The Only Voice That Matters

Many of us that are here in the Southwest have had the opportunity at one time or another to be able to go to Arizona and to be able to view the Grand Canyon. The Grand Canyon is a marvelous spot to behold. The first message talked about creation. Somebody once asked, how was the Grand Canyon created? And they said a Scotsman lost his nickel. And so that's how it was created. Bad joke, but to the point. It is a marvelous sight to behold. People come, they sit, they reflect, and all the multiple forces that have created that canyon. All of us that have ever studied a little bit of topography or history, geography, etc., we know that canyons such as the Grand Canyon have been shaped and molded over many, many years by sun, by rain, by wind, and of course by the Colorado River. It didn't just happen. All of these forces came together to create such a picture before the eyes of the beholder. It is a clear picture of cause and effect. You and I are very much like those cliffs and those canyons that we look down upon at times as we fly over Utah or Arizona or parts of New Mexico. Friends, we also are sculpted and shaped by elements that over time slowly, surely, steadily impact us, that seemingly create indelible impressions on us, not only on what people see on the outside, but what we are on the inside. And to be very, very frank, if I may, they are on full display for everyone. But as Christians, unlike the Grand Canyon, once God calls us, we have a choice as to what ultimately shapes the contours of our hearts, even as natural forces will continue all around us and will remain unabated, and they will swirl around us, and they will come up against us, and they will try to eat up our time and mold our hearts and shape them. That is, if we allow them to continue to erode what God has chosen to perform in us. What better time to reflect on all of this than on God's holy seventh day Sabbath? It's a time out for us to reflect on something very special. Join me, if you would, in 2 Corinthians 5. I've talked about a glorious and a wonderful physical creation, and indeed that is the Grand Canyon. But again, let's remember what God is continuing to create and will create. Something that is not made of the dust or sandstone, something much more precious. In 2 Corinthians 5 and in verse 17, therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. Old things have passed away. Behold, all things have become new.

And here we have a chance to think about that, to take time out.

Questions I want to ask you today are simply this. For you to reflect on, what is shaping you today? What has brought you to this point over your years? What have been the molding factors that have shaped and contoured your heart? So, first of all, it's about you.

Number two, how are you shaping? And how are you molding other hearts and other lives around you? Now, we can look at the Grand Canyon and, you know, all 200 miles long of it and 10 or 15 miles across, whatever that might be. I think I'm kind of close on that. And we can say, wow, look at that mesa, look at that butte, look at that canyon, look at that, and we go on and on. Look at that pinnacle. But we are doing the same with other people, and other people are doing the same to us. That is, if we allow it. One of the most powerful forces of nature that continue to come on our way, and I realize our first speaker gave you the galactic overview of the incredible forces that are out there. But I want to kind of boil it down to a very simple force that continues to mold into shape and to change this every day. I just simply call it this. Voices. Voices. Voices, many voices coming at us every day create an impact on us.

There is a cause. It has an effect. It's very, very powerful. They have just as much impact on us as rain, sun, snow, and rivers to think about it. They sculpt our view of ourselves. Ultimately, God. And what God is doing with others by the voices that we receive and what we do with them, and how we handle them, how we interpret them, how we incorporate them, and or how we dispel them, and we do not allow them to affect us and what God is already doing in us.

Let's consider for a moment voices. Voices are with us all of our life. They are from the womb, and it is scientifically proved voices affecting little embryos and little fetus that are in the womb. The environment that they are growing up in those first nine or ten months. We can go from the womb. We can think about the the jungle gym world of the playground with its cheers, with its laughter, and also, yes, with its putting down and with its taunts at little kids that are five or six years old that shaped them to the classroom.

To our parents' voices, to our parents' voices, and also to their expectations. Many of those voices are very positive and very wonderful and very nurturing. Incredible! But you know, and I know other parents' voices have shaped, molded, eroded people's lives. Voices that sometimes even when those parents or grandparents are dead, it still has an incredible impact on the children and on the grandchildren. It's as if they're still being shaped and contoured by those voices that are below the grass. There's the voice of a boss. There's the voice of a pastor, as to whether or not the voice is loving and encouraging and nurturing, or whether it's hard and brittle and discouraging.

