We add what we think, what the folks we know think. Dr. Tony Evans says we pollute God's word with our ideas and traditions. Calling on God, prayer must be legitimately connected to His word in order for you to see an answer come. This is the Alternative Broadcast, featuring the timeless biblical teachings from the archives of Dr.
Tony Evans. Too many Christians build their life around what people say about the Bible, instead of what the Bible says about people. Today, Dr. Evans explains why that's such a dangerous temptation, as he talks about the real authority for Kingdom Christians. Let's join him today.
I want to talk to you about the authority of the Kingdom. For many of us, Jesus has position but no power. Because we spend most of our time telling him what we're gonna do, the Bible is given position. We tuck it under our arms, we put it on our shelves, we read from it even for devotions. It's got high position, but very little clout.
Your experience of kingdom authority is tied to its connection to the book. And once it deviates from a connection to the book, you lose the authority of the kingdom and the benefits of the king. In other words, you're on your own. Many of God's children are on their own because they have sidelined the book, not knowing that in the same time they've sidelined the king. From Exodus 19, he takes a couple of our key words.
He says to them in verse five, "If you obey my voice and keep my covenant, remember that word covenant. You operate under my my governance. Then you shall be my own possession among all the peoples, for all the earth is mine, and you shall be to me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation." You're going to be special, unique. Holy means special, set apart, unique. You're not going to be average, ordinary.
You're going to be in a class by yourself. How you view the Bible and how you respond to the Bible will determine your authority or lack thereof. That is your ability to rule. Authority is your ability to rule. The problem.
What's the problem? What's the problem? What's the problem? Here it is. Most of us live in a fog of human opinion.
And what's interesting is it's always changing. Drink coffee, don't drink coffee. Drink eat meat, don't eat meat. I mean, human opinion keep changing. It's good for you this day, and and now they all mixed up.
Eat this or take this, it'll fix you.
Now it may destroy your kidneys while it's fixing this over here, but may jack you up. But it'll heal that headache. That's why David said in Psalm 19, he says, "Show me, reveal to me, show me my hidden stuff, stuff I can't even see, so that I don't live a life of trial and error." And most of us in here have gone through trial and error. We've seen what it is when we, what the Bible says, lean to our own understanding. You see, here's why you can't trust you or anybody you know.
They have limited information. See, everybody you know, no matter how smart they are, are operating on limited data. That's why things change, because people discover something later that they didn't know yesterday. And so, when they discover this new thing, it changes the old thing that they used to think was the thing. Cause it keeps changing.
God is the only person who is infinite, who knows everything about everything. God is the only one who's got the inside information on every subject you'll ever deal with. To have authority. In the realm, on the field of life, where all the chaos is tackling people, being tackled, people being hit, people being knocked down, you being run over, you got all this chaos around us. You got a book, and guess what?
That book gives you authority to throw a flag because the book gives you that authority. Leave the book, you lose the authority of the kingdom. You lose the ability to see God rule. And overrule, in your circumstances, you see what we've lost a belief in, or maybe many have never had it, is the sufficiency of Scripture.
So we go around looking for Bible supplements. You know what a supplement is? It's it's to make up for what's lacking. You know, you're not getting enough of this, you're not getting enough of that, so you go to the health store and you buy some supplements to make up for what the diet is not providing.
Well, we come to church and we carry our Bibles, then we leave church and look for Bible supplements. Let me help the Bible out because it's incomplete. And so we either don't go to the word, or go to it after we tried everything else and seen it didn't work right. You don't have all the information. The reason why you're saved today is somebody gave you some inside information.
Based on the Bible, they told you about heaven. They told you about hell. They told you about the death of Christ, salvation by faith alone, and Christ alone. You accepted Christ. You haven't been to heaven yet.
You've not seen that place. But the reason you accepted Christ is somebody gave you some inside information.
Now watch what he says in verse five of Deuteronomy four. See, I have taught you the statutes and judgments. That's the word of God. Just as the Lord my God commanded me that you should do thus in the land where you are entering to possess it, I'm gonna tell you how to roll. I'm gonna tell you how to do this stuff.
