Beware – Distraction Is The Ultimate Temptation

WOLFL-2024-08

Transcript

We’ve got to finish Philadelphia, the Church of Philadelphia. They, this church could rest in this incredible security listen what Jesus said, I’m coming quickly. We don’t know the day or the moment, the hour, He could come at any moment. Did you know Jonathan Edwards? You ever heard of Jonathan Edwards? Y’all know who Jonathan Edwards is? Yeah, yeah. I mean, they say that he had one of the greatest human minds. He had an incredible ability for intellect and computing. But this is what his, he wrote down these, these resolves. He said, resolve never to be doing anything I wouldn’t want to be doing at the moment when Jesus returns. How do you like that? Boy, that limits. Is there something you wouldn’t want to do and Jesus coming and finding you doing that. And you would be stricken with sadness that He caught you doing that. Then don’t do it at all. Cause you don’t know when He’s coming. You understand? See, that’s, that is one of the greatest… loving Christ return is one of the greatest deterrence to doing bad things. And anything you do, you don’t want anybody to see, you shouldn’t probably do. You know what I mean? And, and so we should only do what we want Jesus to do.

So, I’m coming quickly. Hold fast to what you have. In verse 12, he who overcomes, who is an overcomer? 1 John says, those are the born again Christians. Now look at this. This is a promise from Jesus to each one of us in this room that know Christ. Do you notice I keep saying, I haven’t met all of you yet, and I don’t know if you’re all Christians, you know.

Have you noticed I’ve said that about 50 times? I’m going to tell you a story in just a minute. Someone at University of California, Berkeley, you ever heard of Berkeley? Was watching the Isaiah class from Word of Life. And they said that I looked out, I must have looked right at the camera and they were watching this on their computer and they said, it’s like you looked right at me. And you said, we don’t even know if you’re saved. And this UC Berkeley staff member said, of course I wasn’t. And he said, so I decided to watch all the classes. So, we watched all 15 hours of Isaiah to figure out how you get saved. One of the class hours was how to be born again. I had the class, that class, bow their heads. And I said, now, if you want to know the Lord and you’ve never reached out to Him, reach out to Him right now. He’s there. Sitting in San Francisco, well, Berkeley, California, he reached out to the Lord.

 We have to realize that Jesus knew that not everybody that claimed to be a Christian was, and so we have to make our calling and salvation sure. And then start having that concern for those around us. If you see someone around you that doesn’t have spiritual hunger, that doesn’t like the Bible, that’s just going through the motions, that doesn’t feel close to the Lord, you should really have a burden for them and pray for them and love them and live Christ before them.

But look at the promise to everybody that’s really saved. I will make him a pillar in the temple of my God. Remember I told you every church, Jesus says, I know you. Philadelphia had a problem, not spiritually, they had an earthquake problem. The city was built in one of the greatest amounts of earthquake fault lines, kind of like California has, you know, and the ring of fire. They constantly had earthquakes that knocked down all the temples that the Romans built. And they were, they were such a wealthy city. They would just build them back up again. Think of that. When you read this, hold fast to what you have that no one may take it from you. He who overcomes will make him a pillar of the temple, My God, and he shall go out no more. What did they tell you to do when there’s an earthquake? If you’re in any kind of dangerous structure, it’s better to go outdoors. Did you ever see earthquakes? Everybody’s out in the streets because the buildings collapse. These people had run out of their houses so many times every time the earthquakes hit. You know what Jesus says? I’m going to make you a pillar in the temple of My God, which means that’s secure, it’s never going to shake, and you’ll never go out anymore. See, it’s a promise of stability and security, but he doesn’t stop there. He says, I will write on him the name of My God, the name of the city of My God, the new Jerusalem, which comes out of Heaven from my God. And I will write on him My new name, the ultimate security.

Did you know that when, when I was saved and when you got saved, the Lord addressed us to Heaven, you see, that’s what it says, the name of My God and the city of My God. So, God the Father, new Jerusalem. And then he put one more thing on us, our new name. It’s kind of our access code. Did you know you can write three lines on a piece of paper and mail it to any spot on Earth? A name, an address, and then a city, state, and country. And out of the eight billion people, it’ll go to one. Isn’t that interesting? We don’t think anything of that. We call it mail. And you can mail something to anyone if you have their address. God says, I’ve put my address onto you. You belong to Me, you’re a pillar, you’re going to be part of Heaven forever.

By the way, there’s a global war on Christians that’s coming. Are you ready? How do you get ready? Well, make sure you have the vital signs of a healthy believer.

