The Master‘s Class, LifeChange Church Wichita

THE REVELATION OF GOD'S WILL (Genesis 45:9 to 46:7)

THE REVELATION OF GOD’S WILL (Genesis 45:9 to 46:7)

Does God have a purpose in the events of this world? Does God have a purpose for your life?  If the answer to those two questions is “Yes”, and it is, then the better question is do you know the purpose of God for your life?  If not, how do you go about discerning the purpose, or the will, of God in your life?  This is what our lesson is about today.  I want to speak to you about The Revelation of God’s Will.

Your great desire ought to be to know His will.  Your great delight will be to do His will.  Your great danger is to refuse His will.  Nothing is right for you, if it is not God’s will.

It may sound simplistic, but the will of God for you is Jesus, just Jesus.  Jesus is the head of the church, and the church is the body.  What is the will of my body? My head.  What is the will of the church of the body of believers? Jesus, the head of the church.  The will of God for your life is Jesus.  He is your Lord.  Know Him, know the will of God.

Here are three principles about the will of God.

First, The will of God is for your welfare.  It is not something you have to do; it is something you get to do.  

Second, The will of God will never take you where the power of God and the grace of God cannot enable and keep you.

Third, You are free to choose.  God will never force His will upon you.  You are free to choose His will.  You are not free not to choose.  When you say, “Well, I just won’t choose.” You just made a choice.  You are free to choose, you are not free not to choose—and pay attention, you are not free to choose the consequences of your choice.  You make a choice to follow God’s will or not, and that choice chooses the consequences for you.  

So, what should we do to know the will of God? Ask the same questions that Jacob did.

Lord, who are you?  Do you know that Jesus is the Son of God? Do you know Him as your personal Lord and Saviour? Do you have an intimate relationship with Him?  Is your mind conformed to the mind of Christ?

Lord, what do you want me to do? Are you willing to do whatever God will enable you to do?  Are you surrendered to God?

Click on the play button to hear a message on how to know the will of God for your life.

This is a live recording of The Master’s Class Bible Study at LifeChange Church Wichita, KS.

Amen.

WHAT WAS ONCE HIDDEN, BECOMES KNOWN (Genesis 41:53 to 42:28)

WHAT WAS ONCE HIDDEN, BECOMES KNOWN (Genesis 41:53 to 42:28)

Have you ever had a sin that you buried in your past and never dealt with God about it?  No matter how hard you tried to forget it, did it just keep coming up from your subconscious mind to your conscious mind?  During the day when I have lots of other things to keep my mind focused on, I do okay, I can forget about them for a while.  But, whenever I get someplace away from all of the hustle and bustle of the day, like when I am in bed trying to go to sleep, that is when all those things that I have kept buried all day long come out as things I need to worry about.  

Now, as a believer, the devil will try to accuse you of sins that have already been forgiven.  He does it just to make you feel guilty.  Yet, the Bible tells us it is wrong to feel guilty about something you have already been forgiven for, and have had that sin cleansed by the blood of Jesus.  But there is a difference between the accusations of the devil and the convictions of the Holy Spirit of God.  

Conviction is the Holy Spirit saying, “This and this and this you have done,” and like a good doctor, He’ll put his finger right on the sore spot, and He will push.  He will call it by name and want you to confess it and be cleansed.  And once it is cleansed, it is so wonderful.  You will know the conviction of the Holy Spirit because He will be specific in His convictions of your heart.  

Did you know that if you are child of God and you sin, spiritually you’re going to feel dirty?  And if you don’t feel dirty when you sin, then you need to ask yourself if you’ve ever been saved.  If you have ever truly asked Jesus to forgive you of your sins, and made Him you Lord and Savior.  No pig has ever said, “Woe is me, I’m dirty.”  For a pig has no concept of being dirty because that is his element.  The child of God realizes that he is dirty when he sins, because he knows what it is to be clean.  If you are a child of God, and you’ve sinned, then you have felt that.  I want to say this again, just so there is no mistake, if you can sin and don’t feel dirty and grimy, spiritually, you need to ask yourself: “Have I ever been saved? Do I really know the Lord”

Click on the play button below to hear a message on the consequences of sin in the life of a believer.

