Creating the Character of God

Today I want to speak on a subject that is pretty common, I suppose, but I want to review this and look at it possibly from a bit different point of view. And this just has to do with the, I'll give you the three titles, because it evolved here. The first one, a sermon I gave actually many years ago, or quite a few years ago, creating, or not creating, but building the character of God. And that was, it came from an idea I got from an article, oh, 60 years ago, on building the character of a king, because we are to be rulers, kings.

And you can't just go waltzing in and have such great responsibility, and especially in the kingdom of God, which is unlimited power as far as capabilities, and you have to have good character. That's what the Bible is about, in one sense, preparing us for God's family, and so building the character of a king. And there's a little bit of a fallacy in thinking that, building the character of a king.

Well, it's true, that's what we're supposed to do. But it puts the emphasis on us building our character, and we surely have a part in it, but we cannot change our essential character without God's help. We can change habits, and we can make a lot of changes. That's part of the spirit in man that God has given to us. We're sentient beings, and in addition to that, have the spirit of intelligence, the spirit that is in man, as it's called in the Bible, in several places. And we can do a lot.

So then I changed it to God is creating his character in us. That puts the emphasis on what God is doing. He's the potter with a clay, and that's better. And I just decided creating the character of God, because we're both involved in this creation. It does say that 1 Corinthians 5, you know, we're a new creation. It says a new creature. And both words can be translated both ways into English that way. But it's just... one of the aspects of the basic purposes of our existence has to do with the way of life, the most serious question, and that is, what is God looking for in us?

What does he want of us? So I have a few scriptures to just note quickly throughout the Bible, starting in Deuteronomy 10. And this is... and I'm not going to actually quote them, but just... this is chapter 10, verses 12 and following. And God says, and what is it that God is requiring of you, O Israel? And then points out... it's very, very simple. God wants us to do what he says, because when we do that, it will change our character.

If God is involved and we're obeying God, He is changing our character. He's creating in us, or creating us, what He wants. So what does God want? Well, He wants us to put Him first and just simply to love Him. I had a problem with this growing up, and for quite a while, it had to do with the idea of... we use love for many, many reasons. We love God. We love our church, but we also love our car, and we love our pizza. The word is ridiculous. We use over 100 different ways.

And so I had the Hollywood idea of love. You fall in love, and that's what love is. And so to love... I even had a hard time telling anybody that I loved them, because I was supposed to be one person, and that was supposed to be a certain kind of love. Hopefully holy and pure, but it might not be, but that was my idea. And that was running in my mind for a long time. That's a big part of our culture. And so what we have here is, of course, God says He is love, and He wants that kind of love back from us.

He says, I can do this. I can glorify you. I can make you different so you don't have all these downward pulls, and you become glorified. So that's what He asked. Deuteronomy 10 verse 12, following a wonderful scripture. I've read it here several times in services. Both churches here. I don't want to take the time to do it, but it's wonderful just to read through it. Oh, that's right. It's not so complicated, because our life quickly becomes complicated. That's why we're supposed to go back to God on our knees and straighten things out once a day.

At any rate, it's just wonderful scripture. Micah 6, 8 talks about love, mercy, and faith. It's simple. It's just really simple. Love and mercy and faith. Trouble is, it's hard to love when you're selfish. It's hard to give mercy when you're angry when somebody hurts you.

Everybody does have faith, but it's limited. You have to have help from God to build that into the strong and powerful trust and faith that God requires. So that's another one. Micah 6, verse 8. A major scripture.

Then we have a scripture that's paraphrased in the New Testament. Zechariah 8, verse 16. There are many of these. I'm just giving you a few. I'm saying them slow enough. If you want notes, you can keep them. They tell us, in this case, speak the truth and execute the judgment of truth and peace. In other words, be honest. Peace is in there, so it requires love, mercy, and faith. It's all real simple. It's different aspects of how God thinks, and He wants us to think in those ways. Hosea 7, verse 14, is another one. It's the opposite, actually.

