto a church and everybody’s not all doing this because one\r\nperson does it, we all must do it now. Now this is called the\r\nchorus line. This is not called worship. This is, \u201cOh, God, I’ve\r\ngot to put my hands up now,\u201d right? And this is what\r\nhappens\u2501trust me; I know these things, okay? This is what\r\npeople do. I’m like, \u201cOh, God, I’ve got to put my hands up. Aw,\r\nI don’t want to clap anymore. When’s the song going to be\r\nover?\u201d Okay? What I’m saying to you is that you could be just\r\nstanding there enjoying the music and be just as much\r\nworshiping in spirit and truth as the person who is\r\npraising God with their hands.\r\n\r\nRemember I said I was going to\r\ncome back to this? The idea somehow is that godliness and\r\nworship must look a certain way. That’s, I’m sorry, that’s the\r\nerror right there. I, I can tell you, I think I’ve told you this\r\nstory before, and I’m sure that folks there probably don’t like\r\nme telling this story, but I was at a Full Gospel Fellowship\r\nmeeting and I told you they were playing all kinds of 7\/11 music\r\nand everybody’s standing up and praising God. And someone’s son\r\nwho I knew quite well got up and played \u201cHow Great Thou Art,\u201d at\r\nthe piano. I was the only person standing in the room and it\r\nministered to me. I was standing up and I was praising the Lord.\r\nI didn’t care. I thought all the people in there were probably\r\nsaying, \u201cWhy is she standing?\u201d Or \u201cShe’s the only one\r\nstanding.\u201d I didn’t care.\r\n\r\nIt wasn’t about anybody in the\r\nroom. It was about my moment with God and that’s worship. So\r\nwhatever that looks like, I mean, within reason, I’m not\r\nexpecting people to\u2501there are some churches where I was\r\nwatching a video of one woman, she was, they had a dance team, and all of a sudden her dance went into breakdancing. Okay, so\r\nI’m not talking about that, okay? All right, next one;\r\nbetter to move on here. These are the words of John the\r\nBaptist, but if you think about it, they apply to\r\nevery one of us, \u201cHe must increase, I must decrease.\u201d And\r\nthis is a big one. See, even if you think you’ve heard all this\r\nbefore, these are good reminders. Sometimes, we take\r\nup a lot of space and if you were to weigh out the space that\r\nwe perceive to take up versus the space we allot to God, it’s\r\nkind of skewed. So this is a wonderful place to camp\r\nout, meditate, and pray because He must increase.\r\n\r\nHe must take\r\nup the better part of my thoughts or my life or whatever\r\nit is, and I must decrease. It doesn’t mean I cease being. It\r\njust means that if I call myself a child of God and I’m tethered\r\nto Him by faith, then my mindset is, and my thoughts are about\r\nHim more than anything else. Now, how easy is that or how\r\nhard is that? I’m going to tell you something. When people make\r\nthe statement, \u201cWell you’ve got to think of the Lord all day long,\u201d\r\nI’m sorry. You’re human. I’m human. That doesn’t happen.\u201d I\r\nthink about being hungry. I think about being tired. I think\r\nabout how much work I have to do. I think about all the\r\nmillion things, but I also think about God. See, I’m human. I\r\ndon’t play at church. I’m not wanting you to play at church.\r\nThe important part of this reflecting on, \u201cHe must increase\r\nand I must decrease\u201d is to remind us of proper perspective.\r\nI’ll say it this way, In an age of self-absorbedness,\r\nof in an age of ego-driven, egomaniac, selfie,\r\nwhatever you want to call it, \u201cHe must increase, I must\r\ndecrease\u201d will keep a person treading on the right\r\npath.\r\n\r\nI mentioned this one before, \u201cThat the Scriptures\r\nmust need be fulfilled,\u201d and this is important for the\r\nChristian because there are Scriptures that have already\r\nbeen fulfilled that build our faith, and then there are\r\nScriptures that are yet to be fulfilled. But He says the\r\nScriptures must, it is inevitable. So when somebody\r\ngoes and they read the, we’ll call them books on eschatology,\r\nspecifically Revelation coupled with the pepperings of some of\r\nthe prophets, the Scriptures and it is inevitable, they must be\r\nfulfilled. So when somebody says, \u201cWell, why are you so\r\ncommitted and so,\u201d because I understand something, this all\r\nmust come to pass. The next one is that \u201cwe all\r\nmust appear before the judgment seat of Christ.