The Master‘s Class, LifeChange Church Wichita

TAKE A WALK WITH GOD (Ephesians 5:1-17)

TAKE A WALK WITH GOD (EPHESIANS 5:1-17)

Is that something that you want in your life, to walk with God, step-by-step every day?  That is what Paul is writing about in these verses.

Paul says that we are to “walk worthy.”  Worthy of the work that the Lord has given us the spiritual gifts to accomplish. 

Paul tells us not to walk as an unbeliever does, “in the vanity of their mind.”  The word “vanity” as it used here means the emptiness and futility, of human life without God.

Paul says that we are to “walk in love, as Christ also hath loved us,” we are to “walk as children of light,” and we are to “walk circumspectly.”  We are to walk worthy, in love, in light, and circumspectly.  Simple, but hard words to accomplish in our lives apart from the power of the Holy Spirit.

Man has learned to fly through the air in his airplanes like a bird. He has learned to swim through the sea in his submarines like a fish. But he has yet learned how to walk on earth like a man, like God wanted him to walk. The Christian life, being saved, is described in the Bible, and characterized, and illustrated, as a walk. The Bible says that the Lord Jesus Christ died for us, and He gave us an example that we should “walk … as he walked.” (1 John 2:6) And the Bible also says, “As ye have therefore received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk ye in him.” (Colossians 2:6)

Why does the Bible describe the Christian life as a walk? Because it is lived one step at a time. We receive Jesus Christ by faith, and so we walk one step at a time by faith. Step-by-step-by-step we serve the Lord, walking in sunlight. We are to walk one step at a time with our Lord Jesus Christ.

The thing that is going to impress the lost people of this city is not the preaching in our churches.  It is going to be the way you walk this Monday morning.  It is your walk that will make the difference. You see, talk is cheap. We are not talking about talk; we are talking about walk. We are to walk as Jesus walks. And when there is a church full of people—who are holy in character, holy in conversation, and holy in conduct, the city is going to look around and say, “Jesus Christ is real.” 

May I submit to you that the greatest argument for Christianity, and the greatest argument against Christianity, is the life of a Christian. The thing that will put the lie to what I am saying quicker than anything else is for me not to walk as Jesus Christ walked. The thing that will put the yea and amen, and the truth and the seal of God, upon what I am saying more than anything else is for you to walk in holiness. 

Click on the play button to hear a message on how to take a walk with God.

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

Amen.

FINDING FREEDOM IN FORGIVENESS (Ephesians 4:31-32)

FINDING FREEDOM IN FORGIVENESS (EPHESIANS 4:31-32)

The overall theme of Paul’s message to the believers at Ephesus is about the power that is found when the church is unified in purpose and love.  In the local church there is to be unity, but most of all in the body of Christ, the body of true believers, there is great power and comfort in unity.  Both for the overall body, and the individual believer.  

There are two problems that do great psychological, emotional, and spiritual damage to anyone, and perhaps to you.  One is guilt, and the other is bitterness. Guilt imprisons us; bitterness poisons us. Forgiveness is the answer both to bitterness and to guilt. Guilt is the result of something we have done wrong. Bitterness is our reaction to someone else’s wrong, or our perception that someone else has wronged us. They both have us in a prison, and it is forgiveness—hallelujah—that sets the prisoner free from guilt, or from bitterness. God’s forgiveness of us sets us free from the prison of guilt, and our forgiveness of others sets us free from the prison of bitterness. 

In the message today, Paul is telling us that when you forgive someone, truly forgive them from your heart, you set two people free.  One, the person that you have forgiven, and the other is yourself.  Now, “to forgive” actually means “to pay a debt.”  You see, there are no bargain pardons. That is the reason our Lord taught us to pray in the Model Prayer: “And forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors.” (Matthew 6:12) Sin is a debt that we owe. We have sinned against heaven, against the kingdom. We have been sued for damages, and it is a debt that we cannot pay. But God, in mercy and in love, has forgiven us and paid that debt. You see, there are no free pardons. When somebody is forgiven, somebody else has paid.

