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The Goal of Discipleship, Part 2

The Urban Alternative / Tony Evans, PhD
The Truth Network Radio
December 11, 2024 5:00 am

The Goal of Discipleship, Part 2

The Urban Alternative / Tony Evans, PhD

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December 11, 2024 5:00 am

Caterpillars may seem slow, slimy, and unattractive, but within them lies the incredible potential to one day transform into beautiful butterflies. In this message, Dr. Tony Evans examines God’s purpose for discipleship in our lives, revealing that it’s not about superficial changes but a complete spiritual transformation.

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What God wants to do is expose you to you like He sees you. And while you may not like what you see, Dr. Tony Evans says God will use that revelation for purpose in your life. Because only with that exposure comes transformation. This is the alternative broadcast featuring the timeless biblical teachings from the archives of Dr. Tony Evans.

Caterpillars may seem slow, slimy, and unattractive, but within them lies the incredible potential to one day transform into beautiful butterflies that can quite literally take flight. Today, Dr. Evans examines God's purpose for discipleship in our lives, revealing that it's not about superficial changes, but rather a complete spiritual transformation from the inside out. Let's listen in. We want to talk today about your extreme makeover or the goal of spiritual transformation. Paul speaks of this in 2 Corinthians 3. He begins the first three verses of 2 Corinthians 3 explaining that those believers were the proof of his ministry because their lives were being changed. He uses as the context for this the Old Testament. And notice what he says in verse 14. But their minds were hardened, for until this very day the reading of the old covenant, the same veil, remains unlifted because it was removed in Christ. He says in verse 13, not like Moses, who used to put a veil over his face so that the sons of Israel would not look intently at the end of what was fading away.

He's reciting something that happened in the Old Testament. Moses would climb up the mountain to be in God's presence, and when he was in God's presence, his face would change. His face would begin to glow because the glory of God would rub off on him, and so it was clear he was being changed. But then he would go down the mountain, and as he went down the mountain, the glow would fade. The further he got from God, the more the glow would leave.

The closer he got to God, the more the glow would show. So where he was in proximity to God would determine the change that took place on his face. Well, Paul uses that Old Testament incident with Moses to talk about the New Testament transformation God wants to make in your life and my life. The two key verses I want to focus on are verses 17 and 18. He says, Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty. But we all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as from the Lord the Spirit. Please pay attention to the first three words in verse 18, but we all.

Now what that means is what I'm about to tell you, you're not an exception. So the transformation that God wants to make applies to all, and the way you get it is the same way everybody else gets it. He's talking about transformation. He says we are being transformed. The Greek word transformed is the word that we get our English word metamorphosis from, and it refers to changes taking place from the inside out, like a butterfly in a caterpillar's cocoon.

The butterfly is inside the caterpillar cocoon. The butterfly is slow, slimy, and ugly. But inside, there is a change metamorphosizing taking place, turning something slow, ugly, and slimy into something lovely, beautiful, multicolored that can get up off the ground and take flight. In every Christian, there's a butterfly trying to get out.

But in order for it to get out, it must be transformed. God's goal in transforming us is to make us look like Jesus. He wants to clone Christ in His people.

That's why Scripture calls Christ the firstborn of many brethren. God wants a lot of little Jesuses running around, so He wants to turn you in to a Jesus look-alike. He says if you want to be changed, here's what you need. He says you need a mirror. Verse 18, But we all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed. He says if you want to be transformed, you need a mirror. Because what God wants to do is expose you to you like He sees you. Not like everybody else complimenting you and patting you on the back. He wants to expose you to you as He sees you because only with that exposure comes transformation.

Because without it, you don't even know how badly you need to be changed. You're just a satisfied caterpillar, not knowing your butterfly potential. He says you must come with an unveiled face. Now watch this. Beholding as in a mirror. Beholding.

Watch this. To behold is to stare at something, not glance at it. James 1 calls it looking intently at the perfect law of liberty or staring at it. James 1 says don't be like a man who goes to a mirror and quickly turns away. And the Greek word for man there is the word that translated male as opposed to female. It says when you go to a mirror, the word of God he's talking about, don't be like a male who looks at it and quickly turns away. Because females don't look at it and quickly turn away. Females hang out at the mirror.