\u201d I’m\r\ntouching on every part of everything, we’ll call it a dimension of our\r\nfaith.\r\n\r\nWe must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ and\r\nthe Christian does not stand there to receive punishment. You\r\nread Romans 8, and Romans 8 says, \u201cThere is therefore now no\r\nultimate punishment to those who are in Christ Jesus.\u201d And people\r\nget this confused. This is much different. The throne of, the\r\njudgment seat of Christ is different than the great white\r\njudgment seat; two different and distinct moments.\r\n\r\nOne is for\r\nthose who have trusted Christ and those who have not.\r\nWhich door would you like to pick? Never mind. It’s a very\r\nbad place to make humor, but I figured a little levity might\r\nhelp the situation. Okay. Number 10, \u201cthis corruptible must put\r\non incorruptible.\u201d This one I love; you know why? Because it’s\r\nnot saying this might happen.\r\n\r\nIt says this is inevitable, and\r\nI’m, I’m okay with that. Are you okay with that? This\r\ncorruptible, this thing that’s rotting every single day and\r\nrotting every day that goes on inside and out must put\r\non incorruptible, must put on immortality, must be clothed in\r\nthat by God, must, this must happen. You start kind of\r\nthinking about what it means to be a Christian now when you line\r\nup all these musts. You’re not looking at game playing or\r\nentertainment. You’re recognizing these are hardcore\r\nto the point of what’s expected. All right, from the book of Acts\r\nwe have another one that says, \u201cThe multitudes must needs come\r\ntogether.\u201d And I want to say this happens at every age.\r\nYou’ll have the banding together of people and then it’s just\r\nthis kind of movement that happens over time.\r\nThis one reads a little bit differently in your\r\nBible, but if you were reading it in Greek, it would be\r\ntranslated as \u201cmust\u201d and this is out of Romans 8 where it says,\r\n\u201cWe know not what we should pray for as we ought.\u201d And that word\r\n\u201cought\u201d actually would be a \u201cmust.\u201d We don’t know how we\r\nmust pray, okay? And there couldn’t be a more truer\r\nstatement.\r\n\r\nSo I’ll go back and kind of put this in proper\r\nperspective. Developing a relationship with somebody takes\r\ntime to learn, you know, in a relationship you have to learn\r\nthe language of the other person, how they think, how they\r\nspeak, and until that’s figured out, it can be on rocky ground\r\nbecause you don’t know where the person’s coming from.\r\nBut if you’re reading this book and you’re talking to God,\r\nyou’re talking it out with God. You know, prayer is kind of\r\nweird. You start off thinking, you know, \u201cShould I, should I\r\nsay, ‘Dear God,’ or should I,\u201d you know, think about sometimes\r\nhow silly we are, right? I’m trying to think about how I’m\r\ngoing to pray or what I’m going to say versus I’m just going to\r\nsit down here and I’m going to think about God and my issues\r\nand what God’s done. And as soon as I kind of feel that\r\neverything’s congealed together, I’m going to start talking to\r\nGod. And I don’t; I can’t tell you that it’s, it’s something\r\nthat’s planned out.\r\n\r\nSometimes I start talking and something else\r\ncomes out of my mouth. And I didn’t, I was thinking, \u201cI’m\r\ngoing to talk about, I’m going to talk to God about this,\u201d and\r\nI’m talking to God about that. Don’t ask me because I can\r\ninterrupt myself. It doesn’t matter. But what I am saying to\r\nyou and what is important is if we don’t know how we must pray,\r\nthen think about how ineffective a lot of our prayers are. Now\r\nI’m not saying that there’s a method to prayer like, you know,\r\n\u201cStep one, you do this and step two,\u201d What I’m saying though is\r\nin sincerity and genuineness. When you relate to somebody,\r\nwhen you’re having a relationship with somebody, you talk to them.