The healthy life Jesus offered, which we see, this is the church in Philadelphia, they were healthy. Jesus didn’t find anything wrong. They had an abundant life, a confident life, a joyful life, a guilt free life, a peaceful life, a life filled with hope, a life that overflowed, and a life of purpose. And they were just faithful to Christ. That’s a normal Christian. Wouldn’t you want to live by someone like that? Wouldn’t you want to work with someone like that? Wouldn’t you like to marry someone like that? Wouldn’t you like to, you know, be best friends with someone? We should be normal Christians. That’s what the Bible says. These people living in the worst place in the world, Asia Minor, these people living in the most immoral, immorality has not quite gotten to the degree it was in the Roman Empire. I mean, go by the soccer field, they’re wearing clothes, okay? So, it’s not quite like the Roman Empire, where they wore nothing in the public pool. I mean, it was an unbelievably sensual, wicked place. At least, you know, that’s relegated to the internet, you know, and a few strange places.

But healthy life in that environment means it’s possible. That kind of life is prompted by love, John 14:21. If you have my commandments, keep them, you love Me. That is trained by grace. Already told you this grace teaches us to deny ungodliness, but that kind of life is renewed by consecration. Now, as a pastor, we would invite groups to come, and Bonnie and I would pray about what group would come visit our church and minister. And one of them I loved was called Life Action. You ever heard of Life Action? Any of you from the north? Maybe you’ve heard of it, and they sing, and they do a great job. They do skits and everything and dramas. Then this preacher comes out.

But boy, when they came to our church, and that church, Calvary was a very large church, our platform was like this, and they put a piece of chalk on the platform, one little piece of like chalk, chalk for a chalkboard, all the way across the front of platform. I was watching them, and they were opening these boxes. I said what are you doing? They said, well, we’re trying to put one for every person in your service. They said, how many are in here? I said, oh, about 1,200 in this service. I’ve probably got that many in the next service. And so, they brought a lot of boxes of chalk.

I said, what’s the chalk for? They said, it’s just wait, you’ll see. After they got all done, it was a really good service. The guy comes out and he says, I’m leaving chalk up here. And if you are interested, in renewing your consecration to the Lord, he said, I want you to do something. Take a piece of chalk, go out to your car, and before you get in, stand in front of your door, draw a circle on the ground, and step in the circle, and stop everything and say, God, You… Well, look at the verse, I present my body a living sacrifice to You, I want to live a life of holiness, I want to be acceptable to You, I want to serve You by… reasonable services has to do with worshipping, its like this worship of service. I want to be a living sacrifice serving You. I don’t want to be conformed the world. I want You to transform me. I want You to renew my mind so I can know what is Your perfect will. And so, he sent them all off with their chalk, two services worth.

Well, being a pastor, you know, you’re the last one out. And I sent Bonnie and all the kids home and I made sure everything was set and got ready for the evening service and fixed everything. And then I went out. And I was the last one and that church had acres of parking, and it was the most beautiful sight I’d ever seen. The whole parking lot was empty. I wish I’d had a drone because all you saw were blank spaces of black and then two circles, six circles. I mean the people had done it. And I thought, wow, what’s going to happen in this city with all those people saying that to God.

So, you know what I started doing? Bonnie and I, we travel all over the place so much that you have to weigh your bags. You know, some countries were in, you can only have a 17 pound bag on the airplane. Most bags weigh 8. 8 pounds, you know? So, we really shrink what we do. So, I’ve stopped taking my chalk with me and a lot of other stuff because I don’t have room. I do it without the chalk. This morning, actually in the little apartment they have, I woke up enough to get ready and I stepped into my invisible, now, circle and I said, I’m presenting myself. I don’t want to be conformed to the world. Transform me today, renew my mind. I want to do Your will. I want to be a living sacrifice that’s holy and acceptable to You. That’s my work, my offering of worship. You know, I hope that you will become that type of consecrated believer. Not just at the campfire meeting, where you tie a ribbon to the cross, you ought to re tie your ribbon every day. This, Romans 12, is a constant, ongoing, renewing consecration.

And by the way, if I had time, and if I was teaching Hebrews I’d tell you, you need to do what Hebrews 10:24-25 says. It says we’re not supposed to forsake our gathering together, small group, ministry, church, whatever, getting with other believers, but we’re supposed to gather together and exhort one another. What do we exhort? We say, hey, what are you eating in the Word of God? What are you reading and feeding your soul upon? What are you meditating and memorizing? What are you praying about? When’s the last time you shared the Gospel with someone? Can you imagine if you had a group of people that every time they saw you, they ask you those questions. You know what you would do? Either avoid them or get with the program.