Okay? They hang out at the mirror. In fact, they hang out at a whole slew of mirrors. They got mirror number one. That's the bathroom mirror to show them how they got messed up last night. Then there's mirror number two, aptly called vanity mirror.

Okay? Then they got a mirror to look into the mirror. Then they got a full body mirror to check. Then they got a visor when they get in the car and they looking at that mirror. Then they carrying around in their purse a compact so they can pull out a mirror anytime.

And if there's a man in here with a compact in your pocket, we got to talk after the service. You ever notice how much women are in a mirror? Because they are beholding themselves.

They are staring it down. He says when you come to the mirror, don't just look at it and leave. See, here's what happens every Sunday. People will come and hear a sermon.

They may enjoy the sermon and then they leave until the new sermon comes next week and they are not transformed. Because unless you stare at it, unless you look at it, unless you're like a guy looking at a pretty girl, you know, beholding. Not just glancing, but you're beholding.

You're staring at it. He wants you to take this passage and he wants you to meander it and review it and think it and roll it over. That's why the Bible calls it meditation. You're rolling it over and you're rolling it over and it says, until you see the face of your birth, James 1 says. He says you stare at the mirror, the Word of God, until you see the face of your birth. What does he mean the face of your birth? He's not talking about your physical birth because he's talking about spiritual transformation. He's talking about until you see your spiritual response to it, your new birth, until the seed that has been planted in every Christian, which is the Spirit of God planted in your soul, which is the transforming agent, you stare at that Scripture until God bursts that thing in your soul and you see you. Until you see you, you've not looked at it enough. You haven't rolled it around enough. In other words, you want to stay in the valley because there's too much trouble to go on the mountain. You want to hang out with folk and even if you come to church with them, that will not change you or me. That will not transform us. He says you must behold in a mirror.

You must stare at it. James 1, he says, be quick to hear. Quick to hear what? Quick to hear God's point of view. Slow to speak.

Slow to speak what? What you think. Be slow to anger. Don't be mad when God disagrees with you. Give God a chance to do his transforming work.

Now, what happens? Notice verse 17, now the Lord is the Spirit, where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty. Notice the end of verse 18, our being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as from the Lord the Spirit. Notice in these two verses, you'll see the word Spirit three times. The word Spirit is three times. Talking about the Holy Spirit.

Here's how the transformation works. When you look into the word of God as a mirror, not just glance at it, but you roll that thing over until God is talking to you, the Holy Spirit, who is inside of every true believer, will kick in and take the word and breathe life into it for your personal transformation. He will animate the word in your soul.

See, if you just read the Bible, then your eyes are working, your brain is working, because it's understanding what it's reading, or at least it's comprehending the words, but that does not do anything until it gets deep down inside your being. Dr. Evans will talk about the role the Holy Spirit plays in making the word come to life within you when he continues our message in just a moment. Don't go away. As we anticipate the new year, we want to not only end this year strong, but go into the new year able to take advantage of all the opportunities that God has brought our way for the transformation of individual lives, for the building of strong biblically-based families, for strengthening churches, and that's what we're committed to do. Your generous financial support will help us to be strong, because we're not going to back down, we're not going to back away, and we're not going to compromise the truth of this book to placate the secularism of the society.

Stand with us, will you? Stand strong by us with your generosity and your prayers, because you know we hold tightly to this word, a word that the world desperately needs today. Visit tonyevans.org to give. That's tonyevans.org. Thank you for your generosity.

The alternative is entirely listener-supported. We rely on your generosity to keep this ministry going. Visit tonyevans.org or call 1-800-800-3222 to show your support today. As our way of saying thank you, we'll send you the top 24 of 2024, a collection of the year's most requested messages, along with Anthony Evans' inspiring new Christmas album, The Greatest Gift. Plus, while on the website, you can learn how to enhance this offer with your own hardback copy of the Tony Evans Study Bible. Get all the details when you visit us online at tonyevans.org or call us at 1-800-800-3222. I'll repeat that contact information for you after the second part of today's lesson.

