Classic Christianity – Peace, Purpose, & Promise Part 3 – 8-19-26
~ Peace I leave with you; My peace I give to you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled; do not be afraid. John 14:27
For those who are in Christ Jesus, Jesus is our Peace. When the Holy Spirit came and gave us Life, the very moment we exercised faith, the Spirit of Peace came to Live directly inside us. And Jesus said that would happen, when Jesus said He would send the Holy Spirit: “But the Advocate, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in My name, will teach you all things and will remind you of everything I have told you.” So now, livig after the cross, the Holy Spirit was indeed sent by the Father to teach us ALL TRUTH and to teach us ALL things. For some, who are in Christ Jesus, they have not asked to be shown the TRUTH of what is really going on in the world today. For many are still operating in their flesh, and are trusting in what they were taught throughout their whole life, yet are still believing in major lies without even realizing it.
So if you really, really want to know the whole Truth, ask of Him and it will be given to you without finding fault. Because He will reward those who seek after Truth, and will be given Truth. Don’t lean on your own understanding of anything today. But come directly too Him for wisdom and understanding.
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Pray to God:
Do you really want to know the WHOLE Truth of what is going on today?
Lord Jesus, teach me the truth of the world today and give me the wisdom to know the truth and identify the lies of the devil. Thank you God.”
~ Bob George discusses the concept of peace through grace, emphasizing that true peace comes from Jesus, not from worldly pursuits. He explains that Paul’s salutations of “grace and peace” highlight the inseparability of grace and peace. Bob elaborates on the abolition of the law through Christ, which created a new man out of HEBREW and Gentile, unifying them in Christ. He stresses the importance of love among believers, noting that the world will recognize Christians by their love. Bob also touches on the eternal life in Christ, the unconditional love of God, and the need for humility, gentleness, and patience in the Christian life.
“Are the laws of God. Now let’s look at that again. He Himself is our peace? Now again, do you know how Paul addresses all of his letters, right up there in chapter one, verse two? Every one of his letters. What’s he do? Grace and what? Peace be unto you. Was that the normal salutation of the HEBREW? What was the salutation of the HEBREW? Shalom, peace. Paul never said peace. He said grace and peace, grace and peace, grace and peace. Why? He knew something. There’s no peace apart from grace. So he’s talking about now that he’s saying that he himself is our peace. Now we’re out looking for peace by a river, or by a fishing hole, or whatever else be said. No, no, Jesus is your peace. If we’re going to experience peace, we’re going to have to experience the peace of God that passes all understanding through experiencing God. Through the experience of Him, Jesus is my peace. I don’t have any peace from the world. My peace comes from Him, and it can’t come anyplace else. So He Himself is our peace, who has made the two now one, has destroyed the barrier, the dividing wall of hostility, by abolishing in His flesh, that’s Christ’s flesh, He abolished the law with its commandments and regulations.” ~ Bob George
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Are the laws of God. Now let’s look at that again. He Himself is our peace? Now again, do you know how Paul addresses all of his letters, right up there in chapter one, verse two? Every one of his letters. What’s he do? Grace and what? Peace be unto you. Was that the normal salutation of the HEBREW? What was the salutation of the HEBREW? Shalom, peace. Paul never said peace. He said grace and peace, grace and peace, grace and peace. Why? He knew something. There’s no peace apart from grace. So he’s talking about now that he’s saying that he himself is our peace. Now we’re out looking for peace by a river, or by a fishing hole, or whatever else be said. No, no, Jesus is your peace. If we’re going to experience peace, we’re going to have to experience the peace of God that passes all understanding through experiencing God. Through the experience of Him, Jesus is my peace. I don’t have any peace from the world. My peace comes from Him, and it can’t come anyplace else. So He Himself is our peace, who has made the two now one, has destroyed the barrier, the dividing wall of hostility, by abolishing in His flesh, that’s Christ’s flesh, He abolished the law with its commandments and regulations.
