Living an Abundant Life in Balance with God, Part 2

Thank you, Mark. Thank you very much. Well, we're going to go into part two of our seminar and our presentation today. And there was a time in the New Testament on the day of Pentecost when a group of individuals heard a very inspiring sermon by the Apostle Peter. And at the end of it, they were convicted that they needed to make some changes in their lives. So this is what happened. Now, when they heard this, they were cut to the heart and said to Peter and the rest of the apostles, men and brethren, what shall we do? So if we want to have, if we desire to have, an abundant life in balance with God, there are certain things that we need to do to maximize our lives, to tap into that spiritual dimension that I mentioned earlier. So what we're going to do in the second portion of the seminar is we're going to look at nine keys to living an abundant life in balance with God. And each one of these keys are important. And one at a time, these keys unlock a knowledge or a special truth that help us to draw closer to God, that move us from maybe being far away from God, but just having an interest and maybe just getting our attention to slowly but surely moving closer and closer and closer until we literally have an intimate relationship with the great creator. So here's key number one of the nine keys. Make a conscious choice to learn about God and to know Him. I am just amazed in my discussions with people in the world how many people never think about God. They never think about their existence. They never think about why were they born. They never think about spirituality. They are so wrapped up in do-do-do. They are so wrapped up in just their lives that they don't take time to stop and think it through and think about life. And God understood the way human beings are, but we are reminded of this in the book of Psalms. Realize that the Lord alone is God. He made us and we are His. We are not here by accident. We are His people and His sheep in His care. Enter His gates with a song of thanksgiving. Come into His courtyards with a song of praise. Give thanks to Him. Praise His name. So again, we need to make a conscious choice to say, I want to know God. I want to begin making an effort and doing things to draw closer to God. Unless we make that choice, nothing else will happen. All of the other keys are invalid if we don't make His first choice and turn this key. In Deuteronomy, God said to the nation of Israel, today I ask heaven and earth to be a witness. I am offering you life or death, blessings or curses. Now choose life. He's saying please make the right decision.

Choose to receive blessings. Choose to be fulfilled. Choose to enjoy the fullness of this life that I offer you and beyond. Verse 20, to choose life is to love the Lord your God, obey Him and stay close to Him. So again, if we don't make that choice, if we don't put that key in and turn it and open that door and make that commitment and say, I want to know God, then all the other keys that I'm about to mention mean nothing. They're not going to change your life. They're not going to have any effect on you at all. Here's key number two. Repentance. That sounds like a biblical phrase. It's the next essential key because it establishes the right relationship. God is almighty. He is omnipotent. He is great. I am nothing. I am fleshly. I am carnal and without His grace I cannot survive. It is by the grace of God that I have, all that I have.

Repentance means to confess our sins to God and to begin a spiritual journey of change and spiritual growth. From a religious sense, repentance means that we were walking in a direction away from God and we were doing the kind of things we shouldn't have been doing, maybe the kind of thoughts that we shouldn't be having. And we decide through repentance that we're going to turn around and we're going to go the other way and we're going to walk toward God and His values and His way of life instead of trying to run away from Him all of the time. That's what the word repentance means. In Mark's account of the Gospel, Chapter 1, now after John was put in prison, Jesus came to Galilee preaching the Gospel of the Kingdom of God. The good news that in spite of all we see in our world today, that Jesus Christ is going to return and at that return there is going to be a resurrection that occurs of all of the faithful throughout the ages who had been in Christ. And they will meet Him in the air and return to this earth to establish the government of God. And together they will change the history of this world forever. And all the nations and all the man-made philosophies and all the things, the terrible things we see in our world today, the violence, the war, the manipulation of people, all of that will end when there is a righteous government established on this earth by Jesus Christ Himself. The time is fulfilled and the Kingdom of God is at hand. Repent and believe the Gospel. And of course part of that Gospel message is that Jesus Christ is King and Savior and will return to earth to establish that Kingdom. So notice the word repent. Change your life. Turn around and head toward God instead of walking away from Him. As so many in the world do today.

