INVINCIBLE CHURCH 4-14-24

Invincible Church Sermon Notes
4/14/2024
How to be a True Follower of Jesus pt 9 – Beginning to End – “SEEK”
Romans 3:9-20
Over the last few weeks, we’ve been talking about God’s plan for His creation and everything in it. His plan includes Biblical decisions, instructions and principles for how to be a true follower of Jesus! So, once we freely choose salvation through Jesus by submitting to Him as our…
… Lord and Savior, our goal in life becomes bringing glory to God! He expects us to live and speak the truth about Jesus to the world! Jesus Himself gave us instructions and a process to get it done, which is the only tangible way we have to show Him that we love Him!
We started this series by covering God’s plan and strategy in some detail and God’s sent us specific messages every Sunday for the first 7 first critical action item about the instructions and process from Jesus. It’s to LOVE, PRAY and BE THANKFUL to God for everything…
… then GO into the world… MAKE disciples for Jesus… and TEACH them how to be obedient to the commands and instruction He’s given us! Then the wise thing to do (with the right motive) is the ASK God for the words, wisdom and ways to handle every circumstance and situation we face along with every opportunity He gives us to serve.
Today we’re going to talk about the action item SEEK and we’ll be in…
Romans 3:9-20 NIV - 9 What Shall we Conclude then? … Do we Have Any Advantage? … Not at All! … For we Have Already Made The Charge that Jews and Gentiles Alike are All Under The Power of Sin! ... 10 As It Is Written … “There is No One Righteous … Not even One … 11 There is No One who Understands … There is No One who Seeks God! … 12 All have Turned Away … They have Together Become Worthless … There is No One who does Good … Not even One! ...” 13 Their Throats are Open Graves … Their Tongues Practice Deceit! … “The Poison of Vipers is On their Lips! … 14 Their Mouths are Full of Cursing and Bitterness! … 15 Their Feet are Swift to Shed Blood! … 16 Ruin and Misery Mark their Ways! … 17 And The ‘Way of Peace’ they Do Not Know! … 18 There is No Fear of God Before their Eyes! … 19 Now we Know that whatever The Law Says … It Says To those Who are Under The Law … So that every Mouth May Be Silenced …. And The Whole World Held Accountable to God! ... 20 Therefore No One will Be Declared Righteous in God’s Sight by The Works of The Law … Rather … ~Through~ The Law … We become Conscious of our Sin!
Paul’s writing a letter to the church in Rome and he’s quoting what King David wrote to Israel in Psalms… and they’re not saying here that of all the people who’ve ever lived nobody’s ever tried to seek God. God made humans as triune beings with a body, soul and spirit.
In (vs 9) Paul’s just stating the fact that all mankind, both Jews and Gentiles are guilty of sin against God! The Word “we” here is talking about the Christians in Rome that he sent the letter to. They were completely dominated and enslaved by sin and under God’s condemnation!
In (vs 10) He’s pointing out that Christians don’t have a superior moral nature over everybody else. We’re all born with a sin nature because of the choices that Adam and Eve made in the garden and we’ll get to that here in a minute. But mankind is universally evil.
Then he says, if people don’t seek God, they can’t be made righteous, not even one! So, in (vs 11) when he says… man is unable to comprehend the truth of God or understand His righteousness, it’s because they don’t have the power of the Holy Spirit.
They’re choosing a life of evil depravity by rebelling against God! And they can’t blame their spiritual ignorance on a lack of opportunity for understanding God’s righteousness. It’s because they’re rejecting His son Jesus by denying that He’s the true Messiah sent by God!
Paul’s clearly implying that instead of fallen man seeking God Almighty, they’re trying to get away from Him, chasing false religions of the world… because man’s natural tendency is to seek their own interests and pursue the philosophies and rituals of other mortal men!
The reality is the only hope that anybody has is to seek God first! It’s the best means for finding out how His grace and mercy works! (Vs 12) is basically saying that people are natural inclined to wander off from God’s ways and pursue their own worldly ways.
In (vs 13) tombs were sealed to respect the dead, keep the decayed body from being seen and cover the stench of death! The open grace is a metaphor for an open throat, which would allow foul words to be spoken and would show the decay of the heart inside evil people.
In (vs 14) cursing here isn’t “cussing” … it’s talking about publicly declaring or wishing bad things would happen to somebody else with angry, loud and insulting language! It drives people to be bitter and hateful toward others for no real reason. Sound familiar?
(vs’s 15 & 16) are saying that evil/sinful people damage and destroy everything they touch. They leave a trail of pain, destruction and suffering in their wake! Good people try to build up… evil people try to tear down. Again, sound familiar?
In (vs 17) it’s not talking about lack of inner peace in the person. It’s talking about sinful people’s tendency toward conflict and division with other people… and with nations! Even when things are good, evil people will intentionally create conflict to tear things down!
In (vs 18) the true spiritual condition of evil people is very obvious because they have lack of proper respect, reverence or even acknowledgement of God! They foolishly and publicly show a complete disregard for God! In other words, they have no fear of God!
