-Transcript-
00:36 Thank you for joining me. Great to be here today. You know, today we are going to get to the bottom of things. We’re going to discover a great truth from the Bible, and that is what God wants us to know about truth. At least a little bit about what God wants us to know about his truth. You know, truth is very important to God and it should be very important to us.
00:56 In fact, truth is something that oftentimes in this world is hard to come by. Uh, there’s, everything seems to be. Not black nor white. Everything seems to be a different shade, a different color. There seems to be a lot of confusion here, there, and everywhere. We know the devil is the author of confusion.
01:18 And what I love about God, I love about Jesus Christ, our Savior and Lord, is that He gives us clear truths. Truths that we can count on. Truths that we can follow. Truths that we can share with others. And I love that because it’s not overly complicated. It’s simple. I can follow it. I can understand it. And so can you.
01:38 So today we’re gonna talk about what God tells us about the truth. Firstly, our burning desire should be to know His truth. You know, many people, they want to know the truths of the world, maybe the truths of business or sports or entertainment or how to not age quickly or stay healthy or. Whatever it is, they want to know these truths, but we should have a burning desire for God’s truth.
02:04 When you’re saved and you have the Holy spirit and dwelling within you, when you’ve accepted Christ as your savior, you should have this desire to know His truth, Psalm 51:6 behold thou desirous truth in the inward parts. And in the hidden part, thou shall make me to know wisdom. You know, we need to understand that.
02:25 Number one, our truth comes from God. Number two, He desires us to know truth. And number three, uh, He will make us to know His wisdom. If we seek it, you know, we need to ask God for it. We need to beg Him for it. Amen. We need to pray and petitioning God and ask him to let us understand. The truth, you know, again, it all starts with a desire.
02:48 Look, if you have no desire to eat, what are the chances you’re going to go somewhere and order food and pay for it and sit down and eat it, or go to the kitchen cupboard and go and prepare something and so forth, you’re not, if you don’t have a desire, more than likely, you’re not going to do it. And it’s the same thing comes with searching out the truth.
03:09 If you don’t have a desire, you’re not going to do it. And so it starts with this desire to say, you know, what, what God has for me. Is valuable. You need to say what God has for you is valuable. That truth is like a million kajillion billion dollars. It’s like all the gold in the universe. And I’ll tell my congregation, I’ll say, if I held up this Bible and it was wrapped around and stacks and stacks and stacks, a hundred dollar bills, I bet you people would pay attention.
03:32 But yet it’s so much more valuable than that. His truth can change. It will change your entire life. It’ll change everything about you for the better. Uh, and you know, we understand that the true peace only comes from God and that true wisdom only comes from God. And we have to realize, uh, that, that this world says, um, wisdom and peace comes from material things or from.
03:56 Uh, guru leaders are from knowledge at universities. You know, the Bible says, uh, those that are wise win souls. Amen. The Bible’s telling me that the wise ones are soul winners. The wise ones are those that fear God, that reverence God. Amen. What a difference between what the world is saying and what the Bible is saying.
04:15 But it starts with having this desire. To know the truth, behold, thou desirous truth in the inward parts and in the hidden part, thou shall make me to know wisdom. And so we need to pray to God and petition to God that He will give us truth. And we need to have that earnest desire. And I think, um, as best as I can see.
04:36 That that desire is going to come when we’re fully repentant before God. No, it’s, it’s not about our works or works. Don’t save us. Amen. But we need to kind of get right with God. We need to go ahead and cleanse our hands as sinners. We need to go to God and repent and say, Lord, forgive us our sins. Help us understand what we have done to transgress against you.
04:57 Help us to understand that sin that hurts you. Let that hurt us the same way. Let us identify with it so that we never ever do it again. And now that we, we have repented and we understand that you’re a God of forgiveness and that all our sins are cast away into the sea of forgetfulness, never to be brought up again.