Acts 2 and verse 38. Then Peter said to them, this was his response to their original question, What shall we do? He said, Repent and let every one of you be baptized into the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit is what gives us that spiritual dimension. So it allows us to look at our existence in 3D, in stereo vision. And without it, we're disconnected from God. There are actually three important elements in this scripture. The first one is to repent. We've already talked about that. The next one is to be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ. And of course, baptism is symbolic of our old human nature and our old self being put to death in a watery grave. And when we repent, we accept Jesus Christ as our Savior. We ask that His shed blood cleanse us from our sins. We go down in that watery grave in that baptismal tank and we come out as a new creature, as something brand new, forgiven, sinless, and ready to embark on a new journey in our existence.

And then the third thing that occurs is receiving the gift of the Holy Spirit. Of course, we do it through a very beautiful ceremony, biblically oriented, called the laying on of hands in which we ask God to give His Holy Spirit to someone who's recently been baptized. So that was key number two. Key number three. Accept Jesus Christ as your personal Savior, your Lord, your Master, and soon coming King. Isaiah chapter 9 and verse 6, the birth of Jesus Christ, was prophesied, His birth and His life in His kingdom, all summed up in a very beautiful scripture by the prophet Isaiah. Chapter 9 verse 6, For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given, and the government will be upon his shoulder. That's referring to the soon coming government of God. And His name will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace, and of the increase of His government and peace, there will be no end. So beginning in Jerusalem when Jesus Christ returns with His resurrected saints, the truth and knowledge of God will begin from there and will eventually encircle the entire earth and will overwhelm every culture, every nation, every religion that exists in the world at that time will be absorbed by the increase of the government of God. Acts chapter 4 and verse 10, Let it be known to all of you and to all the people of Israel that by the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth whom you crucified whom God raised from the dead by Him this man stands before you whole. And this was after a healing had occurred. The disciples had precipitated a healing of an individual and were questioned about it. In verse 11, This is the stone which was rejected by you builders which has become the chief cornerstone.

Nor is there salvation in any other for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved. There's a lot of wisdom in the world but understanding Confucius will not provide salvation. Understanding the life and the writings of Muhammad will not provide salvation. The only thing that provides salvation is accepting Jesus Christ as our Lord and Savior, His shed blood for the remission of our sins and as a response to that to be committed disciples to follow the example of Jesus Christ in the rest of our lives. So here's key number four of the nine. You are not alone. God gives us two great mentors as a personal gift. When we get to the point where we repent of our sins and we are baptized, we are not abandoned, we are not isolated, we are not all by ourselves. God gives us two wonderful mentors to help us on this journey so that we can share our lives and our experiences. The first is the Holy Spirit. John chapter 14 and verse 14, Jesus said, if you ask anything in my name, I will do it. If you love me, keep my commandments. Remember earlier I talked about the importance of God's value system, how we need to know and understand what His values are? Those are included in His commandments. Verse 16, I will pray the Father and He will give you another helper, a comforter. He will actually give us the power of God that both Jesus Christ and the Father share. We will actually have, when you receive the Holy Spirit, a little bit of Jesus Christ and the Father within us through the presence and power of that gift, the power of the Holy Spirit. The Spirit of truth whom the world cannot receive because it neither sees Him nor knows Him, but you know Him for He dwells with you and will be in you.

At this point, the disciples were being led by the Holy Spirit. It wouldn't be until the day of Pentecost that the Holy Spirit would literally reside in them. That's what Jesus meant by this phrase. Notice verse 18, I will not leave you orphans. I will come to you. So the first mentor that we are given, because we don't have to be in our journey alone, is the gift of the Holy Spirit, the very power and presence of God that enters our lives. Hebrews chapter 10 and verse 23.

Here is another very special mentor that we are given if we're wise enough to take advantage of it.