So keep and do them. For that is your wisdom and understanding in the sight of the peoples, who will hear all the statutes, the word, and say, "Surely this great nation is a wise and understanding people." For what great nation is there that has a God so near to it as the Lord our God? When we call on Him, oh, I hope you don't miss that. He says, "Don't turn to the right, don't turn to the left. Stick with the book, stick with my word, and then other folk are going to see what I do for you when you call on me." Here's the formula: Calling on God, prayer, must be legitimately connected to His word, in order for you to see an answer come.
If what you're asking from God is disconnected from His Word, there will be no response. It is because Christians have left the Word, not by denying it. Very few Christians go around saying this is not the Bible, it's not the Word of God, but by adding to it and taking from it. And the main way we add to it and take it from it is human opinion. We add what we think, what the folks we know think.
And as Jesus told the Pharisees in Matthew chapter fifteen, verses three to six, here's some powerful words. He said, "He said, 'You make invalid the word of God with your traditions.' Talking about we always did it this way. My grandmother did it this way. I like doing it this way. He says all you're doing is canceling out the effectiveness of the word in your life.
Anybody in here hate folk running across your lawn?" No, you know, especially kids. If you live near a school or something, and and they and you know, this happened here at the church.
Some kids were cutting through one of the places out front of our church, and they were doing it like regular, which means they were creating a path where there was none designed to be, because they were wearing down the grass in that area, and so they were creating an illegitimate path. Where it wasn't designed to be, that's what tradition is. Is creating a path God never meant to be there. You create your own cut shortcut, and God is saying, "Oh no, uh-uh." He says you are nulling, canceling out—not canceling out the power of the word, canceling out its power for you by adding to it, taking from it, or throwing your traditions and ceremonies on top of it. I hate to tell me and you this, but God kind of don't need our help.
I figure anybody who can create a world can, you know, pretty much do whatever he needs to. The Bible loses its authority. Second Kings four. Elijah came and made a stew because everybody was hungry, and he made a stew, and they were sitting down to eat the stew. But one guy said, "Well, let me spice this thing up." And he went outside and got a wild gourd.
A wild gourd is a cucumber with poisonous pulp. But he just thought it was a cucumber. He didn't know it was a wild cucumber, poisonous pulp.
So he comes and he cuts up the the cucumber and puts it in the soup in order to spice it up a little bit. And it says, and everybody started vomiting.
Now the man ain't mean any harm. But he turned something that was supposed to be beneficial and taste good into something that was a disaster. I hope you know rat poison is ninety percent food and ten percent poison. But it's that ten percent that'll jack you up when you mix God's truth. With human opinion—that is, man's view—that doesn't agree with it.
And I know I illustrated this before, but it's the best illustration I have, and that's my apple. You know, I don't like apples except at the Texas State Fair, because they're my candy apples, and I love candy apples. But once you dip it in liquid sugar, it's of no nutritional value. It tastes good, but it doesn't do you any good because the sugar overrides the nutrition. We come to church and get the word, then we leave on Monday and dip it in the human opinion, and then we wonder why the word doesn't work because it's been soaked in man's view.
And once you soak God's word in man's view, it loses its power for you. He says the nations are supposed to know and see God's authority operating in the lives of individuals and families and churches and even in the society. It says the nation should see that you are a unique people. Why? Because they will see your authority.
They will see you ruling rather than being ruled. But when you leave the book, you lose the authority. Kingdom authority you do not experience, but Doctor Evans says kingdom believers sometimes wind up being unique people in ways that don't seem to make sense. More on that when he continues our message in just a moment. Don't go away.
Chronic illness, long hospital stays, questions with no clear answers. On the Unbound podcast, Dr. Tony Evans talks with New Testament scholar Dan Wallace about faith when suffering doesn't have a timeline. I ended up going to hospital after hospital, and for the next five years, I kept coming back to the hospital. Real pain, real perspective.
Trials produce perseverance. Perseverance produces character. Character produces hope. Unbound with Dr. Tony Evans.
Listen now. You can find the Unbound podcast on any of the major podcast platforms.