When I was a youth pastor, remember the one that walks around the aisle and stands and looks at whoever’s not paying attention? Do you know what I used to do with them? I made a deal with them. I had 100 kids in my youth group, and I said, every time I see you from today on, I’m going to walk toward you. And when I walk toward you, I’m going to say, where is the last place you’re reading in the Bible? What’s the last verse you memorized in the Bible? What’s a burden on your heart you’re praying about? And when’s the last time you consciously tried to lead someone to Christ and shared a tract and a Gospel witness with them? Guess what? I made that announcement. A couple hours later, I was walking around town. I saw one of my kids from my youth group. He was right over there. I walked toward him. Guess what he did? He walked away. He didn’t want to talk to me. Later that day, I saw the same kid. It was like a cruise missile being launched from Iran toward Israel. It was coming straight at me. This kid. So, I walked away. He came right after me. He said, don’t leave me. I said, why? He said, I want to tell you, aren’t you going to ask me? I said, ask you what? He said, you’re supposed to ask me where I’m reading the Bible. He said, I went home and read. He said, you’re supposed to ask me to memorize. I started memorizing. He said, you’re supposed to ask me what I’m praying about. I’m praying I’ll do it tomorrow. And he said, you’re supposed to ask me who I witnessed to. And he said, I don’t know how, would you show me?

Do you understand? That’s why we’re here. We’re not here for, for having a good time. We’re here to stir the people up around us toward love and good works. Did you know how your church would change if when they gathered on Sunday, they weren’t comparing their cars or where they were going out to dinner or what vacation they’re going on or showing pictures to each other or their grandkids. If they started with saying, where are you reading in the Bible? Where is God feeding your soul? What are you learning from it? How are you changing? See, that’s. That’s what we’re left here to do, to stir each other up to love and good works. Jesus is not looking for perfection. What we see in Philadelphia, they were not perfect. He even had to encourage them. He said, I’ve set before you an open door, go through it. They needed a little encouragement. They weren’t perfect, but they were faithful. And that’s what the Lord is looking for.

I have a question for you. We have 45 minutes, and the Lord might return during this class. Wouldn’t that be exciting? You would be in the class that had the best ending of all. Do you guys really believe that? Do you really believe Jesus could come today? Yeah, I saw that. A lot of you are saying, no, I want to get married. You know, no, I’ve got a few more plans. We’re supposed to live like we believe that. Okay, here we go.

Beware. Distraction is the ultimate temptation. That’s what the theme is of Laodicea. Here we go. On the map again, we’re looking, remember to properly interpret you’ve got to ask who were the original audience? What did Jesus say? What did He mean when He talked to them? And if you figure out what He meant when He talked to them, you know the interpretation of that portion of scripture. What did Jesus mean when He talked to Laodicea? He was asking them how they were doing at avoiding the ultimate temptation. Do you know what the ultimate temptation is? Anything that distracts you from God.

You ever heard of C. S. Lewis? Yes, you’ve heard of C. S. Lewis, most of you. You ever heard of his book, Screwtape Letters? Yeah, you’ve probably heard he wrote a lot of books. Do you remember Uncle Wormwood, you know? And, and, the whole idea, the whole book, I can distill it down, is about this demon telling the young…, the big old demon telling the young demons how to do their job. And they would come and what… The greatest part of the book is, he said, they all said, I want to get them into a great sin. He said, the greatest sin is anything that will get their eyes off Jesus. Anything that will distract them, to use my term, from Jesus.

So, let’s talk about the world Laodicea lived in. Okay. The world Laodicea lived in was a Roman world and most Roman citizens were drawn into the gaming world of spectacles in the arenas. Now, they didn’t have gaming on portable digital devices and mega, you know, consoles. They had to go to the arena. And it was a nonstop calendar of events that began in the capital city of Rome and soon went to the furthest flung provinces. And they were ever increasingly exciting. You know, they had levels. And you know how it is. It’s the same way with sin. What used to be pleasing in sin right here doesn’t please me anymore, I need a little more. That’s why drug addiction is so good for the people selling it. You just need more. You need more to get a buzz, to get a high, to get a thrill. Same is true in anything that we get addicted to. That’s how you know you’re addicted. By the way, you want to know if you’re addicted or not? Stop.