Now again, what did Paul say about the law? He said, “There’s nothing wrong with the law; it’s good and holy. But when it flows through me, he said, “it what? It kills me. So it became an instrument of death rather than an instrument of life. Paul said that I thought the law was intended to give life, but he said when I read the commandment “Thou shall not covet, sin seizing its opportunity stirred up every kind of covetet’s desire inside of me, and I died. I recognized something. This law I thought was going to bring life showed me my death, and so he abolished the law with its regulations, its rules and regulations. Why did he do that? His purpose was to create in himself one new man out of the two. So how is the world divided according to God, HEBREW, Gentile, Ecclesia? Who’s in the ecclesia? Born again HEBREWS, born again Gentiles. If any man be where? In Christ, he is now what? A new creation. I’m no longer a HEBREW. I’m no longer a Gentile. I’m a child of the Living God. And my friends, that’s what God wants us to see. Now we don’t see that either. You got HEBREWS gathered together over here, Gentiles gathered together over here. Was that God’s plan? Absolutely not, he said. “You need to see yourself as not being a HEBREW or not being a Gentile, but see yourself as the new creation that you are, and that is a child of the living God in Christ. We’re told what? There is no HEBREW, no Gentile, no slave, nor free, we are all what one in Christ Jesus. He destroyed the barrier that divided HEBREW and Gentile, so they said, “You guys can be together as one. You don’t need to think of yourselves anymore as HEBREW and Gentile, slave or free, but as a child of the living God, that’s been recreated in the image of God for good works, you’re one now. There’s no such thing as a HEBREW Christian and a Gentile Christian. You’re just a child of God. There’s no black Christian and white Christian and brown Christian, and there’s just Christian child of God, there’s no race delineation. There’s just people who are in Jesus, one in Him. Isn’t that wonderful? That regardless of your background, we’re one in Christ Jesus and love one another as one in Christ Jesus. Did the world ever see HEBREW and Gentile loving each other? No. Do people see races loving each other in the world? No. You know what the definition of prejudice is? Anyone who ain’t like me. We’re prejudiced if we’re men against women. No, that’s the way those women think, you know. And the women think, well, those are dodo guys over there. We’re prejudiced against anyone who doesn’t think like us. And so prejudice is not color blind, and it’s not educational blind. We all have it. And he says, “Uh-uh, you all been made one now. There’s just one in Christ Jesus. We’re just one now, together.
Now all of a sudden, you saw Gentiles and HEBREWS loving each other. And what did Jesus say about that? The world will know that you are my disciples by your love one toward another. How come? World never seen that before. World doesn’t see that kind of stuff. The world sees separation, isolation, prejudice, and they see people loving each other of different backgrounds and different creeds and different educational backgrounds and different colors and different everything, and men and women really loving each other. You say, “Wow, what’s going on here? And he said, “That’s how the world is going to know that you’re my disciples, is by your loved one toward another.” He didn’t say the world’s going to know you’re my disciples by your ecthousis around your neck. He didn’t say the world’s going to know you’re my disciples by your bumper stickers. Don’t you wonder what they did before we had cars and bumper stickers? Probably put a little placard on the back of the donkey saying “Snort if you love Jesus, or something along that line. We try to separate ourselves and say, “Oh, they’ll know my disciples by those kind of things. Said, “No, you can have bumper stickers all over your car, you can have ethuses around your neck, but the only way that the world’s going to know that you’re my disciples is when they see love one for another.