Now, before we get to the second part of today's message, I want to make sure you know about a resource that can help you make the important principles of the Kingdom Agenda part of your daily life. You can receive all six full-length messages in Tony's series, a comprehensive look at what it means to live life the way God intended. These lessons can help you discover greater meaning for your faith, give your family a stronger foundation, and change the way you see. Your relationships, your culture, your work, and the world around you. We are offering the complete collection on CD, USB flash drive, or instantly downloadable MP3s as our thank you gift when you make a contribution to support our work.
And as an added bonus, for a limited time, we'll also include Tony's One Kingdom Under God paperback. This is the final day we'll be offering these resources bundled together, so con Contact us right away at TonyEvans.org to get all the details and make your request, or call our resource center at one eight hundred eight hundred thirty two twenty two, where team members are ready to help you day or night. That's one eight hundred eight hundred three two two two.
Well, right now here's Dr. Evans with more of today's message.
Now let me explain something here. I want to be crystal clear on this. I mean, no disrespect to God when I say this, and I need to say this again so He hears me. But God sometimes can be weird. In the words of Isaiah fifty-five, my ways are not your ways.
My thoughts are not your thoughts. In fact, they aren't even close. As high as the heaven is above the earth, that's how different I am than you.
So you can't look at you or another one who looks like you and decide for me, because the way I roll isn't the way you roll. The way I act isn't the way you act. That's why you have to limit yourself and your decision making to the book, because many of the things God says, you won't like. I'm gonna tell you that now.
Some of the stuff God comes up with is not gonna win the vote of the year.
Some of the methods God comes up with, some of the demands, some of the expectations are gonna mess you up. It won't seem like it makes sense. I mean. I mean, just think of Joshua. Joshua, what way we gonna do these walls of Jericho?
Did you gonna walk around the walls once a day for six days? On the seventh day, you're gonna walk around it seven times. Then everybody scream.
Now that's weird. You won't get that at a military academy. You're not gonna get that at a strategic meeting of generals. We're going to defeat Jericho by walking around the wall. That's weird.
But last time I checked, them walls came tumbling down, cause my way is not your way. There are a lot of things that God is going to say to you that will not feel natural. It will not feel natural. But the question is, does He know enough, and has He been around enough, and has He been doing this long enough to know what He's talking about? And there are enough of us here.
Who have made enough mistakes to know we don't know enough?
Okay, we we've blown it enough to know when we thought it was okay and found out it disagreed with God, but went ahead and did it anyway. God was right and we were wrong. Let God be true. Romans three four says, and let every man be a liar. Let God be true; every man be a liar.
He must have final authority in every area of life. You say, but there's so much in the Bible I don't understand. I got that. I got that. Let's put it this way: You're sick.
You go to the doctor. You say, Doc, I'm sick. I have an upset stomach. Doctor examines you, and he says, "Okay." He writes out a prescription.
Now, you don't understand it, but that doesn't stop you from going to the pharmacist. That doesn't stop you from handing it to the pharmacist. That doesn't stop you from taking it, even though you don't understand it. In fact, very few of us ask the pharmacist to break down all the ingredients that made up the thing that's in the pill bottle. We don't have to have full understanding to swallow it.
You know what we did? We believed what we couldn't understand because of the character of the person who gave it. Because you trust the doctor, you take a pill you didn't understand. Believing he knew more than you know about your stomach. That's why we're so sick with our lives.
Because we have dumbed down the word, we have made it a religious word—a word about God rather than the authoritative word of God. Here's what it means: It means you can no longer operate on what you believe to be true. Not if you want authority. Authority means the ability to rule. You cannot operate on what you believe to be true.
I know my truth.
Okay, you're telling me you know what you believe to be true. The promise of God in John eight is, you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free. It's the truth that sets you free, not what you believe to be true. The movie Inception, that's one of them headache movies. It's one of the movies where you know you need aspirin while you watch it because you know it's one of the heady movies.
You know, he is a guy who can enter dreams. He can enter dreams. Not only can he enter dreams, he can enter dreams, dreams. He can enter the dreams of dreams. Not only can he enter the dreams of dreams, he can enter the dreams of dreams of dreams.
