Do you ever feel like you're just going through the motion spiritually? You wish down deep you could have a fresh, real, new experience with God? Well, let me tell you, today we're going to discover what the Bible says about authentic spirituality, how you cannot just know about it but experience it, starting today.
If that interests you, stick around. Thanks for joining us for this Edition of Living on the Edge with Chip Ingram. Chip's our Bible teacher for this international teaching and discipleship ministry focused on helping Christians live like Christians.
And could you relate to the feeling Chip just described, like you may just be acting as an authentic follower of Jesus instead of truly living like one? Well, today as Chip picks up in his series Momentum, he'll continue revealing the keys to having a genuine, active faith 24-7. And be sure to stick around after the teaching as Chip shares some additional ways to progress along your spiritual journey.
You won't want to miss it. We'll go in your Bible now to Romans chapter 12 as Chip dives right into the second half of his message, What is True Spirituality? Our Father knows what you need before you ask Him. This, then, is how you should pray. Our Father, foreign concept.
Judaism of the day had the sense of God's majesty and His glory and His transcendence, but they had missed the truth of Scripture of His Fatherhood, of His intimacy, of His approachability. And since God is your Father, He has a dream. He's got a plan for your life. How many people, by the way, just are parents in here? You got a kid.
Wow, awful lot of us. If you don't know this yet, it's only because they're real small, but your kids have a powerful, powerful role to play in your life. They will be the source of greatest joy you will ever experience on this planet, and they will be the source of the greatest heartache you will ever have.
Far more than any conflict with your mate, this person that's a part of each of you can break your heart, can break down communication, can say things and do things and live in ways that will bring you the deepest, deepest sorrow you'll ever experience. And by contrast, man, when your kids want to be around you, I mean, when they're little and they, Daddy, can I crawl up in your lap? Yeah. Daddy, what? I love you.
I mean, you're right. And I will tell you that even as they grow up and get older and have kids of their own, there's few things sweeter in all of life. And you have a dream for your kids, and I have a dream for my kids. And when you're young, like they're like one or two years old and your young parents like, I want them to be an astronaut, a nuclear physicist. I want my son to, you know, cure cancer or, you know, I want him to be the CEO of, and you have all these lofty what they do. And then they get to be like little kids and eight, nine, 10 years old and you're thinking, you know, I'd like him to be a nice boy, nice girl. Then they get to be teenagers. I don't care what they do.
I mean, they can deliver trash. But if they loved God, if they were a person of integrity, if they had character, if we had a great relationship, I could care less where they work. Oh God, give them a good vocation, help them to put food on the table, put them in their gifts, but oh God, what I really want. See, what you're really concerned about, the older you get, is not what they do, but who they become. God's dream for you is about who you become.
When you understand that he's father, God's dream for his children is to make you like his son. He's not a force. See, we got this idea that there's like these invisible rules or principles or duties, and when I violate those, oh sorry, I messed up.
No, no, no, no. You broke your father's heart. You stepped away from relationship. You pulled away from his hug. He loves you.
He cares for you. For reasons I don't understand, the one that created all that there is has given you the opportunity to either bring him joy or bring him sorrow. You can grieve the Holy Spirit. That's a personal word. When I live in ways that are not good for me, it hurts God's heart because he's my father.
You miss that. You fall into religious activity, external rules. So first and foremost, you get an accurate picture of God, but second, true spirituality is built on the principle of relationship. It's not the external keeping of religious duties.
Now, you may end up doing some of those things out of love for a whole different set of reasons. It's not about keeping of external rules and, you see, these five things or those seven things, it's not that there aren't any things to do, but it's the difference between a child that you say to them, okay, don't go outside the yard. It's a four-year-old or five-year-old because the cars are very dangerous and you put a little picket fence, but they can get over it. And they, now, for all their life, I don't go outside the yard. I don't go outside the yard.
I'm better than anybody else. You know, some other kids, they go outside the yard. I don't go outside the yard. I stay inside the yard.