The voices of our fellow members, our friends, appreciate what Stephen brought out about it, to encourage one another. To encourage one another. Voices are so important. The voice of a loving and a generous God. There are other voices that are coming at us today. We're just multiplying the voices for a moment. We're going to add up the voices that we have to deal with, that come at us and shape us and mold us. There are many, many voices out there today, so many voices.

And again, I do not say this to be anti-technology. There are incredible wonders that are occurring in the realm of technologies and computers and what is readily available to all of us. But for every instrument, there is a blessing and there is a cursing. One of the challenges that I see personally as a pastor, as a Christian, as one that in a role is responsible for seeing the gospel being preached.

There are so many distractions today in the technology that is in people's hands. Just came off a trip coming and going. And it's amazing that people don't look out the window. They don't look at one another. All they're looking at is this little black box that's in their hand, consumed with what's in their hand. Wondering if anybody knows that they're out there. Wondering if anybody knows that they're going to be messaged. Wonder if anybody's going to post a like with something that has been said. Now, is that wrong, though? That's not wrong oven by itself, but think of the cumulative effect.

You know, it's just like a little water and a little wind. The oven by itself is not wrong, and it can be very profitable. But it is changing the culture. It's even challenging of getting the Word of God out because there are so many different elements and forces out there. And there's a wonderment because, indeed, we ourselves are using it. But how many other voices are out there to distract and to distract you from going to the very basics of what Christianity is all about? And they're very, very, very real voices.

I'm sometimes concerned because I realize the voices that come at us and shape us and mold us begin to shape our contour. We begin to have thoughts bounce off of the walls of our hearts, or our hearts, indeed, are shaped with our own inner voice that begins to echo the voices that have been coming at us.

It's impossible. I'm too tired. Nobody loves me. I can't go on. I can't figure things out. I can't do it. It's not worth it. I can't forgive myself. I can't manage. I'm afraid. I'm not smart enough. I feel all alone. All alone. And we can transpose these voices of negativity, despair, and judgment upon others and mold them into shape them. Matthew 12 and verse 32. Join me if you would. Matthew 12 and verse 32. Let's notice what it says here.

Anyone who speaks a word against the Son of Man, it will be forgiven him. But whoever speaks against the Holy Spirit, it will not be forgiven. Oh, that's not what I want. Excuse me. Where am I looking for the wrong verse? Verse 34. It says, For out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks. Friends, I want to share something with you. Our hearts are shaped and they are molded. And they are groomed just as much as the Grand Canyon is and has been and will be into the future.

And we've got to know what's going through the canyons of our hearts. Take control of that and make sure that we're glorifying God and being a blessing to other people. That's so very important. Unlike the Grand Canyon, I don't have ages to mold me. You kind of come to understand that when you get my age. I didn't say Susan's age. I said my age. I'm in the autumn of life, maybe on the downside of the autumn of life. And I've come to a realization in my mind, in my life, that my time is limited. I don't know how long God is going to give me. Perhaps 20 years, 30 years. All of my family lives to 95 to 97. That is on my dad's side. But there's always one that breaks the mold. So we will find out. I might have perhaps 20 or 30 days. I might have 20 or 30 minutes. I just don't simply know. And neither do you about yourself. I will share something with you, personal. I have become very jealous of my time that I have left. I'm jealous. I don't want to have it abused. I don't want to have it misused. I want to be able to control the wind, the sun, the fire, and the rivers that come through my life. Some will come through that are good, that glorify God. And others, I'm just going to put a stop. Because you can only handle so much. I'm jealous of my time.

