Radio Broadcast Tuesday 01/31/2023

Classic Christianity – A Closer Look at Law & Grace P49 (01-31-23)

Without The Spirit of God Living In You You Cannot Understand What The Word of God Means

~ for, “Who has known the mind of the Lord so as to instruct him?” But we have the mind of Christ. ^{1 Corinthians 2:16}

~ “So today, we’re told that the spiritual man has the Spirit of God living inside of him with the ability now to understand what the Word of God means. That’s irregardless of your education. As a matter of fact, the Scripture says that he’ll take the foolish things of the world to confound the wise. So it’s not something of an educational deal, you don’t have to be a highly educated person in order to understand the meaning of the word of God. And in the final analysis, if we had the old and the new, totally memorized, and quite frankly, computers have that. That’s all memorized. And, and if we knew what it meant, but we don’t apply what it meant, in other words, there’s an application, I know what this says, I know what this means. Now I’m going to act upon it. Why, again, we may as well not know it. And so in the final analysis, when you cut away all the debris, what Jesus did was say, we’re gonna get right down to the bottom line of this thing. That the bottom line of everything you’ve ever learned, of everything, hopefully, that you understand, in regard to what the Spirit has taught to you, in regard to the only application that I am really interested in, it’s to love one another. And if you are not doing that, everything else is nothing. But as he said, in Corinthians, a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal, it has no meaning to it at all, the only thing that matters is faith in Him, expressing itself through love for one another, if you love me, Feed my sheep. If You Love Me, If you love others, be willing to communicate me to others. That’s the greatest expression of love, that you can give to another human being no man has greater love than he lays down his life for the sheep. In other words, you’re putting aside your own pride, putting aside your own desire for popularity and acceptance, putting aside your desire to be a part of the boys. And you’re saying no, if I love then, I’m going to tell my friends about Jesus. That is the sign of love. If I go and give cold water to someone who is thirsty, that’s fine, but they’re going to be thirsty again. So if I’m going to give a cup of cold water to a thirsty person, I’m going to do so. And while I’m there, and they’re having their physical thirst quenched, I’m going to tell them about a water that you’ll never thirst again. If I see a person that is hungry, that beloved will certainly reach out to give food to the hunger, but they’re going to be hungry again. So while they are getting their hunger, quenched, while they’re getting their hunger met, that that need for hunger, that desire that is there. I want to tell them about the bread of life, that when you eat of it, it’ll never go away. That is the sign of love. And Bob, what we’ve been studying about in his final book is this area of love. Without it, it means nothing. And each and every one of us in and of ourselves are totally incapable of that type of love. Only through dependency on the author of Love, are we going to experience it in our lives.”

Listen in to today’s lesson with more in-depth teaching, from the Bible study booklet, A Closer Look at Law & Grace, available for purchase from our online Bob George Ministries ecommerce store.

Jesus asked how does God love and accept us? And how does he expect us to live the Christian life? To answer those questions, this insightful study explores a vital issue at the heart of the Christian experience, the biblical relationship between law and grace, understanding their role in our relationship to God will bring joy, freedom and spontaneity to your Christian life. Now, let’s take A Closer Look at Law & Grace.

