The Master‘s Class, LifeChange Church Wichita

KNOWING YOU ARE ETERNALLY SECURE PART III (John 10:27-29)

This message is part three of a four-part series on knowing that you are eternally secure. Now, I am spending so much time on this because I want you to not only know this is true in your head, but in your heart as well. I want you to know this because God wants you to know that you are eternally secure. He has other kingdom work for you to do, and you can’t focus on that, if you are always worried about your salvation.

So far, we have covered six of the eight reason that you can know you are eternally secure.

Promised: God has promised you eternal security. If you believe what God says in His Word, then there can be no doubt that you have eternal security.

Perseverance: God will complete what He has begun. Even before you got saved, the Holy Spirit began a work in you, and He will not quit that work until the day of Jesus Christ.

Predestination: God has predestined your salvation. God has known that you would make the choice to be His child since before the foundations of the universe. He loved you first, and then He called you, and you accepted that call. It was His calling and your choice, He just knew which choice you would make. He predestined your salvation.

Perfection: By one offering He, Jesus, hath perfected forever them that are sanctified. Not two offerings, not three. One. Jesus shed His precious blood on that cross one time, and in doing so, He perfected each believer forever. Forever.

Position: God tells us that we are already positioned in the Lord Jesus Christ. God has told you to come into the ark, the ark of Jesus Christ. He said come in where I am. When we got saved, we came into Christ, we are a part of His body. What is true of Christ, is true of us. We are not Christ, but we are like Him, and we are in Him. The door to the ark of Christ has been sealed shut by God Himself. The only way we can go down is if Christ goes down.

Possession: God tells us that we already have eternal life. On the day I got saved, I received eternal life. It is mine, and nobody can take it away.

Click on the link below to the last two reasons why you can know that you are eternally secure.

Amen.

KNOWING THAT YOU ARE ETERNALLY SECURE - PART II (John 10:27-29)

God has a gift for you in this series of messages. God wants you to know that you can be saved. He wants you to know that you can be certain of your salvation. But, most of all, God wants you to know that you are eternally secure. That once you are saved, you can never, ever, lose your salvation. That is what the Bible says, and God wants to give this certainty to you, so that you can concentrate on loving Him, praising Him, and working for Him.

Click on the link below to hear a message on how God has promised you eternal security. If you believe what God says in His Word, then there can be no doubt that you have eternal security. God will complete what He has begun. Even before you got saved, the Holy Spirit began a work in you, and He will not quit that work until the day of Jesus Christ.

Amen.

KNOWING THAT YOU ARE ETERNALLY SECURE (John 10:27-29)

Let me ask you a question. Is there something that could be better than knowing that you can be saved? Yes, there is. It is knowing that you can be certain that you're saved.

Well, is there anything more wonderful than knowing that you can be saved and knowing that you can be certain that you are saved. Yes, there is. It is knowing that you can be saved, knowing that you can be certain that you're saved, and knowing that once you're saved and certain you're saved, you can also know that you can never ever lose your salvation.

The title of today’s message is, “Knowing you are eternally secure.” If you don’t believe this can be true, I want you to listen to the scriptures that we are going to cover over the next 3-4 weeks. I want you to ignore for a little while, what makes logical sense to you, because God’s love and grace for you is beyond your ability to understand. I also want you to ignore what you have been taught before. I want your mind open, your heart open, and your ears open. No preconceived ideas or ideologies.

Instead of all of that stuff that man says, I want you to listen to what God has to say about this question. God wants you to know that you can be saved. He wants you to know that you can be certain of your salvation. But, most of all, God wants you to know, that once you are a child of God, an adopted member of His family, a joint-heir with Jesus Christ, saved to eternal life, that you can never ever lose that salvation. That father-child relationship can never be undone. You don’t drop in and out of God’s family. Once you are in, you are in for good. That is what the Bible says, and that is what we are going to talk about over the next few weeks. Jesus tells us this is true in the verses from the Gospel of John that are the focus of our lesson today.

John 10:27-29
27 My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me:
28 And I give unto them eternal life; and they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand.
29 My Father, which gave them me, is greater than all; and no man is able to pluck them out of my Father's hand.
KJV

Click on the link below to hear a message that is talking about something that is fundamental to our faith when we're talking about eternal security of the believer. How you can know that you are eternally secure.

Amen.