I'm circumspect of the exterior voices that come my way that I allow myself to be in. I also know that I have to control and deal with my own responsibility and my interior voices that are still in me that are not yet pleasing to God. And that's completely subject to that new creation that He wants for me. I'm not only jealous of my time, but God is jealous. You know, there's a verse in the Bible. You might want to jot it down. You won't believe it when you see it. Exodus 34, 14, it says, I am the Lord whose name is jealous. God is working a purpose in us. He knows He only has so much time to do it in this human framework, and He wants to give us His best and mold and to shape us according to His will and not our will. Isaiah 64, in verse 8, says, I am the potter. You are the clay. I'm the potter. I'm the molder. I'm the shaper. I'm the sculptor. So, He's got skin in this game that you and I are involved in. He's got skin in this game, and I have a choice. And you have a choice as to the voices that you allow into your life, so that you can indeed redeem the time. The question I have for you, I told you this message is going to be rather short. You're going to go away and say, well, what did you talk about? Simply this. What voices are you allowing in your life that you're making choices about and that you are going to be in control of your life because you are a son and a daughter of God Almighty and Jesus Christ, and you are redeemed, you are called, and you are chosen. And God says that our attention is to be upon Him, to be growing in grace and knowledge. Everything else—please understand, young people, you can have some fun along the way doing this, too—but everything else is a distraction. My question then is to what voices are you listening to?

I want you to allow me to direct you to the only voice that matters, and let's hear His voice loud and clear. The only voice that matters. That's the title of this message. The only voice that matters. Now, that's again very important because the amount of voices that are out there today my grandparents had it very simple. They did not have radio. My parents had it a little bit more complicated because by then there was radio. For those of you that think I'm ancient, Sabrina, I was not raised in the radio age. I came afterwards. Families had little little boxes. Okay, in 1951 they were watching President Truman. Doesn't that sound ancient? And then Ike, Eisenhower. When we were growing up there were only what? There were three television stations, NBC, ABC, and CBS. And actually, ABC was a very fledgling network at that time. Later on, they offered PBS. Later on, now over the last 20 years, you can watch every form of life you want to on reality television and ask, why am I watching this? Why am I spending this time? 500 stations coming at you. Are there positives to that? Absolutely, too. Actually, you know, our telecast is on one of those cable stations called the Word Network. So there are plussings and there are cursings, but you have to make choices as to how you're going to fill your time because you only have so much time to fill. You'll say, where did the time go? Where did it go? And I only have this much time left to be shaped and molded in the image of Jesus Christ. Let's go to John 10 and verse 7. John 10 and verse 7.

Then Jesus said to them again, Most assuredly I say to you, I am the door of the sheep. All who ever came before me are thieves and robbers, but the sheep did not hear them. I am the door. If anyone enters by me, he will be saved and will go in and out and find pasture. The thief does not come except to steal and to kill and to destroy. I have come that they may have life and that they may have it more abundantly. I'm the good shepherd and the good shepherd gives his life for the sheep. But a hireling, he who is not the shepherd, one who does not own the sheep, sees the wolf coming and leaves the sheep and flees. And the wolf catches the sheep and scatters them. The hireling flees because he is a hireling and does not care about the sheep. I am the good shepherd and I know my sheep and am known by my own. And as the father knows me, even so I know the father and I lay my life down for the sheep. And the other sheep I have which are not of this fold, them also I must bring. And they will hear my voice. And there will be one flock and one shepherd. Being members within God's flock means that you are going to be tuned in to His voice. That is going to be the main transmission that is going to be coming into your life. Now what does that transmission tell us? Join me if you would in John 3.

John 3. What does that voice say? Well here's a self-disclosure by Jesus Christ Himself in John 3. And picking up the thought in verse 11.

Most assuredly I say to you, we speak what we know and testify what we have seen and you do not receive our witness. If I had told you earthly things and you do not believe, how will you believe if I tell you heavenly things? No one has ascended to heaven but he who came down from heaven. That is the Son of Man who is in heaven and as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up. That whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. For God so loved, and that love there, brethren, is talking about godly love, outflowing an outgoing concern away from self. A love that's not from around here, a love that is not earthly, a love that does not seek its own, it's a love that does not keep score, it does not put down, it does not condemn. It nurtures, it builds, it edifies that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son that whoever believes in him should not perish but have everlasting life. Notice the voice that Jesus uses, the tone, the content, the color. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world. It doesn't mean that there's not judgment. Please understand there is judgment for every cause, there is an effect, but it's not a spirit of condemnation. It's not a spirit of being put down but that the world through him might be saved. Notice the tone. Notice the color of the gospel. Warming, inviting, welcoming, inclusive, including that Christ came to give his life. That's the voice, that's the tone, that's the color that we need to have. Luke 19 and verse 10. Again, more of that voice penetrating all the voices that are out there today that are coarse, that are crass, that defile, that put down, that are not inclusive. Luke 19. This is oftentimes called the specific purpose scripture of the book of Luke. Luke 19 verse 10. For the Son of man has come to seek and to save that which was lost.