\r\nYou don’t try, and no, sometimes we’re talking to other people\r\nwhich I don’t want to hurt your feelings, so I’m going to be\r\nvery diplomatic and I’m, I’m going to say this in a way. You\r\nwant to talk to God in sincerity and with openness of heart. And\r\nyou might say, \u201cWell, what if that sounds offensive?\u201d Do you\r\nthink that God doesn’t already know the thoughts that you’ve\r\nthought? So speaking it out to Him or meditatingly, however you\r\nwant to convey your thoughts, He already knows about them.\r\n\r\nSo\r\nIt’s like, I’m already confirming what God already\r\nknows because He knows my thoughts and when I open my\r\nmouth and talk to Him, those thoughts and my words connect\r\nbefore Him. So when people try to make this like, \u201cWell, I’m\r\ngoing to think about this now,\u201d have you ever sat down, and\r\nsomebody says, \u201cWill, you pray for the food?\u201d And instead of\r\n\u2501again, think about this, instead of\r\nthinking about why we’re praying to receive food and, and, or the\r\nconcept of why we would even pray in receiving it. You’ll\r\nhear people take the opportunity like, \u201cI’d like to thank the\r\ngovernor and,\u201d You know, their prayer, their prayer is\r\neverything, right? \u201cAnd the silverware, whoever polished the\r\nsilverware today, they did a very good job.\u201d You’re praying\r\nfor the food! Now, I know I’m being ludicrous, but I’m trying\r\nto make a point that it, it has to be something that comes from\r\nhere and flows out of you and that genuineness, whatever that\r\nis, that is what connects with God; nothing more, nothing less.\r\nAnybody gives you a formula, tell them to\u2501yeah, that’s what I\r\nsaid.\r\n\r\nAll right, the next one, which I’m sure you’ll all like,\r\nsays, \u201cThe servant of the Lord must not strive,\u201d and that is a\r\nGreek word, machethestai, or machthesthai, \u201cto fight.\u201d That\r\ndoesn’t mean that a pastor is milquetoast or wimpish, but one\r\nwho can discern between righteous indignation and\r\nblatant, we’ll call it, you know, you can distinguish\r\nBetween these things, someone who’s angry because something\r\nhas been done against God or the church or God’s people versus\r\nsomething that affects me personally. Now that personal\r\nthing could be righteous indignation if it’s about the\r\nthings of God, but typically we don’t see it like that. So this\r\ndaily struggle, if you want to call it this, of what the\r\nservant of the Lord must not strive, and I’m saying this\r\nbecause there are people, again, who get critical and they say;\r\nSometimes I’ll say something, \u201cWell, that was kind of brutal\u201d”\r\nor \u201cThat was kind of harsh.\u201d How about that was kind of honest?\r\nAnd how about, I’d rather tell you to speak the truth in love? And\r\nIt may be brutal to try to give you some syrupy stuff that\r\ndoesn’t help you with anything, doesn’t even make you face\r\nreality.\r\n\r\nSo when we talk about not striving we’re not talking\r\nabout someone, I’m not a brawler, and I’m not out there\r\nlooking for fights, but someone capable of being firm,\r\nand leading. That doesn’t mean, as I said, imagine the shepherd, If\r\nall the shepherd does all day is take his staff and beat the\r\nsheep all day long, okay, you get the point. So I must\r\nnot beat the sheep, all right. All right, I’m almost done here.\r\nFor the believer, I will, I ought, or I must, you’re getting\r\nthe gist of this now. So what the Revelation given to John in\r\nthat book, says that the Scripture related to what John\r\nwrote \u201cmust shortly come to pass.\u201d And I want to address\r\nthis one because what does \u201cshortly come to pass\u201d mean if\r\nit’s been all this time? Now, and I want to answer this\r\nbecause I think there are a lot of people that say, \u201cWell, you\r\nknow, you talk about a lot of stuff, and all the stuff you talk\r\nabout that’s past and present I can deal with, but the future\r\nstuff; how do we know it’s even going to happen because it’s\r\nbeen so long?