Many people today, they don't want to come to church. Many people don't want to be associated with anyone who comes to church. You may or may not have heard the story of the mother who walked in one day and suddenly pulled the covers off her son, flashed the lights on. She said, okay, that's it. Get out of bed. You're going to be late. You got to get to church. He said, Mom, I hate church. I don't want to go to church. She said, you need to go to church. Now get out of that bed. He said, give me two good reasons why I should go to church. She said, number one, you're 45 years old and it's about time that you made a commitment. Number two, she said, you're the pastor and people are waiting for you there. So the author of the book of Hebrews addresses the fact that God has called us to be part of a family and we need to be assembling. We need to be fellowshiping and loving other people who also love us in return and can share our burdens and encourage us.

Let us hold firmly to the hope that we, notice plural, a group, have confessed because we can trust God to do what He promised. Let us think about each other and help each other to show love and to do good deeds. You should not stay away from church meetings as some are doing, but you should meet together and encourage each other. I can't encourage you if I'm home alone. You can't encourage me if you're home alone. We should never discard the second great mentor that we are offered by God on our journey because we don't have to be alone. We don't have to go through the struggle of this life and the struggle of human flesh all by ourselves. God has created a family for us, a team to love us and to help us on that journey. So continuing here, do this even more as you see the day approaching, obviously referring to the second coming of Christ as world events ratchet up, as the world becomes more violent, as people become more self-absorbed and selfish more than ever before. We need to meet and share our experiences with people of like mind. So the gift of the church is a spiritual and a physical mentor. So again, that was key number four. God's two great mentors as a personal gift. Key number five is desire the very presence of God in your daily life. That means we have to make an effort to connect with God every day, at least in some way. That means taking time out to pray to God. That means taking time out to study our Bibles. Now I'm not one of those who sets a clock and says that someone should study for 30 minutes a day or someone should pray. I'm going to tell you an honest story. I began coming into the church. I was 17 years old when I my eyes were open and I understood God's way of life. And I was told by my preacher that I needed to pray for 30 minutes every day because that's what we were taught back then. So I set my little alarm clock and I had that sitting there.

And I prayed and I prayed and I prayed about my girlfriend and I who was now my wife. And I prayed about my job and I prayed about my family and I prayed about every church member that I knew was sick. And I prayed about everything I could possibly pray about and I opened my eye up a little bit and I looked into the clock and I only had 29 minutes left. So God is interested in quality. He's not interested in quantity. He doesn't want us to punch a clock but he does want us to connect each and every day with our loving Father and have a little chat with him and open his word up and allow him to talk back to us and teach us and inform us. So desire the presence of God in your daily life. We don't want to be the kind of people that only one day a week we get around to thinking about God and then the other six days of the week people couldn't tell us from our neighbor.

We don't want to be that kind of a people. We want to be a kind of a people who are close to our Father each and every day of the week. Tap into the power of the Holy Spirit. Again, because it changes who and what we are. It gives us that spiritual dimension so that we can look at our lives in 3D and no longer just in the flat secular vision of this world with limited to our human senses. John 14, verse 21, he who has my commandments and keeps them, there's God's value system again, it is he who loves me and he who loves me will be loved by my Father and I will love him and manifest myself to him. Judas, not as scary, it said to him, Lord, how is it that you will manifest yourself to us and not to the world? So being a little skeptical, Judas says, what are you going to do that's going to make a difference in my life? How am I going to be any different than that guy out there or that guy over there? How are you going to manifest yourself in my own life? And Jesus says in verse 23, Jesus answered and said to him, if anyone loves me, he will keep my word, there's that value system again, and my Father will love him and we, that's he and the Father will come to him and make our home with him. And that is what happens when we receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. It's a gift because we can't earn it. We don't deserve it. It is purely from God's grace and love that he gives us that very special presence that he and his son share in our lives, that powerful presence, the very same spirit that at the formation of the earth hovered upon the waters. And when the voice spoke, that very power created and fashioned the world that we see and we know of today, that very same spirit can reside in us because it comes from the Father and the Son. 2 Corinthians 5 and verse 17, therefore if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. Our attitudes can change. We can have a new attitude. We can look at life from a fresh, positive perspective. We see a future. We understand that God has a plan and a purpose in our life, and even the bad things that happen to us we can learn from and can serve us in a great way if our attitudes are healthy and right. They can help us to grow, help us to change.