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Bob George 0:39
Indeed, I have enjoyed teaching through this, hopefully, as much as those who have been the recipients of it. And I would venture to say probably even more than those who have been the recipients of it, because every time that you do have the opportunity to teach why you get the opportunity to learn, yes, and that’s just the way that the Lord works on those things. Bob, we’ve, we’ve talked about in broadcasts in the past, the truth of the fact that you can know what something says. But you cannot learn what something means, through the normal learning process. We think, and of course, a theological community would think that you can learn the meaning of the word of God by dissecting the verbs, or studying the original language. You have many people arguing as an example, again, the very opposite of what this lesson is about, of loving and being patient with each other. But instead of that, arguing with one another, over translations, and I do realize that there are some pretty pitiful translations. But I also understand that if you’re lost, it doesn’t matter whether it’s a good translation, or a bad loss or translation, you’re not natural man can understand spiritual things, whether it’s written poorly, or whether it’s written finally, you’re not going to understand it one way or the other. So the the accuracy of the translation is not going to do a whole lot for a loss person. Because apart from the Spirit of God living in you, you can’t understand what it means anyway, to the saved person, if indeed, the Spirit of God is living inside of you. And you’re depending upon that Spirit, the Spirit of God is going to teach you what something means. And that’s a hard concept for us, as people, especially in our pride, and our really, somewhat of a rebellion against living in dependency upon someone else, when we think I’ve got this marvelous brain, I’ll learn it myself. But you see, Bob, the truth of the matter is that the New Testament as an example was written in Greek, wasn’t it? Yes, people spoke in Greek. They didn’t have to go to seminary to learn Greek. They spoke it and they understood what it meant. They understood the words so that you didn’t have to go to some school to learn a foreign language that was their language people spoke Greek it was it was internationally spoken. At the same token, the Gospel went to the Hebrew. And so and they spoke, strangely enough Hebrew. And so they understood what the Bible said they didn’t have to go to seminary to study Hebrew and dissect the verbs. They knew what it was saying. When Hebrew priest picked up the Bible, what they had in their hands of the Pentateuch, whatever else it might be, they didn’t have to struggle over the words. But just and and, and the, in their religious system. They had most of those things memorize amazing ability, brain wise to memorize almost the entirety of the Old Testament, many people had that. And they were told to have to their children to have the scripture on the on the, on the doorposts. They had it on their foreheads. Scripture was their life. And they knew what it said. But they didn’t know what it meant. Only those who relied on God, who came to him justified by faith in Him, not in my own intellect, ever had a clue of what it meant otherwise. And Jesus said that you searched the scriptures in hopes of finding eternal life and the scriptures all pointed to me and yet you refuse to come to me for life. You say, you won’t believe me. Because you say you depend upon Moses. But he said, No, you don’t depend upon Moses. Moses wrote about me. And if you say the one you’re depending on he wrote about me that you don’t believe him. How are you gonna believe me whom he wrote about? And so the fact of the matter is that the information was in the head But the information was not in the heart. And so there was no indwelling Holy Spirit in people back in those days. So if they had the capability of knowing what it meant the Holy Spirit came upon people, to teach them what something meant, but not to indwell this light and indwell us, as he does today.

So today, we’re told that the spiritual man has the Spirit of God living inside of him with the ability now to understand what the Word of God means. That’s irregardless of your education. As a matter of fact, the Scripture says that he’ll take the foolish things of the world to confound the wise. So it’s not something of an educational deal, you don’t have to be a highly educated person in order to understand the meaning of the word of God. And in the final analysis, if we had the old and the new, totally memorized, and quite frankly, computers have that. That’s all memorized. And, and if we knew what it meant, but we don’t apply what it meant, in other words, there’s an application, I know what this says, I know what this means. Now I’m going to act upon it. Why, again, we may as well not know it. And so in the final analysis, when you cut away all the debris, what Jesus did was say, we’re gonna get right down to the bottom line of this thing. That the bottom line of everything you’ve ever learned, of everything, hopefully, that you understand, in regard to what the Spirit has taught to you, in regard to the only application that I am really interested in, it’s to love one another. And if you are not doing that, everything else is nothing. But as he said, in Corinthians, a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal, it has no meaning to it at all, the only thing that matters is faith in Him, expressing itself through love for one another, if you love me, Feed my sheep. If You Love Me, If you love others, be willing to communicate me to others. That’s the greatest expression of love, that you can give to another human being no man has greater love than he lays down his life for the sheep. In other words, you’re putting aside your own pride, putting aside your own desire for popularity and acceptance, putting aside your desire to be a part of the boys. And you’re saying no, if I love then, I’m going to tell my friends about Jesus. That is the sign of love. If I go and give cold water to someone who is thirsty, that’s fine, but they’re going to be thirsty again. So if I’m going to give a cup of cold water to a thirsty person, I’m going to do so. And while I’m there, and they’re having their physical thirst quenched, I’m going to tell them about a water that you’ll never thirst again. If I see a person that is hungry, that beloved will certainly reach out to give food to the hunger, but they’re going to be hungry again. So while they are getting their hunger, quenched, while they’re getting their hunger met, that that need for hunger, that desire that is there. I want to tell them about the bread of life, that when you eat of it, it’ll never go away. That is the sign of love. And Bob, what we’ve been studying about in his final book is this area of love. Without it, it means nothing. And each and every one of us in and of ourselves are totally incapable of that type of love. Only through dependency on the author of Love, are we going to experience it in our lives.