You know, I tell people all the time, you want to do something? How long can you go without this? How long can you go detached from Electronica? I know some of you are diehards and you are. I met one in New York. I did that in New York and the boy came up and said, I’m not on any social media. I have a flip phone. I’m not in anything. I said, well, you’re unique. Okay, you’re rare. Most the rest of us touch this thing about 1,200 to 1,500 times a day. Our finger, the haptic touch records that. They know how many times. Apple knows how often a bodily part of you, that senses the haptive generator, it keeps count of that. And the average person does about 1,200 to 1,500 touches. I mean, do you touch anything else that much? A person, or your Bible, or anything? Are you kidding? See, we’re in a different world.

Well, look at this. First, they start with live gladiatorial fights to the death. Then they, people got tired of that, so they went men with ravenous beasts, and then beasts fighting beasts to the death, and then duels and bloody deaths, shocking sights. All of it was intense visual stimulation. One series of games could have 30,000 animals in a week’s time, killed in the arena. They just stripped all the shores of the Mediterranean of ravenous beasts, and they raised them.

The roar of the crowds became intoxicating. No one wanted to miss the events that often ran all day long, and even for many days at a time. The overpowering gladiatorial gaming culture of the 1st century that troubled and tempted and weakened the Early Church has morphed into an even more alluring, and by the way portable 21st century, irresistible, almost inescapable culture.

Bonnie and I were on the subway in Beijing, and we looked around the car, and they were packed in there like, I mean it was packed, and we were going between our meetings. And I looked, and I counted, and there were 100 of us in the car, 97 of them were on their phone. I wasn’t because I was counting. Bonnie wasn’t because she was watching me and afraid I was going to go the wrong direction, and there was a 98 year old woman in a wheelchair that was shaking and she didn’t have a cell phone. Every other person did and either they were listening or watching or playing or you know, whatever they were doing. They were absolutely glued and they knew how long the subway was between stops and they were counting in their minds while they were doing that and when it became time for their stop You’d see them briefly look away from the screen grab their stuff and get off and then they were right back. Last night Bonnie and I went out for our walk in New Port Richey, or I don’t remember where we were. There was a guy coming down the street like this on the sidewalk, I mean, walking straight on the wrong side, never looked up, if I’d had stood still, he would have ran over me. He wasn’t even there. I don’t know what he was watching or listening to or whatever. Think about that.

The message Jesus gave to this church is beware of the ultimate temptation.

How do you overcome temptation? Well, the writer of Hebrews said this, fix your eyes upon Jesus the author and finisher of our faith. Did you know if you start in your little circle, fixing your eyes, or Paul put it this way. It says in Colossians 3:1-2 set your affection on things above, not on things on the Earth. If you do that enough, it becomes a habit. It changes your life.

So, the book of Revelation was written to these people who were very distracted to tell them they were right here. They were headed there where they were going to have to answer for what they were doing with all their time, whether they were going to these murderous gladiatorial games, that the Tribulation was coming, Christ is returning, and they were headed to Heaven.

Now, this is how Jesus introduced Himself to these people. Revelation 3:14, to the angel of the church of the Laodiceans, write; these things says the Amen. You notice these are all different, every one of these introductions, and it’s tying to them. The Faithful and True Witness. The beginning of the creation of God.

By the way, Amen and Faithful Witness. Jesus said, I keep My Word, so what I say in My Word is true. Verse 15, I know Your works. You are neither cold or hot. Does that puzzle you? Do you want to be a cold Christian? Have you ever heard someone say, I want to be a cold Christian? Isn’t that weird? What do we all want to be? A hot, zealous Christian, not a cold one. Why did Jesus say, I want you to be hot or cold? Have any of you ever wondered about that? Do we wonder about stuff like that? What is the cold thing? Again, it’s the geography. It’s this church. Laodicea is here, Hierapolis is there, Colossae is there. Just take a map. And Colossae, the first letter of Colossae is the letter C. Did you know every morning when you go into the bathroom and look at the, the bathroom sink, there should be, well there used to be, now I guess they don’t do it anymore, there’s a C on one faucet and an H on the other. What does that mean? C is what? Cold An H is what? Hot Think of Colossae, cold, C. Hierapolis, hot, H. That’s exactly what it was. Hierapolis is built on volcanic, sulfur, smelly hot springs. I mean, it’s just amazing to see. They just, it looks like Yellowstone’s big geyser thing, you know, geyser basin. That’s over there.

And what the Romans did is, Laodicea didn’t have a water supply. Now, you could never have a city in the ancient world without water until Rome came along, and then they built what? Aqueducts. Miles of aqueducts and they perfectly brought water. And so, from Hierapolis came the hot water, and from Colossae came the cold water. But it was miles. By the time they got to Laodicea, hot was lukewarm, cold was no longer cold. And what He said is, I wish that you would be like cold water in a hot day after you’re out sweating, and you’re dehydrated, and you need to be refreshed. I would that every Christian was that way. That people that are struggling and near passing out spiritually and emotionally, that would get a boost from you. Or that you were like the hot sudsy water of the shower after you’re all dirty and you take a hot shower, and you really feel great. I would that you were something for Me, but you’re not. Why weren’t they? Because they were floating through the world.