Aren't I a good person? I'm a really wonderful person because I don't go outside the yard. I have to go outside the yard. And they keep the external rules, but they never go talk to the parent who said, don't go outside the yard. And they totally forgot that the whole reason for not going outside the yard was I love you and I care for you and like I don't want you to get hit by a car. That's a lot different than someone who says, you know, I could go outside the yard if I wanted to and I could look both ways. And you know what? My father wants me to stay in here because he cares for me.
My parents want me to be in this place. And so it may look a little bit the same, but the motives are completely different. When Jesus was asked, you're so different. You're a radical teacher.
You're not religious. So what's it all about? There's 613 or 14 commands in the Old Testament.
I mean, net it down for us. What's it all about? Jesus would say, here's what it's all about. Love the Lord your God with all your heart, your soul, your mind and your strength and love your neighbor as yourself.
In fact, the most vivid example, if you have a Bible with you, open it, if you will, it's toward the back, Philippians. This is the most religious man that ever became a Christian. The most moral man. He was far from God. He was so religious he thought he was doing God's will when he was killing Christians.
And someone challenged him and basically said, you know what? You don't measure up religiously like we do. Listen to the priorities of the Apostle Paul. Beginning about verse four, he says, if someone thinks he has reasons to put confidence in the flesh, I far more. And then he gives us his pedigree, circumcised on the eighth day of the people of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews, in regard to the law of Pharisee, as for zeal, persecuting the church, as for legalistic righteousness, faultless.
In other words, I'm squeaky clean, I follow all the rules, all the time, in the right way, I had it down. But whatever was to my profit, I now consider loss for the sake of Christ. What is more, I consider everything a loss compared to, listen to his focus, the surpassing greatness of knowing Christ Jesus, my Lord, for whose sake I've lost all things and I consider them rubbish.
Literally the word is dung, or another good translation would be poo-poo. I mean, that's what he's saying. It's in the text. He says all of that former religious activity, impressing people, keeping the rules compared, that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes through the law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness that comes from God that is by faith. Now notice his focus, I want to know Christ. Not earn God's favor, not avoid some fearful, wrathful God, not discover a formula, and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of suffering to become like him in his death, if somehow to obtain to the resurrection from the dead. And then notice it's a process, not that I've already obtained it, I've already been made perfect or mature, but I press on.
Notice the focus. I take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me. Brothers, I don't consider myself yet to having take hold of it, but one thing I do, forgetting what lies behind and reaching forward or pressing forward what lies ahead, I reach to lay hold of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus. You know what that upward call is? I want to know God.
It's a relationship. We've missed this. We've taken Christianity and made it some little moral code. A good Christian is people that don't cuss and don't do certain other things and are a little bit nicer at work.
Oh, I'm sorry, that was a real Christian thing to do, sorry. The Jesus of the New Testament was a strong, compassionate, righteous, and when he confronted things, he actually got very angry about some things to change the world. He calls us to follow him. True spirituality begins with a accurate picture of God. True spirituality is built on the principle of relationship is the core. And if you want a good definition of it, it literally is loving God and loving people 24-7 from the heart. That's what it means to be spiritual. When you are loving God and loving people from the heart with the right motive, that's when the Father looks down and goes, oh, man. Boy, climb up into my lap. That's when the Father is most pleased with you.
Now, the problem is it raises the issues, you know, we can get fired up and say, okay, I want to love God and love people 24-7 from the heart. How? What's it look like? How do you do it? How do you get a handle on it?
What specifically, what's the pathway? I mean, show me, you know, Jesus, you said I'm the way, the word is hadas, the word is, it means a street or a road or a path. I'm the way, the truth, and the life.
So would you show me what is the way? And the apostle Paul would pen the way for us. Romans 12 provides us with a relational, grace-paced pathway of true spirituality. In Romans 12, after 11 chapters of grace, he's going to tell us what God did for us, where we've fallen, how he's taken care of us, how he's forgiven us, all the power that's available. And then in chapter 12, he's going to say, let me give you the pathway, the profile of what it means to be an authentic follower of Christ.