For example, if someone owes me a thousand dollars, and that person says, “Keith, I can’t pay,” and I say, “All right, I forgive you,” the moment I say that, it cost me what? A thousand dollars. You see, to forgive is to actually pay the debt. The word “forgive” comes from a root word that literally means “to bear the burden.”

Now, if that is true, and it is, then let me ask, when our Lord forgives us, does He pay a price? Paul says that the answer to that question is, yes, the Lord does pay a price when He forgives us.  Out of the riches of His grace, He paid the debt Himself and, therefore, cancelled that debt. That is the reason we call salvation “grace”—G-R-A-C-E: “God’s Riches At Christ’s Expense.”

Click on the play button to hear a message on the freedom that we can find in forgiveness.

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

Amen.

HOW TO BREAK SATAN'S STRONGHOLDS IN YOUR LIFE (Ephesians 4:22-31)

HOW TO BREAK SATAN’S STRONGHOLDS IN YOUR LIFE (EPHESIANS 4:22-31)

In last week’s message, we talked about what a difference God makes in the life of a true follower of Christ.  We contrasted a life without God, to a life full of God’s grace and power.  Yet, there are many believers who might say that they don’t feel all that different, that God is not working fully in their lives.  The Bible tells us that the reason for this is that we allow Satan to have strongholds in our lives.  If we want to experience the full measure of God’s grace and power in our lives, then we must remove the strongholds in our lives that Satan has dug in, and fortified, and is using to defeat us.  

It is a tragic fact that there are many believers who get strongholds in their lives.  And I believe that there are many people, who are listening to me today, who have in their heart, and in their mind, and in their life, a satanic stronghold.  The tragedy of this is that not only is it harming them and wrecking their spiritual life, but they also, themselves, are contaminating the life of their family and the life of their church, because the devil has found an unclean place in that person, and the devil has made a campground, a foul nest, a beachhead, a citadel, a stronghold, there. And he uses that stronghold to war against God and against the work of God.

You are never going to cease grieving the Holy Spirit, you are never going to expunge Satan and get him out of your life, until you take these three steps: repentance, resistance, and renewal.

Click on the play button to hear a message on what these three steps are, and how to apply them to your life.  How you shouldn’t try to repent until you are honest and face your sin. Don’t try to resist until you’ve repented. And don’t try to be filled until you resist—until you choose against Satan and yield to God’s blessed Holy Spirit.

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

Amen.

WHAT A DIFFERENCE GOD MAKES (Ephesians 4:17-27)

WHAT A DIFFERENCE GOD MAKES (EPHESIANS 4:17-27)

The Bible teaches us that the behavior of a true Christ follower is to be radically different from that of the person who does not know Christ as their Lord and Savior.  That difference is God.  That difference is the light, the strength, the presence, the comfort, and the wisdom, among many other things, that God provides to His children, to those who call Jesus Christ, Lord of their lives.  

In our message today, Paul reminds us of the blindness of lost people.  He reminds us that no follower of Christ should let such earthly minded, secular, and lost, people influence what they believe, or how they behave.  People who are outside of Christ simply cannot think straight on moral and spiritual issues. They may articulate the issues, but they leave out the spiritual dimensions because they are blind to them. Therefore, they cannot come to any true conclusions

Man was created to be inhabited by God. God intended for the human spirit to be inhabited by the Holy Spirit. The indwelling Holy Spirit was to enlighten the intellect, elevate the emotions, and energize the will.  As a result, the life of man would express, in human terms, the life of God. The fall ruined all that. Sin entered and the Holy Spirit left. Without the life of the indwelling Holy Spirit, the natural man is spiritually dead, “alienated from the life of God.”