This is a live recording of The Master’s Class Bible Study at LifeChange Church Wichita, KS.

Amen.

GOD'S PLAN UNFOLDS (Genesis 41:1-53)

GOD’S PLAN UNFOLDS (Genesis 41:1-53)

I just love it when a good plan unfolds and it goes just like it was supposed to happen from the very beginning.  Now, that doesn’t happen very often for me, but it always happens when God plans something.

Last week, we left Joseph in prison, forgotten by his family, forgotten by Potiphar, and forgotten by the butler who had promised to tell Pharaoh about his plight.  Almost every person that Joseph had come to depend on had forgotten him.  But Joseph’s faith was not in man, it was in God.  While everyone else may have forgotten Joseph, God had not.  God had a plan and a purpose for Joseph’s life, and He was making it come true.  

This is the reason that God gives us the story of Joseph.  As believers, we know that God has promised to be with us every step of our lives.  Through hardships and trials, as well as the good times of our lives, God is with us.  Our strength does not come from men, or the world.  Our strength lives within us.  God has placed His Holy Spirit in our hearts to be our strength, and it is through the power of the Holy Spirit that God gives us the power to endure any trial that is placed before us.  

Click on the play button to hear a tremendous message about the power of God’s working in the lives of those who love Him.  Joseph faced tremendous trials in his life, yet God was there with him each step of the way.  Yet this only happened because Joseph fully and completely surrendered his life to the will of God.  God would have handled it anyway without Joseph, but just look at the blessings that Joseph would have missed in his life if he had not been obedient to the call of God in his life.  

Just imagine the blessings that you have missed in your life, simply because you have not been obedient to the call of God in your life.  God used an obedient Joseph to perform great works in His name.  What works can God use you for, if you will be obedient?

This is a live recording of The Master’s Class Bible Study at LifeChange Church Wichita, KS.

Amen.

WHEN EVERYTHING GOES WRONG (Genesis 39:20-23)

WHEN EVERYTHING GOES WRONG (Genesis 39:20-23)

Have you ever had one of those days when everything goes wrong? Have you ever had one of those years when everything goes wrong? There are some years like that, when everything seems to go wrong. What do you do?

I’ve always been amazed at the advice that people give to other people. It sometimes seems like good advice. For example, “When the going gets tough, the tough get going.” Tell that to a person who’s really hurting. Or here’s another one that will really bless your heart: “When you get to the end of your rope, tie a knot and hang on.” Now, doesn’t that just bless your soul? Can you see a guy dangling over a cliff, trying to tie a knot. It takes two hands to do that.  If you try that, then you will fall.  Or here’s one that’s really sweet: “Grin and bear it.”  Now, really, that’s what the world tells us to help us in our times of loss, to help us to understand why these bad times are happening. Or you’ll be really hurting. I mean, you’ll be in darkness and consternation. One of your friends will come along and put his arm around your shoulder and say, “Cheer up! It could get worse.” Well now, that’s a lot of comfort: “Could be worse.”  One person said in response, “Yeah, I cheered up, and it got worse.” He was right. 

Now that, really, is what the world does when the world cannot understand.  Listen, there are times when you, as a child of God, will find yourself in difficulty, and darkness, and consternation.

Click on the play button to hear a message on one of the greatest testimonies that we can share with the world is how we face tragedy and loss.  How we deal with events when it seems like everything is going wrong in our lives is the difference between a life of hope, and a life without hope.  It is that hope, based on the absolutely certain promises of God, in our lives that gives us the strength to face whatever it is that God allows in our lives.  

This is a live recording of The Master’s Class Bible Study at LifeChange Church Wichita, KS.

Amen.