Notice first that it's about relationships. Verse one is about your relationship with God. Verse two, your relationship with the world or the world system, the cosmos, that's not the physical world, that's the worldview energized by the evil one, Satan, who wants to seduce your soul from God. And then there's a relationship, notice verse three through eight, with yourself. In verses nine through 13, you have a relationship with believers, those that are in Christ. And then in verses 14 through 21, you have a relationship with unbelievers. If you would, with your pen, I want you to circle just those relationships. Go back through where it says God, world, yourself, believers, unbelievers.
Circle it in your notes, because you've got to get this. And left to ourselves, we always drift into religiosity, into keeping rules, and how am I doing? We actually want a scorecard. We want a cosmic scorekeeper, and we want him to grade on the curve, but he doesn't.
And so there's a response to each one of these. We're going to learn what God wants the most from you. And what we're going to learn, what he wants, is for you to offer your body, your physical body, as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to him.
That is your spiritual service of worship. That's what he really wants. He wants you, not your money, not your religious activity.
He wants you. And then we're going to look at the life of Abraham, because he blazes the trail. And we're going to learn that surrender to God is the channel through which God's biggest and best blessings flow. It's super counterintuitive, but we're going to learn by coming to God and surrendering all that I am and all that I have, God, because he's a good God and he's a father, he pours blessing into our life with him, relationships in every area. And we'll learn from Abraham what it looks like and how to do it. We're going to learn that there's this world system, and we need to stop allowing ourselves to be conformed to the world, but we need to be transformed not by trying hard, but by the renewing of our mind, by thinking differently. And when we think differently and our mind is renewed with truth, then we will understand what the will of God is, that we'll taste it, we'll prove it, and we'll actually get the good, acceptable, and perfect good things God has for us. And we'll look at the life of Daniel, who lived in an amazing pagan, pagan world. And as a young teenager, all the way through his 80s, he figured out how to not allow the world to press him into its mold, but he lived this amazing life and what he learned was how to get God's best.
And that's what you'll learn. And we'll talk about having a sober self-assessment. You know, verse 3 says, don't think too highly of yourself, but think as you ought or with a sober judgment. God made you with strengths, with weaknesses. He's deposited spiritual gifts. You have a DNA that no other person in all the world has. You'll never discover your calling of what he wants you to do until you quit denying who you are and trying to be someone else and trying to impress other people.
We all do it. And we're going to look at the life of Moses. Moses, at one point, thought he was bigger than he was and failed.
And later, he didn't think he was good enough and he almost failed. And we're going to learn from his life how to get an accurate, sober assessment where you can look not just in the physical mirror, but into the mirror of your soul and say, God, thanks for making me the way you are. I'm glad I'm this tall with this color of eyes, with these strengths, with this personality that came out of this background. And I know there's a whole big, you know, painting and all the commercials that say I need to look like that and act like that. But you know what? No one can be me.
And when you discover that and lean into it, you will find a joy and acceptance about how to come to grips with the real you that you have never had in your life. After listening to Living on the Edge with Chip Ingram, we'll get back to our series Momentum in Just a Minute. But quickly, I want to remind you that we are in the middle of our mid-year match. Thanks to a few close ministry friends, every gift we receive until July 9th will be matched dollar for dollar.
For more information about how to partner with us, go to livingontheedge.org or call 888-333-6003. Thanks for doing whatever God leads you to do. Well, let's rejoin Chip now for the remainder of his message. Next, we'll look at our relationships with fellow believers.
And we'll learn that far from Christianity or being a Christian, coming and sitting in a room and hearing some person talk and playing a little music and saying, well, I got that done today. Let's see. Let's see. I ate. I ate. That's important. I went to work, church. Okay.
Got that one done. And it was a little more interesting. That wasn't bad. And you're going to realize, no, no, no. It's about doing life. Let love be without hypocrisy. Literally, it's take off your mask. Abhor what is evil.
Come clean. You don't have to protect and hide and fake it. Be devoted to one another in brotherly love. And you'll learn to serve and love. And we'll look at the life of Jonathan and David in a relationship where they peel back the layers in their heart to heart and face to face and devoted at deep levels. And they experience this connection. And you'll learn how to experience authentic community.