\u201d Well, again, this is the thing.\r\n\r\nThe Lord talks\r\nabout a day as a thousand years or a day as a thousand\r\nyears. People start to go with, \u201cWell, what is, how does that\r\ntranslate, and how should we think about time?\u201d The Scripture\r\nsays that all the things written must come to pass could\r\nmean another thousand years have to happen. It could mean that\r\nthere are events; not could mean, it does mean that there\r\nare events that must happen that are prophetically\r\nrevealed in some of the prophets that tell us when these events\r\nstart to happen, other events will start to happen, which\r\nwill cascade into the final events. So when it says these\r\nthings must come to pass or shortly come to pass, if\r\nsomebody’s reading that and saying, \u201cWell, but all this time\r\nhas passed?\u201d Yes, but in between, many, we’ll call them\r\nthings that must happen, have happened.\r\n\r\nAnd there are; there\r\nis an order in God’s book. So what happens, let’s just say in\r\nthe middle of the week or in the middle of the tribulation, there\r\nare events leading up to that before that must take place that\r\nIf those don’t happen, these other events can’t happen. So\r\nThink of it this way for people who say, \u201cWell, I’m still not\r\nconvinced because all this time has elapsed.\u201d If you are so\r\ninclined to, you’d do yourself a really good service to read\r\nabout, especially out of Daniel and some of those other books\r\nthat talk about prophecies of kingdoms that didn’t yet exist\r\nIn Daniel’s time, for example, that was the future that came to\r\npass. And then you start recognizing that this whole book\r\nhas enough, we’ll call them markers, street signs, neon\r\nsigns to tell us these are events that have unfolded, these\r\nare yet to happen, and when this happens, trust me, you’ll know\r\nit.\r\n\r\nSo when he says that the Scripture must shortly come to\r\npass, I don’t want anybody in the sound of my voice thinking,\r\n\u201cWell, because it hasn’t happened, it won’t happen.\u201d No,\r\nthese events will unfortunately happen on earth, ushering in, as\r\nI’ve talked about in the last week or two, the Millennial\r\nKingdom. Obviously, for some of us who believe in this,\r\nI think it is super important to understand when it says, \u201cThis\r\nmust pass. It must come to pass.\u201d That means it will. And\r\nthis is why when people don’t take their commitments and their\r\nfaith and their learning about God in the now seriously, how do\r\nyou expect to take it seriously when we don’t even really know\r\nthe timeline of things to come? You start now.\r\n\r\nThat’s all I can\r\ntell you. You start now. So here’s what we’ve learned in all\r\nof these. There were musts that Christ spoke of Himself. And if\r\nyou go back and reread those musts, He fulfilled them. He\r\nfulfilled every single one of these musts when He said, \u201cThis\r\nis what I must be about my Father’s business. I must\r\nsuffer. The Son of man must be lifted.\u201d Everything that He\r\nsaid came to pass. Now the things that were said in\r\ndirection to us, what must be, how we must be born again, how\r\nwe must be saved, I want you to think of all this because the\r\nreality is when you take all of this information in, you realize\r\nthat there’s a lot more, there’s a lot more substance in\r\nanalyzing these words, what must happen. I said I would take you\r\nto the passage in Luke 19 to\r\nclose out, and that’s what we’re going to do because I do want to\r\nshow you something here. It’s a passage we’ve read before,\r\nLuke 19, the conversion of\r\nZacchaeus. But I want you to look at this as we bring, this\r\nmessage to a close for a purpose, and here is the\r\npurpose.\r\n\r\nAs you know, \u201cJesus entered and passed through\r\nJericho. Behold, there was a man named Zacchaeus, who was the\r\nchief among the publicans, and he was rich. And he sought to\r\nsee Jesus who he was; and could not for the press,\u201d the crowd,\r\nand \u201cbecause he was a man of little stature,\u201d he was short.