Now, folks, incidentally, that is the most difficult thing for us to do, isn’t it? As a matter of fact, it’s impossible to do. So everything that Christ commanded you and me to do is a total impossibility. Until we until we realize something that maybe Jesus came to do something more than just die for my sins. That He came to give me life, and He even came to do more than that. He came more than to give me life, he came to be my life. Folks, do you realize the difference in that? Christ is your life. If you’re in Him, He is your life. If any man be in Christ, you’re a new creation. And when Christ, who is your life, appears, you will appear with Him. Christ is your life. That’s why people come in and say, “Oh well, you can lose your salvation. Baloney! Salvation is Christ. If you’re going to lose salvation, you’re going to lose Him. And how are you going to lose the One who said, “I’ll never leave you nor forsake you?” He’s yours. He has eternal life. You have eternal life. When did you get eternal life? The minute you have the Son. He who has the Son has life. Who’s life? Christ’s life. What kind of life does He have? Eternal. What kind do you have? Eternal. Why? Because you’re in the Eternal One. Now that’s why you and I don’t have to go to our death beds wondering, huh? Wonder what’s going to happen. But we go to our death beds with joy in our heart, like Paul, able to say, “For me to live is Christ; me to die, man, that’s gain. That’s gain. The day that I leave this body of mine, I’m going to be absent from the body and immediately present with the Lord, I know that. I don’t know that because I’m a good person, because I’m not. None of us are. I know that because Christ enabled that to occur. He gave me Himself, and He will usher me into the presence of God Himself the very day this heart stops beating, and your heart stops beating.
Now, is there anything to lose in that deal? Then, no. That’s what Paul said. Nothing to lose for me to live, Christ. For me to die, gain. In other words, for me to live is Christ. For me to die is Christ. So, how you going? What do you have to lose? So, when we have loved ones that we know who are in Christ when they depart, do you have to, as the Scripture says, grieve like the heathen do? Why? Because I know where they are. When my mother stopped breathing, she was absent from the body, present with the Lord. When my dad stopped breathing, absent from the body, present with the Lord. They’re in a lot better place than I am. I told Amy I want her to put on my tombstone. Go home. I’m not here.
No sense coming to visit me out there. I’m not there. I’m gone, and we have to realize that that is truth. And boy, we sit around and mourn and mourn and all that stuff. Not if you’re in Christ, there’s anything to mourn about. We’ve now gone to enter into the presence of Christ Jesus, and you’re going to be there too someday. So the worst with a loved one, departed loved one who’s in Christ, the worst thing is we’re just got a brief separation from each other. And you know, I learn a little bit about that too. I learn from the older you are, the more you learn some of these lessons, but when you haven’t seen someone in 20, 30 years, have anyone ever had that? Haven’t seen someone a long, long time. What’s it like after you’re together about five minutes? Seems like you’ve never been apart, and you know I think that’s the way it’s going to be in heaven. You know, parents. Dead, 30, 40 years, whatever might be. Minute we see each other, it’s like we’ve never left each other. And so, it’s a beautiful thing to know, isn’t it? Think of the hope that that gives to us. And every bit of that, folks, was brought about by the unconditional love of God that was given to us in Christ Jesus.
So he made the two into the one; that was his purpose. Let’s go back to verse 15. By abolishing in His place the law with its commandments and regulation, his purpose was to create himself one new man out of the two, and thus making peace, and in this one body to reconcile both of them to God through the same cross, Jesus Christ, by which He put to death their hostility. He came and preached peace to you who are far away. That’s the Gentile, and He came and preached peace to you who were near, that’s the HEBREW. For through him we both have access to the Father by one Spirit, and consequently you’re no longer foreigners and aliens, but fellow citizens with God’s people and members of God’s household, built on the foundation of the apostles and the prophets, with Christ Jesus Himself as the Chief Cornerstone, and in Him the whole building is joined together and rises to become a holy temple in the Lord, and in Him you too are being built together to become a dwelling in which God lives by His Spirit. Now let’s go over to Chapter Four. As a prisoner for the Lord, then I urge you to live a life that is worthy of the calling that you’ve received. Now, folks, what is it saying there? That your motivation is, if you understand who you are in Christ, then live a life consistent with that.
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Bob George 13:55
In other words, if you and I came to Christ, we came to Him only one way, and that was by faith, wasn’t it? So He says, “Live by faith. Be a person who lives by faith. If you responded to the love of God, which is what drew you near to Him to begin with, then learn to love one another. Let that love be passed on to someone.
