R1099 Well For Christ, Pt.2

We all could use some encouragement, and we'll find it together today in the Bible-based teaching of Dr. Don Wilton about Well for Christ.

That's our topic today, Well for Christ, as we head to Romans chapter 12 and studying the encouraging word, the Bible itself, with Dr. Don Wilton. While we do so, we want you to know that we're available for you 24 hours a day on our website, www.tewonline.org. Well, you'll find this message and many more from Dr. Wilton. That's www.tewonline.org. And today, if you drop by, you'll see a remarkable insight from the concept of praying that matters, prayers that avails much. You'll hear more about that in the broadcast, but it's a resource available right now on our website at www.tewonline.org, especially for parents and grandparents. That's www.tewonline.org.

Now, Dr. Don Wilton. All of us must serve our fellow man, all of us. All of us, we believe that, folks, everybody, we must all serve our fellow man. And here in our church, we have got hundreds of opportunity for every person who has received the grace of God to serve fellow man.

Sunday school teachers and discipleship leaders and singing in the choir, ushers and part of the welcoming committees, and in so many capacities from driving buses to participating, to standing in doorways, to being part of security teams, to you name it, there are scores and scores and scores. And our goal, really, folks, is that as a church, that we are facilitating well for Christ. Now, all of us must worship together in the fellowship of God's presence, and all of us must prepare ourselves to meet the challenges of life, and all of us must serve our fellow man. And number four, all of us must engage the gospel in the world in which we live. All of us, worship, prepare, serve, and engage.

Last week, I asked our people if you would be willing to tell at least one person a month about Jesus, or if that is problematic and or would you be willing to invite at least one person to come to church with you where we will tell them. And folks, do you know there were a lot of people who didn't even have those cards? A lot of people who didn't even have an opportunity to sign. A lot of people don't have Blackberries and iPhones.

You couldn't text 77577 and say, I will. But evidently, a lot of people did. Over 700 people did.

That's amazing. In Gideon's day, God only used 300 to conquer an insurmountable enemy, to declare that God is king. Over 700 people in this fellowship said, I can do it. Folks, there are lots of other ways that people engage.

There are Bible studies at all hours of the day. There are people walking and serving in our helping ministry center. There are people who are part of feeding the homeless and clothing the cold and the needy. There are people doing things every day. There are people engaging. It's not just limited to doing one or two things.

There is an engagement taking place everywhere. If you want to be well for Christ, you must worship at least once a week. You must prepare and be in a life group, at least one.

You must serve in at least one capacity where all you're doing is giving to somebody else. And you must engage in at least one zone of your life outside of the church and in and through the church. So what is Paul saying in this passage about will for Christ? Well, he's urging two things. He's urging us to consider God's mercy. He's urging us to consider God's mercy and he's urging us to yield our bodies. And how must we yield our bodies? He tells us how to yield our bodies. We yield our bodies, number one, as living sacrifices. We yield our bodies, number two, as holy vessels. We yield our bodies, number three, as pleasing to God. And this is our reasonable demanded act of worship. Now here's the question.

You ready for it? If we have to yield our bodies as living sacrifices, what are our bodies? What does God demand of us?

Now folks, I want to share something with you that's very close to my heart. When God talks about our bodies, he's talking about you and me individually and God sees us exactly as we are. Our bodies are divided into three components all in the same vessel.

We are spirit, mind, and body. And when God expects us to be well for him, I want to be well for Christ. I want to give myself to Christ. And I fail so many times. I need help. I'll be perfectly honest with you.

You and I need help to do this. And what God is talking about, he's saying it's not just about your money. It's not just about your ability to preach or to sink or to drive a car or to go.

It's everything about you. I want you to give me everything. When God spoke to Abraham in Genesis chapter 12, he said, Abraham, I want you to get up and go. And Abraham had to gather everything that was his. I mean everything.

And he had to be totally devoted. He had to get up and say everything that I am, everything that I have, spirit, mind, and body. It's all yours. I'm going to capitulate and I'm going to hand over to you everything. I'm going to ask you today whether you are willing to offer your everything as a living sacrifice to God. Because when you and I do, my friends, God is going to move in and take over and bless you and me in ways that we can't imagine. I want to be perfectly up with you today, folks. I want my life to count for something. There's got to be more to life. I want real meaning in life. I want there to be real purpose in the days that I have on this earth.

