First of all being a Christian is no light thing, it is Jesus in our heart as Jesus is love and obeying His commandment of Love is very important as it is given to us from His Word. The Love of Jesus should be the most important part of our Christian life. This includes loving the Lord our God with all our mind and heart and strength. Then in this same commandment we are to Love our neighbor as our self. The Word was written for our benefit and it was written for us to take it all into our hearts with Love. I would like to share with you tonight the scriptures that have come to mean a great deal to me throughout the years:
Colossians 3:1-4 1. If ye then be risen with Christ, seek those things which are above, where Christ sitteth on the right hand of God.
2. Set your affection on things above, not on things on the earth.
3. For ye are dead, and your life is hid with Christ in God.
4. When Christ, who is our life, shall appear, then shall ye also appear with him in glory.
The first verse here says that if ye then be risen with Christ, seek those things which are above, where Christ sits at the right hand of God. We should be letting His Holy Spirit of Truth take over our lives to the point of being willing to let our lives be cleaned up to an acceptable habitation of God with us.This is something to ponder. What is an acceptable habitation of God in each one of us? Or what does God expect of each of us? I believe that He expects us to have an ear to hear the Holy Spirit speak His Word to our heart and to let His Word be put into our hearts to last forever. As I see the meaning of His Word that will last forever, I see His Love take hold of my life and the meaning of His Love coming forth to us all, not in interpretations, but as truth that we are to hold onto and let Him seal it in our hearts so that we know beyond a doubt that if we believe in Jesus and let Him into our hearts by faith, His Holy Spirit will take our heart and mind and cleanse us from the world. I have found this to be so in my life as I am trying my best to love the Lord with all my heart and let my whole being become sensitive unto Him and let His Love take over with Power to deliver me from the world.Colossians, Chapter 3 verses 3 and 4 tell us 3. For ye are dead, and your life is hid with Christ in God.
4. When Christ, who is our life, shall appear, then shall ye also appear with him in glory.
I would like to refer to Apostle Paul’s writing in Romans Chapter 6 verses 1 to 16. This writing has to do with how we show the world that Baptism is an outward appearance of dying to the world of sin. How shall we show the world that we are dead to sin if we would keep sin in our lives. Is it by our own interpretation of what is good for us and what is not good? The word shows us that we cannot continue to live in sin if the word is revealed to us that we live in sin. That is why we have to let the Holy Spirit impress upon our mind and heart what sin truly is. 1 What shall we say then? Shall we continue in sin, that grace may abound?
2 God forbid. How shall we, that are dead to sin, live any longer therein?
3 Know ye not, that so many of us as were baptized into Jesus Christ were baptized into his death?
4 Therefore we are buried with him by baptism into death: that like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life.
5 For if we have been planted together in the likeness of his death, we shall be also in the likeness of his resurrection:
6 Knowing this, that our old man is crucified with him, that the body of sin might be destroyed, that henceforth we should not serve sin.
7 For he that is dead is freed from sin.
8 Now if we be dead with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with him:
9 Knowing that Christ being raised from the dead dieth no more; death hath no more dominion over him.
10 For in that he died, he died unto sin once: but in that he liveth, he liveth unto God.
11 Likewise reckon ye also yourselves to be dead indeed unto sin, but alive unto God through Jesus Christ our Lord.
12 Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body, that ye should obey it in the lusts thereof.
13 Neither yield ye your members as instruments of unrighteousness unto sin: but yield yourselves unto God, as those that are alive from the dead, and your members as instruments of righteousness unto God.
14 For sin shall not have dominion over you: for ye are not under the law, but under grace.
15 What then? shall we sin, because we are not under the law, but under grace? God forbid.
16 Know ye not, that to whom ye yield yourselves servants to obey, his servants ye are to whom ye obey; whether of sin unto death, or of obedience unto righteousness?
I have seen so much of half Christian living and half living for the world in so many in my 45 years of Christian life and I am not leaving myself out either. From 1972 until 1989 these things have been part of my own life also and I think the Lord let me even experience these things before His Holy Spirit impressed upon me to dedicate my life to Jesus. In 1989 His Holy Spirit started moving me in the right direction or in the upward way. In obedience to Him I let the Word of God saturate my whole being for many months and one day the Holy Spirit’s presence became very real to me. There was such a very wonderful presence that I felt like He gave me a healing in my inner most being. This is the only way I can describe this presence. He impressed upon my heart and mind some scripture that had started to have great meaning to me at the time and will remain as a wonderful hold upon my life. The first scripture was that I should keep my eye single on the Lord. Matthew 6:21-22 For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.