God complains about Israel that you don't put your heart in your prayers and your insincere. You don't really mean it. So that's 7, verse 14. That's the opposite of what we're talking about. He's talking about the same subject, but this is the negative side. What does He want? Real sincerity in our prayers. We pray a prayer of 7 or 8 minutes in the morning. Or 3 minutes. You get up late, you don't have time to pray or study or eat breakfast. You just have to go. You have a short prayer that is direct, just heartfelt. It's like when a man said, tell God how you really feel. Don't tell Him how you know you're supposed to feel. Because we get into habits with everything, and we can just pray it can be just a habit. But make it just what you really are feeling. For example, David started out in a few prayers, Psalm 73, notably, he was in a rotten attitude. But he went and told God the truth about how he was feeling, and talked it through with God. By the end of the prayer, he goes through four stages. By the end of Psalm 73, he's got his mind straightened out again. Because he prayed sincerely, and didn't try to play games with God, who sees right through, knows what we're thinking anyway. So this faith, this real trust, which includes the love and the obedience for why we show our love and faith, at any rate, it's so important that Jesus found that, in Mark 6, verses 5-7, it says, Jesus could do no mighty work there. It was impossible for him even to do particular miracles that he would have done otherwise. So what does that mean? Since God isn't limited, and he has all power, and Jesus had all power to do it, part of it means, partly, there was nothing to respond to. He wanted to go out there and respond to the faith. We have examples where this one man was honest. He said, I believe, Lord. Please heal my daughter. I believe, Lord. When Christ asks him, well, do you have faith? Yes, but help my unbelief. You know, there's that faith is not stable. We're unstable beings. We are pushed here and there and have a lot working on us with Satan and his demons around. And they have the ability to put thoughts or ideas or sometimes even feelings. You don't even have to have a specific thought. But he couldn't do any mighty work. There's no faith to respond to. He did a few. It says he healed a few people in that town. That's all. But no mighty deeds he could have done if they had little faith. So, an interesting side point of that one is that that a false heart with God leads to false ideas, false doctrines and false action. It's just, you know, you have to be sincere or it's just going to mess everything up in your life. It will ruin your life. Matthew 23, 23. The weight of your matters of the law are mentioned as justice, mercy and faith. And actually, justice, mercy and faith is often compared to Micah. Love, mercy and faith. And with the overlapping, the fullness of the meaning there, it's the same thing. Now, here's something I'd like to read, and that's in John 4. So that's just a survey just to show that that's out there, that this concept is really major in the Bible. But I'd like to go to John 4 now and read a couple of verses. The Gospel of John.

And let's go to verse 23. And this is breaking in the middle. He says, salvation is of the Jews. He was talking about worshipping the Father. Verse 23, But the hour comes, and now is, John 4, 23, and now is, when true worshippers shall worship the Father in spirit and in truth. Worship includes, at that point, doing sacrifices, and it includes doing physical things. Well, we're worshipping now. We're coming to church, studying the Word of God, having sung praises to God, which is also worship. So, you can do those things, the physical things, but it needs to be backed up. It has to be backed up with the Spirit of the truth. It says, worship in spirit and in truth. But God's Spirit, For the Father seeks such to worship Him. I always thought this was a fascinating question. What does this mean? The Father seeks children to worship Him in spirit and in truth. What does that mean? He continues, God is a spirit, and they that worship Him must worship Him in spirit and in truth. We have to have the truth. We have to know Him, at least to some extent, and know who we're talking to, and what we are, and who we are, and so on. We have to be absolutely truthful with God, or it just isn't worthless. It's a waste of time in our lives.