So we become a new creation, and that is symbolized by coming out of that baptismal tank and literally coming out of the grave, that watery grave, and entering a new phase of our life, a spiritual dimension in which we desire to become more like Jesus Christ, in which we desire to learn about the values of the Father. Now all things are of God who has reconciled us to Himself through Jesus Christ, of course that's through His shed blood, and has given us the ministry of reconciliation. So Jesus Christ reconciled us to the Father, and we should follow suit by doing everything we can to be peacemakers, to have our own little ministry of reconciliation, and have a peaceful church, and peaceful friends, and people who share the good news of the kingdom together in a peaceful way. Key number six. God wants us to be all in and not cafeteria Christians. What is a cafeteria Christian? Also, I've heard it called smorgasbord Christian. It's that I will pick and choose what I want to believe. God, through His word, He reveals all of these are truths and doctrines from His word. Well, this one's fun. So I'll take this one. This one doesn't require any personal sacrifice on my part. Okay, I'll accept that one. But this one's hard. I actually have to talk to people. Oh, no, thank you. This one requires a sacrifice of my time, a sacrifice of my life in some way. Oh, that's too uncomfortable. No, thank you. Well, my friends, if we have that kind of an attitude, a barrier still exists between us and God. And we cannot experience the richness of that spiritual dimension if we are cafeteria Christians, if we've decided to believe and live by the things that we like, but have rejected the difficult things. Because we have to be all in. God wants us to be obedient to His laws, to His values, to His way of life. Acts 5 and verse 30, the God of our fathers raised up Jesus, whom you murdered by hanging on a tree, speaking to the Jews, and Him, God has exalted to His right hand the be prince and Savior to give repentance to Israel and forgiveness of sins. And we are as witnesses to these things, and also is the Holy Spirit whom God has given to those whom obey Him. Why would we believe that God would give us the gift of the Holy Spirit? He would give the Holy Spirit to a person who is rebellious. Why do we think that God would give such power that emanates and is shared by the Father and the Son to someone who is not committed, to someone who does not want to live by God's way of life? God doesn't want to create any kind of a being with that kind of a mindset or attitude. It is given to those who obey Him. 1 John, chapter 5, verses 3 through 5, for this is the love of God that we keep His commandments. There's that value system again.

And His commandments are not burdensome, for whoever is born of God overcomes the world, and this is the victory that has overcome the world, our faith. If we want to have victory, it's because of our faith that God created the world. Our victory is because we understand that Jesus Christ was the Son of God who has existed forever, who shed Himself of His glory about 2000 years ago, and because of love, came down to this earth and lived a perfect life as a human being, and willingly submitted Himself to be tortured, to be crucified, and His blood is shed so that you and I could be saved from our sins. Now, how is that possible? Well, because Jesus Christ is the Creator, the value of His life as the Creator was worth more than the totality of all human sins that have ever been committed. The shed blood of the Creator Himself is of greater value than all of human sin. So His one sacrifice once and for all was able to atone for all human sin that could ever be committed. So our faith is our victory. It's our faith that gives us confidence of knowing who and what God is. It's our faith that gives us that understanding to seek and live in that spiritual dimension. It's our faith that we understand that Jesus Christ died for our sins, and we have been offered salvation. It's our faith in knowing that our lives have purpose and meaning, and that God is putting us through the experiences we need to change us and to mold us and to train us so that we can be faithful servants and kings and priests in His kingdom forever. Who is He who overcomes the world but He who believes that Jesus is the Son of God?