Now this is my high school group, and that’s the Red Cedar River. I grew up with the highlight of the year being the annual float trip down the Red Cedar. And what we did is we gathered as a church, we got on this bus with a big trailer behind us, and it pulled us upstream, UP stream. The river was flowing that way, we went that way. Dumped us in our canoes, threw in the life vests, gave everybody a paddle, and we spent the whole day, not in our canoes, but splashing everybody with our paddles and walking along. And guess what? The whole day, those canoes were doing this. They were going with the current. See, that’s why they used the Red Cedar River. It had this nice, gentle, slow, strong current. And if you dumped all the canoes up there, by five o’clock, they’d all be down there. No matter what, even though the kids weren’t paying attention, you kind of stayed with where your chips and soda were in the canoe, you know, and your life jacket, and whatever else you brought with you, and the plastic bag your mom gave you, it was in the canoe. You just kept by your canoe, but you’re splashing and ducking everybody, and we just had the best time. That’s life. You and I were born, Jesus said, in the broad river that leads toward destruction. And it’s going to the wide gate and Hell. And everybody’s born floating down the river, headed toward destruction.

And all of a sudden, standing in the river, someone stops our canoe. It’s Jesus Christ. And He says, you’re going the wrong way. Do you really want to go to destruction? Or do you want to go to the Celestial City? You want to go to Heaven? And if we hear His voice and listen to Him, you know what He does? He turns our canoe around and He gives us a paddle. You know what sanctification is? You know what the power of the Spirit? You know what grace is? It’s a paddle to resist the current.

What’s the current? It’s the world you ever heard of worldliness? What is worldliness? It’s what everybody and everything is doing, headed Satan’s way toward Hell. It’s everything. It’s everything around us that’s not energized by God. It’s the world, the flesh, the Devil. The system, it’s materialism, it’s religion, it’s pride, it’s everything, it’s lust, it’s just flowing. We get saved, we get turned around, Jesus gives us our paddle and we go, Oh, that’s hard.

Did you know it’s hard to resist sin? Do you want to feel God’s power today? Some of you, you know, you hear all these glorious testimonies and you’ve never felt any of that big stuff. You want to feel it? You can feel it sitting here. Resist sin. The only way a Christian can resist sin is by the power of the grace of God. And the moment you resist sin, how did Paul put it? Where sin abounds, what? Grace abounds more. You get a dose of grace. People that do that, it becomes the most transformational thing. They realize it’s all real. I can say no to sin. I can say yes to Jesus. And they start paddling. And that’s what new believers, they’re paddling furiously, they’re, they don’t want to be in that old life and they’re ruining everything, and they want Christ.

And guess what happens? People come and they go, you’re going the wrong direction. All of us are going that, they try and turn your canoe back around. That’s your old friends. Now we’re in 1 Peter. Peter said that everyone thinks you’re going the wrong direction. They think you don’t go the way they’re going, and they’re threatened by that. That’s the Christian life. Are you floating along with the world or not?

Well, Laodicea was floating. They got saved, Jesus turned their canoe around, and they were floating toward the world’s way, but Jesus turned them around. So, they’re really mixed up. They’re not even facing the right way. They’re, people think there’s something wrong with them, and they don’t like where they’re going, but they weren’t willing to paddle. They were floating with the world. And look what happens. So then, because you’re lukewarm, you’re not resisting the world, you’re not engaged in the grace of God that leads to sanctification, you’re neither cold nor hot. You make Me sick. Do you see that?

Do you know what the exits to every theater and Colosseum in the Roman world is called? A vomitorium. Isn’t that interesting? That means exit. Jesus said, you make me want to projectile vomit. It’s a gross thing. He said, you’re making Me sick because you’re distracted from what I saved you to be, and you sicken Me because you’re floating along with the world. What were they doing?

Well, because you say I’m rich. I have become wealthy. I don’t need anything. Did you know that the awareness you have of how much you need the Lord is directly connected to how much you pray? If you don’t pray very much, it’s because you don’t need His help very much. If you pray a lot, you feel His prayer. So usually before tests and when mothers or fathers or grandparents are sick or we haven’t got enough money, we pray. Or we’re scared of going, you know, on the missions trip or the outreach or whatever. We pray because we need the Lord. But the rest of the time, we can handle it. The Lord says, you need to get into a situation where you need Me. What does the Lord’s Prayer say? Give us this day our what? Monthly bread. Oh, daily bread. None of us like that.