The genius of the gospel is that when we accept Christ as Savior, we are cleansed by His blood and regenerated by His Spirit. The Holy Spirit takes up residence in the human spirit, making it possible for the saved person to have fellowship with God.  They can now cooperate with the Holy Spirit, and begin to live the kind of life that God intended man to live—a life governed by the Spirit of God. 

The understanding of unsaved people is darkened because they are cut off from the life of God.  Their spirit is empty, and darkened, because the Holy Spirit does not live within their spirit.  As a result, they are ignorant of the things of God.  This is the cause of their deep-seated, inner blindness. It is a vicious circle. The darkness is self-perpetuating. The lost move from darkness to darkness in darkness.

Click on the play button to hear a message on the dramatic, radical, difference God can make in your life.

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

Amen.

TO BE FAITHFUL IN MINISTRY (Ephesians 4: 7 to 16)

TO BE FAITHFUL IN MINISTRY (EPHESIANS 4:7-16)

In today’s lesson we are going to talk about how you can be faithful in your work for God, in whatever ministry God has chosen for you to do.  God has a purpose for you in this world, and the Bible promises that God will give you the power, the spiritual gifts, that you need to accomplish that purpose.  

Charles Spurgeon, one of the greatest, and most influential, Baptist preachers that has ever lived, told a story one time. He told of a woman who had been a member of his congregation.  This woman was very poor, and she lived in what they called “the poor house” in those days. And Spurgeon went to visit her to give her some comfort and some help. And when he was there in her room, he looked up on the wall, and there he saw framed a certificate, a piece of paper, and it was a legal document. And so, he went over and read it. And it was a document transferring great wealth to this woman. She didn’t know what it was. She had framed it and put it on her wall. What had happened is this: that she had served as a nurse and had taken care of an elderly man, and when he died, he left her his estate.  But, she couldn’t read so she didn’t know what it was. She was untaught, unlearned. When, finally, the bank learned about it, they said, “We wondered who the old gentlemen left his estate to.”

When the Lord Jesus Christ ascended to heaven, He left you an incredible giftedness.  And it may be that you have not yet discovered what you have in the Lord Jesus.  So, I want to talk to you today about your spiritual gift. Could it be that you have it framed as a motto on the wall, rather than having carried it to the bank to cash it and use it? Or could it be that you have left your gift under the tree, wrapped and unopened and, therefore, unappreciated? When God saved you, God saved you by His grace, but God did not save you to sit, soak, and sour; God saved you to serve. And you are saved by grace, and you serve by grace.  You are a gifted child of God.

Click on the play button to hear a message on how you can learn what your spiritual gift is, and how you can develop and display your gift.  If you are a born-again believer, then you are a person who has been gifted by grace,

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

Amen.

FAITH WITH LEGS ON IT (Ephesians 4:1-6)

FAITH WITH LEGS ON IT (EPHESIANS 4:1-6)

The Bible says that we are called to a vocation, and that vocation is “a worthy walk.’ We are called to walk worthy. That is, our faith is to have legs on it. It is not enough just to simply be seated with the Lord Jesus Christ in the heavenlies. That is our faith, but we are called to have a faith with legs on it, or what the Holy Spirit calls “a worthy walk.”

The Christian life begins with resting. The very first thing that you need to do in order to be saved is to quit trying and start trusting.  To quit your struggling.  To quit trying to be good by doing.  Christianity is not spelled “d-o.”; it is spelled “d-o-n-e.”  The work of salvation is already finished.  When God created the world, God worked for six days, and God rested on the seventh day.  Not because He was tired, but because His work was completed.  But man was created on the sixth day, and man’s first day was a day of rest. God worked and then rested, God completed His work, that man might rest and then work. 