Key number seven. Growth and maturity is a process, not an event. I can remember the child. I always grew up in a religious family. I was a Methodist until I was in my teens, but I can also remember as a young boy, my grandmother taking me some tent meetings where there were altar calls.

And the problem that I saw with that whole concept is that change is a process, not an event. People would hear something and they would be emotionally pulled and it might shed a few tears, and they would walk down the center aisle and they were told that something happened in their life and they were given a booklet. And unfortunately, they went home and within a few days they had the same lives they had before they ever went to that service. Why? Because they were deceived into thinking that change is an event. Change is something that we experience through time.

God patiently loves us and He helps us to grow and change throughout the rest of our lives when we have Christ in us. And we have to be patient with ourselves because we'll make mistakes and we have to be patient with God because sometimes He will correct us in ways that are not pleasant. He will allow things to happen to us that we don't like. Perhaps it'll be diseases. Maybe we'll get fired from a job. Maybe our spouse will give us trouble. Whatever it is, we have to be patient with ourselves and patient with God because change is a process, not an event.

Paul understood this when he wrote the congregation in Galatia. He said, But the Spirit, that's that Holy Spirit within us that is a gift from the Father, shared by the Father and the Son, produces the fruit of, and these are the qualities, and these take time. They take a lifetime. Love and joy and peace and patience, kindness, goodness, gentleness, faithfulness, and self-control. And all of that takes time.

And we, when we meet with people of like mind, we will meet with some who are growing in this area, and they may be weak in some of these fruits. And we may be weak in some of the other fruit, of the Spirit. We need to love one another. We need to be patient with one another. And we need to understand that it takes time to grow and to change our lives. So that's an important key. Don't become impatient with yourself and give up. Don't become impatient with God and quit. Stay on the right course and allow God to help you to grow. 2 Peter 3, verse 17. Therefore, dear friends, since you already know this, be on your guard so that you may not be carried away by the error of lawless men and fall from your secure position, but grow in the grace and the knowledge of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. To him be glory both now and forever. So this journey that we are on is a growth process. And we'll make mistakes. And we'll fall back and do some things we shouldn't do. And that's when, once again, we repent. And we go to God and ask him for help and ask him for strength. And we process what we did wrong and why. And we get up and we keep moving forward in faith, knowing that God loves us, that God is working with us, and over the process of time is helping us to grow and change into the kind of people, again, that can be part of his family and serve humanity forever. Key number eight is to grasp your destiny. If you were starting a business today, they would ask you what your vision statement is. That vision statement is that statement that inspires you and motivates you to keep going forward, no matter what obstacles you run into. Well, we have a vision statement. Here's one given to us in 1 Corinthians chapter 15 from the translation God's Word for Today. This body that decays must be changed into a body that cannot decay. I mentioned earlier about how we all have a physical flesh. We're like tents. And we are all slowly but surely we are wearing out. And we need to shed this for something far better. The mortal body must be changed into a body that will live forever. And of course, in context here, Paul is talking about what happens at the time of that great resurrection of believers when Jesus Christ returns. Those who are in Christ will experience this. That's inspiring. That's encouraging. God has a future for you.

Revelation chapter 20 verses 4 and 5, and I saw thrones, and they saddened them, and judgment was committed to them, and they lived and reigned with Christ for a thousand years. Again, these are the saints that are resurrected at the time that Jesus Christ returns to earth, meet Him in the air and return to establish the kingdom of God. And they will reign with Him. They will be administrators and leaders and priests and mentors and coaches to the nations of this world so that everyone can learn about God and His kingdom.

First Corinthians chapter 2 and verse 9. Here's the reality of it. The most gifted speaker in the world couldn't even scratch the surface of the incredible things that God has planned for us. Human, any human language, is incapable of describing the joy and the blessings and the destiny that God has planned for us. That's exactly what Paul tells us here. However, as it is written, no eye has seen, no ear has heard, no mind has conceived what God has prepared for those who love Him.

