The Answer to Every Generation

It's only right for me to obey God because it's for my survival and my good and the promise that he has for my life. Jonathan Evans cautions us to use our freedom of choice very carefully.

To submit your life to anything else is only to become enslaved to something that ain't got nothing for you.

This is the alternative with Dr. Tony Evans, author, speaker, senior pastor of Oak Cliff Bible Fellowship in Dallas, Texas, and president of the Urban Alternative.

A loving parent protects their children by establishing rules and boundaries. Today, Jonathan Evans points out that God does the same for us and that only in our obedience to God's rules do we truly experience freedom.

Let's join him as he explains Deuteronomy Chapter six, verse 20 says When your sons ask you in time to come saying What do these testimonies in the statutes and the judgments mean, which the Lord, our God commanded you, then you shall say to your son.

We were slaves to Pharaoh in Egypt and the Lord brought us from Egypt with a mighty hand more over. The Lord showed great distressing signs and wonders before our eyes against Egypt and Pharaoh and all his household. He brought us out from there in order to bring us in to give us the land which he had sworn to our fathers. So the Lord commanded us to observe all these statutes, to fear the Lord, our God, for our good old ways, and for our survival as it is today. It will be righteousness for us if we are careful to observe all the commandments before the Lord, our God, just as He has commanded us.

I hope you all saw in those verses.

That they were rehearsing, that they had seen them work.

Let us know if you saw that already or not. But they were rehearsing. Let me tell you what God did for me yesterday.

But there was a question and there was a question that was coming. It says the sons will ask him the time to come. You know what that means? That means there's a time that's coming that the sons will ask. There's a question that's coming.

And the question that's coming to the people is simple, let's say, is what are the testimonies in the statutes and the judgments which the Lord, our God has commanded us? What are the testimonies in the statutes in these judgment tells me? Tell me what it means. You're not saying tell me what it says. I know what it says. I just read it. I want to know what it means. What are the benefits and outcomes? What are the why is it necessary? These statutes and judgments, what they're talking about as the Ten Commandments, because the Ten Commandments, the Mosaic law, was the covenant that the people were living under at the time. And so the question that's coming is that what does it mean to live under that rule, to say it like we say it at our church? What does it mean to live your life under the rule of God? What is the meaning of living your life under the rule of God? What does it what are the benefits and outcomes? Why is it necessary to live our lives under the rule of God? That is the question. Many of you have that question, because you're living under the rule of God kingdom. But not all the way because you're still a little wishy washy on whether or not it's necessary to live your life under the rule of God. You're okay. We're coming to church. You're OK. That he saved you from sin. You're OK. That now you know you're going to heaven. But while I live. Why is it fully necessary for me to give my life totally to God?

What is the necessity of that? And then they begin to answer the question.

And so I want to go through it again so you can see the answer. But I just want to storyboard it for you now that you have the question.

What you shall say is that we used to be slaves in Egypt. But God brought us out with a mighty hand. I mean, he showed us himself when he brought us out. He showed great signs against all of my bad situations and my sin in my past to get me out of that mess. And he brought me out in order to bring me in to the promise that he has for my life. So he commanded me to obey him for my good and my survival as it is right now. So it's only righteousness for me to obey God and everything that he's calling me to do.

But that makes sense.

You're with me now. No women. I must say it backwards.

It's only right for me to obey God because it's for my survival and my good and the promise that he has for my life. I have seen him with my own two eyes. I used to be stuck in a slave in sin, but he brought me out of that in order to bring me in to where I'm currently standing so that I can continue to have good I can continue to survive and I can experience the fullness of the promise that he has for my life because I used to be a slave. I know what slavery is. And you want to ask me, what does it mean to live under the rule of God? I live under the rule of God because it's for my good and my survival. He has given me a promise. So I'm living under the rule of God because God is the one that should rule, since he's the one who has the mighty hand to bring me into the promise that he has. He has your life. What is the answer to the question? Simple. Submit your lives to God, because God is the one who has your life. To submit your life to anything else is only to become enslaved to something that ain't got nothing for you. And we spend our lives looking that the mighty hand of God for salvation. But we'll leave his mighty hand to fix our own lives on Earth. And he's saying here is the answer to the question. And I don't care when the question comes because he said the time is coming. That the question will be asked. And no matter when the question comes, whether it's Old Testament or New Testament or what you feel like, maybe your testament is the same exact answer. I don't care if you're a baby boomer, millennial, Xindi, old generation, ABC D don't care who you are. You better submit your life to God. Because God is the one who has that, God is the one who's holding it. God is the one who brought you out to bring you into something. God is the one who saved you. God is the one who made you. God is the one who put you two together in marriage. God is the one who position you. So there's nowhere else to go. If you want to experience the freedom that he freed you for, you say Will.