22 The light of the body is the eye: if therefore thine eye be single, thy whole body shall be full of light. From then on all I wanted to do was live for Jesus and let Him take control of my life. I wanted only to please Him and I wanted to seek Him more. In seeking Him more the world was leaving my life and my love for Jesus was ever increasing. Jesus had become a great treasure for me and from that time on I was learning that nothing in this world means anything to me, but to follow the Holy Spirit and let God’s Word rule my life. From that time until this very day from the time that I would wake up until it was time to go to bed my thoughts were constantly on Jesus and what He would have for me. Even when I would wake up in the middle of the night, Jesus was the first one I would think of and most often His name would form on my lips, and under my breath I would be singing silently: “Jesus, Jesus, Precious Jesus, Oh for grace to trust Him more.”
It has been 16 years and Jesus is still the center of my attention. I’m not saying these things, just to let people know how spiritual I am, but that everyone should let the Lord take hold of their lives and let Him take complete control so that His Work will truly get done the way He desires us to follow the way the Holy Spirit would lead and work in each of our lives.
In 1989 when I let the Holy Spirit take over my life completely I dedicated my life and my Love to my Lord and Savior Jesus. In the early sixty’s I asked Jesus to save me from my sins and to come into my heart, but I didn’t let the Lord take over my life completely and I even experienced a time when I felt the need to be Baptized, but the Lord knew I was not ready. He knew me better than I knew myself. I wanted Him in my life more, but I was just not ready to let the world go completely. When I was ready to cut the world loose from my life, then I knew when it was time to be truly obedient unto Him and be baptized. I had already felt a newness of the presence of the Lord and His very wonderful Power came over me as I knew that I had let the Holy Spirit start to lead and guide me in the upward way towards Jesus and where He sits at the Right Hand of the Father on the Throne of God. I also felt as if there was nothing more that I needed to do, but the Lord provided a means for Baptism to happen for me in the late summer of 1990. My Mom met a Baptist preacher at a neighbor’s funeral and we started to go to his church in Sewickley. His name is Doug Lauffer and I consider him to be one of three Baptist preachers that are high on my list of people who are in the category of having a true Love of the Lord and a true love of souls to bring them to the Lord. A couple of weeks later he was having a Baptism with several churches involved and I asked him if he would include me in the Baptism and he agreed to Baptize me.
This was something that was scriptural and so I wanted to be obedient unto the Lord and show to everyone that I had excepted Jesus as my Savior and I was now dead to sin with Christ and that I was risen with Him and I was also showing that I was walking with Jesus in the newness of the new life He had made possible for me.
At the moment I would like to talk about something that is close to my heart and is very much misunderstood by certain church people. I believe that being in the Spirit should also be a very part of our Christian experience. Even though we take Jesus by faith, there is also something that we should let happen in our lives. Jesus told John in the second and third chapters of Revelation that we should have an ear to hear the Holy Spirit. I believe that if we are in the Spirit we will hear what He has to give us from God’s Word and we will know and understand what pleases God and what He dislikes about our lives. At this we better have an ear to hear.
Some people make such a big business over being “in the Spirit,” and they want everyone to know how spiritual they are while they tell their experience of being “in the spirit.” It usually goes like this: “when I was in the spirit I fell over and started speaking in tongues.” They will never say for what purpose that this experience is for.
This is something that is very odd. Throughout the years I have experienced a lot, especially in the ministry that I was in for so many years. For I have seen the true results of being in the Spirit and being filled with the Spirit. It did not include falling over and speaking in tongues. There has to be a purpose for everything the Lord does and the true purpose of being filled with the Spirit is for Power for service. The results were the true workings of the Power of God and many people who were truly sorry for their sins were saved by coming forth to give their hearts to Jesus. Also many people were healed, including myself a few times. Everything was done in the proper way the Lord does everything. When Apostle John was in the Spirit, he described something that was very wonderful, it was Jesus behind him and speaking to him, and giving him the revelations to write down. In Revelation 1:10. There was no mention of tongues, but there was truth given as the Lord revealed His revelations to John to write down for us to see the prophecies of things to come.
As I would be seeking Jesus and as the Holy Spirit of Truth would be leading me through God’s Word I would be praying for understanding. The understanding would be there and the presence of the Holy Spirit of Truth would confirm it and I would know what in the Spirit is. For there was always a presence that I cannot to this day explain, except that the Holy Spirit of Truth would impress upon my mind and heart to look up to where Jesus is found and the Holy Spirit would glorify Jesus in every way to me. The scripture that comes to mind is what Jesus said in the Gospel of John chapter 16:13-15 Howbeit when he, the Spirit of truth, is come, he will guide you into all truth: for he shall not speak of himself; but whatsoever he shall hear, that shall he speak: and he will shew you things to come. 14 He shall glorify me: for he shall receive of mine, and shall shew it unto you. 15 All things that the Father hath are mine: therefore said I, that he shall take of mine, and shall shew it unto you. There are so many scriptures that have impressed upon my mind and heart what the Lord is saying to us, but these few have stood out to me and it pertains to the scripture that I started out with: It is found Philippians 3:20-21 For our conversation is in heaven; from whence also we look for the Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ: 3:21 Who shall change our vile body, that it may be fashioned like unto his glorious body, according to the working whereby he is able even to subdue all things unto himself.