Picking up on page 86 of your Classic Christianity study series called A Closer Look at Law and Grace, we are dealing with the subject of love Ephesians 4:32, Romans 15:7, Ephesians 4 be kind and compassionate to one another. forgiving each other. Just as in Christ. God forgave you. Where was God’s forgiveness? in Christ. How did Christ forgive you? Totally. He took away your sins. Never did see them again. How are we to forgive one another? The same way. Love we’re told in first Corinthians keeps no records of wrongs. That means keep no records of wrongs. Folks, our brain has a memory to it. And so a lot of times people get the idea that what we can do is all of a sudden turn off a certain segment in our brain whereby that offense that has been made against us will never return to us. See, that is not the case. It’s there. And it can be drawn out and brought to the surface at any time. That’s why you and I can remember things that happened to us 40 50 years ago. But in my case, can’t remember what happened to me yesterday.

But at any rate, what you’re talking about is being kind and compassionate to one another forgiving each other, just as Christ Jesus forgave you. And in Corinthians talking about keeping no records of wrongs, is you don’t file it away. You don’t intentionally say I’m keeping this over here in my filing cabinet, so that when I need it, I can pull it out. It’s, it’s a mindset that says, I’m going to quit bringing it up. I’m not going to talk to you about it anymore. There are many people in relationships, even in marriage relationships, where 30 years later, they’ll bring up what you did to me 30 years ago, constantly reminding you of a failure. And folks, there is nothing about God in that. He says, Don’t keep records of those wrongs, put them behind you. All of us are capable of making mistakes. All of us do make mistakes. And none of us like to have a reminder of those mistakes. And so for the sake of love, quit bringing up mistakes to people for the sake of love, and for the sake of compassion. And for the sake of being able to live in a spirit of restoration, rather than a spirit of condemnation.

Accept one another, therefore, Romans 15, just as Christ accepted you, in order to bring praise to God, your acceptance of other people brings praise to God, we accept one another, the way they are, acceptance means you’re not all that God has meant you to be yet in in total experience, but you’re all that He wants you to be right now. And I accept you because I’m he isn’t through with me yet either. And, folks, we cannot sit around setting ourselves up as some kind of an example of this spiritual giant. And we’re apt to try to help all of these poor underlings that just aren’t quite as mature as we are. That’s not a spirit of Christ. We’re to accept each other where we are just like we accept the baby. A baby’s messing up their diapers, baby has reversible stomachs. baby wakes you up at night, baby can’t walk, he’s totally dependent upon you. And yet you accept that baby where it is you don’t expect that baby to get up and sit at the table and eat a three square meal and walk to the bedroom and go to bed on his own. That babies don’t do that you accept a baby, as a baby. As a baby Christian, many times we’re not haven’t been in the Lord as long as someone who’s been in the Lord 20 or 30 years, they’re not going to have the same understanding. But we have to accept each other and we want to accept each other. Just as Christ Jesus accepted you.