Do you like being dependent? That’s not the American dream. Do you know what the American dream is? Have enough stacked up that nobody can tell me what to do. I own my own stuff, and I can have anything I want, and you can’t stop me. That’s the American dream. Now it’s crassly put, but you know what it is. Have enough money so you can live in Florida and play golf the rest of your life and go on cruises. You know what I mean? And have the best healthcare and security system and a nice car. That’s the American dream. You know what God says? I want you to get to such a place where you’re desperately needing Me to even go on another step. I’m describing now the greatest times in Church History and Christian life is when Christians needed God constantly. You wouldn’t believe what happens when you need the Lord. He’s right there, and He helps.

Well, what, let’s get back to oh, and by the way, you don’t even realize that you’re wretched, miserable, poor, blind, and naked. Now, Jesus is going to zero in on this city, but before He does, look at this.

What is the ultimate temptation? The ultimate temptation is anything that distracts us from God. We can set Him as the start page of our day and tune our minds to Him or not.

That’s why before I start anything else this morning, At 5:07 a.m. I turned my dish. You guys ever see these houses and apartments and, you know, whatever that have a dish, you know, Dish Network, or I don’t know all the other ones. We have Starlink where we live. They have no telephone or internet where we live a few weeks a year in Colorado. It’s in the mountains. So, we have Starlink and Starlink is great. Starlink has an internal system that follows the satellites. It’s unbelievable. If I come in and my Starlink is pointed like this, guess what I know, something’s wrong. It’s not going to get any signal from the Skynet, you know, pointing at the ground. You know that, that the Dish Network is properly placed when it’s kind of tipped up looking at the sky somewhere. If I could look at all of your? Dishes, your connectors to God, do you know where many of them are pointed? At the Earth. At the things. Do you know what Paul said? Set your affections on things above, not on things on the Earth. What he’s asking is how do we use our phones or technology? Because we have to use them for everything. We even have to use them as the key to our door in hotels and everything else without them becoming the distraction. So that’s the short version. I kind of summarize what he said.

Well, one thing I do until I just had to get a new case because my old case broke. But up until that moment, my current verse that I’m memorizing, I always tape on the back of my phone and that became… because remember how many times a day do we touch this thing? You know, over a thousand. Every time I pulled it out, I had to make a choice of looking first at this side that has a picture of Bonnie, the one person in the whole world I would like to spend all my time with. It is a sacrifice to talk to you guys. I’d rather be with Bonnie. I waited my whole life to meet her, but I love teaching you guys, but I’m serious. You know. In fact, I still, I believe I’m going to be able to chase her in Heaven. You know what I mean? The Lord will let us know who we knew on Earth. So, but how do we use a phone? The first thing I did is, I reminded myself every time I pulled that out. I’d go… oh, oh, oh… before I text my boss. Yeah. Okay. I’m still working on that. And I would text him. So, it becomes a tool.

Do any of you notice I’m distracted when Bonnie’s in the room? I do my job, but I notice her all the time That’s what this has to be. This is like the class that I have to do, but the Lord, whenever my mind is allowed to go it clicks back to the Lord, and I think am I still doing what You want me to do today? How did you want me to fulfill Your purpose in my generation? It’s just constantly there. How do you know when technology is getting in the way? When you’d rather be on the phone than talking to people around you. Have you noticed at restaurants how many people eat looking at their phone and not even talking to people? They go out to dinner at a restaurant, and they don’t even talk to the people. They’re, they’re on their phone for what? And it isn’t the phone, that just is the current one. Back then it wasn’t the phone. It was anything. So as long as your phone doesn’t distract you from witnessing, reading your Bible, memorizing your verses, living for Christ and fleeing sin, it’s great.

But let me ask you this if you tracked your hours, I was just asked to speak to 250 missionaries departing to give five years of their lives in India, India. I said, what do you want me to speak to them for? They’re surrendered to God. They’ve raised their support. It was at the airport. They were leaving for India for five years All of them had enrolled in India’s higher education. They were all getting master’s degrees in India, because India doesn’t allow missionaries. And so, they enrolled in school to go there, to live for five years, to take classes in an English speaking country and live for Christ. What a sacrifice. And so, they invited Bonnie and me to come to the airport and they said, you get three hours with these. I said, what do you want us to do? They said, well, they’re all in their twenties and thirties. And if you ask them, most of them have maybe read the Bible through once. I said, I thought these were missionaries. They said, they are. I said, I thought they’re going to reach the subcontinent of India for Christ. The most demonized. I mean, they worship a million different things in India. Did you know what Paul said? Behind every idol is a demon. India has a lot of demons, and a lot of Satan’s power going on there, and I could go on and on with that. And they’re going to one of the darkest spiritual places on Earth, and they hardly know the Bible?