We spend so much time as we go through our lives wasting our lives. But all that's important because we're coming to understand, going through Obey God, and He will change us, so we do have understanding. That process continues until the resurrection, when we are resurrected. When God is done with us. So, the answer here, what does this mean, is that it has to do with God's character. He seeks to build His character traits into us, so He wants to see them exhibited by us. And that's what He wants from us. There's an overview. There are a lot of specifics. But we see the character of God when He's perfect and absolutely faithful. And He is truth and love. The Scripture says Ephesians speaking of the truth and love. That's 415 of Ephesians, and we mentioned that recently, too. So, the character of God is spiritual strength, which has to be based on the recognition of truth. Or, in other words, that which is real. So, God is, you could say, big on truth. He says He speaks nothing but the truth, and He has truth, He owns truth, He gives truth, He enlightens us with truth, gives an understanding of truth as we obey Him, and put ourselves into that attitude of submission. It has to do with submission. So, all these things are great big words and really important things.

Thank you, I'm very best. I appreciate that. Now, honey is warm, or at least has a coat on, so... And Judd has jumped up, and he's the technician working on the mystery... We have a mystery thermometer or thermostat over there that we all play with and haven't learned yet. Anyway, thank you, Judd.

Okay, so all these big words describing God, they're huge. We have some understanding of the greatness, and we... And that's what God wants from us. This attitude of just seeing the whole picture, having the truth, ordering our lives like God tells us to, which results in just loving God. You see God working in your life and around your life and others as well, and you develop...

You must develop, if you see just this enormous respect, and that moves and changes as God works with us, and as we continue in that attitude of submission and trust and faith. He just changes us. He's the one that does this change. It moves in the direction of greater understanding, and the respect turns to love, and even concern for his feelings sometimes.

We think of him as so great, but he has feelings. He talks about his feelings. And finally, you come up with just an absolute devotion to God because he is so great. And like Psalm 117 says, this is the one I mentioned to you some time back, that... Psalm 117, Psalm 117, that I had memorized, and I'm not so sure of it right now, so I'm going to read it to be sure, but I was proud of myself having memorized this entire song. Some of you are laughing. Remember we were talking about it. In one sitting, the whole song... Here it is, two verses, the shortest psalm in the Bible.

This is just an overview of the whole book of Psalms. And you see that mercy being extended over and over and over. God helping you over and over and over. You know, you're not worthy of yourself at all, but how good God is. And even if you're in a bad attitude, or even if you just messed up pretty big, God is just the same. The goal hasn't changed. Your goal hasn't changed. His... as the potter, His idea of what you are going to be hasn't changed.

And He is competent, He is capable, and He is doing it. So there are many sins and many goofs and many repentances and many kindnesses and mercies that God gives to us. It says, for His merciful kindness is great toward us. And that's why we should praise the Lord all you nations and all you people.

Meaning peoples of the world. And not necessarily dividing Him down into political definitions. He says, His merciful kindness is great toward us, and the truth of the Lord endures forever. So He has those two elements. Speaking of truth and love. His merciful kindness. You see that. And then it just finishes the Psalm. Praise you, the Lord.

There's no other conclusion. And you come to where you do love God. And so my concept and many others about limited knowledge or confused knowledge of what exactly love is. Can be healed. Can be straightened out. And you can learn. Love is outgoing, concerned. And at the basis or down to the root and the core of love. All different kinds of love. It is outgoing, concerned. There's true concern. You might not even like somebody. They're just acting up or maybe you don't know them. You think they're awful. And they probably are if you think so. You think of politicians. Don't want to beat up on just one group.

We humans are awful. And you might know somebody who's just letting that go. And not like them at all and not want to see them coming, but you care for them. And you want to see them have you. You see the potential. You see what they're coming to. And that's godly love. And so that changes your actions and your prayers and everything in your life and acting with other people is that genuine outgoing concern. We certainly have incoming concern. We should. We should love ourselves. We're supposed to have the same attitude towards us ourselves as God does towards us.

So we have to love ourselves and have the respect for the responsibilities and what we are. Children of God. So what does God need most in a prospective family member? We are all prospective members of God's family.

In fact, he is so powerful and has things so much in hand. In Romans 4.17, he says, he calls things that are not yet as though they were already happening. It's so sure they're going to happen. And that is that he is going to glorify his saints and he is going to be working on them all the way up until the resurrection and get everybody to where he wants us.