The Biblical definition for the fear of God is 1) awe of His greatness and glory… and 2) dread of the consequences for violating His holy nature! The reality is bad people who practice or support evil actions hate people so much that they don’t even think about God!
(vs 19) Tells us that every lost person is under the law. Jews received the written law through Moses… and Gentiles have the works of the law “written” on their hearts! It’s in our soul, so it’s in our conscience, which means both groups are accountable to God! (Everybody is.)
God pronounces a guilty verdict on the entire human race because of sin! And there’s no human defense for it! Jesus is the only answer! (vs 20) Goes on to tell us that it’s impossible for people to do what God’s moral law requires them to do for salvation. So, everybody’s condemned by their inability to follow the law, which means…
If a person isn’t saved through Jesus, then God justly condemns them for not keeping the law that He gave to His servant Moses! So, the law makes sin known and sets the boundary but it can’t save people from sin, which causes them to be eternally separated from God!
Now, humans just naturally seek spiritual things because God put a spiritual nature inside us. So, humans want some kind of spiritual connection to something, whether they can admit it, recognize it, understand it or not! That tells us the reality is…
… billions of people have sought after a god of some kind (small “g”) but not all people seek after the “one and only” true Almighty God of the universe! Followers of Jesus need to understand why so we can explain it to people when God gives us the opportunity… and we don’t want to miss them!
This all ties directly back to the very first sin against God by Adam and Eve! They already had an intellectual knowledge of the difference between good and evil because of how God designed us to function as a triune being with a body, soul and spirit. Now, stay with me here…
The spirit that God puts in our body warns our soul when we’re about to make a decision. Our soul reminds the conscience in our mind that there’s a difference between right and wrong. Then we use our brain to make the decision to do good or do bad.
The only way to guarantee that we make the good, right, God-honoring decision every time … all the time… is to always “seek God first” in everything we do, say, think and feel! Then God will ultimately work the experience to be “good” because God is always good!
Romans 8:28 NLT - 28 And we Know that God Causes Everything to Work together for The Good of Those who Love God … And are Called According to His Purpose for Them! … Now …
Adam & Eve knew God was good, so when God told them they could eat of the trees in the midst of the garden, they knew it was good to do that! And when God commanded them, “Don’t eat the fruit from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil in the middle of the garden…
… they also knew what God said was “good,” so the wise thing for them to do would be to just stay away from that tree and don’t eat that fruit but they chose to disobey, which meant that they experienced evil for the first time because their bad actions were a sin against God!
At that point, they not only had an intellectual knowledge of evil but they completely understood the nature of evil because they had fully experienced good and evil physically, mentally and spiritually for themselves… all because they didn’t seek God first!
God knows everything, so he already understood the nature of evil when Adam and Eve sinned. They lost their innocence, so the nature of evil was imparted into their very soul! Now they knew what evil was truly like, so like God they fully understood the nature of evil!
They felt the disgust, shame, guilt and grief of sin! It’s why they tried to hide from God but there’s no hiding from God. It’s why we want to always be working hard to follow the instructions and commands that Jesus gave us because we don’t want to be trying to hide from God. We want to be seeking God!
Now, Satan is real and he has a real supernatural power, but his supernatural power is limited! He knew Adam and Eve would be curious about deeper spiritual matters, so the snake’s deception in the garden included a very clever partial truth, which is still a lie. Now, think about it…
The Bible says that God allows Satan a certain amount of limited freedom, which means he can’t do everything he wants to do. So, Satan didn’t have free reign of the garden or he would have already slithered over to where Adam and Eve happened to be. So, the scenario is…
… Adam and Eve loved God. He’s the first person that Adam sees after God made him! Then God made Eve… and Adam loved God even more than he thought he ever could have. And God would come and visit them in the cool of the evening… and both of them loved it when God came so…
… they were constantly seeking God and He had told them a few things. One was… don’t go over to the tree in the middle of the garden! So, with the powerful brain that God gave them, they should have reasoned a couple of things… 1) God probably wouldn’t be over there either and 2) If God was over there, He didn’t want them to see what was going on over there.
Either way, God was telling them, don’t go over there, should have been enough! A lot of people say, “But I thought God is everywhere!” And He is! It’s called omnipresent. Then people ask, “Well why didn’t God stop them from sinning?” The answer is it was a test of their love, loyalty and obedience!
God will test us, but He’ll never tempt us. He’s given us “free will” to choose good or evil! It’s the only tangible way we have to show Him that we love Him! He’ll test us to give us a real-life opportunity to show Him that we truly love Him by choosing to obey Him!
If we truly love God, we’ll always seek Him first, whether He’s testing us, we’re being tempted by our flesh or it’s an attack from the enemy! And we don’t have to be embarrassed about a temptation of the flesh… as long as we don’t act on it!
It’s why we seek God first… because when we do, He’ll immediately protect us from ourselves and the enemy and in His perfect timing. He’ll work things to the good of those who love Him. So, “Don’t eat the fruit from that tree or you will surely die!”