Man starts by resting, and then he works. God works and then rests, that man might rest and then work.  When Jesus Christ died upon the cross, He bowed His head and He said, “It is finished” (John 19:30). And you and I, by faith, enter into the finished work of Calvary. I don’t try to be saved by living a good life, keeping the Ten Commandments, getting baptized, going to church, and all of those things. They are all good, and they all have their place.  But, those things are works, and works cannot save. The only thing that saves us is when we by faith appropriate the finished work of the Lord Jesus Christ. And so, first of all, the Christian life begins with sitting, resting in the completed work of Salvation of our Lord Jesus.  But then, after we have come to the faith rest, then, there is the practical outworking, where we start to walk. We are not told to leap. We are not told to run. We are not told to drift. But we are called to walk.

Click on the play button to hear a message on how a Christian is to live a life of faith, facing our day-to-day problems and trials, by walking one step at a time.  Walking with our eyes on Christ one step at a time.

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

Amen.

HOW TO PRAY FOR OUR LOVED ONES (Ephesians 3:8-21)

HOW TO PRAY FOR OUR LOVED ONES (EPHESIANS 3:8-21)

Today’s message is going to help us learn about intercession.  If you have loved ones, then certainly you want to learn the art of intercession, or prayer.  Let me tell you that I will use those two words, prayer and intercede, interchangeably.  Because that is what we are doing when we pray for somebody, we are interceding for them with God.  We are praying to God for them.   
There is nothing we can do for our friends, our children, our parents, our fellow members of the church, and even people we do not know personally, that is any nobler, any higher, any more wonderful, or any more effective, than to learn how to pray for them, how to intercede for them. 

As I was studying this week, there was a thought that hit me. It was so staggering that it almost consumed me. I mean, it almost drove me to my knees. It almost just overwhelmed me. I hesitate to tell you what the thought was because you’ll say, “Well, I knew that. You mean you’ve been teaching all these years and you just discovered that?” But, I want to tell you what the thought was. Now, don’t laugh when I tell you. Here’s what it was, and remember it was perhaps the most staggering thought I’ve ever had in my life: God answers prayer. Well, you say, “What’s the big deal?” Yeah, I knew it, too, but then I got to thinking, “Is that true?” I mean, is that more than just talk? Does God really answer prayer?

Now, if there is a God and He answers prayer—you think about it—that is staggering that I can touch the One who made the universe and bring Him into action through prayer. It just overwhelmed me, and I thought, “Oh God, knowing this is true, why don’t I pray more? Why don’t I learn to pray if God answers prayer?” What unmitigated fools we are if we don’t learn how to pray. And yet, there is a constant battle in my heart to pray more and a constant confession, “O God, have mercy on me. I’ve failed again in my prayer life.” 

Is that true about you sometimes?  If yes, then you will find something wonderful in this message.  Now, I pray, and I thank God for answered prayer.  I know that God hears my prayer and answers my prayer, but I am constantly condemned and constantly amazed that I don’t pray more and better than I do pray. I believe that when we get to heaven, one of the things that’s going to amaze us, and chagrin us, is that we prayed so poorly and prayed so little. 

Click on the play button to hear a message on how to pray for your loved ones.  

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

Amen.

THE GREAT DISPENSATIONAL CHANGE (Ephesians 2:11-22)

THE GREAT DISPENSATIONAL CHANGE (EPHESIANS 2:11-22)

Now, that is a great big word, dispensational.  So, what does it mean?  For purposes of studying the Bible, a dispensation is a period of time, and it defines how God deals with man during this time period, and how man interacts with God.  It has nothing to do with salvation, for salvation, throughout the Bible, has always been by God’s grace alone.  

When you think about it, those of us who were born and grew up in this age of Grace, take for granted the direct relationship we have with God, and the blessings of the Holy Spirit empowered life that we lead.  In today’s lesson, Paul is going to take us back in history and describe the relationship the Gentiles had with God prior to this great dispensational change.  And then he will describe the changes brought about by Calvary and Pentecost. 

Click on the play button to hear a message on how the church is the body of Christ, and in this body, all believers are equal members. There are no divisions based on denominations, racial origins, religious backgrounds, class distinctions, national boundaries, or color prejudices in the true church. All believers are equal members of this marvelous, mystical body. A new bond has been established.