There was a story one time of a of a of a guy that. Was roaming around in in in Colorado and looking at the different stone structures and all this type of thing. They said he picked up this one stone and he says the most beautiful stone he’d ever seen in his life, and and he he said I just couldn’t believe the beauty of that thing. And so he said he picked it up and and put it in his pack and took it home and and and set it up on his shelf and kind of walked away and after a while he came back and looked at it and it was just a just a rock, just kind of an old, ugly looking rock. As a matter of fact, he thought, golly, wonder what in the world I’m seeing. So he he said, I don’t need this anymore. He took it outside and was going to throw it away. And when he took it outside. All of a sudden, it was beautiful again. What was it? The sun was reflecting on it, and when the sun was reflecting upon that old piece of stone, it was gorgeous. And what is that? That’s a picture that we should be a reflection of the Son. We’re just a hunk of clay, but that’s a hunk of clay with a capacity to reflect the beauty of Christ.
And so he’s saying, as a prisoner of the Lord, I urge you to live a life worthy of the calling that you’ve received. That shouldn’t be very hard. All he’s doing is saying to be completely humble. Now look at this. I mean, it’s a lot easier to say go to church, tithe, sing the choir. Didn’t say any of that stuff. He just said, “Here’s what it is to live a life worthy of the calling: be completely humble and gentle. If that isn’t bad enough, he then says, “Be patient, and to bear that means hang in there with one another in love. Easy assignment, isn’t it? Do you know, guys when you look at these things, when you’re talking about humility, gentleness, patience, bearing one another in love, you know what the opposite of all that is? Pride. Pride is never humble, obviously. Pride is not gentle. Pride is certainly not patient. Pride says, “I want my way right now. I want what I want when I want it right now, and pride has no interest at all in bearing with one another in love. Because pride says, “I don’t need to bear with you in love. I want my own way. So the very opposite of these things is this great big I. That’s our problem. Now, when you look at life itself, and you see with these kind of things, do you realize that many times, and again, we live in this society, in this world, where everyone else is to blame, and do you realize, folks, that if you begin to blame someone, that you will ultimately hate that person that you blame, and you can blame someone for your misfortune to the point that I hate that person, and then you let that hate carry on for a while, and that hate becomes a part of your life, and you become a hateful person. We have to realize that when we get into the blame game, and that’s where again we live in a world, and we’re going to be told on here in this scripture not to be listening to the world. What does the world tell you when you’re all messed up? Why, let’s see. Let’s get together and let’s explore your background, and let’s see what your parents were like. And if I can, I’ll get you to see they’re to blame. Of course, if then I can buy that that my parents are to blame, why before long now I got a new problem. Now I hate them. Is that right or wrong, folks?
So we better watch who we blame. I think in Amy’s life, and I think the teaching of her mother, where she said, “War is war. Don’t ever hate the Germans for what they did, the Russians for what they did, or the Americans for what they did. Because as I told Amy one time, nobody liked you. Everyone was shooting at you, it was war. And don’t hold grudges. I’ve never seen her mom. I’ve never seen Amy. I’ve never seen her sister or brother. Anything, of ever having a hint of saying the reason that I’m depressed, the reason I’m insecure, the reason is because of the Germans, or the Russians, or this-never one time ever heard that. Told people before that if your background was the cause of misery, Amy would be a basket case. But yet we want to blame it, don’t we? I’m this way because, not because of the way I’ve responded to my circumstances, but I’m that way because of my circumstances.