That's the voice of encouragement, of welcoming, of love. Yes, of sacrifice, his sacrifice. And yes, our sacrifice is we follow that voice. But brethren, there are so many distractions out there today that we need to be aware of. I'm not creating a litmus list. I'm not creating an index. I'm just making a fact. You know it and I know it. And God allows each and every one of us to make choices as to what we have come into our life and what is going to shape and what is going to mold us.

That's very important and that is your responsibility. That can be a challenge because sometimes in growing up or perhaps what we came to in college or perhaps even early on in our spiritual experiences, voices came at us and to us and molded us and shaped us in a way that God wants us to expand and grow from and to focus on the Christ, focus on the Father and their perfect voice, their dear voice, their spiritual voice that lifts up and includes. John 6 verse 35.

I want some of these scriptures, dear friends, to penetrate us today, to mold us, to shape us, to encourage us, sometimes because of life's forces, the forces of life's wind and rain and sun on our lives and on our hearts. We don't realize how special we are to God because maybe we've never felt a drip of love in our life from those that should have loved us the most, inspired us the most, given us roots to be firm and wings to fly. In John 6 and verse 35, I've noticed what it says, and Jesus said, I am the bread of life. He who comes to me shall never hunger and he who believes in me shall never thirst. But I said to you that you have seen me and yet do not believe. All that the Father gives me will come to me and the one who comes to me I will by no means cast out. For I have not come down from heaven not to do my own will but the will of him who sent me. Now, I want you to look at something and I want you to be encouraged by this. Please, this is the will of the Father who sent me that of all he has given me I should lose nothing but should raise it up on that last day. That's encouraging. We have a God who cannot keep his eyes off of us. We have a Savior who cannot keep his eyes off of us. That's his job. He is the great shepherd. We count. We are special. God loves us. We have been chosen. I want to share a verse with you which is very encouraging in Ephesians 5. In Ephesians 5 and verse 1.

Ephesians 1. Did I say Ephesians 1? I didn't mean Ephesians 5, Ephesians 1.

You know there are times when we've grown up. There's times when we've been on the playground and we all had to kind of stand along a line. And depending upon the sport of the activity, remember how this person was chosen and that person was chosen and that person was chosen and then you were the last person on the line. Nobody wanted you on their team.

And because the teams were even, you went to the bench. You had to wait until somebody hurt themselves to get into the game. You were on the sidelines. That does shape. That does mold young people from an early age on that somehow they don't count or they're not good enough or they're not a part of the team. That can go up and up in other venues of life. Brethren, we're here today because it is the reverse with our good God and our loving Heavenly Father. I want to have you look at Ephesians 1 for a moment. This is a voice that comes down to us through the ages, through the writing of Paul. Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ. Now notice verse 4, just as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, when all those lights were going off that Stephen was talking about, even before the foundation of the world, we were chosen that we should be holy and without blame before Him in love and having predestined or predetermined us to adoption as sons by Jesus Christ to Himself according to the good pleasure of His will. That's what makes God God. He takes pleasure in choosing us and grooming us not by wind or fire or sun, but by His Son and by His Spirit and by His Word to the praise of the glory of His grace by which He made us accept it in the Beloved. Now this is wonderful news. We are elect. We are chosen. God wants us in the palms of His hand. Now, with all of that stated, I can be excited about sharing God's love with you, telling you about His purpose. You can hear that. For a moment there can be a sense of well-being, and then you go into your Mondays and Tuesdays and Wednesdays, and you know what happens? This is the voice of God that is being spoken, not my voice, but these words. You go, wow! Then you go back into life, into the jungle gym life, and you begin hearing those echoes in your heart of old voices, old tapes that get played out, and or other voices that come and come and come and want to shape you. The sheep hear the shepherd's voice. And there are, for any of you that have ever studied Greek mythology, as I did, and we know the story of Ulysses and the Odyssey. I don't know if you still read that in schools anymore. There's the siren's voice that wants to bring you into being dashed on the rocks by the coast. Beware those voices. Ask God's Spirit for you to know that which comes from Him and that which comes from without. The voices never stop down here below. You say, well, why did God do that? That's not fun. Why didn't He just do a Star Trek? Beam me up, Scotty. Why is He keeping us down here? Because He's given us free moral agency. He's given us choice.