One neat thing, I think. I didn't understand this originally. I just had to...he'll bring me up. I'm way behind, but he's got to bring me up to perfection right before I die. The second before I die, because in the resurrection, he's going to resurrect no imperfect children. And that's not really true. I don't have to do it.

It goes back to who's doing it. God's doing it. So you die and let's say you have one or another problem. Maybe just a couple, right? Okay. And you're not ready for the resurrection at all. It doesn't matter, because when God brings you up, he brings up what he has created. He brings up the being that he has created. And you still have salvaged this and pride and everything else. You still have those things. But you have been striving to obey him, and so that has enabled him to lock in and create that godly character. And so I said, creating the character of God, that's what God does. But it starts with...we have our part, for sure.

And I did think I'd mention one sermon I gave in the reaction to it. This was in Wisconsin Dells many, many years ago. And it was...I used the term, we've got it made. Because if God is for us, and who judged us, and Christ is for us, who gave his life for us, and go through Romans 28, all those things. And he has promised, and we are doing our best, despite failures, we're trying to keep his law in all the particulars, as well as just the general law of love, then we've got it made.

Otherwise, nobody has any hope, because nobody's going to get all the way to perfect. And this one man, a friend of mine, liked each other, had many good times, he decided that's just wrong. We never have it made, because we preach quite a bit about the once saved, always saved. Say the words, like magic words. I repent of my sins, and want to be in your kingdom, or in your family, or whatever, and then I'm baptized, you've done what's...no, that's what you do.

It's really important, but that's not who does the creating. God does the creating. And so, if you think I'm harping on this, I know I am, because I've mentioned this several times in the last few years, this particular thing, more than before that. Because this formula takes away the guilt, and the worry, and increases your joy, and you get to relax more knowing that God is for me. I'm going to make it, because I'm not giving up, I'm going to turn aside, turn my back, and I might, through weakness, or forgetfulness, or goofiness, or whatever it might be, make a lot of mistakes.

I'm not turning my back on you. I'm in it forever, because that's life. That's our very life. In that sense, we have it made, but He took great exception and did not want me to say the words, even though I explained to me He agreed with that. So I didn't, to Him. But just to...if you haven't explained, you should be able to see through that. We don't have it made in the sense of, once saved, always saved, just saved the words, and you've got it made. No, we have our part. It's continual. It's daily. But it doesn't depend on us for success. That is what comes from God. So...a little more here...

Okay.

This goes directly to unity. In other words, if we have the same attitude that God has and His Spirit, we're going to be in unity with God. There is a spiritual unity where you have the same goals and the same purpose. This requires you to have the truth or a basis for understanding that. Same goals and same purposes that God has, and also the same values and methods, the what and how. In other words, the character of God, the stuff you are made of, what you are at your core.

So God is interested in that. He said, I give rain to the just, God gives rain to the just and the unjust. And He is kind to those and wants us to be, even when they are mean to Him. Most of humanity is really disrespectful and flat out mean to God. And even when we are impolite, we slip and don't mean to be, but it is really disrespectful that thought or whatever.

God is, He forgives and He has that love that is outgoing completely, doesn't worry about Himself. So Christ, of course, was the perfect human example of that. And He was following His Father's example of just being so totally caring for others that He was able to just give His physical life. That is very, very hard. He was following the Father's example when He did that. Another way of approaching the... It looks like I skipped a part. I don't know that I really want to go back. It was about coming into God's Kingdom and the purpose of it being to make God's Kingdom greater, God's Family greater, because we are adding ourselves to it.

And so, that is a real important point, but let's move on here. Another way of approaching the same issue is a question. How can God prevent another Lucifer or a rebel, a Satan, in His Kingdom?

How can He prevent another rebel or Satan to be in His Kingdom? And this is worth our thinking about, because it shows something about human government. We're right in the middle of a kind of an exciting time of restoring some things, the restitution of certain laws and such that are good for the country. So, we're seeing that to a small degree. But this government is missing some vital, important things, the real important things. And so, there will be an improvement as a result of this government, apparently.

