Faith Lesson 21 week 2
Mike Doyle · Dec 13, 2015
Faith, No. 48
Holly Hills Bible Church
https://www.hollyhillsbiblechurch.org/teaching/messages/492652335590

Transcribed from the recording by SermonAudio, so expect the occasional misheard word.

So we are in Lesson 21 and we were doing really well until... Is it 21 or 22? I asked about the gift of faith, right? Is faith a gift? And I probably should have... modified the question, it would help us understand if I had asked it another way and said, is faith a spiritual gift? And we'll talk about that as we go forward.

But first of all, question five, does Romans 12.3 and Romans 12.6 indicate that faith is a gift?

Romans 12.3 says, Through the grace given to me, I say to everyone among you, not to think more highly of himself than he ought to think, but to think so as to have sound judgment, as God has allotted to each a measure of faith. Wouldn't you say that this passage says, OK, there it is. There's no question that every man has a gift of faith.

Yeah, what else could it be if it wasn't a gift? I don't know. Well, it's not earned. Right. And it's not something we can have ourselves without God, so I guess that's all it could be. Let's look at the passage in context, which would bring in also 12.6. And if you go down there it says, since we have gifts that differ according to the grace given to us, each of us is to exercise them accordingly, if prophecy according to the proportion of his faith.

So if you put this issue, does every man have faith, in context with Romans 12.6, who is Romans 12.6 talking to? Believers, right? But you could look at 12.3 and say, well, he's talking about anybody. Right. We have special gifts. Believers do. At least one spiritual gift. Some have more.

So spiritual gifts are in the context of Romans 12.3, 4, 5, 6 and other places.

If you put Romans 12.3 in the context of 12.6, we are talking about believers. So I don't think it's appropriate to say that Romans 12-3 speaks of any and every man because of the context. You all right with that or not? Well, okay. No, you're not.

How about, you know how it says how God is in nature and there's no excuse? You know, it seems like That is the... God puts it in us that we have... Puts what in us? Faith? The opportunity to see Him. Okay. So, there's no excuse. I mean, even if you don't have the Word coming to you, even if you're in Africa in some, you know, place where you never heard the Word, you still have that something the opportunity of faith to believe in him.

So question six I said, does God give a measure of faith to an unbeliever in order that he might believe? So it almost seems like the capacity to choose is like a little bit of faith. The capacity to choose, what do you have a will for? So you're constructed by God with a will and with the capacity to believe or not believe. But when you're talking about a spiritual gift of faith, you have to be talking only about a Christian. A non-believer has the capacity to exercise his will to believe, but he does not have the spiritual gift of faith.

Let me tell you why. There's an entire body of Christianity, which is predominant today, that says you must be regenerated and given the gift of faith by God in order to get saved. What am I talking about? What group? The Gospel people. Who else? The most important one. Calvinism. Calvinism, the Reform.

So anytime you're driving down the street and you see the First Church of the Who-Who Covenant, Reformed, or any of that, or Baptist, that's what they believe. They believe that man is so depraved that God has to interact with him and give him a gift of faith so that he can believe in order to be saved. That's true. So it's really that we have the capacity but it's not until we believe that we make that choice that we get the faith.

No, you got it backwards. Oh. Let's just say you're not a believer. Okay. And here comes the gospel. Okay. And it's very clear to you and you understand and now comes the time to decide. Do you believe or don't you? And you say, yes I do. Were you operating your will and believing as a non-believer? When you operate, yeah. You were. Right. Oh, well that's what I said. So then you choose and then you get the gift of faith. Well, you choose and then you get saved. Whether you get the gift of faith, then we'll talk about what the gift of faith actually is and whether it's operational or not.

Okay. Go ahead. Well, what's his name? Joel Osteen. Oh, well. I know, because I know that at the end... If you could at least pick a guy who's a Christian. I just want to say, at the end, he always says, do you... I give everybody the opportunity to be born again, and do you believe in Jesus Christ, whatever.

Now, what about those people They don't know. Maybe some people don't know. Don't know what? The gospel? Well, they haven't been to this church. Think about it. It's pretty specific in the word of God about what the gospel is and what our responsibility as human beings is to it. I mean, it gets flowered up and added to and taken away by all kinds of groups. Like the Free Grace Movement says, all you have to do is believe in Jesus and you're saved.

Is that enough? Well, that's what he's saying. Is that enough? No, that's the one that says Jesus was a good guy. Well, they don't say anything. They just say you have to believe in Jesus. Yeah. Is that enough? Not that he was God. And that he died or anything like that. Just believe in Jesus.

So it's kind of subtle, isn't it? I was just wondering in context with this gift of faith, is that something different like in a church as a spiritual gift? Because I was just remembering back to one of Vern's charts on spiritual gifts. Is that one of the gifts that has been faded away? Yeah, it is. So that's different from the gift of faith that we all have just as a normal believer?