THE FAITH OF JOSEPH (Genesis 39:1 to 40:23)

THE FAITH OF JOSEPH (Genesis 39:1 to 40:23) 

In today’s message we will discover that Joseph is a very different person than his brothers were.  The single biggest difference in Joseph’s life is that he is a man of faith.  Joseph distinguishes himself as something in the world, but different from the world.  When people see him, they notice something different about him, and they are drawn to him.  People are not drawn to failure, or to those who are walking around with despair hanging like a cloud above them.  To be an effective witness for God you have to have something that people want; they see your ability to handle trials in your life, your calmness in a storm, and your faith in the promises of God.  They see something that they do not have, they see something different in you.

Joseph had every reason to just give up in despair; to simply hide in a corner and weep.  Joseph was sold into slavery because of the hatred and animosity of his brothers.  And to be a slave in a foreign country is a life that is described as a slow death.  It was certainly a bleak prospect for a seventeen–year–old boy.  Joseph would have had to look hard to find anything to bring encouragement to his heart.  

There is no person in the Old Testament in whose life the purpose of God is more clearly seen than Joseph. The providence of God is manifest in every detail of his life.  The hand of God is upon him and the leading of the Lord is evident.

The question of why God allows trials in our lives, is one of the hardest lessons we face as believers, but it is also the thing that strengthens our faith in the power, and protection, of an almighty God that loves us and is gracious to us.  

Click on the play button below to hear a message on how each step of Joseph’s life prepared him for the role that God had for him.  If we are the children of God, in the will of God, then we can have the assurance of God, that nothing comes to us without His permission. 

This is a live recording of The Master’s Class Bible Study at LifeChange Church Wichita, KS.

Amen.

LEARNING TO LEAN ON JESUS (Genesis 32:1-28)

LEARNING TO LEAN ON JESUS (Genesis 32:1-28)

The title of the message today is “Learning to lean on Jesus.” Now, in order to learn how to lean on Jesus, there is a battle that each of us will face, and it is a battle that I hope you are going to lose.  It is that battle that we will be talking about today. 

We have been studying about the man Jacob and how God loved him.  Why did God love Jacob? It is for the same reason that He loves you. God did not love Jacob for what he was, but for what He knew He could make out of him. For, in spite of all of his faults, Jacob had a heart for God.  The question that you need to ask yourself today is, do you have a heart for God?

Secondly, I want you to notice that God did not change Jacob so that He could love him; He loved Jacob in order to change him. And I’m so glad that God loves us today. With all of our weaknesses and with all of our faults, God sees something in us that He wants to make out of us. And so, He just loves us, and He keeps working with us. Thank God for His infinite, marvelous patience.

God wants us to come to a place of total, absolute, dependence upon Him.  Most of us have never come to that place. Most of us still have enough Jacob in us to say, “Well, we hope He’ll bless us, but if He doesn’t, we’ll figure out a way. We’ll figure out a way somehow.” 

God had to bring Jacob to a point where he was leaning on Jesus instead of his on self-confidence.  It is the place that God wants to bring every one of us to. Paul said we are those who “have no confidence in the flesh.” (Philippians 3:3) 

Do you know what most people want to learn? Self-confidence. You go into any bookstore, and there will be a wall of books on self-confidence.  Having self-confidence sounds so good that to speak against self-confidence sounds terrible.  But, the Bible tells us that the one thing we don’t need, is self-confidence.  Ok, when you hear me say that, right away your mind threw up a wall and you said, “Oh, yes, we do”—“yes, we do.” Everybody wants that self-confidence. We’ve been taught everywhere that we have got to have self-confidence.

Yet, Paul tells us that, “[We] have no confidence in the flesh.” (Philippians 3:3)  We have no confidence in self.  Now, understand that I am not saying you should not have confidence, but, if you are going to have confidence, then you just have it in Jesus, have confidence in the Lord.  That doesn’t mean that you are going to go around like a doormat. You go around like a real person.  If your confidence is in Jesus, then you will really have confidence.  Jesus is someone you can have real confidence in.  Jesus is someone that you can truly lean on.

Click on the play button to hear a message on how God is battling with you to learn how to lean on Jesus.  I hope you lose this most important battle with the Lord. This is a battle you cannot afford to win. And when God the Holy Spirit is striving with you today, why don’t you just throw in the towel and say, “Lord, I’ll not let you go except you bless me,” and no longer be dependent upon the flesh.