Here's Tony. The Bible is like a still photograph. You take a picture and you get a photograph.

That's like the Bible. It's a still photograph. It's real. It may be pretty, but it's not moving.

It's not doing anything. It's a still photograph. The Holy Spirit's job is to take a still photograph and turn it into a motion picture.

His job is to breathe life into the stillness of a photograph. All of us have read the story of the crucifixion, where Jesus was crucified, died on the cross. We've read it over and over, and we've had people read it over and over and over. But that's a whole lot different than going to see the movie The Passion of the Christ, because there you felt it when they were nailing His hands and you felt it when He was screaming out. You felt it when they pierced the sword in His side and the blood was gushing out.

You can read it, but seeing it on the screen, you felt it. The job of the Holy Spirit is to take what's written on the Bible, lift it off the page so that you feel it, experience it, and are transformed by it. But He will not do it if you're skipping the mirror. He will only do it in concert with the mirror. So if there is no time in your schedule, if there is no focus in your schedule, if the only time you read the Bible is while you're watching television, and there is no focus on the mirror so that you're beholding the mirror, the Holy Spirit who is in you will lie dormant. And there will be no transformation taking place. In other words, never be satisfied with a sermon. Never be satisfied with just reading the Bible, because that won't change you.

It will only inform you. And maybe you'll come up with a grit your teeth and conform to some things for a while. But God is not interested in conforming. He's interested in transforming.

When the Holy Spirit grabs the Word and makes it light up inside of you so that you're now experiencing it. Okay? You're hungry. You want to go to a restaurant because you want something to eat. You go into a nice restaurant, what's the first thing they're going to do? They're going to hand you a menu and give you a seat. You will read the menu, and you may even salivate by what's on the menu.

You may say, that looks good, that looks good. You know, sometimes you salivate just reading the menu. Not only, though, do you get the Word that they offer in writing, there is going to be somebody who is going to come and proclaim the Word to you.

A waiter or waitress. They're going to proclaim the written Word. The written Word is on the menu. You know what they offer because you've read it. But they're going to explain it to you. And they're going to tell you what's in that and what's in this and the specials. Then they're going to have a Q&A session at the end. Do you have any questions?

Okay? So you will have the Word written about what the restaurant offers. Then you'll have somebody who will come and exegete, exposition the Word, exposit the Word to you so that you know what it means. But after you've read the Word, and after they proclaim the Word, you don't then get your coat and leave. Because you didn't come for information.

And you didn't come for declaration. You came for an experience with the Word. You want some food in your mouth, not just a menu on some paper. You come in the church and you take your seat in the restaurant because you want to be spiritually fed today. And we give you a scripture and you open up your Bible and you read the Word. Then I come up your waiter and I explain the Word as best I can to you. But if you leave this place only having read the menu and heard from the waiter and not tasted the meal, you're still going to be hungry.

Because your goal is to have an experience with the food, not just learn about the food. God wants to progressively transform you from one level to another. So that this year I'm reflecting Christ this much. Next year I'm reflecting Christ this much. The year after that I'm reflecting Christ this much. And the year after that I'm reflecting Christ that much. And I just keep on reflecting the image of Christ.

Why? Because I keep on growing. You will always know when God is ready to take you to the next grade level of growth from glory to glory.

You'll always know when He's ready to take you from here to here. Because there will always be a test. Isn't that what happened in school when it was time to go from one grade to another? There was a test before there was a promotion to the next level. See, when God sends a test, while you may not like it and while it may not be good to you, it's good for you because He's getting ready for you for the next grade level. See, the test is to move you from this glory to that glory. Now I must tell you, if you fail the test, God bleeds in retesting.

So you will keep taking the test until you pass because He doesn't want you to stay in kindergarten for the rest of your life. He wants you to go from glory to glory. And when you do, He says you will find liberty. What does liberty mean? Liberty means freedom. Freedom. No longer being controlled by stuff that shouldn't be controlling you. No longer being controlled by things, vices, people, circumstances.