If you take a non-believer, every human being, we're born with certain properties. We have a body, we have a soul, and we have a spirit. And within that soul of ours, we have emotions, we have a mind, and we have a will. And with that will, what can we do with it? We can choose. What do we choose? We choose to believe or not. Or we choose to believe this or this. You can't implement with your will. You think you can, but you really can't. What you do is you believe this set of facts or that set of facts, whether they contrast with each other or cooperate with each other.

So when the gospel comes to a human being, what does it come to? It comes to his intellect and it comes to his will. What does God want from him? He wants him to exercise his will to believe the gospel. the person and work of the Lord Jesus. If he will do that, what happens to the man or woman?

Twenty-two things. Thirty-five things. Two hundred and twelve things. I mean, it's amazing. One of the most important things is that, one, they're saved, they're regenerated, they're justified, reconciled, but they become a new creature in Christ. They become a member of the body of Christ and they are gifted.

With spiritual gifts, what are spiritual gifts for? Why do you have them? For other people, right? Do we change here the question? Well, the first question was, does every human being have a gift of faith? The answer is no, they don't. They have a will and the ability to choose, to believe. That's the way God makes them. That's not a gift, that's just the way they're made.

Now the problem with having a will is that it also comes with a sense of responsibility, right? If you don't have a will, you don't have any responsibility. Isn't that true? If I take your will away, you become a dog or a robot. They say a dog even has a will. My dog's got a mind of his own. Whether he's got a will or not, I'm sure it operates on instinct.

Do you understand what I'm saying? That we as human beings have these capacities and abilities the way God made them. Can I say that my intellect's a gift? Yeah, I could say that. But every man is built that way. And because they are built that way, God holds them responsible.

Romans 1.18. So you said, okay, humans have mind and spirit and... Mind, emotion and will. Okay.

So it seems like at the garden when Adam and Eve made the choice to, you know, disobey God, that they had the spiritual separation. So when you have when you choose Christ, the gospel, then it seems like that the spiritual union part comes back, or is new again, because it was dead, right? So it seems like you can't have faith unless you have spiritual union, right? So prior to that spiritual union...

No, it's not true. When my friend across the street here in the White House goes out to DIA and gets on an airplane, does she have faith that that sucker is going to go off the ground when it goes down the runway? Oh, I mean spiritual faith. I don't mean like trust in airplanes. But that's all faith is, is trust. That's all it is. Yeah, but we're talking faith in God and Christ. Okay, so... And that's spiritual.

If you're talking about spiritual gift of faith, yes. But every garden variety believer has the ability to take God at his word or not. Don't they? There's a list of gifts, and I'm not going to spend a lot of time chasing that rabbit, but there's a lot of gifts that are what I call signed gifts that are no longer operational today. When I get to that question, I'll answer it.

So when we believed, did we all get at least one spiritual gift? The answer is yes. And so the question was, what is a spiritual gift for? For the body of Christ. So everybody in this room has at least one spiritual gift and the purpose of that spiritual gift is for you to minister to the body of Christ.

Huh? Guys know what it is? Anybody here know what their gift is? Is that a gift? I thought that was a job. Huh? Care about each other? Mine is loud questions. What's that? Hospitality? Let's do it this way. We'll just see how brave you guys are. Have a show of hands on who knows what their spiritual gift is. Let's have a show of hands on who doesn't know.

Courtney doesn't know. His whole spiritual gift is to give me grief. Well, I didn't want to mention that. I'm trying to find where that's first California. I know what Courtney's is, even though he doesn't know it. Does it matter that you know it? I do know it. I know what it is. Donna knows what it is too, right? Irritation. That's fine. She's an eschatologist. His gift is hospitality. He eats his servant's heart. He's a grumpy old guy, but he's got his servant's heart. True. He's got the same gifts. The best parties. That's right. Give them parties.

So, I mean, I thought it was pretty spiritual. Do you think being a wife is a spiritual gift? It was one I didn't get. How about being a mom? Is that a spiritual gift? Well, I don't think it's being a mom itself, but probably being a mom who... No, I think it is. What kind of mom? What's that? What kind of mom? Right. A Christian mom. Right. But I would say all moms.

How about a dad? You think being a dad is a spiritual gift? You think that's an enablement by the Holy Spirit? If he's going to lead his family in the way they should be. So we're going to have a class about that and give them the Hup-2-3-4 and the 35 rules of being a good dad and send them on their way? I think every dad is gifted by the Spirit of God to be a dad. Even non-believers. Unbelievers are dads. Unbelievers are moms. They don't do it like believers do. They don't. So it's saying a Christian dad. A Christian is the only one who has spiritual gifts. That's true. Might be gifted to be a grandma. I think so.

What are you doing? You're nurturing members of the body of Christ. You're teaching them or you're nurturing them or you're exhibiting hospitality. You have a gift of helps. You have a gift of organization. There's a lot of them. And it all comes with one single issue. You know what it is? You have a heart to serve. That comes with the new life. So does every Christian have a spiritual gift? Yes, they do.