I want my days and my moments to be numbered in the presence of God and to really count. And God tells me how to do it. I've got to yield my spirit, my mind, and my body to Christ. That's what he tells me to do. And that is so difficult for me to do.

It is so difficult. So what are our bodies? Well, number one, spirit. Every one of us, God created us as spirit.

Your soul spirit, I love that word, your soul spirit. When I marry couples, very often I'll turn to both of them. I'll turn to the potential husband and I'll say to him, your wife, God made this beautiful bride to be. She is 100% woman.

She's female. And I'll look at the husband and I'll say to him, future husband, fiance, I want you to know your number one job as a husband is to reach inside your bride, your wife, and to bring out and to celebrate and to cultivate and to nourish and to provide everything at your disposal to allow her and to enable her to be the absolute very best of the soul spirit that God made her to be. That's your job as a husband. And I'll turn to the future husband and I'll say to him, every time you do something that chips away at her soul spirit, the way God made her, that little girl that came into this world that is now this beautiful woman that God has given to you. Every time, every little word and every little thing that you do that chips away, her soul spirit begins to crumble from inside out and you lose. What God is trying to say to you and me is he's created our soul spirit and he wants our soul spirit to belong to him. That is what salvation is. Nicodemus came to Jesus and said, what must I do in order to inherit your kingdom to come into heaven? And Jesus turned to Nicodemus in John three and verse three and he said, nobody, nobody can see or enter into the kingdom of heaven unless your soul spirit is born again of the spirit of God. There's the first component of our body, our being, Ephesians two, eight, nine.

Paul put it like this. He said, for by grace you and I saved through faith, not of ourselves. It's the gift of God. It's not of works. We're talking about your soul spirit here.

Nothing to do with what you do. You must repent of your sin and by faith receive the finished work of Jesus Christ upon the cross. Have you given your spirit? Have you given your heart to Jesus? You're listening to Dr. Don Wilton, our teacher here on The Encouraging Word. Please don't go away.

He'll be back with the rest of today's message in just a moment. But some of you know him as a pastor, as a seminary professor, as a teacher. But many of you know him as the pastor to Dr. Billy Graham over the last 25 years of Dr. Graham's life. Very much involved in his family and his ministry. And the concept of evangelism is a root of not only Dr. Billy Graham, but Dr. Don Wilton.

And as you just heard that question, have you given your heart, your spirit to Jesus from Dr. Wilton? You need to know we'd love to talk to you about that right now, just as we would if Dr. Billy Graham were sitting right here. Our phone number is 866-899-WORD.

That's 866-899-9673. And if you'd like to know more about the relationship Dr. Graham and Dr. Don had, well, here's some details. Hello, everybody. You know, my friends know me as Don Wilton, pastor, friend, neighbor, dad, husband, grandpa. But I'm going to tell you people all around the world just like you know and identify Dr. Billy Graham as that man that God used to reach so many people around the world for the Lord Jesus Christ. I had the privilege of knowing Mr. Graham in a very personal and intimate way, both as his friend and as his pastor.

In fact, for many years, I drove up to his home in Montreat, North Carolina, and visited with him every Saturday. Just like friends do everywhere, we sat together and ate together, walked, talked. We discussed politics, friends, places, people. We laughed our heads off.

We did everything one could possibly imagine. That's why I wrote this wonderful book, Saturdays with Billy. It's all about a personal relationship. And I hope and pray that Saturdays with Billy will be a blessing to you, will inspire you, and will encourage your heart, just as Mr. Graham encouraged my heart and changed my life. God bless you, my friends. Again, it's a powerful book.