They said, that’s why we invited you. We saw you online, and you said it only takes 72 hours. We thought you’d light a fire under them. I said, what? I can’t light a fire under them, but maybe God can. I said, okay. So, they let me into the class and there were 250 of them. There’s a hundred, so twice as many as you guys. I said, hey, could everybody, before we have the class, everyone pull out a piece of paper, just quickly write on the piece of paper, how many minutes a day you spend on Facebook? Now you could tell this was a while back. How much you spend on Instagram? How much you spend on Snapchat? How much you spend on Tik Tok? How much you spend on, you know, your gaming? How much you spend on prime video and everything? They all knew. They were writing. I mean, it was a fun assignment. Everybody knew the answers. They wrote down how many minutes they spent editing photos and uploading them to Instagram, you know, and answering and TikTok ing this and that and watching the endless, you know, shorts that come through all of those. I said, okay, turn your paper over, add it up, how long you spend on all those things. Oh, I added Pinterest because there were a lot of married ladies, and that’s where you keep the list of the favorite things you want in your home and cupcakes. And you know what I mean, and all that. So, Pinterest, I don’t even know if that’s popular anymore, but there was that and everything and they turned it over.

And I said okay now, okay now I’m back to you, I said how many you’ve read the whole Bible all the way through, raise your hand. So, let’s try it. Everyone go like this. How many of you read the whole Bible all the way through? I mean, hold it up high. I mean, it’s only for a second. Okay, put it down. How many of you want to read the whole Bible all the way through and you’re still working on it? Okay, that’s the rest of us. Okay. Now, they were not even as good as you guys. There were a lot of you with your hands raised. And I looked at them and I said, you’re going to the darkest, demonized spot you could pick on the planet Earth for five years. And you haven’t even read the Bible yet?

They go, yeah, I read Philippians and my favorite Psalm. I say, great, what if you get confronted with some spiritual problem that is not covered in Philippians or your favorite Psalm? It’s the Sword of the Spirit. It’s the only thing that will keep you full of joy and rejoicing in a depressing place to live. So, look at this, anything that pulls our minds regularly away from God is a temptation. It might be the phone, it might be our hobby, it could be our health. Some people are obsessed with, you know, like, being the ultimate healthy person. Today we live with the strongest, most universal temptation since the days of Noah. So, my question, has God gotten blurry to you? I mean, you love Him, but it’s just not there.

And that’s how our weekend started with those dear saints. And by the way, it was remarkable. And many of them, set aside from their list, I had them turn over the list of how much time they had. I said, why don’t you start with 15 minutes a day to read the Bible through once a year. I said, Look how much time you have on your list. Find 15 minutes. I’ve been hearing from them. I mean, one of them now has moved from India. He’s in Dubai. He said, man, that changed my life. He said, I’ve never stopped. He said, I went from 15 minutes, to 30 minutes, to 45 minutes, to an hour a day. He said, it didn’t even hurt. I already saw how much time I was spending and all I did is withdraw from the temporary and put it on the eternal side. He said, it changed my life. He said, I’ve started reading through, you know, all the way through the Bible on prophecy, all the way through the Bible on salvation. Salvation? Have you ever read all the ways that salvation is presented in the Bible? Have you personally studied that? You’re supposed to spend your life sharing the Gospel. They started reading every verse in the Bible and marking what God says about salvation.

So, the idolatry of distraction. When they came to Christ, they had to go on living in that world. They had to make life for Christ without getting neutralized by the gaming world around them. God’s Word taught them to the key to that, which is avoiding it.

So, what I say to you is, maybe it’s time for you to draw your little circle. You know, imaginary circle of chalk and make a sacred vow to refocus on God. Say, I’m going to seek You God, and Your Word before my social media or any online activities or my amusements. Do you know what amuse means? In English, a muse. A means not. It’s an alpha privative. Muse means to think deeply or meditate. Amusement is to not think deeply. Americans love to be amused. We don’t like to think deeply. We should make a sacred vow to start our day and end our day reflecting on this, seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness and everything else Jesus promised will be added to you. It’s unbelievable.

What does salvation do? Salvation actually brings us the gift of spiritual sight. One of my favorite verses is that verse, Acts 26:18. That’s the Apostle Paul giving his testimony in the theater in Caesarea, and telling everybody what Jesus told him. What did Jesus tell him?