WHAT MAKES A GOOD SHEPHERD? (John 10:8-26)

What are the characteristics of a good shepherd? Does he take care of his flock? Does he lead them to pastures where they can find food? Does he protect them from those that would harm them? Does he teach the Bible as the inerrant Word of God? The answer should be, yes, to all of these. The pastor of a church is the under-shepherd of the flock, and he must have all the same characteristics that Jesus says He has as the Good Shepherd. Now, I want you to ask yourself, is that the kind of under-shepherd that you serve? If not, then you need to find another church with a better shepherd. Don’t wait, don’t hesitate. You go find a Bible believing, Christ follower, to be your under-shepherd.

This is the message that Jesus has been telling the Jewish people. Their religious leaders have failed to act as good under-shepherds of the fold of Israel. They have become full of pride and greed, teaching the people false scripture, burdening them with strict regulations, and turning them away from God and toward the religious establishment that Judaism had become.

Click on the link below to hear a message where Jesus will make three powerful statements. He will tell the pharisees how a Good Shepherd cares for His sheep, contrasting His own behavior with that of theirs toward the fold. Jesus will also proclaim Himself as the Son of God, and then He declares that He is the only way to find eternal life. Big, powerful, Biblical doctrines are in today’s message.

Amen.

JESUS AS THE GOOD SHEPHERD (John 9:39-10:7)

Where do you feel the safest? At home? That is generally the answer we give to that question, and it is because that is where we spend most of our time, it where we keep most of our possessions, and it is where our loved ones live with us. It is also the reason we feel so emotionally impacted when a robber comes in to violate that safe space. It is not just the things that they take, it is that they remove that feeling of security we feel within the walls of that safe space. Once that feeling of security is violated, you may want to fortify your home, put in better locks, stronger doors, or get a burglar alarm. I know if it happens in my house, my first reaction will be to stand guard at the doorway of my home as the protector of my loved ones who live in that house with me. I believe that is the role God gives the husband, to be the protector of the people that God has put in his life, and I would give my life in order to keep them safe.

Click on the link below to hear a message about that safe place we have in our spiritual lives. That place where we feel protected. Jesus is going to talk about being a good shepherd, one who puts His sheep in a secure place and stands at the door to protect them from those who would come to steal and to rob the flock.

Amen.

TO BE BORN BLIND (John 8:54 to 9:7)

Most of us who have the ability to see, take that ability for granted. It is like walking, or hearing, or even breathing, it is something you consciously do every day. But you don’t think about doing it, or what it would be like to not be able to see, until something happens that puts our eyesight in jeopardy. Those who were able to see for a period of their lives, and then lost their sight, feel the loss of that sight every day, but they have their memories of what things looked like. Someone who is born blind, and has never been able to see at all, has no such memories. The colors of a sunset, the faces of loved ones, and the stars in the sky are things they must imagine from the descriptions others give them. Yet, they have no reference to compare it to, they have only the words that they hear. How do you describe the colors of a sunset to someone who has never seen any color at all?

Yet, what would happen if someone came up to that blind person and said, I can give you sight, I can let you see what you have been missing? Would that person who could not see, choose to see, or would they be so used to living the way they had been, that they would choose not to see? Would they embrace the light, or would they choose to stay in the darkness? You say, “But of course they would choose to see the light, why would they choose to stay in the darkness?” Well, that is indeed the question, isn’t it?

John 3:19-21
19 And this is the condemnation, that light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil.
20 For every one that doeth evil hateth the light, neither cometh to the light, lest his deeds should be reproved.
21 But he that doeth truth cometh to the light, that his deeds may be made manifest, that they are wrought in God.
KJV

Click on the link below to hear a message about two different kinds of people who were born blind. One man who was born physically blind, and another group of people who were born spiritually blind. One chose the light, the other chose the darkness.

Amen.

TO WHOM DO YOUR WORKS SAY YOU BELONG TO? (John 8:41-53)

A wise man once said that “Actions speak louder than words.” Do you know who that person was? According to that paragon of truth, Google, the first person in the US to say it was Abraham Lincoln in 1856. He said, “Actions speak louder than words is the maxim; and, if true, the South now distinctly says to the North, Give us the measures, you take the men.” Now, I have no clue about the context of President Lincoln saying that, but the phrase "Actions speak louder than words" essentially means that what we do means much more than the words we say.

If you combine this phrase, Actions speak louder than words, with the question of the title of the lesson, To whom do your works say you belong to, you begin to get an understanding of the Biblical truth that our message is about today. You can say that Christ is your Lord and Master, but do your works say that this is true?