How do I get my marriage from a turbulent one year to a successful tenure? You have to both husband and wife submit yourselves to God. You say, well, I'm I'm a wife and I'm submitting myself to God and my husband, he's gone rogue and he's not submitting himself to God. So what do I do?

So you'd better do what, Priscilla in War Room and go to the prayer closet and pray for your husband while you continue to submit yourself to God. Therefore, being a first Peter three woman leading by example, because you can't change him with your mouth, but you can be the woman that God has called you to be and be the wife that God has called you to be as unto him, because you assume that the mighty hand that saved you was the same mighty hand that can heal his perspective. It still has everything to do with submitting to God.

You say what? As Old Testament, Jonathan, you're talking to me about the Mosaic law. You're talking to me about the Covenant back then. No is New Testament.

That's why James 122 says don't just be a hear of the word. Be a doer of the word less. You delude your life.

That's why John, chapter eight, verse 31 and 32, it simply says that if you abide, in my word, you are my disciples and if you abide in my word, you will recognize that my word will set you.

It even talks to children in Ephesians one that says children obey your parents in the Lord. This is right. Honor your mother and father. Because this is the first commandment with the promise so that you may live long on the earth.

Luke Levin, 28, says, Don't just hear my word.

Keep my word and you will be blessed. It says your good and your survival that that's in the Old Testament. But let me tell you about Matthew, Chapter seven, where he talks about the man who built his house on the rock, the man who built his house on the sand. They both built something. But when that storm came through, only one stood. Why? Because someone was resting on the word.

That's how you survive.

It's a different testament and maybe a different half. But trust me, we're still playing the same exact game.

It's through obedience. What is the answer? Submit your lives to God.

Because when you submit your life to God, you get to have your life.

And we're running around trying to figure it out with our own hands and our own two feet. Becoming more frustrated and becoming more bound.

And trying to get different avenues to try to figure this thing out, and he's saying the question will be asked and some of us are asking this question, why is it necessary? This whole church thing, why is it necessary for me to give my life to God?

They tell you because it was the mighty hand of God that brought you out of sin and death.

And it's the mighty hand of God that can give you the experience of the freedom that he freed you to experience. Do you know that you can be free to become a slave or you can decide to become a slave so that you can be free?

So people are thinking that I want to be free, a definition of freedom is I want to do whatever I want to do whenever I want to do it. That's not a definition of freedom. That's his definition of freedom. That's really just camouflaged as a reality of chaos.

We just introduced chaos to our life, that's not freedom at all, because who the sun sets free is free indeed. It is for freedom that you have been set free. Galatians five one never again return to the yoke of slavery. Say the verse backwards. That means that there is a yoke of slavery that you can return to even if you've been set free.

So you can be a free slave or you can be a slave. That's free.

Jonathan Evans will tell us more about being free under God when he continues our message in just a moment. First, though, Dr. Tony Evans has just completed a book that focuses on what it takes to develop a face to face relationship with your heavenly father. It's called The Power of Knowing God. God wants you to be more than just his acquaintance is student or his fan. And this life changing book will inspire you to allow God to transform you from the inside out. It not only emphasizes the importance of drawing closer to God, but it will teach you how to actually do that. Request a book today and it, George says, are thank you gift. When you make a generous contribution to help us keep Tony's teaching on the station. If you do that right away. We'll add a whole collection of special bonuses, including the interactive study guide and Companion DVD with custom content from Tony. You'll also get all eight full length messages in Tony's current teaching series, Knowing God, both on c.D and Digital Download Visitors Before Time runs out at Tony Evans dot org, where you can get the details and make your request online. Or call one 800 800 32 22 members of our resource team or there 24/7 to help you in person. That's one 800 800. Three, two, two, two. I'll have that contact information for you once again.

After part two of today's message and this, we have a common enemy, racism, and now we have a sensitivity in the society to respond.