This is the Gospel in seven parts. Jesus said to Paul, this is what you’re going to do the rest of your life, till you’re a martyr. To open their eyes, to turn them from darkness to light, from the power of Satan unto God, to receive forgiveness of sins, and inheritance among those who are sanctified by faith in me. There are seven parts of salvation.

The very first thing God does is, He opens our eyes when we get saved. Isn’t that amazing? All of a sudden, we go from being blind in the dark, headed toward the waterfall down into the pit of Hell. We see where we’re heading. We don’t want that. And we see Christ and we want to head His way. He turns us. God turns us from darkness to light. See, salvation, repentance is, I have a change of mind. And the change of behavior is God turns me. Have you been turned? Or do you still love the darkness more than the light? True believers have their eyes open, and God has turned them from darkness to light. God sets us free from the power of Satan. Our sins are forgiven us. We have an inheritance in Heaven. We are being sanctified. Do you know what sanctification is? God is making me more and more and more useful to Him. It’s like He’s peeling back layer after layer.

Someone asked me about my dad. They said, how did he sing hymns when he was beating up you? I said, oh, sanctification. It’s amazing. God peels and He’s peeling layers of me and He’s peeling layers of you and He’s changing us more each day and it’s all by faith.

So, look what He does with the Laodiceans. Remember I told you He knows the town. Look what Jesus said to them. I counsel you. Now look at the stuff in yellow. Buy gold from Me, white garments and eye salve. Do you see those three commodities? What were the three commodities of the city of Laodicea? Number one, they were the ophthalmological capital of the world. You know what ophthalmology is? It’s eye doctoring. And they had developed the most desired ancient medicine for the eyes. It was an eye salve that protected people from blindness because they walked in a dusty, dirty world and they weren’t in hermetically sealed cars with air conditioning and filters. And there was a lot of eye sickness. They had eye salve.

They had these black sheep that had the most amazing, rich, dark black, glossy wool. And if you had clothes made of that black wool in the Roman Empire, it was just a step below having what the emperor wore. It was very expensive, very luxurious. They also were a banking center with gold. So, Jesus says to them, I know what your town has. You have gold refined in the fire. Why didn’t you get real gold from Me? You have the fancy black clothes. I’d rather give you white garments so you can be clothed so that your nakedness may not be revealed. What was He talking about there? Some people are going to get to Heaven and suffer loss. They’re going to be wearing forever the fact, not that they’re going to be naked physically, but spiritually it’s going to show how much of their life they live for the Lord. That’s permanent. It actually says there are magnitudes in Heaven. Paul said that in 1 Corinthians 15, Daniel says that in Daniel 12, and I’m not teaching you either book, but it does say that. And, anoint your eyes with eye salve so you can see.

True children of God get spanked by Christ. I already read you that in Hebrews 12. Look what He says here. As many as I love I rebuke and chasten. Therefore, always the same, be zealous and repent.

 Invite Jesus into every day of your life. Do you know why I love to read and study the Bible? Because Jesus stands at the door and knocks, and he says, I want to dine with you. If there’s any motivation to having a life filled with the Word of God, it should be this.

You know, W. Holman Hunt painted this, it’s in St. Paul’s Cathedral in London, if you want to go see it. It’s the picture of Jesus standing outside and there’s no handle on the door, and it’s used as a salvation thing, but actually it’s not a salvation thing here. This is for believers, that Jesus wants to come in and dine with us, and us with Him, and He wants us to hear His voice.

So, my question is, if the great physician examined our lives today would we be like the people of Ephesus? We have our top spot crowded. Or Pergamos? Our immunity is compromised because we’re comfortable around sin. Are we like Thyatira? We’re actually infected with the sin. Or are we like Sardis? We’re like dead. We aren’t even like Christians. Are we like Laodicea? He’ll check our eyes and find us blind.

You know, the Christian life is much like going out to battle and we’re in the briefing room and the commander’s telling us that he’s the only one that’s been out to battle and we’re his special forces, believers, deployed for the Great Commission. We’re going against the master terrorist Satan, the god of this world.

And so many are getting defeated because they don’t pray in preparation, they’re not wearing their body armor, they don’t come to the briefings, they have no ammunition, they don’t even know about the Sword of the Spirit. Are you obeying Christ’s last words? Revelation 2 and 3 are Christ’s last words to the Church. Are you obeying the last words or are you distracted, floating in your canoe?

No matter how many steps we take away from the Lord, it’s just one step back. And if you haven’t floated away, you start the day standing and offering yourself again.