Now, if you'll please indulge me for a minute, I'm going to step out on a little bit of speculation. I'd like to tie in what we talked about earlier in the first presentation. Remember all of those galaxies where there was no sign of life? Remember what Professor Cox said, that in his opinion, that we are unique, that nowhere in the universe will you find life like exists on planet earth? Remember that he said that? Indulge me for a minute as I speculate about something. This is from NBC News, an article from a few months ago.

It says, space is vast, but it may not be so lonely after all. A study finds that the Milky Way is teeming with billions of planets that are about the size of earth, orbit stars just like our sun, and exist in the Goldilocks zone, not too hot and not too cold for life.

Astronomers using NASA data have calculated for the first time that in our galaxy alone, there are at least 8.8 billion stars with earth-sized planets in the habitable temperature zone. By the way, the same galaxy that was studied along with the other 100,000 in which there is no life. Why all of these planets out there in the Goldilocks zone dead, waiting like unfinished furniture to be completed? As if it's a creation suspended, waiting for a time when God says, okay, now we can expand life here and here and here and here.

So I'm just speculating that ultimately God's plan may be not to just reserve life in this third rock from the sun, but perhaps on these other planets that are out there void and empty and lifeless, perhaps even initiate life in some of those worlds. Thank you for indulging me for a minute. Key number nine, the final key but very important. Don't quit or let anyone steal your promised reward. Luke chapter 9 verse 61 and another also said, Lord, I will follow you, but let me first go and bid them farewell who are at my house.

But Jesus said to him, no one having put his hand to the plow and looking back is fit for the kingdom of God. As I said earlier, we have to be all in. People today, they don't want commitment. They don't want responsibility. They're afraid of accountability if they get to know God. But brethren, we have tremendous rewards and we shouldn't allow anything to take that reward from us. We cannot look back. This is the most sober and the most serious decision that we could make for eternity is accepting Jesus Christ as our personal savior and beginning a journey of discipleship for the rest of our physical lives.

It's serious. It's important. It changes who and what we are forever in a beautiful and a wonderful way. And we can't look back. And when God wakes up our consciences and our minds and we understand who and what he is, we can't put him off. We can't say, oh God, I'll start going to church. I'll start reading the Bible right after I finish this project at work. Right after I save up enough money and get this new car. Right after I find a wife. Someday, soon, I'll start doing what I need to do.

We just can't do that. That's unacceptable in the mind of God and in the sight of his son, Jesus Christ. Matthew 24, verse 10. And then many will be offended, speaking of the days that we live in today, will betray one another and will hate one another. Kind of sounds like the terrorism we experience in our world today. Talking about the love of many waxing coal. Have you taken the time to read any blogs lately? You see a typical pattern in most blogs. First of all, someone writes an article and the first few comments pick apart the author of the article. He doesn't know what he's talking about. He's an idiot. He's a fool. You have a few more comments and then they all turn on each other. And by the 20th comment, they're all insulting each other. They hate each other. They're off the topic of what the article was even about. That is what we see in our distorted and sick world today. So it says they will betray one another, will hate one another, then many false prophets will rise up and deceive many. And because lawlessness will abound, rejecting the values of God, lawlessness will abound. The love of many will grow cold. And that's certainly what we see in our culture today. Verse 13, but he who endures to the end shall be saved. That's either the end of our physical lives or the end of this age when Jesus Christ returns if we're still alive. We have to endure. We cannot start on a journey of change, of discipleship, and then turn around and quit and turn around and go backward into the world.