This is a live recording of The Master’s Class Bible Study at LifeChange Church Wichita, KS.

Amen.

JACOB AND LABAN (Genesis 29:1 to 30:30)

JACOB AND LABAN (Genesis 29:1 to 30:30)

As we study Jacob, we see a man who is confident and sure of his ability to handle anything this world can dish out.  Jacob knows God, and God has promised to be with him at all times.  Yet, Jacob has not learned to be led by God.  Instead, Jacob is leading and expecting God to back him up.

That is the way many believers treat God.  When times are good, they choose the way they want to go, and what they want to do.  Yet, just as soon as things turn bad, they turn to God to get them out of whatever mess they have gotten themselves into.  They never think to ask God to lead them; they never ask God to choose the path they will go down, and they never humbly surrender their life to the will of God.  

In today’s study, Jacob will find himself deceived by his Uncle Laban, trapped in a job he wants to leave, caught in the middle of a battle between two wives for his attention, and ultimately with 13 hungry kids looking at him for food and provisions.  Sounds like a normal day in one of our own lives, doesn’t it?

That is what makes the study of Jacob interesting, because Jacob is a story about us.  Think about your own life, are you retired but forced to work a job to meet your financial needs, are you stuck in a job you feel taken advantage of in, are you having marital problems, do you feel deceived by those you should be able to trust, or do you have hungry kids, sometimes adult children and their kids, looking at you for dinner and a house to live in?

Do you ever ask yourself, how did I get myself into this mess?  Do you ever ask yourself, and honestly answer, did God lead you, or did you lead God?  

As a believer, God has promised to always be with you, and He always will be, wherever you drag Him, but the real question you need to ask is, have you totally surrendered to the will of God in your life?  Are you following God as He leads you, or is God following you as you lead Him?  Have you ever seen the bumper sticker that says “God is my copilot”?  Listen, if God is your copilot, then you need to move over and let Him be Captain.  God is to lead you.  

Click on the link below to hear a message on the importance of living a life fully surrendered to God.

This is a live recording of The Master’s Class Bible Study at LifeChange Church Wichita, KS.

Amen.

A FAMILY OF LIES AND LIARS (Genesis 27:1-46)

Today’s message is about the family of Isaac, Rebekah, Esau, and Jacob.  From the birth of these two children, neither the parents, nor the children were obedient to God’s will.  Each member of this family knew of God’s proclamation that Jacob was to be the one that the covenant blessing was to be passed to, and each person set about either attempting to by-pass this proclamation, or to obtain it through lies and deceit. Each member of this family was controlled by the carnal nature that existed within them and which demanded that they solve their problems under their own strength and limited wisdom.  As a result, each of these people suffered the consequences of their decision to be disobedient to God.  

Chapter 27 is a sad chapter, because everyone in it is doing the wrong thing, especially Isaac.  As the head of the family, Isaac was a spiritually weak man, controlled by his carnal desires.  He was a liar, and he was disobedient to God.  His family followed his lead, they were a Family of Lies and Liars.  This chapter has as its theme, Jacob and Rebekah conniving to get the blessing of Isaac for Jacob, which Isaac had every intention of giving to Esau, in spite of God’s revealed will. 

Jacob wanted the blessing of his father. He knew that God had promised his mother that the elder would serve the younger, so the blessing was already his.  All he had to do was wait on God.  However, he did not trust God to handle this. Rebekah, certainly did not trust God. And evidently Isaac didn’t trust God either, or he would never have attempted to bypass Jacob and give the blessing to Esau. He followed his own feelings and appetite in contradiction to the distinct Word of God.

Now, something I want to make very clear, the method Jacob used in obtaining the birthright cannot be supported on any grounds whatsoever. He used fraud and deceit. His conduct was absolutely despicable. God did not condone this any more than He condoned the conduct of Sarah and Abraham in the matter of Hagar and Ishmael. Do not say that God gave this blessing to Jacob because of what he did, for God could not, and would not, use the trickery and cleverness of Jacob.  Jacob received this blessing is spite of his actions, because God had covenanted to do so.  