Not only can he enter the dreams of dreams of dreams. Before the movie is over, he can enter the dreams of dreams of dreams of dreams. He can enter dreams to the fourth power. You don't know where you are. You lost as a Jaybird.
You lost. You lost as a skunk trying to enter the dream of a dream of a dream of a dream.
So his problem is he doesn't know what's real and what's a dream, and neither do the folk in the movie. Because the dream was as real as the real, so everything is real, although most of it is operating in a dream.
So before he enters into dream number one, he takes a spinning top and spins it. It's called a totem. The top falls over after its spinning wears out. But in the dream world, when he spins the top, the top never falls over. It just keeps spinning because there's nothing to fall over to.
Because it's a dream realm.
So the way he knows what's real versus what appears to be real is an objective standard outside of himself. He couldn't trust him to know what was right and what was real, because the wrong looked real. And the dream looked real, so he needed a totem to tell him what reality really is. God has given you a totem. Spin it.
He's given you a standard to know reality. All Scripture is inspired of God, profitable for doctrine, reproof, correction, and instruction in righteousness, that the man of God may be thoroughly furnished to all good works. The Scripture gives you the truth, the whole truth. But unless you let it penetrate, it's got to go in there, plop, plop, fizz, fizz. Oh, what a relief it is!
But it's not a relief in the package. It's a relief in the water. Unless the word is allowed to soak in your soul and become the basis of your decision making, you will not see it unleash its power, so that you can experience kingdom authority, so that you can rule your world. Anybody tired of being ruled, being ruled by circumstances, ruled by people, ruled by problem, ruled by this, ruled by that? The kingdom means rule.
It is the visible manifestation of the comprehensive rule of God over every area of life. That's what the kingdom offers. God wants you to have a fixed totem, a fixed standard by which reality is measured. And so we close with this verse: First Thessalonians chapter two, verse thirteen. It says, for this reason, we are constantly thanking God that when you received the word of God, which you heard from us, you accepted it not as the word of men, but for what it really is, the word of God, which also performs its work in you who believe.
He says, we told it to you, but you didn't think it was just a man talking, because the Bible is to be the standard. For all decision making, every area of life. Doctor Evans will return in a moment to wrap up our program and this current series with a final comment. But first, don't forget that what we've been learning comes from Tony's powerful teaching collection, The Kingdom Agenda, an overview of God's plan for His people. And what it means to live according to His purposes.
If you request the series today, you'll get all six full-length lessons, which includes material we haven't had time to present on the air. We'll send them to you on CD, USB flash drive, or digital download as our thank you gift when you make a contribution to support this ministry. And along with the audio lessons, we'll also include Dr. Evans' One Kingdom Under God paperback. A fitting companion to the series that can help you recognize your place in God's kingdom and put these principles into practice.
Get the details and make your request today at TonyEvans.org, or call our 24-hour resource center at one eight hundred eight hundred thirty-two twenty-two. That's one eight hundred eight hundred three two two two.
The Declaration of Independence proclaims all humans have the right to pursue happiness, but tomorrow, Doctor Evans explains that the only way to find it when it comes to your family is to pursue something else. Right now, he's back with a final comment for today. His name was Bill Clem. Bill Clem was in the old Negro baseball league. He was an umpire, big, strapping guy.
He was calling a game one day. It was the bottom of the ninth. The tying run was on third base. The batter came up, hit an infield ball. The shortstop caught it.
The man on third was trying to run home to tie the game. He threw the ball home. He put the tag on. But when the man slid, there was so much dust around these old plates that you could hardly see anything.
So one team came out. The team that was at bat safe. He's safe. He's safe. The other team ran out.
He's out! He's out! He's out! It was this big commotion around the play because it was such a critical play. After all this commotion, Bill Clem took off his face mask, threw it down, and said, "Everybody, shut up!
'Cause it ain't nothing till I speak, and I will tell you what it is." You got Democrats saying one thing, Republicans saying another thing. You got your friends over here, your mama over here, your daddy over here. Then you got you in the middle. God says it ain't nothing till I say what it is, because I am the final authority.
