Friend’s Of God Part 3
John 15:15 (NKJV) No longer do I call you servants, for a servant does not know what his master is doing; but I have called you friends, for all things that I heard from My Father I have made known to you.
As we saw last week, Jesus in this verse is telling us that God doesn’t want to have a slave/Master relationship with us but a son/Father relationship with us. Yet too many Christians are living as servants instead of sons.
This is what society has done to us. It says that we are so unworthy and that there is no way that a Holy God could be friends with worms like us.
Yet this is not what Jesus has showed us about the Father throughout the Bible. He has showed us a Father who is Passionate about us and loves us dearly.
To many believer have lived there lives with an Old Testament picture of God, yet Jesus came to reveal the true Nature of God.
John 14:6-9 (NKJV) 6 Jesus said to him, "I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me. 7 "If you had known Me, you would have known My Father also; and from now on you know Him and have seen Him." 8 Philip said to Him, "Lord, show us the Father, and it is sufficient for us." 9 Jesus said to him, "Have I been with you so long, and yet you have not known Me, Philip? He who has seen Me has seen the Father; so how can you say, 'Show us the Father'?
Most of The Old Testament was a covenant set in stone with a law that man could not keep.
In the New Testament we have a covenant between God and Jesus and He has kept the whole thing and gave it to us.
Ephesians 2:8-10 (NKJV) 8 For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, 9 not of works, lest anyone should boast. 10 For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them.
So we see that we couldn’t earn this great Salvation and there is only one thing I can do to get into this great work of Christ and that is to believe.
The thing that got God so upset with the children were there unbelief and it was really the only sin that kept them out of the promise land. The land of Milk, Honey and rest.
Hebrews 3:7-19 (NKJV) 7 Therefore, as the Holy Spirit says: "Today, if you will hear His voice, 8 Do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion, In the day of trial in the wilderness, 9 Where your fathers tested Me, tried Me, And saw My works forty years. 10 Therefore I was angry with that generation, And said, 'They always go astray in their heart, And they have not known My ways.' 11 So I swore in My wrath, 'They shall not enter My rest.' " 12 Beware, brethren, lest there be in any of you an evil heart of unbelief in departing from the living God; 13 but exhort one another daily, while it is called "Today," lest any of you be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin. 14 For we have become partakers of Christ if we hold the beginning of our confidence steadfast to the end, 15 while it is said: "Today, if you will hear His voice, Do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion." 16 For who, having heard, rebelled? Indeed, was it not all who came out of Egypt, led by Moses? 17 Now with whom was He angry forty years? Was it not with those who sinned, whose corpses fell in the wilderness? 18 And to whom did He swear that they would not enter His rest, but to those who did not obey? 19 So we see that they could not enter in because of unbelief.
Hebrews 4:1-3 (NKJV) 1 Therefore, since a promise remains of entering His rest, let us fear lest any of you seem to have come short of it. 2 For indeed the gospel was preached to us as well as to them; but the word which they heard did not profit them, not being mixed with faith in those who heard it. 3 For we who have believed do enter that rest, as He has said: "So I swore in My wrath, 'They shall not enter My rest,' " although the works were finished from the foundation of the world.
This was all done from the foundations of the world. God wants us to enter into His rest and the way we do this, is through accepting what Jesus has already done for us. You can keep going over and over, I have to do better, I have to do this or that, or we can start saying Thank-You Jesus for already doing it all for me and watch how you start sinning less and your life becomes so much more restful. You will find yourself falling more and more in love with Him.
We saw last week how Zacchaeus didn’t repent because of Jesus banging on him about all his mistake, but because He showed him kindness.
Romans 2:4 (NKJV) Or do you despise the riches of His goodness, forbearance, and longsuffering, not knowing that the goodness of God leads you to repentance?
“The Gospel that Jesus Gave us, this Gospel of grace does not give us a license to sin. On the contrary, It give the power for people to sin no more.”
Here, Watch This! Look at the women caught in adultery.
John 8:1-11 (NKJV) 1 But Jesus went to the Mount of Olives. 2 Now early in the morning He came again into the temple, and all the people came to Him; and He sat down and taught them. 3 Then the scribes and Pharisees brought to Him a woman caught in adultery. And when they had set her in the midst, 4 they said to Him, "Teacher, this woman was caught in adultery, in the very act. 5 Now Moses, in the law, commanded us that such should be stoned. But what do You say?" 6 This they said, testing Him, that they might have something of which to accuse Him. But Jesus stooped down and wrote on the ground with His finger, as though He did not hear. 7 So when they continued asking Him, He raised Himself up and said to them, "He who is without sin among you, let him throw a stone at her first." 8 And again He stooped down and wrote on the ground. 9 Then those who heard it, being convicted by their conscience, went out one by one, beginning with the oldest even to the last. And Jesus was left alone, and the woman standing in the midst. 10 When Jesus had raised Himself up and saw no one but the woman, He said to her, "Woman, where are those accusers of yours? Has no one condemned you?" 11 She said, "No one, Lord." And Jesus said to her, "Neither do I condemn you; go and sin no more."