But Dr. Tony Evans says only a biblical response will do.

God created the races. He has explained how he wants the races to work.

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It's a plan for any community can see transformation take place, one that's embraced available now at Tony Evans, dawg.

What does it mean to live my life under the rule of God?

What does it mean?

It means your good and your survival. It means your promise and your destiny. It means that you don't spend your life and waste your life.

It means that you get to experience what God has for you specifically, since he knew you before he formed you in your mother's womb.

The people started in Egypt. They were enslaved. That's where a story is. OK. They got freed by the mighty hand of God. They got to experience a promise. But then by time you get to judges. Chapter two, verse 10.

There grew up a generation that did not know the law nor the work that he had done, but work as important as it relates to knowing God. They didn't know the work that he had done. So by the time you get to the end of the Book of Judges, the last verse, twenty one twenty five, they begin to do whatever was right in their own eyes. So they forgot about the mighty hand of God. And they decided to do what was right in their own eyes. So by the time you get to second kings. Twenty four twenty five second chronicles nine one Nebeker nesrin as boy showed up and raided southern Jerusalem. Now they took him back into captivity for 70 years. That's why when you read the book of Daniel there in captivity again when they had already been set free. Well then how did they end up in captivity when they had already been set free? They start doing what's right in their own eyes. And so God let Nebeker Netzer and his goon show up and go ahead and raid them, tear down the temple and go ahead and take him so he could teach him another lesson of how it is when you go to yourself in order to get things done. You can write back in captivity now.

You got to go higher, Nehemiah. And that's because now you've got to go rebuild what God had already built. And we got people who are rebuilding their lives that God had already built because they went to their own eyes, even though God had already set them free.

That's the whole story.

We got slavery. We got freedom. We got our own eyes. We're right back in slavery now. We've got to go rebuild stuff.

I'll be in counseling sessions, invited counseling sessions with my dad will let you know I'm not sneaking in in your business.

And I realized that my dad says the same thing every time. In different ways. But it's the same thing. They come in different problems, different things they want to talk through. My dad assesses.

He pulls out. He probes. He gets questions answered. Then he pulls out the area or areas that are not submitted to God. Then he puts scripture on those areas.

And once those areas are pulled out, he shows the person that's telling them the problem.

Then he shows how it's not submitted to God. And we've gone to our own ideas and feelings. And the situation has made us take a turn for more. All of these different things. And as they see that situation sitting out in front of them because he's explaining it and he's a good talker.

They start going, Yep, I see it. Yep. He ain't even explain nothing yet. It's just.

I'm already with you. He says, if you would, go ahead. I know it's going to be hard because you feel like your hand is mightier than his hand, but if you would, go ahead and submit this area of your life to God.

Then you will allow God the freedom to show up for you. Now you may have to wait. But at least you're waiting on a trustworthy hand.

Matthew 011 Come to me all you who are weary and heavy, laden and I will give you rest. Who gives a rest.

You don't.

So in order to get rest, you have to come to him. Proverbs three, five and six, trust in the Lord with all your heart. By no means don't lean on you.

But in all your ways, acknowledge me. You know why? Because I will make your path straight. That means you came make your path straight.

Only he can make your path straight.

Which also. Out you in the verse because it lets you know that your path is crooked or wouldn't need to be straighten.

Submit our lives to God.

Because God has your life to submit your life to anything else is only to become enslaved to something that has nothing for you.

I brought you out in order to bring you in, Colossians, 113, says I brought you out of the Kingdom of Darkness so that you can be in the kingdom of light. You thought it was Old Testament? No, it's both testaments. It's the same exact game.

My daughter, Kelsey, when she was younger, 22 months, 24 months, something like that. And she wasn't really talking very well. We taught her sign language and so she would tell us more when she was hungry and we would get her something to eat. Well, she recognize that the fridge aerator was where the food came from. So she got smart. Originally, she would come to us and say more. We get her food. But now she's like, oh, that's where the food is. So now she stood in front of the refrigerator.

She stand in the front refrigerator, Maw Maw, me shouting at the refrigerator for dread, not budging. Just more more so I saw her doing that. I took notice and I went over and I picked her up to take her over to her baby chair to prepare her for what she was asking for.

But all she knew is that she was getting further from the food. So she start throwing a fit. She thought that, you know, the two year old fits. They just lay out so you can't really hold them well.