And then finally, we'll look at the most supernatural of all. And by the way, this one can't happen until the others do. Because in a fallen world, you get knocked, don't you? You have mates that walk out on you. You have bosses that betray you. You have, quote, what you thought were Christian friends or Christian business people who you're left with the debt and they're left with the money.
We're all going to get a raw deal. It's a fallen world. Really bad things happen to good people.
And what bothers me almost as much or more is really good things happen to some bad people for a season. And you're going to have to discover what are you going to do about the evil that's aimed at you. And you can whine and complain and not forgive and be bitter and you become a little prisoner of your own little world. Or you can bless those who persecute you. You can bless and curse not.
You cannot be overcome with evil, but you'll learn how to overcome evil with good. And you'll just choose to do it and you won't feel like doing it. And you'll be with a group of people now and by now you'll get to know really one another and some stuff you've held on to from years will get on the table and God will break the prison that some of you are in and you will do good for some people that have done you wrong and you'll forgive from the heart and you will be free. And people will wonder what in the world happened to you. Because what you're happening is you're just an authentic regular ordinary normal Christian.
You're an R12 Christian surrendered to God separate from the world's values sober and self-assessment serving in love and supernaturally responding to evil with good. That's the journey we're on. That's true spirituality. Now here's the deal. Everything I just shared is going to be an exciting journey, but right now if I could have like red lights flashing in the back beep beep and maybe some you know like with those big trucks like when you go backwards there's a warning turn the page.
Here's the warning very very important. Because we're human because we like to control because we want to know where we're at the danger is we will make the R12 profile or pathway we'll just make it a new set of rules and it'll become our new set of externals and we'll try to do it in our own energy. R12 is not trying a try-hard moral code to live up to, but a faith response to what God has already done. Listen to that.
Let that wash over you. A faith response to what God has already done. If this was like if you could imagine this as a number line and the book of Romans was actually an open book and I could stand right here and God would supernaturally open the book of Romans and I'd say come on you guys.
We'd walk through chapter 1, 2, and 3 and I would say if I would summarize all of it this is the problem of all people of all time. We miss the mark. We know what's right and we don't do it.
We know what's wrong do it anyway. We try hard we fail and God is an absolutely holy God and it says for all of sin and fall short of the glory of God. The glory of God says anyone to have a relationship with the holy God your moral character motives needs to be a perfect score of 100 all the time and God says no one does that.
How do you solve that problem? Being religious doesn't do it and so in chapters 4 and 5 if we move through the book is God's solution to the problem of sin is salvation. The word salvation means deliverance and chapters 4 and 5 are about God the son Jesus coming to the earth living an absolutely perfect life being convicted of nothing being the central person of all time and history and he would die upon a cross being fully God and fully man and when he died upon the cross he took on your sin and my sin once and for all and he paid for it but he atoned for it. It means he covered it and so he took the first three chapters and he covers it and the only way you can receive that forgiveness that's an absolute free gift is by faith.
God forgive me I repent of my way of thinking. I admit that I've sinned and I ask you right now to give me the gift of the life of Christ to forgive my sin and he says he will. When that happens the spirit of God enters your life and so we move into chapter 6, 7 and 8 and the theologians call this sanctification or how do you live this new life in freedom and in power? Chapter 6 says whatever happened to Jesus actually happened to you. You died with him, you've been raised with him. Chapter 7 says as long as you're in this physical body you're going to have a battle between the flesh and the spirit and it's going to be three steps forward progress and then you're going to really blow it doesn't mean you're not a Christian it just means you're human and you stay on the path and chapter 8 will say thanks be to God that there's no condemnation therefore for those that are in Christ and the Christian life isn't hard it's absolutely impossible and chapter 8 will teach you and me that the only one that can live it is Christ but now that his spirit lives inside of you your only goal you abide and as you abide and surrender to the spirit of God and are in the word of God in the community of God's people the life of Christ will be produced in and through you he lives his life through you that's true spirituality I look back out of that book and God says now here's how the pathway for followers I want you to surrender all that you are and all you have to me so you can get my best I want you to turn from the world have your mind renewed in such a way that I will show you my will for you and give it to you I want you to discover how I made you I want you to get connected with people to get loved and give love and then in a world that is absolutely evil until I come back I want you to stand with me and say