Jesus said “Verily, verily, I say unto you, Whosoever committeth sin is the servant of sin.” Therefore, you may tell the world that you are a Christian, but when they look at your works, the things that you do each day, do they speak loudly that you are indeed the servant of Christ, or of sin? What would God say if He looked at your works, are they His, or Satan’s? There is no in between.

The lesson for us today is that you can give the best sermon that was ever preached, you can teach the best Bible study lesson that was ever taught, you can quote hundreds of verses from the Bible, or you can give the sweetest testimony about what Christ has done for you, but if your life is full of sin, then you are nothing but a hypocrite serving Satan as you master. Again, To whom do your works say that you belong to?

Clink on the link below to hear a message on how God, and the world, look that the works that you do.

Amen.

WHO IS JESUS CHRIST TO YOU? (John 8:24-41)

This is the single most important question that each of us must answer. No other question has your eternal destiny in the balance. It is the one question that Jesus will look at when you stand before Him to be Judged.

John 5:22-24
22 For the Father judgeth no man, but hath committed all judgment unto the Son:
23 That all men should honour the Son, even as they honour the Father. He that honoureth not the Son honoureth not the Father which hath sent him.
24 Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that heareth my word, and believeth on him that sent me, hath everlasting life, and shall not come into condemnation; but is passed from death unto life.
KJV

Today’s message is one with three powerful statements by our Lord Jesus.

The first one is a declaration that Jesus is God, and if you fail to believe that He is God, then you will die in your sins.

John 8:24
24 I said therefore unto you, that ye shall die in your sins: for if ye believe not that I am he, ye shall die in your sins.
KJV

The second is that if you truly accept Jesus, the Son of God, as the Lord and Master or your life, then that truth will set you free from the bondage of sin.

John 8:31-32
31 Then said Jesus to those Jews which believed on him, If ye continue in my word, then are ye my disciples indeed;
32 And ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.
KJV

The third statement is that if you commit sin, then you are the slave of sin. If you do the works of Satan, then you are the slave of Satan.

John 8:34
34 Jesus answered them, Verily, verily, I say unto you, Whosoever committeth sin is the servant of sin.
KJV

With these three statements, Jesus Christ is laying out the gospel message of the Bible right here in this set of verses. These are powerful statements that are meant to convict the hearts of each of us.

Click on the link below to hear a powerful testimony as to who Jesus Christ is. Jesus declares Himself to be God. You may want to call Jesus a good man, a prophet, a teacher, or a healer, but until you call Him God, Jesus says “that ye shall die in your sins: for if ye believe not that I am he, ye shall die in your sins.” If you refuse to accept Jesus as God, then you are still without a passport to an eternity in heaven. Deny Jesus as God, and you will spend an eternity burning in the fires of Hell. Is just doesn’t get any plainer, any more powerful, than that.

Amen.

JESUS IS THE LIGHT OF THE WORLD (John 8:12-24)

When Bible talks about Jesus being the light of the world it has several meanings, but essentially it means that Jesus is God. Do you believe that Jesus Christ is the light of the world? If not, then how long have you been rejecting Jesus as the light of the world? How many times do you believe that the Holy Spirit will stand knocking on the door of your heart asking to come in? Everyone wants to believe they have forever to decide about Jesus, but the truth is, that there comes a time in everyone’s life when their refusal to accept Jesus Christ as their Savior, becomes final, and the Holy Spirit walks away never to return. When this happens, the eternal destiny of that person is sealed forever.

Click on the link below to hear a message on how Jesus is the light of the world, and how the rejection of that truth will cause God to leave you to die in your sins.

Amen.

ARE YOU QUALIFIED TO JUDGE? (John 7:45-8:11)

Today we are going to talk about a familiar story from the New Testament. It is about a woman who was caught in the act of adultery, but the woman is not the focus of this story. It is instead the statement that Jesus makes to the scribes and the pharisees who had brought her to Jesus. Jesus tells them, “He who is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her.”

The real question that Jesus is asking is, “are you qualified to judge this woman?” We are required to make judgments almost every day of our lives, but rarely do we judge whether a person should die for their sin. Never are we allowed to determine the eternal destiny of a person, and I am glad that is true because we are simply not qualified to be that judge. I am glad that Jesus is the only One qualified to judge my eternal destiny. To determine if I will spend eternity in heaven or hell. Amen?

Click on the link below hear a message, not about the perils of judging others, but a message about the wisdom and compassion of Jesus Christ. Wisdom to see through the schemes and agendas that we have as humans, and the compassion to forgive the sins of a woman whose heart chose Jesus as her Lord and Savior.

Amen.