It's because they make things go the way they want, because they're just following more closely God's laws, the rule of law, and things like that. But the real answer will not be brought by the United States of America. The United States proposes that we can bring the Kingdom of God, perfection. We can perfect government without God. People don't think of it that way, but that's what it is.

The United States is a counterfeit. It's one of the best, I think, the best so far that I am aware of. And a lot of people say, this is the best. I believe that they're right. As far as an attempt to do this, we'll fail.

We'll have to fail, because we have to learn the big lesson, which is that God is running the show, and we can't do it ourselves. Even if we have God's law, which is we have a lot of God's law in the United States Code, and not to mention a lot of baloney, but there's poison in the well. There are false concepts and laws and ideas.

And so we and everybody else must learn that lesson. We have to have God doing it. But here's the question, how can we prevent this? And this is what all physical governments do. That is, to be absolutely sure, you would have to take away the ability to make personal choices, because everybody has to be in unity.

And if you're the guy in charge, the government in charge, then you try to make everybody do what you want. That's what human government does. And God prophesied about it, but anyway, that's what human government does. To take away freedom of thought, free moral agency, God could have created it so he couldn't sin. We just couldn't do it. And he would have everybody doing right. And it wouldn't get his goal done at all.

So if you took the personal choice away from people, freedom of thought, free moral agency, you would have to engage in controlling the thought and behavior of a whole nation. And God, it would seem, to the human mind, would have to do that and control everybody's thought to a major extent, billions and billions of people. And of course he could.

He could have created it so we couldn't sin. But then what kind of family would have had? He wouldn't have had a family of God beings, God-level beings, who are right and do right and would never go back and turn away from the right because they had been changed. They had been recreated through this process that we're going through of striving to obey and letting God change it so that we have a hand in our own creation of our character and therefore we have the reason we are perfect and right in God's kingdom is that we have chosen that and we have the character to never go back and it's our own thought.

It's not just God's thoughts imposed on us. That is just one of the greatest insights that we can have. Basically, you can't do it your way. It has to be God's way. That's why the idea of submission... I'd like to cover that. I'm not sure how many sermons I'll have left, but I'm going to try to cover that anyway.

I'll speak from time to time after that, too. But that's so important, the idea of submission to God. That's why it's so important. He says, all through the Old New Testament, it shows a lot of examples of what happens if you don't, some of what happens if you do, and constant reminders to obey God. It's because, as he said in Deuteronomy, He's giving you these laws for your good so that you can live.

It's a huge leap to take what you think is right and realize is wrong and say, okay, I'm going to do it your way. That is faith. Not perfect faith, maybe, but that takes a lot. So, the only way... I heard this as a boy. This is a 65-year-old or 70-year-old statement that I heard. God's... I'm not sure of the years, but somewhere in there... God, in order to make sure that he would have a family like himself, with that power and strength of mind, He decided that the way to do it is to put himself, part of himself, in each of us.

So, that's what it talks about in John 17, spiritual unity, being in unity and glorifying us. Paul talks about this quite a bit. It says, then comes the end. This is 1 Corinthians 15, verse 24. I'll read a couple of verses and then verse 28. Then comes the end, 1 Corinthians 15, 24. When he shall have delivered up the kingdom to God, even the Father, when he shall have put down all the rule and all authority, all the rebels, and he only has people that agree, for he must rule until he has put all enemies under his feet.

And there's no saying, you know, the best way to destroy an enemy is to make him a friend. You know, change his heart so he becomes friends. So, then verse 28 here, 1 Corinthians 15. And when all things shall be subdued unto him, then shall the Son also himself be subject unto him, that put all things under him. God put everything under the Son's charge, project man. And so then Christ gets that done and turns around and presents it to God, and is subject to the Father.