No longer being a slave because you've been set free. When a woman gets pregnant, when a woman gets pregnant, there is a seed planted in her, in her womb. And that seed is alive. Now, you don't know what it looks like when it's first there, but it's a person.

It's a person. That's why we don't believe in abortion here. Because the thing inside of her is alive.

So if it's alive, that means you're killing something if the thing inside of you is alive. So this fetus that is undefined yet is alive in her. But as she abides in food, the tube, the biblical cord, will pass down the nutrients to the seed and the seed on the inside will begin to grow. But you'll know the seed on the inside is beginning to grow because it's going to show up on the outside and she's going to get bigger and bigger and bigger. Now, as she gets bigger and bigger, some other things are going to change. Certain appetites, pickles, are all of a sudden going to look very inviting.

Extra ice cream is going to be more desired or a myriad of other changes are going to take place. That's because there is life growing on the inside changing her appetite on the outside. And she's getting bigger and bigger and bigger. Why is she getting bigger and bigger?

Because the life is growing and growing and growing and growing. That's what God wants in us. He wants Jesus Christ to become bigger and bigger and bigger and bigger. Guess what He wants in our church, in every church?

A bunch of pregnant Christians with the life of Jesus Christ expressing itself. You say, well, when does this stop? Oh, well, you know when it's coming to an end because they're going to be labor pains.

You're going to be hurting, but the hurt is good news because all the hurt means is I'm ready to come up out of here, up out of here. In other words, I want to be liberated to express the full life that I was created to have. Look, what God wants to do is transform us from the inside out, but it doesn't come from a program. It doesn't come from New Year's resolutions. It comes from taking a mirror, abiding in the mirror.

The Holy Spirit will kick in and provide the power so that a still photograph becomes a motion picture and you will experience liberation. Look, if you have a problem, a mathematical problem, you say, I need to know what 100 and 100 is just to pick two numbers. And so let's say it was something you couldn't figure out and I need to know what 100 and 100 is because you couldn't figure it out. Well, what you do is you pull out your phone, which has a calculator on it, and you put 100 plus 100 and then you push equal. Up on your screen, up on your screen would pop 200.

You know why? Because the computer already has built into it the mathematical formula to solve your mathematical problem. You're going to bring your problem to the computer.

The computer has on the inside a system built up with mathematical equations to answer the problem you bring to it. Everybody in here has a problem you want to bring to God. God, this problem, this problem, this problem, this problem. God is saying if your computer is right, I will show up on the face screen of your life, the solution and liberation to your problem because your inside is working according to the transformation of God. He says that all of us being transformed as we stare in the mirror with an unveiled face beholding our new nature based on the Word of God, the Spirit of God will transform you so that you'll become a college graduate in Him, so that you'll get your Masters in Him, so that you'll get your Ph.D. in Him because we are all being transformed. Dr. Tony Evans with good news on the good work God wants to do inside each of us.

And the way that all starts is when you acknowledge Christ's sacrifice for you. You can find out more about that when you visit tonyevans.org and click the link at the top of the homepage that simply says Jesus. If you want to discover what a relationship with the God of the universe can look like, we encourage you to check it out today. Again, that's tonyevans.org. And tonyevans.org is where you can also request your personal copy of today's message on CD or downloadable MP3.

It's part of this year's special compilation, The Top 24 of 2024. As I mentioned earlier, this giant collection is available for a limited time as our gift when you help support the ministry with a generous year-end contribution. In addition to the 24 audio messages, if you contact us right away, we'll also include a copy of gospel recording artist Anthony Evans' new Christmas album, The Greatest Gift. Just visit tonyevans.org today to get the details and make the arrangements, or call our resource center at 1-800-800-3222, where team members are ready to help you day and night. And don't forget to ask about how to upgrade your offer to include a copy of the Tony Evans Study Bible. Again, that's 1-800-800-3222. Over time, our love for God either tends to grow more rich or more routine. On the next Top 24 of 2024, Dr. Evans explains that when routine becomes the norm, it's time to take a serious look at our priorities. Be sure to join us for that. .
Whisper: medium.en / 2024-12-10 22:12:36 / 2024-12-10 22:21:57 / 9

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