We have an enemy known as Satan the Devil, and we're going to have to wrestle with him because he knows every weakness we have in our lives and our personalities. He knows us. He knew your father, your grandfather, your great-grandfather. He personally knew your lineage and your family's strengths and weaknesses going back a hundred generations or more. So he knows us better than we know ourselves. He knows every weakness. He knows every button to push. He knows everything to put us through in order to get us to quit, to get angry with God or angry with a brother in Christ and to quit the journey. We can't allow that to happen. We have to endure unto the end. He who endures to the end will be saved, and this gospel of the kingdom will be preached in all the world as a witness to all nations, and then the end will come. And thankfully, with the advent of the internet and other ways to reach the remote areas of this world, the gospel is being preached in a greater way than ever before in history. So we've talked a lot today about how we can live an abundant life in balance with God. Where do we go from here? What is the next step that you can take? There are actually one of two options, and it's your choice on which option you choose as a result of this presentation today. The first is what I call a fundamental program, and that is to continue on your journey of discovery about God. Thank you for taking the time out to come here today to hear the gospel of the kingdom of God and hear the fact that God has plans for your life that you are very special in his eyes. You are unique, and he has a purpose for your life. Thank you for taking the time to come here today and learn about God. Develop a daily habit of prayer and Bible study.

Develop a habit of connecting with God every day by getting in some prayer and some Bible study. And again, I'm not going to mention how much time you should spend. I will say that it should be quality. It should be a time, a place where we can go be alone and be undisturbed, and we should do it until we feel the presence of God. And I'm not going to put a time on that except to encourage everyone to develop the habit of doing that every day. Ask him for guidance. Ask him for intervention in your life. Say, please help me to feel your presence. Help me to feel your intervention in my life. And as I cry out to you, please, Father, answer my prayers. Help the good things to happen. Help me to have the breakthroughs in my life that I'm struggling with. I also encourage you to continue to read our literature, which is certainly biblically oriented, the Good News Magazine and booklets. And by the way, we have a booklet rack in the very back, and you are welcome to take any booklets that you desire today. We have a booklets in a number of our major doctrines. Encourage you, if you're able to, see the Beyond Today TV program and over-the-air television. You are certainly welcome to do that. If not, and you have internet access, you can go to beyondtoday.tv, or you can go to YouTube, where all the Beyond Today 30-minute broadcasts are put on YouTube. So you can see it on demand and see the programs any time that you like. But continue your journey. Don't let today be the end. Don't just let today be something that went in your head, and you forget about it, and you just neglect it and go on, because I don't know in this lifetime that this opportunity will come to you again. God may be calling you right now. Will we respond to that calling? And then there's an advanced program, and many people start out with the fundamental program, and then decide, choose, make that choice, to become part of the advanced program. And it's a little more intense. First of all, begin to worship God on His Sabbath day. As I mentioned before, it is a commanded assembly. It is a holy convocation. That means that Mr. Thomas can't sit at home and look at himself in the mirror for a number of reasons.

I need to fellowship with others. I need to be part of a group that are all striving for the kingdom of God. So begin to worship God on His Sabbath day. Worship and fellowship with others of like mind. They will help to sharpen us, keep us on our toes, and ask us, what did you study this last week? They will help us grow stronger, and they'll love us, and support us during times of sorrows in our life. Share your life, joys and sorrows, with others who love you, and you will find the congregation of God is very loving, very compassionate, and is there for you. As I said earlier, it's one of the great spiritual mentors and physical mentors that God gives us, and that is His Church. So the choice of what you do with the rest of your life is totally up to you. Whether you leave here and do nothing with what you heard today, or whether you continue on the fundamental program, which is wonderful, and I certainly encourage you to do that. Continue your journey, continue growing, continue understanding, or whether you choose to take the advanced route, the accelerated route, and to quickly begin to learn much more about God. And to hear a live sermon in 3D every Sabbath day, rather than some tape or something off of the internet, it's a choice. Once again, I had this scripture earlier, Deuteronomy 30, verse 20. To choose life is to love the Lord your God, obey Him, and stay close to Him.

Whether any of us do that is a choice, and I will pray that God helps you to make the right choice.

Thank you so much for participating in our presentation today.