I’m fully convinced that if Adam had done his job as the family leader and decision maker, as soon as he saw things stranger danger, if he’d immediately started seeking God… and admitted, “Hey God, I messed up and crossed the boundary… Now this weirdo’s trying to get us to eat the fruit from the tree!” God would have showed up and the story would have been different!
Kid test… one kid… secret camera… favorite candy… set the boundary… give the instructions.
Multiple kids… “You do it!” … “I’m not doing it… You do it and I’ll be the lookout!” That’s how we know that Adam was there! He was the lookout for Eve! But men have the responsibility to lead the family, group, team, business, nation, state or whoever else to “seek God first”!
Satan told Eve that, “God knows when you eat the fruit… your eyes will be opened… and you’ll know good and evil just like God does!" So, to Eve, knowing what God knows seemed like a good thing! But knowing what God knows isn’t the priority!
Knowing what God said and then doing it is always the priority! What the snake didn’t tell them was that experiencing evil would grieve God and ruin their relationship with God. It’s why partial truths can be more dangerous and deceptive than full blown lies!
God says His plan is enough for humans to understand and experience His goodness. So, if we’ll stop trying to know everything God knows… and if we’ll follow the instructions and commands that Jesus gave us to work God’s plan, we’ll see a whole lot more “good” happen in our life. It’s why God says in…
Isaiah 55:9 NIV - 9 “As The Heavens are Higher than The Earth … So Are My Ways Higher than your Ways … And My Thoughts than your Thoughts”!
But people have always wanted more divine knowledge and experience… a lot of times to their own demise! When Adam and Eve disobeyed God, they brought sin into the world and they lost fellowship with God… and suffered other judgements that have affected all mankind ever since!
The evil schemes of Satan have been so clever, devious and precise that lost people can only comprehend bits and pieces of the real truth about God, if any at all! And because of it, the reality of who God is gets blurred to a whole lot of people!
So, it’s only by seeking God and praying that He chooses to reveal Himself to us that our eyes are opened to the truth. Then, we can start putting the pieces together and pursuing Jesus in a way that honors God. Jesus tells us in…
John 17:3 NIV - 3 Now this is Eternal Life … That they Know You … The Only True God … And Jesus Christ, Whom You Have Sent!
Jesus is telling us that when we continue to seek God with the motive to know Him better, then we’ll be able to better understand the true purpose He has for us on earth… and in heaven! So, the two most important things we can think about are seeking God and pursuing Jesus!
Seeking God is a continual responsibility and privilege for all followers of Jesus… and it’s what really determines the direction and quality of our life! Now, seeking God isn’t always an easy thing to do! But it’s not because God doesn’t want to be found! It’s because we let our minds get saturated with the lies, deceit and misconceptions that’re schemed against us by Satan and then reinforced by our society, false prophets and pagan politicians among others!
We have to hold ourselves accountable as well because our sinful nature, disobedience and temptation can lead us astray if we lose focus! So, the best way to defeat the enemy’s deceit is to work hard to know God and His word better… and keep growing in our relationship with Jesus!
Romans 12:2 NIV - 2 Do Not Conform to The Pattern of This World … But Be Transformed by The Renewing of your Mind! ... Then you Will Be Able to Test and Approve What God’s Will Is … His Good … Pleasing … And Perfect Will!
There are multiple examples in the Bible of God’s people straying away from Him. So, they didn’t have a priest to teach them… and they were without the law, but in their darkest hours. Whenever they started seeking Him with the right motive, heart and love. They always found Him!
So, when God’s people sincerely seek Him, things go well. But when they stop seeking Him, things fall apart! Sin increases, morality declines and revelation from God stops! He doesn’t allow us to experience and encounter Him like we want to.
The same advice and counsel God gave to His people in that day still apply to us today! The principle is repeated all throughout scripture. If we seek Him. But if we forsake Him, we won’t be able to find Him, not because He’s not there, but because our heart isn’t right.
Deuteronomy 4:29 NIV – 29 But if from There you Seek The Lord your God … You will Find Him if you Seek Him with All your Heart and with All your Soul!
Jeremiah 29:13 NIV – 13 You will seek Me and Find Me when you seek Me with All your Heart!
Matthew 7:7 NIV – 7 “Ask and It will Be Given to you … Seek and you will Find … Knock and The Door will Be Opened to you!
Acts 17:27 NIV – 27 God did this so that they would seek Him and perhaps reach out for Him and find Him, though He is not far from any one of us.
James 4:8 NIV - 8 Come close to God, and God will come close to you. Wash your hands, you sinners; purify your hearts, for your loyalty is divided between God and the world!
The Biblical principle for seeking God is that when we draw near to God, He will reveal more of who He is to us! God doesn’t hide from people who’re seeking to know Him better. It’s why it will always benefit us to keep seeking God and pursing Jesus.
Think about this, what keeps us from seeking God first and stops us from sinning? It is our love for Jesus or our fear of the law. If it’s fear of the law, then we might need to find a follower of Jesus who we trust and talk to them about true salvation!
The way to recognize a true follower of Jesus is to watch them and talk to them for a minute or two. When they’re a true follower of Jesus, it will be obvious that they’re working in the process of seeking God first!