And so, you know, I was taking her to her chair, but she was throwing a fit. I mean, she was throwing a fit. And all I was trying to do was prepare her for what she was asking for and. And so, you know how I parent. I sat her back in front of a refrigerator and I was sitting there watching TV.

I'm a let you have what you want. I mean, that's what you want. And she was calm you.

And I'm just zoned out just NBA playoffs just.

After a while of living in that bondage, starvin. She decided to renew her relationship with the person she came home right back around that corner.

More. Oh, now you want me now? Now I'm available to you now and I can do some for you. I picked her up.

She was fully submit it. She'd have no problem. She'd throw no fits. She rested in her dead, his arms. I put her in the chair. I put the baby seat on. I put the table on. I went fixed her food. I warmed it up. I put it in its sections. I came and gave her her little baby spoon, her little plate. And she said.

Too many of us are standing in front of the refrigerator of life, and it ain't doing nothing for you. And God is trying to give you the help that you need in order for you to eat the meal that you want to eat. But we're saying I don't want to do it that way. And he's saying, OK, we'll go ahead and have it your way. But eventually, after living in Egypt, that long after being with Pharaoh, that loan. You remember that it was the mighty hand of God that fed you in the first place. And you're going to renew your relationship with the person. And when you renew your relationship with the person, he will set you free.

Jonathan Evans with some good news about God's faithfulness in our lives.

And if you're still looking for a reason to trust God's providence, here's Dr. Evans to tell us why it's so important.

The greatest need in all of our lives is for the forgiveness of sins. And there's only one person who can do that. That's Jesus Christ. That's why Dad on the cross and rose from the dead. And he offers forgiveness of sins. If you carry your guilt for what you've done, fear for what you've done. Jesus Christ is right here right now. If you go to him, confess your sinfulness to him and trust him to forgive you. He will do it on the spot and also grant you eternal life.

Find out more about what it means to start a personal relationship with God. Visit Tony Evans dot org and follow the link that simply says Jesus. You'll find everything you need, including a personal invitation from Dr. Evans and some free resources to get your new life started off right. While you're there, you can request a full length copy of today's special message from Jonathan Evans, which includes material we didn't have time to present on the air. Just look for the message titled The Answer for Every Generation. You can also take advantage of that special offer I mentioned earlier. Tony's brand new book, The Power of Knowing God, the Companion Study Guide and Resource DVD, along with all eight messages from his current series on c.D and Digital Download. The entire Knowing God package is yours as are thank you gift. When you make a contribution to help keep this broadcast coming your way each day. Again, this is a limited time offer, so don't put it off. Visit us today at Tony Evans dot org. To get all the details, you can make your contribution and your request online at Tony Evans dot org. Or call our 24 hour resource request line at one 800 800, 32 22 and let one of our team members assist you. That's one 800 800. Three, two, two, two. People think they can manage anything from their diet to their desires with enough self-control. Tomorrow, Dr. Evans will explain why that's not enough to get the job done. When he talks about growing our knowledge of God, I hope you'll join us for that. But right now, Jonathan Evans is back with today's Final Thought.

If there's anybody in the room today, as I close, who has been living under the bondage of self and who has not submitted themselves to the lordship of Jesus Christ, trust me when I tell you, don't miss your life.

Finally to daddy would say, When I was younger, he caught me trying to go my own way and he said, Well, what are you doing? I thought, well, what are you doing? I said, I'm just trying to figure this out. I'm trying to do for Bobtown. And he said, You can't get done with football. You can't play no football no more.

He said, you keep getting could you play?

How do you go thick football, you've been on you've been on five teams in three years, you can't you can't play no ball.

He said, you know your problem. You know why you're going back and forth and you're struggling with you're trying to figure this out. He said, because you're stuck trying to make your own way. He said, why would you why would you try to make your own way when God has already make away? He said that you were Evans boy. You ain't that dumb.

We're trying to make your own way.

The answer to the question is, what would you make your way?

Who came make your way? The mighty hand of God yesterday is the mighty hand of God for tomorrow and today, trust the mighty hand of God who saved you own yesterday to help you live.

Today and tomorrow, the alternative with Dr. Tony Evans is brought to you by the Urban Alternative and is made possible by the generous contributions of listeners like.