to them from the heart without being a passive doormat God forgive them they know not what they do but in strength and in power the word is meekness or gentleness we blaze a trail where we don't give evil for evil but we return good and in that power as we've seen historically it brings about transformation in people in groups and in cultures you're listening to Living on the Edge with Chip Ingram and the message you just heard what is true spirituality is from our series Momentum Chip will join us in studio to share some insights from today's talk in just a minute you know sometimes the best way to develop a new skill or habit is by learning from someone with more experience and that principle is the same for spiritual growth too and that's what Chip's showing us in this series stay with us as we focus on six familiar biblical characters whose lives teach us valuable lessons like overcoming evil with good discovering your purpose and finding authentic community so if you want to grow your faith stay with us for every part of this series well chips join me in studio now with a quick word before I come back and provide some specific application to today's message I want you to lean back for just a minute and I want you to listen to something what do the following countries have in common China India Nepal Mexico Brazil Dominican Republic El Salvador Jordan United Arab Emirates Egypt Kenya Uganda Ethiopia and the United States here's what they have in common by God's grace these are all countries that we've been able to equip pastors and here's what we know when we equip pastors they take what they learn and they put it into the life of their congregation God's word goes forth life's change Christians start living like Christians and you'll notice that a lot of places of the world there's real persecution and difficulty in India churches are being burned in China pastors are being thrown in jail in Mexico drug cartels are calling the shots and the Middle East they're literally working around growing war zones these brothers and sisters need your encouragement and mine and these pastors are the people that they look to we have the opportunity to train them and I need your help would you pray about joining us financially and prayerfully so we can train these pastors our goal is an additional two hundred thousand pastors in this year alone would you in your mind's eye think about what these pastors are going through and then ask God what he would have you do thanks Chip and if you believe God is calling you to encourage and support pastors with us now's a great time to become a financial partner because from now until July 9th every gift we receive is being matched dollar for dollar so to be part of our mid-year match call us at triple eight three three three six zero zero three or go to Living on the Edge dot org that's Living on the Edge dot o-r-g or call triple eight three three three six zero zero three app listeners tap donate well here again is Chip to share that application he promised as we close today's program and we finish this first message of what is true spirituality here's my challenge I really want to invite you to stay with me on this whole series I have to tell you a quick little story I was actually in Nigeria and I was teaching probably the largest crowd I've ever taught it was about 60,000 people with a big celebration and I found myself teaching through Romans 12 where much of what you heard was birthed and then God used it in an amazing way but then what I learned was you know as I gave you the overview in the teaching today you know I talked about being surrendered to God separate from the world's values having a sober self-assessment serving in love and then supernaturally responding to evil with good I mean it was amazing as I taught that there what I saw God do and it birthed the series called true spirituality and then as that has gone literally around the world and we've done some exciting things here in America and a number of churches we realize that people needed clothes on it you know what I mean it's one thing to say oh I want to be surrendered to God but when you see the life of Abraham you see what it looks like or I want to be separate from the world but when you see a teenager like Daniel actually live it out I mean it really is amazing or when you talk about having a sober self-assessment and someone like Moses steps up and he didn't see himself accurately and then he does here's what I want you to know if you'll stay with me we're going to walk through Old Testament characters and we're going to put clothes on these concepts in a way where God will show you how to experience true spirituality you know we all have situations in our life where we wish we were more consistent a vibrant dynamic walk with God momentum is a series where based on what God has done in people in the past we can take those things and by his grace imitate their life in these areas and God will show you how to live it out every day right where you live this is a great series to get momentum in your life absolutely agree Chip thanks as we close if Living on the Edge is making a difference in your life and you'd like others to receive the same blessing we'd love to have you partner with us thanks to the generosity of some ministry friends every gift we receive between now and July 9th will be matched dollar for dollar to send a gift go to Living on the Edge dot org or call triple eight three three three six zero zero three that's triple eight three three three six zero zero three or visit Living on the Edge dot o-r-g app listeners tap donate for Chip and the entire team here this is Dave Drewy thanking you for listening to this Edition of Living on the Edge and I hope you'll join us next time