As we shall see over the next few weeks, God deals with Jacob in a very definite way for his actions. Jacob had to pay for his sin in the same manner in which he sinned.  Jacob was deceived and lied to by an even greater liar than he was.  He met Laban, who was the dean of the college of liars.  

Click on the link below to hear a message on what happens when a follower of Christ fails to trust God to do what He says He will do.  

This is a live recording of The Master’s Class Bible Study at LifeChange Church Wichita, KS.

Amen.

ISAAC'S STRUGGLE WITH FAITH (Genesis 26:1-35)

Genesis, chapter 26, is the only chapter in the Bible devoted solely to Isaac.  In this chapter we get a look at the actions of Isaac, and we see that he will repeat many of the same sins that Abraham did.  Isaac was not a spiritually strong man.  He was a man easily molded by the circumstances around him.  He was willing to let them bend and shape him rather than seizing them and shaping them to his will.  He was a man who had reached his spiritual peak on Mount Moriah, and then he spent the rest of his days stumbling and somehow kept going for God.

So, what is the lesson that we can find in this chapter?  Well, one of them is patience.  Patience to wait on God to work things out as He has promised.  This is a message that many of us need, including myself.  The second part of the message from this chapter, that goes along with the patience to wait on God, is to trust God to fulfill all of His promises to us.  Both of these lessons go hand-in-hand.  In order to be patient to wait on God, we have to trust that God will do what He has promised he will do.  Isaac, and actually his whole family, were neither patient, nor did they trust God to do as He promised.  

Isaac’s problem isn’t that he is dishonest, although he is.  His problem is that he is not willing to rely on God.  It is this lack of trust in the Almighty God that leads Isaac, and all of us, to take matters into our own hands to resolve.  It is this lack of trust in God that leads us into a good share of the problems we face.  It is this lack of trust in God that leads to many of the heartaches and pain that we encounter in this life.  

Click on the link below to hear a message on how a lack of trust in God, takes us away from Him, and leads us into the world; away from our new nature, and toward our carnal nature; and away from performing God’s will, to performing the will of Satan.  It is also about a loving and merciful God that will bless us in spite of our failings.  None of us deserve the blessings that we receive from God.  Yet, we receive them.  None of us deserve salvation, yet God has provided it for us.  

This is a live recording of The Master’s Class Bible Study at LifeChange Church Wichita, KS.

Amen.

THE WORK OF THE SERVANT

In our message today, we are going to cover the details of Abraham’s servant returning to Abraham’s people to find a bride for Isaac.  Chapter 24 is the longest chapter in the Book of Genesis, and every detail of this beautiful love story, speaks of Christ and His bride, the Church.  This should not be surprising because Paul tells us in Ephesians that marriage is intended to mirror the relationship of Christ and the Church.  

We will see Rebekah, a type, or a picture, of the church as the bride of Isaac, being brought into the very tent of Sarah.  The whole chapter, while interesting and full of local tradition and culture of the time, is at the same time a full-length study of the way in which the Father’s beloved Son obtained His bride, the church.  

Woven into the fabric of this beautiful human story are the threads of an even greater story.  We see the coming of the Holy Spirit into the world with a great mission to win and woo the hearts of the lost to the heart of the Beloved Son of God.  Only rarely does He speak of Himself.  His great mission is to praise the Son and to tell of the love of the Father and His grace and mercy.  His great task is to seek out those that will become the Bride of Christ.  

Click on the link below to hear a message on how the Holy Spirit takes advantage of life’s ordinary circumstances using them to accomplish His task.  He never forces, never violates the human will, never overwhelms, never uses weird and uncanny means to conquer the soul.  Ordinary things happen; a visit here, a chance meeting there, an unexpected conversation, a book passed by a friend—and all the time the Holy Spirit is at work.  Until, at last, the gospel is presented, and the hour of decision comes.  It was the servant’s way with Rebekah; it is the Spirit’s way with a lost soul.  

This is a live recording of The Master’s Class Bible Study at LifeChange Church Wichita, KS.

Amen.