The Pharisees would have stoned her if they could, but they could not.
Jesus on the other hand could have stoned her, but he would not.
This is our God, Neither do I condemn you, go and sin no more.
Jesus gave her the gift of NO CONDEMNATION and empowered her to sin NO MORE.
John 3:14-17 (NKJV) 14 And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up, 15 that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life. 16 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. 17 For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be saved.
Look at the story of the prodical
Luke 15:11-32 (NKJV) 11 Then He said: "A certain man had two sons. 12 And the younger of them said to his father, 'Father, give me the portion of goods that falls to me.' So he divided to them his livelihood. 13 And not many days after, the younger son gathered all together, journeyed to a far country, and there wasted his possessions with prodigal living. 14 But when he had spent all, there arose a severe famine in that land, and he began to be in want. 15 Then he went and joined himself to a citizen of that country, and he sent him into his fields to feed swine. 16 And he would gladly have filled his stomach with the pods that the swine ate, and no one gave him anything. 17 But when he came to himself, he said, 'How many of my father's hired servants have bread enough and to spare, and I perish with hunger! 18 I will arise and go to my father, and will say to him, "Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you, 19 and I am no longer worthy to be called your son. Make me like one of your hired servants." ' 20 And he arose and came to his father. But when he was still a great way off, his father saw him and had compassion, and ran and fell on his neck and kissed him. 21 And the son said to him, 'Father, I have sinned against heaven and in your sight, and am no longer worthy to be called your son.' 22 But the father said to his servants, 'Bring out the best robe and put it on him, and put a ring on his hand and sandals on his feet. 23 And bring the fatted calf here and kill it, and let us eat and be merry; 24 for this my son was dead and is alive again; he was lost and is found.' And they began to be merry. 25 Now his older son was in the field. And as he came and drew near to the house, he heard music and dancing. 26 So he called one of the servants and asked what these things meant. 27 And he said to him, 'Your brother has come, and because he has received him safe and sound, your father has killed the fatted calf.' 28 But he was angry and would not go in. Therefore his father came out and pleaded with him. 29 So he answered and said to his father, 'Lo, these many years I have been serving you; I never transgressed your commandment at any time; and yet you never gave me a young goat, that I might make merry with my friends. 30 But as soon as this son of yours came, who has devoured your livelihood with harlots, you killed the fatted calf for him.' 31 And he said to him, 'Son, you are always with me, and all that I have is yours. 32 It was right that we should make merry and be glad, for your brother was dead and is alive again, and was lost and is found.' "
GRACE, GRACE, GRACE. That’s what it’s all about with our friend Jesus. That’s why we can say that we are Blessed and highly favored and Loved.
One of the things that we need to do is to declare over ourselves that we are greatly blessed, highly favored and deeply loved. “How do we know that we are greatly blessed?”
Hebrews 6:13-14 (NKJV) 13 For when God made a promise to Abraham, because He could swear by no one greater, He swore by Himself, 14 saying, "Surely blessing I will bless you, and multiplying I will multiply you."
Galatians 3:29 (NKJV) And if you are Christ's, then you are Abraham's seed, and heirs according to the promise.
Ephesians 1:3 (NKJV) 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,
God wanted us to be so anchored in the sure and steadfast knowledge that He will bless us, the seed of Abraham, that He swore by Himself, saying, “Surely blessing I will bless you, and multiplying I will multiply you.” AMEN!
“How can we say that we are highly favored?”
Ephesians 1:6 (NKJV) to the praise of the glory of His grace, by which He has made us accepted in the Beloved.
Ephesians 1:6 tells us that by God’s grace (unmerited favor), God “made us accepted in the Beloved.” In the original Greek text, the word “accepted” is the word charitoo, which means “highly favored.”
“And are we really deeply loved by God?” God didn’t just love us. John 3:16 says that “God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son.” He demonstrated how He SO loved us when He sent Jesus to die on the cross for us.
We are indeed greatly blessed, highly favored and deeply loved. If these truths are still not established in your heart, start speaking them. Look at yourself in the mirror every morning and declare boldly, “Because of Jesus’ perfect work on the cross, I am righteous by His blood, and I am greatly blessed, highly favored and deeply loved! I expect good things to come my way. I expect good success and I have a confident expectation of good!” Because of Jesus’ perfect work on the cross, I am righteous by His blood, and I am greatly blessed, highly favored and deeply loved!