\r\n\u201cAnd he ran before, climbed up into a sycomore tree to see him:\r\nfor he was to pass that way. And Jesus came to the place, he\r\nlooked up, saw him, and said unto him, Zacchaeus, make haste,\r\ncome down; for today I must abide at thy house.\u201d Now, I want\r\nyou to stop right there. Anybody reading this, there’s your must.\r\nHe wasn’t saying it like, \u201cHey, I’ve got to come in because I’ve\r\ngot to use your bathroom,\u201d or \u201cI need a cup of coffee.\u201d \u201cI must\r\nabide at thy house,\u201d it was Christ’s way of saying, I must;\r\nForgive me, it’s a really weird way to explain this. Like the\r\nSpirit coming into a person, \u201cI must come and live in your; in\r\nthis abode.\u201d And the only way that could happen, is because the\r\nSpirit was not yet given, was for Christ, whatever was said\r\ninside that house, whatever was done inside that house, who\r\nknows, except when everything was said and done, \u201cZacchaeus\r\nstood, and said unto the Lord; Behold, Lord, the half of my\r\ngoods I give to the poor; and if I have taken anything from any\r\nman by false accusation, I restore him fourfold.\r\n\r\nAnd Jesus\r\nsaid unto him, This day is salvation come to this house,\r\nforasmuch as he also is the son of Abraham. The Son of man has\r\ncome to seek and to save that which was lost.\u201d I want the\r\ntakeaway for this to be, that it is a must for Christ to take up\r\nresidence in a person. This is why you must be born from above.\r\nBut I also want you to take a look at something. If you looked\r\nat Zacchaeus standing or hanging in the tree, you’d say, \u201cThat’s\r\nnot godliness. That’s not a picture of godliness.\u201d Well,\r\nbecause all you see is a man who’s collected taxes, who’s\r\nrich, who’s probably hated by people, and probably had a\r\nhateful appearance even. But godliness looks like this, that\r\nsame man said, \u201cBehold, Lord, the half of my goods I give to\r\nthe poor; if I have taken anything from any man by false\r\naccusation, I restore him fourfold.\u201d That’s what godliness\r\nlooks like.\r\n\r\nDon’t make the mistake of succumbing to the\r\nstupidity of the vast majority of people who think somehow this\r\nis what spirituality looks like and anything else is not. Don’t\r\nmake the mistake of thinking that a message like this in its\r\nsimplicity cannot show you the bullet points; we’ll call them\r\nthe mandatory sign points of the Christian. This is not law, this\r\nis not some mandate by God, but if you’re going to be a\r\nChristian, you be one, which means you read the words and you\r\nunderstand at some point, I hate to say this, but something has\r\nto happen with the words. You can take the words in, you can\r\nmasticate them, and then you can forget about them, you can\r\nreflect on them, you can pray about it, or you can ask\r\nyourself, how, what, what does this mean for me? That’s the\r\nstarting point in my opinion asking, \u201cHow does this apply to\r\nme and how am I to apply this?\u201d Because once you start asking\r\nthose questions, it reveals something about where you are.\r\nI sat and asked myself these questions in\r\npreparing for this message and it was kind of a revelation to\r\nme.\r\n\r\nI could do a lot better, a lot better, and that’s not\r\nwork. That’s talking about pressing in and pressing close\r\nand doing all the things that I just chronicled to you today\r\nabout the musts of God. So don’t think this is just an exercise\r\nin futility. For my new listeners, welcome to a church\r\nthat does not; I don’t judge you, do not judge me. Welcome to\r\na church where people come from, We’ve got Jewish people, Muslim\r\npeople, we’ve got Christian people, we’ve got people who are\r\nnot sure. That’s all fine because God has to sort that out\r\nfor you, not me. And last but not least, we’ve got, as I said,\r\na body of people who come together, we’re like-minded and\r\nthese reinforcements for those who have been here for a long\r\ntime are good because they show us sometimes, \u201cI might be\r\ngetting a little bit complacent here.