The gospel reduces all people to the same level. All people are brought into the great equation of salvation through the same common denominator: repentance toward God and faith in the Lord Jesus Christ.

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

Amen.

HOW TO SHARE YOUR TESTIMONY (Ephesians 2:1-10)

HOW TO SHARE YOUR TESTIMONY (EPHESIANS 2:1-10)

Today’s message includes one of the most recited pair of verses in the Bible, for it is the foundation God’s promise of salvation by grace and not of works.  

Eph 2:8-9
8 For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God:
9 Not of works, lest any man should boast.
KJV

And when you add the rest of verses 1-10, it is also a guidebook for the believer “How to Share Your Testimony.”  We should never ever underestimate the power of a Christian testimony. We are called to be witnesses and not lawyers. A witness is somebody who tells what he’s seen and heard. A lawyer is somebody who argues a case. We are witnesses of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.  Without a doubt, a Christian with a glowing testimony is worth a library full of arguments.

Now, you don’t have to be a theologian to be able to give your testimony. Remember the man who was born blind, and Jesus healed him, and then the Pharisees jumped on his case? Oh, they were angry because this man had been healed, and they got him and backed him into a corner, and they started to ask him all kinds of theological questions. The man just said, “Well, I’m sorry. I can’t answer all of those questions, but, one thing I know: once I was blind and now I see” (John 9:25). There is nothing theological about that fact, yet it is a great testimony to the power of the Lord Jesus.  “Once I was blind and now I see.” And a Christian with a testimony is never at the mercy of an infidel with an argument. Remember that.

Now, it’s important that we learn to share our testimony. Our testimony is the convincing thing when we witness and share the Lord Jesus Christ.  And so today, I want to give you an outline for sharing your testimony; and you can fill in the personal part, but I’m just going to give you the outline.  And listen, if you are saved, right here is your spiritual biography and your future history.

Click on the play button to hear a message on our past guilt, our present grace, and our future glory.  I want you to learn some wonderful things about what has happened to you, what is happening to you, and what will happen to you. 

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

Amen.

THE WISDOM OF CHRISTMAS (Matthew 2:1-2)

THE WISDOM OF CHRISTMAS (Matthew 2:1-2)

Today, we will be talking about Christmas wisdom that we find in the Christmas story.  Certainly, we need a lot of wisdom around this time of year. I need wisdom.  I need wisdom to figure out what am I going to get my wife for Christmas. Now, that’s difficult for me.  It really is.  It is also difficult for her to buy gifts for me.  We go through this every year, even after 46 years of marriage, we still go through this.

But today, I want to talk to you about some wisdom that goes far beyond these mundane things and this worldly type of wisdom. I want to share with you some supernatural wisdom, how you can have some wisdom in your Christmas.  Our text today is going to be in the book of Matthew, and it is going to focus on the story of the wise men coming from the East to bring gifts to the new King that has been born in Bethlehem.  Now, everybody has heard this story since they were children, or they have seen it in plays put on at Christmas time.  It is a very familiar story, and it is a story with supernatural wisdom. 

The first thing we should know about these men is that they were exceedingly wise men. Why? Because they sought out the Lord Jesus Christ to worship Him.  The wisest thing that you could ever do at Christmastime, or any other time, is to worship Jesus. I hope that doesn’t fall flat. I hope you don’t miss that. Because that is the bottom of all bottom lines. That is the wisest thing that anybody could ever do, to simply worship the Lord Jesus Christ.

There are a lot of people who want the joys of Christmas without the worship of Jesus.  But, that is impossible! It is impossible!  You may have a happy time, but you are never going to know the joys of Christmas until you learn to worship the Lord Jesus Christ.

Click on the play button to hear a message on the Biblical story of the wise men who came from the East to worship the young child, born in Bethlehem, born to be a King, born to be a Savior, and born as sinless God, God incarnated in man.

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

Amen.