Those who know me, know that I take the Gospel of Jesus very seriously. I have found that I either have to keep my thoughts on Jesus all of the time or my mind wonders off someplace onto the different things of the world. Now I do not see anything wrong with what people do for distraction of the everyday humdrum of their existence, but to continue to do these things and it takes up precious time that should be spent with the Lord it can become sin. There is just so much distraction out there and that is the reason I try my best to keep Jesus in the forefront of my thoughts at all times.
I had mentioned that between 1972 and 1989 I had not fully followed the Lord and kept letting Him into my life. It would seem that work and recreation were the norm of my life in those years and we did not go to church for 17 years or so. As I said work was important to me and so I worked 7 days a week and when we were not working we were boating or traveling. These things became ahead of God in our lives. This was sin. I thank God for His Holy Spirit drawing me back to Jesus, for in 1989 I finally let Him speak to my heart and I was drawn back to Jesus to let Him take my life and use it for His Glory. It was at this time that I saturated my whole being with the Word of God and it was also at this time that Jesus came back into my life and was gracious to me and His Holy Spirit presence was there again. I was being led in the Spirit again straight to where Jesus is up high and He was so real to me that I dedicated my life from that day until now to loving Him and serving Him.
Everything that is written in the Word of God pertains to each and everyone of us. There are those who think that the preacher is the only one who should be seeking the Higher things or those things that are found in the Heavenly Realm of Christ our Savior as they seek to know all these things to teach and preach the Gospel. Each one of us should be in ministry in some way or another and should take all of the Word of God we all possibly can into our heart. This particular subject of seeking the things of God or those things that are above where Christ is found shows us how we are to act in our everyday lives as we grow into an adult Christian. We cannot grow into an adult Christian without taking all of Christ into our heart and leaving self and the world behind. We really cannot take on the new person in Christ without the help of the Holy Spirit that leads us in the upward way to where Christ is found. Some more scripture comes to mind that is found in 1Corinthians 6:19-20 What? know ye not that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost which is in you, which ye have of God, and ye are not your own?
20 For ye are bought with a price: therefore glorify God in your body, and in your spirit, which are God's.
I would ask the question, What controls your body and mind and heart? Is it you yourself, or as the body of Christ do you let the Holy Spirit show you what is good for you to know and act upon in His Service?
Another thing comes to mind as I would think that all of the church members and most importantly the officers of the church should be praying earnestly for the church and it’s growth and we should all be praying together in special time and in groups at our prayer meetings. I believe that this is important and that it shows how we love our neighbors and each other if we pray together for our community, our loved ones and in particular this church that it would see people saved. In the past 2 and 1 half years we have had an active prayer meeting and I believe that extraordinary things have come about in the lives of people that were prayed for. I know in my own life I have grown closer to the Lord as I have let Him work in my life. Yes and I believe that even healing has come into my body as my blood pressure is down to an acceptable level, where it was very high for years. I have not been on any medication for this problem and I praise His Name for this and for each and every thing that God brought forth in this church for the past couple of years.
Those who think that they are fooling everyone else in believing they are a Christian by living the way they desire to live and placing their desires above God’s desire for us are going to be in for a rude awakening someday, for they are just fooling themselves. They cannot fool God at all. Those who live their lives apart from letting the Holy Spirit do the Wonderful Works of God in their lives are also going to stand before the Throne of God and give an account of themselves. The account of their lives will already be all written in the Book of Life with nothing left out. The life before one becomes a Christian will be forgotten, but after one professes to be a Christian, repentance needs to be done for everything that is revealed to them of sin, these things also must be confessed and brought before Jesus to forgive and what ever is confessed and forgiven, must not enter that one’s life again.
Just think of it, what are we going to do when we meet the Lord face to face, and we will meet Him some day when we all stand before Him and the book of Life is opened and He knows all about us already. Can we give an account of ourselves? Are we going to give Him some lame excuse why we were not in church and loving Him by worshiping Him the way we should have been and witnessing for Him and doing service for Him? I think not, for those who think they are going to give an excuse, I will say they will be speechless before The All Powerful Holy God that knows us all better than we know ourselves.
Preached Wednesday night, February 9, 2005 at Mooncrest Baptist Church. By Starre Steinmetz