He said, the Father is greater than I. And so, continue here. Put all things under him, that God may be all in all. Or as it says in Ephesians 4, there's one Father who is above all and through all and in you all. So, we're talking of physical concepts. That's how we're told that God is in all of us, not in some magical way, but in the fact that his thoughts, which is also called the mind of Christ, his thoughts actually have become ours.

We look at it the same way, we have the same values, the same truth that God owns. And we have bought that concept and just taken it in and it has become ourselves. So, I'm going to skip over some of my notes that I don't need here. I want to make this point. Oh, well. So, glory is defined in John 17. I go over this many times.

I talk about us being one and one in each other. The Father, the Son, and each of us all together. We're all members of each other. We all are in each other in terms of the Spirit of God. And this is such a major thing. It's a hard thing to understand. It's so important that it's called a mystery. How can God take physical man, be in man, and glorify the same person? That's the mystery. But he just tells us, I guess, the steps and the way it's done and we have to experience how it is done.

So, glory is defined as being at one or in atonement, as it were, in complete and perfect agreement. And this has to do with taking the original attitude that Jesus Christ and the Father had for each other. That is just absolute faith. It's, by the way, the picture for the idea of marriage. Just faith and trusting each other. Just devoted to each other. It's a good example of that. Given for us, actually, the institution was given for us to get the idea. But this attitude of total love, this relationship of love, loyalty we call sideways or lateral loyalty. There's up and down, vertical loyalty to God and Him to us, but there's lateral loyalty to each other. This relationship of love and loyalty and unity that existed between Jesus Christ and the Father was so strong that both the Father and the Son had absolute confidence and trust so much that the other would come through perfectly as their plan to give us salvation and life unfolded. They just had no doubts, and therefore Christ didn't have doubts when He gave up His own life as a physical person. He said, Whoa, let me think about this. He had to go back and pray to God for an hour three times. Now, just reviewing everything. Because remember, I'm weak. And I don't know what all the details of that, of their personal relationship, that would be so interesting to know, and we will be able to know it. But He had no doubts when He decided and walked on down and talked to Pilate and did the things that required them by law, by their wrong laws, to kill Him. Because that sacrifice had to be made. That's what you call absolute faith. Absolute faith gave us life. So how's your faith doing? Where is it? Since I know everybody in the room, at least a little bit, but most of it quite a bit, I am pretty sure that I know where your faith stands. If you think it's right about here, say, this is your level of faith, there it is. You're probably well above that. Because we are so conscious of our shortcomings and know where we'll act. And sometimes I know I like the faith to do that. No, I should, but I don't. I'm going to have to do that. And thoughts like that. We're so conscious of those things. Showing that we are trying to follow God and do what pleases Him. So it's not just crossing the, you know, do that, do that, but we obey, as John says, we obey His laws. We obey Him and do those things that please Him. So we're going way over what's required. We're trying to really please God. If you're doing that, your faith is probably higher and stronger than you have estimated. I don't want you to get, nobody get a big head. None of us can do that. But that's a comforting thought, you know. If you are trying, then God is helping you. And He's confident and capable of finishing this job and bringing us through.

So, one other point that's in line, I just mentioned this one other. There is an Acts 3.21, I didn't read it, but it talks about Christ, whom the heaven must receive, until the times of restitution of all things, which God has spoken of by the mouth of His holy prophet since the world began. Restoration and restitution. Have you ever thought of what the most important first thing to be restored in the time of restitution of all things is? What's the number one thing that has to be restored when you restore or restitute it?

You're bringing back things that were just like they were. That's what it's talking about. And it goes back to what we've been talking about, the relationship between Jesus Christ and the Father and the absolute strength. Not really, really, really, really, really strong, greatly, powerfully strong, times ten. Not just the absolute strength of truth, and so you know it, that Christ and the Father had between themselves to go through this plan.

And you think of Christ giving of His life, but the Father gave up the only other friend He had on that level ever. It was a huge chance they took if they were humans. They're God. They didn't take a chance. There was no doubt. There was no doubt. Have any doubts in your relationships? We were trying to strengthen our relationships all the time.