He knows that we've accepted His grace. He knows that we come to Him in faith, but He wants to see us maintain a surrendered life that is striving towards the completeness of Christ. And that comes with choices and surrender and control of our lives and counting the cost as to what comes into our life. The voices never stop down here. The voices never stop. Just as Stephen was mentioning in his first message, what happens is we believe, but so many voices begin to come at us that it can create an atmosphere of unbelief. Join me if you win the first Kings 19. First Kings 19. It happens to some of the greatest servants of God.

First Kings 19 is the story of Elijah.

And Elijah was used mightily of God.

First Kings 19 follows First Kings 18, which is the whole story on Mount Carmel, with the two sacrifices and with the hundreds of priests of Baal. And that at the end, it is Elijah that comes out on top to glorify God. But now notice verse 1 of First Kings 19, and Ahab told Jezebel all that Elijah had done and also he had executed all the prophets with a sword. And then Jezebel sent a messenger to Elijah saying, notice friends, here comes the voice. The voice said, so let the gods do to me and more also if I do not make your life as the life of one of them by tomorrow at this time. And when he saw that, he arose and ran for his life and went to Beersheba, which belongs to Judah and left his servants there. But he himself went a day's journey into the wilderness and came and sat down under a broom tree. And he prayed that he might die and said, it's enough! Now, Lord, take my life! For I am no better than my father's.

You've led me to a dead end. Nothing good is going to happen. He was being sculpted and molded and shaped by the voice of Queen Jezebel. And everything that God had done up to that point to call him, to be a prophet, to work mighty and incredible miracles through him went out the door because of a voice. Then as he lay and he slept under a broom tree, suddenly an angel touched him and said to him, arise and eat. And then he looked and thereby his head was a cake baked on coals and a jar of water. And so he ate and drank and lay down again. And the angel of the Lord came back the second time and touched him and said, arise and eat, because the journey is too great for you. So he arose and ate and drank and he went in the strength of the food, forty days and forty nights, as far as Horeb, the mountain of God. And there he went into a cave and spent the night in that place to behold the word of the Lord came to him. He said, what are you doing here, O Aja?

And that's the voice of God that comes down to each and every one of us down through the ages at times. When we consider what God the Father has done for us through Jesus Christ and elected us and offered us to be citizens of the kingdom of God and has worked through us up to this point. And then we pull on Elijah and the question comes to us. What are you doing here?

God's kind of saying, come on, come on, what are you doing here? Don't you know that I am with you and will never forsake you? I'm not just talking to Elijah, I'm talking to each and every one of us here. So, Elijah comes back, oh, I've been so zealous for the Lord God of hosts. So he gives his own report card to God that's not too humble here.

I've been so zealous.

Children of Israel, forsake your covenant, tore down your altars, killed your prophets with a sword. I alone am left and they seek to take my life. Then he said, go out, stand on the mountain before the Lord and behold the Lord passed by and a great and a strong wind tore into the mountains and broke the rocks and pieces before the Lord. But the Lord was not in the wind and after that the earthquake, but the Lord was not in the earthquake and after that the fire, but the Lord was not in the fire and after the fire a still small voice. All the other elements, the fire and the wind and the earthquake, they can shape a Grand Canyon, but that's not what God uses to shape his children. It's a voice. It's a still small voice. So it was when Elijah heard that he wrapped his face in his mantle and went out and stood in the entrance of the cave and suddenly, notice, a voice came to him and said, what are you doing here, Elijah? And he said, I've been very zealous for the Lord of God of hosts because the children of Israel have forsaken your covenant, torn down your altars, and killed your prophets with the sword. I alone am left and they seek to take my life. Then God spoke to him. He came to understand that there were 7,000 that had not yet bent the knee to Baal. Brethren of Redlands, God is not always going to come at us with an earthquake, with wind or a fire, but we have to be open and we have to be receptive to his voice and not distracted or overwhelmed when that voice does come. Voices will always come. They don't go away, but you make a choice. Think about this for a moment. The voice of the serpent in the garden.

