-Transcript-
00:40 Amen, glory to God. Praise me to God for another day. I hope you’re doing well.
00:45 Welcome to KJV Cafe. Welcome to the program. Thank you for listening.
00:51 You’ve probably listened before. If you haven’t, welcome for the first time. And if you have, thank you so much for returning.
00:58 Here on KJV Cafe we do one thing. We look at the Bible. We talk about it.
01:02 We study the Bible. We dive into God’s Holy Word and I pray over every single episode before I ever preach it so you know that I’m giving it to God. Amen.
01:13 And that it is not from me but from Him, hopefully, Lord willing. Amen. And so we just thank God for this opportunity.
01:21 I thank God for the opportunity and I thank you so much for being here. And I pray that this show is a help and a blessing to you. I believe God has a reason for me to do it and I pray that it helps and it blesses you in your walk with the Lord.
01:34 John 3:30 is our scripture here today. He must increase but I must decrease. And we look at this scripture.
01:42 It’s such a short scripture. I always kind of chuckle when I see it because the youth program at our old church, we had a very diverse age group in there and so they would, you know, they had teens and young kids
01:57 but it was I think there’s a lot of different ages in this youth group and the youth leaders were having the kids memorize a verse and they chose this verse and they printed it out on paper and so forth and it was great. A lot of the kids could memorize it because it was shorter.
02:11 And here, because it’s short, you know, people may not pay as much attention to it or whatever. It’s not something that’s on a piece of art at the store or something like that necessarily but it’s an incredibly powerful verse and there’s a lot to this verse. I mean there’s the biblical context.
02:35 Here John the Baptist is baptizing. The Jews come to speak to his disciples about Jesus and his disciples who are baptizing. As I understand it wasn’t Jesus baptizing but the disciples.
02:48 They were doing that in another place and Judea and John’s disciples are being asked what’s up with this and John gives this example of Jesus being the bridegroom. John just simply being a friend of the bridegroom and the believers being the bride of Christ and us understanding here that John was the forerunner to Christ. That John the Baptist was the forerunner to Christ and John himself is showing great humility saying I am NOT God.
03:12 Remember John could have seized on this opportunity and said you know what you’re right I should be praised I should be worshipped but instead John said what this I’m not even worthy to loose this man’s shoe, his sandal. I’m not even worthy to touch his sandal. John said I’m not the the bridegroom.
03:27 I’m not the one that’s God in the flesh. I’m just doing the will of the Lord. I’m just a friend Amen.
03:35 So he was humble and you know one thing to keep in mind here that John 3:30 he says he must increase but I must decrease. He says God must be greater I must be less and that attitude really resonated with the Lord because you know Jesus Christ Himself said the greatest human to ever live was John the Baptist. Nonetheless the lowest in heaven is greater than him but still that’s quite a compliment from Jesus Amen.
04:01 It’s quite a compliment from Jesus and and you know I think we should take that compliment to heart when we think about applying humility to our life and that’s Matthew 11:11 if you want to look it up and read it beautiful verse there. So God’s order of importance here for us as we look at how we are to serve God and live humbly. Last episode I spoke about the order God would have it for himself the co-equal Trinity the three-in-one Godhead.
04:28 God the Father God the Son and God the Holy Ghost and we talked about that and here today we’re looking at how God would have it for believers and this is from Matthew 27:39 and the second is like unto it thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself and so we know we have to put Christ first we put God first we love him as
04:49 Matthew 22:37 tells us with our whole heart and our soul and our mind and this is the first great commandment we love the Lord that’s God’s order for us we understand that we understand it takes humility to love the Lord in that regard
05:02 because we can’t be proud God hates a proud look amen we can’t have pride we can’t have righteousness about ourselves thinking that we’re good or that God owes us anything the Bible tells us our righteousness is as filthy rags
05:15 to God like dirty gauze pads so we realize to be humble we have to understand our place understand who he is we have to desire to seek him out we have to stop being the captain of our own ship Amen
05:29 we have to realize that God is a fearful God amen we have to fear the Lord and we have to reverence him and we have to understand that his word is here for us that faith cometh by hearing and hearing by the Word of God that his word builds our faith
05:47 and that his word helps us to live life as he’d have us to live it and that’s why we looked at that first commandment in detail last episode and here we’re looking at that second commandment thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself Amen
05:59 you know we deal with others you know and I brought up this acronym joy Jesus first other second yourself last which is a great acronym but how about Jesus first others like yourself okay
06:15 I don’t know what that would be Joel Joel’s I don’t know but others like yourself I mean that’s what the Bible says it doesn’t say love people love your neighbor you know more than yourself here it says thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself
06:31 and I really think the reason why is that God knows that most of us have a very healthy self-esteem in the sense that we love ourselves most of us don’t don’t turn down a compliment when we’re given one amen most of us don’t I don’t know dislike nicer things you know imagine you’re on a bus
06:55 and the seat is terrible and you’re in pain the driver says well you look important I’m gonna give you the front seat and it’s a VIP seat and it’s very comfortable you can say that about being a coach and then going to first class we won’t turn those things
07:09 I wouldn’t turn those things down amen and so we think we deserve good things and so therefore if we just simply treated our neighbor as ourselves and we loved our neighbor as we love ourselves our neighbor would be doing really well Amen
07:22 and I brought the example last week you know like going out to eat and stuff and we go out to eat and you know we enjoy my wife and I and the kids you know the kids are a little young gotta be careful where you take them Amen
07:32 you don’t want to break anything but we enjoy a good meal and so if we enjoy that what you know if we just loved our neighbor as much to start giving them those things that would be really good not just about giving but just treating them loving them enough to care to listen to them you know