05:14 Now we have that slate clean slate with you, uh, by the blood of Jesus. Amen. That He afforded us. And now we can go ahead and seek your truth earnestly, because I believe God’s only going to give the truth to those that are getting right with Him, that those that have the right heart. You say, brother Clark, where’d you get that idea?
05:32 Well, Jesus in the book of John, I believe it was, there were people out there that wanted to talk to Him and so forth, and he didn’t give Himself to them because He knew their hearts. He knew that they were wicked. Uh, there’s other scriptures in the Bible that speaks of how, um, He had to speak in parables, Jesus did because He didn’t want certain people to be saved and have wicked people around Him.
05:51 So God knows the hearts of men. So we need to get our hearts right with God. We not need to draw an eye to Him and He’ll draw an eye to us. And we need a petition for that truth. We should have that burning desire to know his truth. What a wonderful thing to have every day, every morning, get up and say, Lord, teach me your truths.
06:08 Secondly. Uh, we have to understand that it’s God’s will for all to have this knowledge of truth. 1 Timothy 2:4 who will have all men to be saved and to come unto the knowledge of the truth. Well, that’s pretty plain and simple as Paul’s writing to Timothy. God wants all to be saved. That’s all that’s whosoever.
06:29 That’s everybody. Amen. Anyone and everyone can be saved. Nobody is too good. They don’t need to be saved. And no one’s too bad that they can’t be saved. And He wants everyone to come to the knowledge of the truth because the truth is so radically different than what’s being taught in the world. That’s what’s being taught in these school systems for the most part, because it’s so different between, uh, uh, from what people value, Amen.
06:54 What people value, uh, you know, you walk around, you say, well, I don’t have any material things, but I’ve got a lot of treasure in heaven. What’s the world going to do? They’re going to laugh you out of the room, but what’s God going to do? He’s going to say, I love you. I love you, son. I love you, daughter. Oh, that’s the right mind.
07:08 Oh, that’s the real truth. Oh, one day you’ll see, you’ll see, Oh, one day you’ll understand how great that treasure is in heaven. And, and I love you for it and keep giving and giving and giving and worshiping me and staying close to me and I’ll fill your, your heart and your spirit with a peace that surpasses all understanding.
07:25 And I’ll bless you and I’ll be with you and I’ll take care of you and I’ll protect you. I’ll be your strong tower. I’ll be your buckler. That’s that relationship we should have for God with God, that idea that, um, he would have all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth that he wants all to have this knowledge.
07:39 It’s not an exclusive thing. I was talking to my wife about some, uh, big name college and something or other about it. I said, where did these colleges, you know, they started as Christian institutions, where did they get off with this whole thing? We only let in one out of a hundred people or one out of 500 people.
07:57 Whereas what, what is that about this exclusivity? You know, here, God’s telling us that He would like everyone in His heaven, that he would like everyone to be saved, that He doesn’t want anyone to perish and die and go to hell. Amen. And we have to understand that that’s a truth that God wants people to know.
08:15 And He also wants them to know that He wants them to come to understanding of his truth. And who He is, you know, uh, reminds me when the disciples were asking Jesus, if they, if, if He, uh, they could throw down fire from heaven over, I think it was Samaria for them not being hospitable. And Jesus said, I didn’t, I didn’t come to condemn.
08:33 I came to save. Amen. The truth of God is wonderful. The devil wants to pervert that truth and make it into something it’s not. But the real truth of who Jesus Christ is, is wonderful, beautiful, sacrificial, charitable love. And God wants all to come to a knowledge of that truth. We also have to understand that this is God’s required form of worship.
08:54 John 4:24, God is a spirit and they that worship Him must worship Him in spirit and in truth. You know, I’ve got little kids and they say, daddy, what does God look like? And I say, well, let’s go to John 4:24 and I’ll paraphrase and I’ll say, well, the Bible says kids, God is a spirit. So here we have clearly that God is a spirit.
09:16 That’s why it’s so remarkable when Jesus was born because the angels beheld Jesus. It’s the first time they had seen God in a human form. Amen. Cause God is a spirit and they that worship Him must worship Him in spirit and in truth, amen, in spirit and truth. Well, what does that mean? Well, first of all, it means in spirit as in the Holy spirit.