The voice of the serpent in the garden. You can never stop intrusions. They will come up against you just like waves come up against the seashore. But you do have a choice to stop the conversation, linger around, and determine the level of the relationship as to whether it's moving you towards God or moving you away from God. That's a choice that we have every day. I'd like to share a thought from Thoreau, a New England philosopher. Thoreau simply had three words. Simplify, simplify, simplify.

Mr. Armstrong, in the Ambassador Auditorium, he said, now is the time to simplify your life. To simplify your life. That was in 1982. That came along with three other thoughts. And Mr. Armstrong was dead right on this. Number one was to come out of the world. To come out of the world. You can only come out of the world if you do. Number two, and that is to simplify your life so that you continue to hear the voice. And number three is now is the time. Now is the time to learn to become teachers because we are priests in training. Simplify your life. You go back to 1982. That was like Huckleberry Finn on the Mississippi River, going down a raft with Jim, inefficient compared to what you and I are up to today. Now again, understand. I'm not vilifying the instrument. I'm saying we have got to make choices as to what we allow in our life and to recognize what's coming our way. We cannot blame instruments and we cannot blame the world. We are to be cognizant. We are to be aware of instruments and the world and to use them properly and in proper timing. But there can be nothing that distracts us from the voice. Again, thorough, very interesting. Susie and I have been to Walden's Pond with the little hut by the bean field if you've ever read Walden's Pond. Walden had this saying which I think is very interesting. Walden said in dealing with the world, one chair for solitude, two chairs for company, three chairs for society. In other words, keep it simple. Measure what is coming into your life. Now that might be a little spartan. I think you and I have to perhaps agree on that. But it was a matter of not being consumed with the world that is around us. I'd like you to join me. I'm going to move quickly. I just want to share a verse with you in Revelation 3 and verse 20. In Revelation 3 and verse 20. It says, Behold, I stand at the door and knock.

You know today with all of the traffic that is out there and all the voices, just think about this for a moment. It's more like this.

How do you sort that out? It's all, all this is coming at us today like this. But I'm making a point. Today in your life, now Jesus Christ says he stands at the door and knocks.

We cannot afford to be distracted. We count at the cost of baptism. We said we would be listening. We said that we would be sculpted by God the Father through Jesus Christ. We said not our life. We want to look like the life of Christ, God in the flesh on earth. We need to be aware of that. Revelation 3 and verse 20. Behold, I stand at the door and knock.

If anyone notice, hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in to him, dine with him, and he with me. What voice will we be listening to this week on our Mondays and Tuesdays and Wednesdays and Thursdays? Not just to show up at Sabbath services, but as God individually sculpts and shapes and molds us. We know some of the voices that shaped us up to the time that we were baptized or perhaps even continue to shape us, that we allow to shape us rather than the voice that comes from above. I can sum that up very quickly. When you think of the voice of God the Father and are the voice of Jesus Christ, they're a voice that says, I forgive you. I love you.

I haven't given you a spirit of fear. All things are possible. I will give you rest. Cast all your cares upon me. My grace is sufficient. I will direct your steps. I will give you a spirit of wisdom. You can do all things through me. And yes, I will supply your needs. I am able. That voice says it will be worth it. That voice always reminds me, I will never leave you nor forsake you. The Grand Canyon is shaped by wind, by rain, by river. Each and every one of us is shaped by the voices that we allow into our life. I've encouraged you today, brethren, seek out, stay tuned, stay focused, let nothing distract you at all from the voice that comes from heaven above. That is that voice that will give you that newness of life that we need to have. What was this message about? Simply put, no other voice. And now you know what that voice is.