07:51 and we want to be heard and on and on right so John3:30 he must increase but I must decrease but I must decrease the idea that we are to be humble in life and how that goes with treating others
07:59 I mean firstly here never put another down never put another down okay and so I thought about this because I as a someone that went to school for English and graduate school speech communications was in the English department so I didn’t have to take too many boring English classes
08:18 but you know still in that subset but you know you learn not to use absolutes too often I think I had a professor that said never use absolutes which is an absolute but either way we’re not supposed to use absolutes a lot in writing
08:30 and I try not to even in talking to people or on the radio but you know what never put another down I think I can give that absolute because the Bible tells us that he must increase
08:42 and we must decrease and that we should live in a way that loves our neighbors as ourself and so if we’re not going to be putting ourselves down constantly if we’re not going to be demeaning ourselves
08:55 then why should we do it to another you know it’s no fun to get made fun of it’s no fun to be talked about it’s very hurtful amen if we’re honest
09:06 and yet how many times in the church are people talking about others and hurting others I remember a big focus on this at Heartland Ministries when we had our little congregation together there
09:17 and the first building I think it was and the second one we spent a lot of time talking about you know gossip being a sin and this idea that that you know what if the Bible instructs us if we have a problem with a brother or sister we need to go to them directly
09:30 and by the way we shouldn’t be going to the outside people that’s a whole other thing but the Bible tells us to resolve it from within that we don’t need to be going to the courts of the magistrates we just go ahead
09:40 and talk to the brother or sister directly and sometimes I say problem you know take that broadly you may have a problem with somebody individually but you may have a problem with something they’re doing right
09:49 and you know what it’s no fun to confront them I’ve had to do it before somebody that I love Amen someone that’s close to me and I had to sit there with this individual and say this what you’re doing is not biblical and that was not a fun conversation
10:06 but it was what the Holy Spirit had convicted me to do and I didn’t want to sit there and tell other people what he was doing was not biblical I wanted to sit there and tell him directly
10:18 and say that I loved him that I can understand that I literally I believe God helped me to say this correctly I told him I’m no better than you I’m just one person telling another something from the Bible
10:30 and he got it right he corrected his way he probably looks at me a little different these days but that is an example of how we are to act we’re never to put another down
10:42 and if we really apply this you think of God listening and think of us before we say anything about another think of us thinking that individuals made in the image of God so before you say anything you say okay Bob Smith is made in the image of God
10:56 but no buts just just stop there okay and let’s not talk about other people let’s not put other people down let’s love them as we love ourselves we don’t want to be talked about we don’t want to be put down amen people said things to me many many years ago
11:13 and they never went away they kind of hang around the devil likes to bring them up and I just give it to God but the point is it gets to everybody so let’s never put another down and that shows humility
11:23 because frankly what are you doing when you’re putting someone else down I think you’re trying to elevate yourself for time’s sake let’s move on give sacrificially with gladness if we’re humble we’re not gonna think that we deserve what God’s made us stewards over
11:35 but we’re gonna realize our stewardship we’re gonna realize our need to give sacrificially with gladness to serve the Lord with gladness to give with gladness to be happy to give to others amen not to look at it as a chore to murmur
11:49 or to question but to have faith and to love the Lord and to give as God is blessed to give with gladness and finally share the gospel with others have that humility to share the gospel with others so that they too can be saved
12:02 you know this is the idea of having a burden for the lost he must increase but I must decrease I being like the flesh amen our fleshly desires don’t want to go out there and do confrontational soul winning knocking on doors handing out tracts
12:16 but we need to look at that individual and I wish I had time to tell the story there’s someone I met the other day and I looked at him we need to look at him and say this is a creation of God made in the image of God
12:27 that deserves to know that has the right to know that they need Jesus to be saved and if not they’re headed for devil’s hell and that they must accept Christ as Savior
12:38 and that Christ died for their sins and that God loves them and I need to tell them what that preacher took the time to tell me amen that’ll preach right there what that preacher took the time to tell me and those people took the time to pray for me should I not pray for them the Bible tells me to love my neighbor as myself
12:55 I need to love them as myself and I’ve been saved amen I’m reaping the benefits of being saved now Lord knows I’m gonna reap the benefits of being saved for eternity why am I here
13:04 I’m here to help help others help others find the Lord the Lord truly is the one that finds the individual and saves them but we have to plant that seed and we have to help them shepherd them along
13:15 we have to tell them we have to love on them maybe the way that we’re gonna show them the gospel is by listening to them for a while by spending time with them by giving them a ride by studying with them whatever we need to do to help them understand God’s great good news
13:30 we need to do it he must increase but I must decrease John 3:30 John as Jesus said the greatest to ever be born of a woman and here we are to emulate that and this will bring glory and honor to God
13:45 and by the way when you do this you’ll have peace in your life like you’ve never had before and you’ll set an example for others to follow what a great peace priest what a great piece of scripture says the preacher okay I was tripping over the words there
14:01 I thank you so much for listening visit us online KJV cafe calm got a new website KJV Cafe Facebook check us out we’ve got stuff on there and tune in next time for more great truths from God’s Holy Word
14:14 thank you so much take care of God bless and Amen