You can see more details on our website at tewonline.org. Now let's dive back into today's great teaching, A Message Called Well for Christ with Dr. Don Wilson, beginning in Romans chapter 12. So what is, present your body a living sacrifice? Number one is your spirit. Number two is your mind. You're not only made up of soul spirit, you're made up of the ability to think. God's given you a brain, the capacity to make decisions, to communicate, to organize the data of life that is presented to you. God has given to you when your soul spirit, when you have been born again of the spirit of God, God by his spirit comes into you. That's why Paul says in this passage in Romans 12 and verse 2, he says, be transformed by the renewing of your mind. So if I'm to make absolutely certain that in the presentation of myself, my being as a living sacrifice, I know that my spirit belongs to him. What about my mind? Paul said, let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus. My mind is that my ability to think and understand needs to be totally surrendered to the lordship of Jesus Christ. How do I do that?

How do I make that possible? Well, there are so many ways. Daily devotions. Probably one of my greatest difficulties. I battle to have a daily devotion, don't you?

I have to almost force myself. I've got time, I've got to have a devotion. I'll take my wife and I, these last couple, we take the daily encouraging word Bible guide. What we give, it's the number one request that we get through the encouraging word. We open the daily encouraging Bible guide. It's free for the asking.

If you want one, tell us, we'll give you one. And we've got there a wonderful, we'll read that devotion and we'll pray together. Before I leave for the office. Sometimes if we forget and we do, then we try to make sure we do it at night.

But it just does something. Well, that's just one little Bible studies. Being in that life group, coming to that lady's Bible study on a Tuesday morning. Being in those different, that Al Clark group on Tuesday. Being in that small group that folks renew your mind, what you're putting in here.

Just listen up here, folks. How many of you today, just this is a private question. How many of you honestly, genuinely would say to God today, the first time you opened your Bible this week was just a few minutes ago when I said open your Bible to Romans 12. You haven't opened your Bible this week. Now just be honest. Not asking you to tell me. I'm telling you there are hundreds of you that if you honest, you'd say, oh man, are you kidding?

You're right. Do we not battle with that, folks? You battle with it like I do. I want to help you. I need you to help me.

We need to help each other. Because folks, when I am putting God's word in my heart, when I'm studying these things, when I'm subjecting myself, these basic disciplines, the devotion, the prayer, talking to the Lord, being in Christian company. This is what helps me to renew my mind.

Okay, so here's the first two components of this body we're talking about. Your spirit, that's your salvation. Do you belong to Jesus? Your mind, your ability to think for the Lord. See, when your mind is renewed, it means that you can interpret what's happening to you. When you go through that difficult time, you're going to see it through God's eyes. When you suffer that pain, you're going to understand it from God's perspective. When you've been laid off from your job and it's hurting so badly, you're going to be able to call on that resource from God's perspective. When you're facing that temptation and your mind is being renewed, you're able to be fortified from God's perspective because greater is he that's in you than he that's in the world.

Yet you're drawing on his reserve because you're totally yielded to him. But the third component is your body. I mean, it's literally your body. It's this horse. God has given to us a spirit and a horse.

And we are killing the horse. Listen to what Paul said in 1 Corinthians chapter 6 and verse 19. He says, Do you not know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you?

Whom you have received from God? You are not your own. You were bought at a price, therefore honor God with your body. Lord, I have not honored you with my body. I'm telling you right now, I put more junk in this body than you can shake a stick at. It's bad enough because my body's dying.

Every day the clock ticks, you're dying. But what are we doing, folks? What good is it if our spirit is intact and our mind is sharp but we've got no horse to carry it?

And there are so many of us battling. You know, Paul said in Philippians chapter 1 verse 27, I love this. He said, Whatever happens, conduct yourselves in a manner worthy of the gospel of Christ. And Paul here is saying, you need to be well for Christ, the whole package. So here we are as a church. We're trying so hard to say, you know, we've got a strategy. You need to worship, prepare, serve, and engage.

We're providing opportunities. Here we are spirit mind. Folks, when it comes to spirit, every Sunday, how many times have I invited you to give your heart to Jesus?

And I'm not going to stop. I want you to know, not because of dawn, but I want you to know by God's grace, every time we meet like this, by God's grace, I hope that I never forget to say, would you give your heart to Jesus? I want to present Jesus to you, best friend that you'll ever have.

I invite you to give your heart to Jesus. We're trying to do everything to help us with our minds from our little ones. That's what I love about our preschool ministries here at First Spartanburg. This is not a babysitting place, folks. Do you know that our little ones from the littlest age on up are taught God's word?