I had at one of our conferences, and Bob ______ will remember that because he was there as well, but at one of our conferences when we held it at Sunridge at our training center we used to have, there was a couple out there-a very, very handsome couple, beautiful little girl and a very handsome young man. She was depressed and attempted suicide two to three times in her life. As her idea was that she had been in a very unloving family, child molestation, I think, if I remember correctly, had taken place. All kinds of things had taken place, but basically an extremely unloving family, and she was really depressed. On the other hand, her husband he said as we interacted, “No, I grew up in a pastor’s home, and my mom and dad were about the sweetest people you ever want to meet in your life. And well, did you receive a lot of love? Oh man, they loved us to death. And he too was depressed, and he too had tried suicide. Now I brought those two together, and brought those things out for one purpose. I said, “Can you see, to the girl, that had you grown up in the same family, your mindset is, ‘Have I grown up in his family, I wouldn’t be depressed. Then why is he depressed? And do you not realize that it does not make any difference how loving your family might have been? It is not enough that the kind of love that you’ve been seeking is unconditional love and unconditional acceptance, and your mom and dad couldn’t give that to you, whether they were the most loving or the most hateful. It wouldn’t make any difference how much you got. It wasn’t enough. Finally, got the guy to admit, yeah, it wasn’t enough. Was it good? Yeah, it couldn’t been any better. Do you think you could have had any more loving parents? No, but it wasn’t enough. I was like, I never knew that. I never realized that. I said, Why? Because what the two of you are looking for is the only kind of love that’s available to you that can fill that need, and that’s through Christ Jesus, the only Man that ever gave and offered to you and me unconditional love and acceptance, that He so loved you that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believes in Him would not perish but have everlasting life. That’s the love that can only fill that gap in your life, and the two of them came to know that love, and to realize that’s what they were missing, and their entire life was turned totally around.
Now, if we don’t do that, folks, then we’re going to play the blame game. And the reason that I’m the way I am is because of this, this, or this, and whoever that is, I’m going to blame you. You’re the cause of my misery. Someone rips you off, you’ve been ripped off, I’ve been ripped off. I’ve gone through blame games. I’ve gone through situations, and I’m not even feeling bad, but I still blame them. And you know what you have to do with that? You have to say, “Uh-uh. No, I’m going to tell you something. Someone does ill. They’re led by satan, and if you want to blame someone, put it on where it belongs, on him. And to get over that, and to say, in the midst of whatever happened to me, I have a choice of response. What did they do to Jesus? Beat him half to death? What came out of him? Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness. How come? That’s all it was in Him. Folks, we come to learn something. Circumstances don’t cause your nature; they just reveal your nature. Amy can’t put mad in me. She can just draw mad out of me. She does that sometimes. She draws it out of me. If I didn’t have it in me, she couldn’t get it out. Now, who’s to blame? Amy. You see, if I start saying that, I’ll. Hating her, she’s not to blame. I had an option the way I was going to respond. Your mate cannot put jealousy in you. They can only draw jealousy out of you. If you didn’t have jealousy in you, you couldn’t get it out. You ever try to stir up beans in a pot when there aren’t any beans in there? Hard to do.
So, what do circumstances show us? Where we’re walking. What’s in us. Is that important? Why, absolutely, it’s important. If I don’t know what’s in me, how am I going to go to Him for cure? And folks, the beauty of this Christian life is the fact, unlike it would be like if the medical profession was this way, and it isn’t. But if it was, that let’s say that there was this X-ray machine that could say could tell you immediately whether you had cancer or not. You say, “Well, I don’t want to go to that. I mean, why don’t we like to go to doctors? I’m afraid they’re going to find something. Afraid they might discover cancer. I don’t want to go to them. But on the other hand, someone said, “Oh, don’t worry, Bob, because right next door is this guy that’s got this this little cobalt deal that’s been developed. No side effects to it or anything. And if they find cancer, they just zap you, and that’s it. You, you know, it’s gone. And besides that, we don’t charge anything. Oh, well, let me go get a physical then, because I don’t have anything to fear. If it’s been discovered, I have nothing to fear because there’s a cure. Well, folks, that’s the way it is with Christ. I have no fear of going to him with my yuckiness because I know that number one is no condemnation for me, and I know he isn’t looking down and not accepting me for that because he does accept me, and he loves me in spite of me, and so I’m able to go to him, walking it says into his presence, calling him Daddy, Father, and receiving mercy in my time of need. Why? There’s no fear to do that.
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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 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.