And humans have to be held up, but that's the first thing. It just has to be there, that trust and faith, which is where we started a while ago when I started the sermon. So that God may be all in all is a super important concept. It has to do with God being in us and Him putting His thoughts into our minds in a permanent way. There's an interesting, well, not just interesting, but a very teachable concept in Exodus 21. I went over this very thoroughly, this particular verse, in a sermon 21 years ago that I gave to you.

And that was the concept of the permanent slave. The slave says he's being turned out. He's been there six years, seven years, seven years of freedom. And he's being set up with an income or a place to dwell, a job, and whatever, everything he needs.

So he'll have some substance to start with, not just kicked out of the prison with 25 bucks on his hand. But really set up. And he says, I don't want to leave my master. And of course, there was also, he had decided to have a family in that household. So he would have to have the money to pay him by his wife back and then his children, whatever.

That is a complication we don't have to worry about. But he says, I love it here. I don't want to leave my master. I want to keep this job for the rest of my life. And I love my wife and my family. You know, that might have been part of the case. And I don't want to leave my fellow workers the whole thing.

This is the life that he wants. And in order to do that and make that official, it said they had to have a ceremony. And he had to have his ear bored through with all. Sounds awful, right? First you got to put it in the heat, like a branding iron for a cow.

Then you take it out and you, you don't need to stick it through the, that's, nah. They do this all the time in shopping malls. It's called piercing your ears. They have the fewest nerves there in that part of your ears, any part of your body, I understand. And so they would maybe do it with a small one and then with a large one. It would hurt a little bit. And that hole in his ear, I don't know if they'd wear a ring, but that would show it.

He had gone through this ceremony. He was absolutely dedicated to this one master. He and his family, all his fellow workers, that's what he chose forever. Does that remind you of anything? Like being brought into the kingdom of God and deciding to be a permanent slave, submitting and asking for God's will, even when I don't think it's the best thing to do. Certainly not what I want to do. And just doing it anyway, because I chose this master. This master has life for me.

And I want that life. So it's a beautiful ceremony. And I just bring it up to make a point of this. What God wants, what does he want? I read Deuteronomy 10 and several scriptures there. What he wants is what you've already been taught and heard, and probably taught your kids if you have them. I was taught as a kid, as a young person in the church. It's absolutely true.

God first knew what God says. If God says to do that, do it. This is a hard thing. You won't be good at it at first, I'm sure. This has to do with knowing the truth and receiving God's attitude, His Spirit, and asking God to continually build that into you. It actually ties into 2 Timothy 1, verse 7, which is really important for us to pray about this verse. But he says, you haven't been given a spirit of fear, but a spirit of power and of love and of a sound mind. And that's what we're talking about, this whole thing.

The slave that goes through the puncturing his ear with an all, or every single Christian that goes through the change from being your own person in self-will and wanting to do it my way, was really driven and purposed, such a will, to do things God's way, and to therefore develop this sound mind that God has, called the mind of Christ, and the thoughts of God the Father. And that's the answer. That's what God wants. I ask, what does God want from us to be in His kingdom? He wants us to love Him and put Him first before everything.

We show this by our obedience, and by our obedience we show that love and our faith, the faith that's required for salvation. So there's love and faith and obedience, and you come to the sound mind of the Holy Spirit, so that you can make all the rest of your decisions from here on out in your life. Make them better and better, and just make it God's way. Well, I've confessed to nagging you about this. I've mentioned this subject several times the last few years. But it's just so important to see that God is changing us from the inside out.

It's not something we haven't heard, and we can probably explain it three or four different ways. Every one of us just, I'm just reminding everybody, it's so important. It's a first step to our lives in the kingdom, and coincidentally, it happens to be a good first step for preparing for Passover, which is coming up. So, God bless you. Thanks for joining us. Thanks for coming to the services of the Church of God. What a blessing it is, and happy Sabbath to everybody.