\r\n\r\nI need to step up my game\r\nor step up my faith,\u201d however you choose to say that. So I\r\nhope that this is a message that people will listen to again. And\r\nit’s not that I haven’t preached on the musts of Christ before,\r\nbut this is a good staple to say, if somebody’s confused\r\nabout what Christianity looks like, I just laid it out for you\r\ntoday. These are the words of Christ or the words of Paul or\r\nany other writer of the New Testament telling us what is\r\nimportant, and why it matters. And as I said, just a little bit of\r\nreflecting on these musts can carry a big weight on our\r\nunderstanding of where we’re at. It’s called a spiritual\r\ninventory. It’s good to do every once in a while just to see that\r\nyou are still in the faith. That’s my message.\r\nYou have been watching me, Pastor Melissa Scott, live from\r\nGlendale, California at Faith Center.\r\n\r\nIf you would like to\r\nattend the service with us, on Sunday at 11 am, simply\r\nCall 1-800-338-3030 to receive your pass. If you’d like more\r\nteaching and you would like to go straight to our website,\r\nThe address is <a href=\"https:\/\/www.PastorMelissaScott.com\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">www.PastorMelissaScott.com<\/a>.\r\n\r\n<a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=glhlNmsFDVY\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">As found on YouTube<\/a>\r\n\r\n<a href=\"http:\/\/flywait.4parkinson.hop.clickbank.net\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">http:\/\/flywait.4parkinson.hop.clickbank.net<\/a> $49.\u2070\u2070\r\n\r\nBlue Heron Health News\r\n\r\nI thought my Parkinson\u2019s diagnosis was a death sentence \u2013 I was so wrong!\r\nInstead of surrendering as the disease ruined my physical and mental health\u2026 I turned everything around to be healthier, happier, and more energetic than I was BEFORE my diagnosis!\r\n\r\nThe Parkinson’s Protocol Review ||Beat the Parkinson’s Disease Only 12 steps||Blue Heron Health News\r\n\r\n<iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"YouTube video player\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/TiOZ4sieqRU?si=wRmvgPf87skf28hU\" width=\"300\" height=\"185\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><span data-mce-type=\"bookmark\" style=\"display: inline-block; width: 0px; overflow: hidden; line-height: 0;\" class=\"mce_SELRES_start\">\ufeff<\/span><\/iframe>\r\n\r\n12 simple steps tackled this dreadful disease at its source \u2013 and saw my symptoms melt away in days\r\n\r\nWelcome!\r\n\r\nYou\u2019ve just read Steve Peterson\u2019s story of how they treated Parkinson\u2019s Disease \u2013 one of the cruelest illnesses known to man.\r\n\r\nThe Parkinson\u2019s Disease Protocol has delivered thousands of similar stories \u2013 all from ordinary men and women who decided to hit that disease hard \u2013 before it had a chance to ruin their lives.\r\n\r\nThese are people who\r\n\r\nfollowed their doctor\u2019s advice \u2013 but faced an illness that was only going to get worse\r\nknew that unless they did something completely different, they were facing a health disaster\r\nfound out that others had eliminated their symptoms \u2013 so decided to do what they had done\r\nThe causes of Parkinson\u2019s Disease are no longer a mystery. We now know why it happens \u2013 so we know how to stop it.\r\n\r\nWhich means suffering from Parkinson\u2019s is no longer inevitable. It\u2019s a choice.\r\nAnd you can choose to be well again.\r\nInstead of an ongoing loss of physical disability and a degenerating brain\u2026 You can choose to be vibrantly healthy, energetic, and happy. Just like you were before all this started.\r\n\r\nA series of small, simple lifestyle changes eases away both the causes and the effects of this horrible disease.\r\n\r\nThe Parkinson\u2019s Protocol shows you those exact changes. So now you can reliably and quickly eliminate the causes \u2013 and effects \u2013 of your illness once and for all.