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Bob George 13:36
Now folks in order to accomplish those two things, forgiving each other, being kind to one another, being compassionate to one another. And accepting one another requires an attitude, I believe, have a premise or a beginning attitude. First of all, as we said, don’t judge one another, or you too will be judged. It’s not our role to judge one another. That’s God’s role. Matthew seven, one through five deals with that. Next we need to have an attitude of restoration, not condemnation. Galatians six one tells us brothers, if someone is caught in a sin, you who are spiritual should restore him gently. But watch yourself or you may also be tempted. In other words, we never go to someone with a spirit of condemnation. Who are we to condemn someone else? When there is no condemnation awaiting you from God? Unless our standards have become higher than his, then why should we condemn when he is not condemning? Think about that for a while folks, why are we condemning one another when Christ Jesus is not condemning any of us? He took that penalty upon Himself for our sins, He died for our sins so that the wages of sin which is death could be alleviated by the gift of God, which is life. And that’s why Paul said in the midst of your and my individual struggles of life, the things that I want to do, I don’t do the things I don’t want to do I do anyway, wretched man that I am, who will free me from this bondage of sin and death? And the answer to that is, thanks be to God, through Jesus Christ our Lord. So now there is no condemnation, awaiting those who belong to Christ Jesus. For the law, the spirit of life, has set me free from the law of sin and death. And so my friends, when you and I, if we are truly born again, Christians now if we’re not, we don’t have that attitude in us. We have an attitude of self righteousness, we have an attitude of condemnation, toward one another instead of restoration. We don’t think about restoration, the jail system they play at restoration, but the jail isn’t there to restore, it’s there to condemn. It’s there to punish, it is not there to restore. That’s why the return of prisoners is about as evident as anything that is on the face of this earth. That’s the attitude of the lost is to condemn. If you’re in Christ, why are you condemning? Why do I condemn? because our minds have not been renewed by God. Now, brothers, it says if someone’s caught in a sin. In other words, if someone is trapped in a sin, caught in a sin, trapped in a sin interpreted either way you want to, it says, if you are spiritual, if you are in Christ, you should restore him gently. It doesn’t say to restore him harshly, it means to help him, it means to go to him with love. Never with an attitude of I would never do that, because and it says you need to watch yourself, you also can be tempted with the same thing. And folks, I think there is a principle to that. I believe in what I’ve observed in human experience, is that many times you can be in the process of trying to help someone or to restore someone in a certain sin. And through the conversation about that sin that you’re trying to help restore them in your own flesh begins to grab a hold of those temptations that this fella or this woman has gone through. And before long, you find yourself being tempted by the very same sin that they’re talking about. That is precisely why that I do not believe when you’re in counseling, that I need to have dug up all the garbage that has taken place in his garb in this situation, I have found myself wanting to hear more of the garbage. That is just the way it is folks. Watch yourself, you also may be tempted. And so if you see a person caught in a sin, God’s way of handling that is not to go and try to condemn, not to go and try to expose, not to go out and try to ruin that person. But to go to that person gently, lovingly, with an attitude of restoration. And a watch yourself, that you yourself do not get tempted by the very thing that you’re trying to help the person with.

John 3:17 says God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through Him. So if Jesus did not come into the world to condemn, then why should you and I, who are indwelt by Jesus be involved in condemnation?

Now on the next page, we talk about John 15:12. My command is this. It’s kind of like it there for love each other as I have loved you. Just as I have loved you, Jesus said, I want you to love each other. Now, folks, we look at that command. And once again, that command isn’t any different than any command that Jesus gave them gave us. It’s impossible to carry out in the energy of your flesh. Oh, you can put some artificial fruit on your branch and make it look good. You can get some color duplication to make this piece of wax look kind of like an apple or a peach or a pear but you buy it into that thing and you’re gonna find out in a hurry that is not real fruit, it’s just artificial fruit. And folks, unfortunately today, much of what we see going on in Christian experience is nothing but artificial fruit. Someone has read the Bible and said, This is what Jesus commanded. They know full well, they can’t do it to say, let’s try to duplicate it, let’s try to manufacture it. God’s heart isn’t good enough, let’s build an artificial one. If our knees aren’t good enough, let’s build some artificial knees. And they’ll help you for a while. But they’re artificial. We got this world of transplants going on Bob, where all of a sudden, women all over this world and found out that those transplants leak, and they’re causing deaths. Might make you feel a little better for a while. But you’re not going to feel very good. If those things start leaking. So we’re very anxious to inject into our bodies, anything that’s artificial, instead of just being granted and satisfied with what God gave us. But that’s another story. But what he is saying to us is that if we’re going to walk in a newness of life, we’re going to have to walk in a newness of life, trusting in Him to accomplish what you and I can never accomplish on our own.