09:38 When we’re saved, Amen, we get the Holy spirit and dwelling within us. That’s part of the Holy Trinity. God, the Father, God, the Son, and God, the Holy Spirit. And with the truth, there’s a lot to that. I believe that the truth in part, at least is that it’s only through Jesus. The Bible says, uh, that no man can come to God, but by Jesus.
09:58 Amen. And so the spirit and truth here. Is the Holy Spirit and dwelling within us being saved and the truth of God’s word. Amen. God’s word is called the truth. It is our guide book for living and we must worship Him in that light. You know, in the old Testament, they had all of these rituals that they had to keep, but, and many of them pointed to Jesus.
10:20 But all of those rituals Were ended the veil, uh was torn in two In the holy of holies when Jesus Christ died on the cross for our sins And that is the spirit and truth that we must worship Our father god through the working of the holy spirit through the mediator Jesus Christ our lord and savior And when we do that, we are worshiping properly now I don’t know a lot about the different rituals and different denominations, but many denominations have a lot of rituals.
10:53 Amen. There’s a lot of chanting, and there’s a lot of moving around, and there’s a lot of different up and down over here, over there, and light this candle or move over here or flip this book or sing this hymn or whatever it is. And it may not all be bad and some of it may be honoring to God, but we need to realize that that worship right there doesn’t necessarily signify the truth that is in His word.
11:16 And so we shouldn’t add to the word or take away from the word. And as we look, there’s a ton in the Bible about how we are to worship. There’s tons of it in there. I remember quizzing my old preacher. me to plant a church about, uh, different, different service ideas. And he would point me to scripture saying, well, this is how we do it.
11:33 And there was a lot of information in the Bible about worship. And so we get our truth from the Bible, but the truth truly is Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior, and God desires to be worshiped in spirit and truth. And so what this all comes down to is. There is a truth out there, despite what the world says.
11:48 And His name is Jesus Christ. And it reminds me of John 18:37 – 38, when Christ is about to, uh, complete His passion on the cross and Pontius Pilate’s there. And verse 37, Pilate therefore said unto Him, art thou a king then Jesus answered, thou sayest that I am a king to this end was I born. And for this cause came I into the world that I should bear witness unto the truth.
12:13 Everyone that is of the truth. Heareth my voice. Pilate saith unto Him, what is truth? And when He had said this, He went out again unto the Jews and saith unto them, I find in Him no fault at all. So this famous verse here, Pilate recognizing. He doesn’t understand the truth. Jesus really condemning or convicting Pilate by saying, look, anyone that hears my voice and knows me, they know that I’m the truth.
12:40 Pilate obviously didn’t know it, but then he went out there and said, I find no fault in him. And so we see this great irony in that encounter. And we realize again and again, that Jesus Christ is the truth and the truth woven throughout the entire Bible, the Old Testament and the New Testament is Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior.
13:01 The one that we should. Accept as our Lord and Savior, draw closer to every day, follow His commands. Look at how He lived. So let’s sum it up here. God tells us about the truth in His word throughout His whole word. We should have a burning desire to know His truth. We need to understand God’s will for all is to have a knowledge of the truth and that his required form of worship is in spirit and truth.
13:24 If we get ahold of these things, we can get on fire for God, realizing that That he cares, that He wants us to have that desire to know Him. And then He wants us to seek Him continually, not to read the Bible, like some novel, just flipping pages, but to study it, to ask questions, to, to, to understand, say, look, I need to know.
13:48 What is God saying here? What is this? How does this apply to my life? What does this mean? Contextually in the scriptures, as in what is going on in the chapter before the chapter, after historically doing these things will deepen our respect and our love for God. As we understand His great plan, both then and now, and throughout all of eternity, because we’re part of it.
Amen. And hallelujah. Thank you for listening. I’ll be back soon. Take care of God. Bless. Amen.