\r\n\r\nThe program works. We have several thousand stunning successes now \u2013 which is why we have no hesitation in offering you a complete money-back guarantee: <a href=\"http:\/\/flywait.4parkinson.hop.clickbank.net\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">http:\/\/flywait.4parkinson.hop.clickbank.net<\/a>\r\n\r\nIf your Parkinson\u2019s symptoms haven\u2019t significantly reduced within 60 days of buying this program you can have all your money back\u2026 No questions asked!\r\n\r\nParkinson\u2019s gets much worse over time. Don\u2019t let that happen to you. Address it now.\r\n\r\n<a href=\"http:\/\/flywait.4parkinson.hop.clickbank.net\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/i.ibb.co\/nBDMhhF\/0ade2bb5335e96396772523eb64a8f2e.jpg\" alt=\"0ade2bb5335e96396772523eb64a8f2e\" border=\"0\" \/><\/a>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>When people talk about, \u201cWhat must I do to be saved?\u201d I don’t; I’m going to speak for this church and I’m going to tell you this very simply put. God expects that once you have an encounter with Christ through His word, that you come to a place of faith, to a place of &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/effectsofanxiety.net\/archives\/151164\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">The \u201cMusts\u201d of God: What He Wants from You<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":151163,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[111,816,6],"tags":[60744,36825,6907,60014,60020,60517,39775,4328,60301,60742,60027,60028,60026,37124,60401,488,60743,60029,57671,1355,60008,60009,41174,4499,34031,60741,2092,60015,60025,57396,37122,60024,60023,60007,60022,60019,60018,57642,60017,60067,41931,59000,60016,36725,60066,35240,60010,60012,60013,60021,60011,60005,42025],"class_list":["post-151164","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-diy","category-environment","category-reducing-triggers","tag-abide","tag-above","tag-bible","tag-biblestudy","tag-blessed","tag-bornagain","tag-christ","tag-christian","tag-death-2","tag-decrease","tag-doctorscott","tag-drgenescott","tag-drscott","tag-faith","tag-faithcenterglendale","tag-father","tag-fulfilled","tag-genescott","tag-giving","tag-god","tag-godslove","tag-godspromise","tag-gospel","tag-grace","tag-healing","tag-increase","tag-jesus","tag-loveofgod","tag-melissascott","tag-must","tag-pastor","tag-pastormelissa","tag-pastormelissascott","tag-pastormelissascottphd","tag-pastorscott","tag-praise","tag-preach","tag-prophecy","tag-redeemed","tag-resurrection-2","tag-salvation","tag-saved","tag-savior","tag-spiritual","tag-sunday","tag-teaching","tag-thetruth","tag-theword","tag-thewordofgod","tag-trustgod","tag-truth-2","tag-understandthebible","tag-worship"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/effectsofanxiety.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/08\/rootF_IMG_64e87276b50ad.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/effectsofanxiety.net\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/151164"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/effectsofanxiety.net\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/effectsofanxiety.net\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/effectsofanxiety.net\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/effectsofanxiety.net\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=151164"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/effectsofanxiety.net\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/151164\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":151178,"href":"https:\/\/effectsofanxiety.net\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/151164\/revisions\/151178"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/effectsofanxiety.net\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/151163"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/effectsofanxiety.net\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=151164"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/effectsofanxiety.net\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=151164"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/effectsofanxiety.net\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=151164"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}