Every command that Jesus gave us is an impossibility for us to carry out in the energy of our own flesh, as we just talked about, it is something that is produced by the life of the vine, not by the branch. And so Jesus gave us the illustration of how this Christian life is lived. In other words, it is not lived by us, it’s no longer I who live Paul said, It’s Christ living in us. Now, when we don’t understand that, the best that we can do, as I said, is to go out and produce something that looks like the real thing, but is not the real thing. And Satan’s greatest tool is to get the real thing, or get what isn’t the real thing, looking as close to what the real thing is. Until for the undiscerning you cannot tell the difference. And so we we look at a Christian life, as going to church as an example. Anybody can go to church, I went to church for 13 years, 36 years, without knowing the Lord from Abraham Lincoln. And so, but we substitute, I’m a churchgoer. Well, that’s fine. But it has nothing to do with whether you’re saved or not. We can sing in the choir, nothing wrong with singing in the choir, I sang in choirs for 36, some years off and on didn’t know the Lord again from Abraham Lincoln. And when you’re singing songs, you’re not singing the top 10. There’s not hit parade, you’re singing spiritual songs. And so you can get spiritual responses from that. And I’ve had people many times, sit with tears in their eyes, listening to a song being sung. Of course, when I sang, it’s enough to cause people to cry. But the fact of the matter is that can occur has nothing to do with whether you’re a Christian or not. It just has to do with whether you’re singing a song or not, that can engender an emotion in somebody. I could go on and on folks in these types of things. But what we have to understand is those things are our additives to, but no never of substitute for the real thing, which is our relationship with Christ Jesus. So the issue is, do you want to produce your own artificial fruit? You can get a lot of results from that. I mean, you can get people looking at that that have no intention to take a bite of it, but just looking admire it. But absolutely, you’d better not take a bite out of it. It’s like plants in your house, you can have real ones that you have to water, you don’t have artificial ones. Do you want artificial ones in your house? Or do you want real ones in there? There’s a difference in it? Do they look alike? When you look at him in person, it’s not very discerning like me would know the difference. But to the person who knows the difference, they know the difference. So folks, the issue is what do you want in your life? Do you want what you’re producing? Or is your Do you have a desire to receive what he can produce? Now that requires folks a death? It requires a death whose death yours, dying to your own self sufficiency. Dying to your own self righteousness, dying to the laws that you’re trying to keep, dying to the principles that you’re trying to keep, dying to trying to live a godly life. How in the world can you live a godly life? You can live a godly looking artificial life. But you can’t live a life that you don’t have, or to have a life that you don’t live. You don’t live it, he lives in, you die to those things. I have to die to the fact that I’ve got the ability to commit to do something, and to carry that out for the rest of my life or to promise to do something and carry it out for the rest of my life. You don’t have it in you to do that. If you did, the Lord could have stayed at home. And you could have just had everybody sitting around, either marching on Washington or making promises about what they’re going to do or commitments what they’re going to do, or like the Israelites said, when they gave him the law will do it. And God says, No, you won’t. You may think you will do it, you may be as sincere as a heart attack and desiring to do it. But you man cannot pull this off. And until you come to realize you can’t, you will never ever realize that I can. And as long as you’re satisfied with dangling artificial fruit on your branch, you will never bear the real fruit that comes from me. I am not going to share my glory with your artificial fruit. So folks, you have a choice, don’t you? Do I want to spend my life abiding, giving up on my self effort? Realizing it’s no longer I who live I’m crucified, die to yourself died of the law. Died your commitments? Died you’re trying and start trusting? Who do you think it might be a little more sense to trust in one who can then try with the one who can’t?

Thank you so much for tuning in to Classic Christianity, with Bob George. We hope you’ve enjoyed today’s program. We truly hope that today’s message has inspired you to walk a life of faith in the Lord, find more information online at shop.BobGeorge.net. There you’ll also find available CDs, DVDs, and bible studies available for purchase. It’s through your help that we are able to spread the good word of Jesus Christ. Until next time, walk in faith, be good to one another and praise the Lord. Amen.