Welcome to Bible on the Beach. Glad you could join us today. I'm in the hills here in San Clemente
in my home where I live. Glad you could be with us. We're in Ephesians chapter 4 verses 1 through 6 today.
Paul writes, as a prisoner of the Lord I plead with you to walk holy in a way that is suitable
to your high rank given to you in your divine calling. Paul points out three things quickly. One
we're prisoners of Jesus. Our allegiance, our focus, and our priority in life is following him
and him alone. Our goal is to be holy. That means that we're set apart for God's plan
and his purpose for us in our lives here on earth. Did you know that God has a plan for your life
and that you're supposed to strive in your character, in your life, and your integrity to
line up with that plan? You know I know God's plan for my life is to pastor people, preach
this word, preach the word of God, plant churches, and provide water. That's God's
plan and will and desire for me. It's calling for me so I stay very focused on that because
that's what God wants me to do. Are there people that are better than me at preaching the Bible?
Duh! Of course! But just because someone's better than you at teaching the Bible doesn't mean that
you're not supposed to teach the Bible. You see that's what pastors do. They teach the Bible.
Let me tell it to you another way. How do you know if you're good at surfing in this area?
The answer is you paddle out at lowers and you catch a lot of waves. End of story.
If you don't paddle out at lowers and you don't catch a lot of waves, you're not great at surfing.
Now you might be saying to yourself that's such an offensive thing to say to someone.
No, it's the truth. You mean you're gonna have to work at things in order to get
better at them? Duh! Bingo! Pastors teach the Bible. Are you gonna be good at it right away? No!
Are we called, am I called to do it faithfully and consistently? Of course. So it shows humility
when you keep practicing at something in order to get better at it. So God, Paul says
I'm a prisoner. I'm called to be holy and suitable to your high rank. Now God wants to elevate our
thinking and elevate our life in order to line up with his ideas for us. A lot of times we think
here. God says no, no, no. I need you to think here. So the process of us following Jesus is
elevating our thinking. Here's our thinking, here's God's thinking. Are we gonna bring God's thinking
down to our thinking? No. Are we gonna get our thinking right here up to God's thinking? Absolutely.
How do you do that? You realize your priorities, you realize your focus, you realize your calling,
you elevate your thinking in your life so God can work in you and through you. Now verse two he says
with tender humility and quiet patience always demonstrate gentleness and generous love towards
one another. You can do a whole message on this verse. God says we're supposed to have tender
humility. Talked about this yesterday. I believe it was Thomas Aquinas who was asked what are the
finest Christian virtues. Humiliitas, humiliitas, humiliitas was his answer in the Latin.
Milady, humility, humility. So God says we're actually supposed to have tender humility.
Takes it even a step further. There's a descriptive word for humility. Tender humility. So
that's our goal and quiet patience. Patience is quiet because you have to hold your tongue
when you want to say things that you shouldn't say and the majority of people who are not
ready to say things that they shouldn't say. The majority of the time I do pretty good. I don't
really say things I shouldn't. However, I do to my very close family and those are the times when
God has to keep me in check. You know like I notice I'm a little looser when I talk with my
parents. I'm a little looser when I talk with my wife. I'm a little looser when I talk with my
friends I've known for 20 years. That's just how I'm wired. The longer that I know someone the more
I'm going to be. There's nothing wrong with that but God wants to keep us in tender humility,
quiet patience, always demonstrate gentleness and generosity. So God wants us to be. How do you know
you're being gentle? Well when someone does something wrong or something that you need to
forgive them for you're easy about it. You're not making people beg for forgiveness. Making people
get on their knees and grovel and come to you. Don't be that way. God says just be gentle and
be generous. Generosity is a spirit. Be generous with everything that you have in your life. It's
all a gift from God. We don't own anything. We're just asset managers. We think we own stuff. We
don't own anything. All we are is asset managers. Where do the assets come from? They came from God.
God gave you your intellect. God gave you your education. God gave you your opportunity. God
gave you your parents. God gave you your wealth. God gave you everything. All you are is an asset
manager. And God's looking to see how are you stewarding your influence? How are you stewarding
opportunity? God's watching to see if we're doing a good job with that. So
keep that in mind. We're just asset managers for Jesus. He says be faithful to guard the sweet
harmony of the Holy Spirit among you in the bonds of peace. Being one body and one spirit as you
were called into the same glorious hope of divine destiny. He says be faithful to guard the life of
the Spirit. Yes we have to guard the life of the Spirit. There are things that we should never
allow in our life. The Bible says I put, I guard my eyes. I guard my heart. I guard my life. I guard
my friendships. I guard my spirit. We don't want to allow things in that can contaminate what God's
trying to do innocent through us. So guard your life. Guard your mind. Guard your thoughts. Guard
your spirit. For the Lord is one, so are we. We share in one faith, one baptism, and one Father.
Here's the deal. When we get to heaven there's not going to be all these brands
and organizations. They're not going to exist. They exist here on earth mostly because of
you know a cynical view would say that organizations and brands exist because of ego and pride
and power. An optimistic view would say we want to have a level of comfort with people that we run
this race with here on earth. I've seen both. The point is whether you have a cynical view
of religious institutions and organizations or you have an optimistic view of religious institutions
and organizations. The deal is when we get to heaven there's one hero. That's it. There won't
be famous pastors. There won't be famous churches. There won't be famous books. There won't be famous
books. There won't be famous people. There'll be none of that. They'll just be servants of the king.
People that were faithful to the hero of heaven, Jesus. I'm going to ask you a question. Are you
being faithful to the hero of heaven, Jesus? What's he asking you to do with your life? How's he asking
you to spend your time? What's he asking you to do with your money? Are you being faithful to what
God has asked you to do in your life? He says he is a perfect father who leads us all, works through
us all, and lives in us all. That's what God does. He's perfect. He lives in us. He flows through us.
He's that living water that's bubbling up out of our life, making life beautiful for all of the
parched people that live a life of drought all around us. Thanks for joining me today. I love
doing this. I hope this is encouraging to you. That's why I do Bible on the Beach. There's been
a lot of Bible in the hills lately because the surf's kind of been up and down. My routine's
been a little different. I'm glad you joined in. Until next time, have a beautiful day.