Do you know that? They sing about the Lord, they learn God's word, they learn to pray. We believe, folks, that a beautiful mind is a terrible thing to waste. And folks, if we believe in education, I certainly do.

That's why I support all our great colleges and institutions. How much more so our mind when it comes to spiritual things? And God wants my mind to be totally devoted to him, that I'm cultivating the mind of Christ. But I'll tell you, when it comes down to our body, we're struggling. There's a lot of opportunities to get our bodies in place.

There are wonderful fitness centers, programs. You know, we look at things on television and we celebrate, but hey, can we just all agree it still continues to be the tough one? I just, folks, I'm just seeing too many people like me who are saying, you know, I really want more to life.

I really, there's got to be more. I want to be fulfilled in every department. I want to be well and whole, well for Christ. And you know, so I began to say, now what does Paul say about this? And he said, I beseech you by the mercy of God and because of his mercy that you yield your body. Body? Body. I thought, oh no, there he goes again. Weight training, that's not what he's talking about. But he is. He's talking about everything of which my body, this horse, I will tell you, folks, I do feel much better than I did a year ago.

Cobwebs are gone. I'm still not prepared to take off my shirt here on a Sunday morning. Doesn't matter what Steve Skinner has to say about me or the people here today who are willing to say, you know something, folks? I want to be totally devoted to the Lord. It's a powerful question, and it's our prayer that every time we open God's word, we hear from the Lord, not just from Dr. Wilton, our teacher, but we hear from the Lord an opportunity to either change, maybe change direction, or deepen if we're already following Christ, or begin if you've not yet said yes to Jesus Christ. You've heard Dr. Don Wilton teaching from Romans 12 on this wonderful, powerful message, Well for Christ. But as he moves from the pulpit into the studio, I pray that you would open your heart to what he wants to share with you next. Are you ready to give your heart and life to the Lord Jesus Christ?

I'm so happy to hear that. Why don't you pray this prayer with me today? Dear God, I know that you love me very, very much, and I know that the Lord Jesus Christ came and died on a cross so that I might be forgiven of my sin. Today, I repent of my sin. I confess my sin to you, and I invite you to come into my heart and into my life by faith. In Jesus' name I pray. If you prayed that prayer, let me be the first one to welcome you to the family of God.

This is wonderful. I hope that you know how much I'm going to be praying for you and how very important this is for me. So that we can talk to you and connect you in the right place so you can begin this wonderful journey.

And in just a moment, I'm going to come back with a final word. If you just prayed with Dr. Wilton moments ago to give your life to Jesus Christ or rededicate your life to Christ, you need to know our commitment continues to encourage you with some fresh resources. Dr. Wilton has prepared some remarkable free resources he wants you to have. If you're starting your life with Christ or re-beginning again, if you'll call us at 866-899-WORD, we'll send these things to you.

That's 866-899-9673. You can also connect with us on our website. As a matter of fact, Dr. Don would say he would love to hear from you.

You can email him, Don, just D-O-N at T-E-W online dot O-R-G. He would love to hear your story about how God's working in your life and know that every email encourages him. Again, the email is Don, D-O-N at T-E-W online dot O-R-G. And before we get away, we have a moment for closing thoughts from our pastor and chief encourager, Dr. Don Wilton.

You know, these are such special times together. I'm so grateful, my friends, that we can worship together like this through the encouraging word broadcast ministry and you're such a vital part of all that God's doing and I just love you and I want you to know that. You know, this ministry goes on 24 hours round the clock all the time. We want to be involved in your life and we want to continue to pray for you.

You can call us at any time. You can partner with us all the time through prayer and through your giving. We know that you are 100% engaged as we are in sharing God's truth with our searching world.

That's what this is all about. We need Jesus, don't we? And God is doing a great work and I love you today. Thank God for you. Pray for you. God bless you. Again, before we get away, know that we are here for you 24 hours a day at T-E-W online dot O-R-G to pray and encourage you and tomorrow the message, my prayer for you, from Dr. Don Wilton is a powerful one. I hope you'll join us and perhaps invite a friend. The podcast, the broadcast will be here for you to encourage you.