And I remember when we first studied this years ago on Tuesday, I had a long list from some church of how to find out what your spiritual gift is. And you took the test and at the end you went, I still don't know. Is it important to know or does it matter? I think it's really important to know.

Because then you know the direction God has you going. You know, Bob has the spiritual gift of handing out brochures. You're one of those guys that people walk in the front door and they meet him and they say, oh, this is a friendly place. It is. Thanks to you. That's right. And it makes you feel good to see it. Yeah. And there are people, there are exhorters in this body that come up and talk to you and when they walk away you think, wow, that was cool.

You know, I think the focus is wrong. If I'm looking, oh, I'm this or I'm that and you know, I can only do this and I can only do that and it's sudden, you know, once you start trying to identify all your gifts and this and that, it becomes self-focused. I think you can quickly go from a gift that is a manifestation of life of Christ to, gee, what's my gift and how can I use it?

No, that's true. That's absolutely true. It's self-focused. But once you realize what a spiritual gift is and what it's used for, then that self-centeredness goes away because you realize it isn't exercisable without the Spirit of God doing the work through you.

Well, the question is, can you have more than one gift, and do they change over your spiritual life? That was the question. Oh, I don't know. Do they change over your life? I mean, can you start out being a gift of helps or service and then you turn into teaching. I suppose that's possible, I don't know. Well if you say being a mom is a gift, before you were a mom you didn't have kids. I also think that single people are gifted to be single. Yay! I couldn't be single, drive me nuts. I couldn't do it. That's your gift of being a wife. What's the question that I just asked? Can it change? Can it change so much? What do you think?

Well, it must if you say, you know, if being a grandma is a gift. You weren't always a grandma, so it changed. You could kind of lump that into just having a heart for young people. I'll tell you who has a heart for young people is Sue Russell. She's got the gift. She just loves being with those kids. I don't see you down there with them.

So I think, yes I do, I think they grow, but I don't think you lose what God has. He just expands your capacity to serve as you get more and more conformed to Christ. The Lord Jesus was a servant, that's what He was, a suffering servant while He was here and as we're conformed to His image, guess what? That's what we're going to be. That's what we are. We serve. I know that's nowhere in the Constitution or the Bill of Rights, but that's what we do. I guess an answer to my own question is I think you do change as you grow. You have different strengths. I didn't have the same abilities when I was five years old as I was when I was 21.

And I think the spiritual growth is the same. When you're a new believer, you have a gift, and as you mature in your spiritual growth, I think the manifestation of Christ comes in. It may manifest itself in several gifts, and it may change over time. I think it does as you grow and you grow in the Lord. I think He can change just any time.

And I don't know if you lose or whatever, but the manifestation of that gift, may be not evident early on in your Christian life, but as you grow, that becomes manifest as you grow in the Lord. And the other thing about spiritual gifts in the body of Christ is that we're all interdependent on each other, not any of us. That's why the model of having one pastor that you pay who does everything is not the biblical model. We're a body of believers and we have under-shepherds and deacons that do certain things, but everybody's contributing. everybody. And I think that's critical.

Q. What about when you get old?

A. Careful.

Q. You know, I taught Sunday school. I've done this, I've done that through all these years. But I don't have the energy. Really, I feel that way within the church that that I, it isn't here, but it has to be, I mean, when you're living in a different place, when you've given up your home, then you have to make a world where you are. And somebody asked me, what is old age like? And I said, I think it's like living in a foreign country.

Interesting. You know Bertha Anderson? Do you guys know Bertha? I think the Lord might have taken her home, but she lived to be 102. And she lived at home until she was what? 101. So she goes to the nursing home. You know what her attitude was about that nursing home? She was there to manifest Christ to whoever was there. It didn't matter to her who it was. That's what she was there to do. And she knew the Lord took her there.

Well, that's the way I feel. That's cool, isn't it? Sometimes, too, I think, I was talking to my Aunt Jean, and she's 92, and she's like, I feel, she says, I don't like asking people for help and stuff like that. I think, also, to a point, it's like, just to let other people, you know, help you and be gracious to other people?

You know what I find about elderly people which drives me nuts? When they fight it? When their age and their ailments and their frailties, it's all about them. When a believer grows older, what really is happening, it is more and more about others, and less and less about them. And sometimes it's like, let other people help you. You know, one thing is, honestly, And when I saw you pull up this morning, I just lit up inside. You didn't what? I just lit up inside knowing you were here. Oh, you are so kind. Well, thank you. You make me feel better for a little while.

I have a question on the spiritual gifts. When you first become a believer, is that given to you at that time? Yes. But it has to be nurtured. Notice at the end of verse 6, he says, if prophecy according to the proportion of his faith. So spiritual gifts operate based on your faith.

So it's not self-centeredness about what do I got, it's where I am in my faith, where am I in my service, where am I in what I believe what God is telling me. If you, a growing believer, understand identification and what it means, and what it means to be resurrected and seated in Christ in the heavenlies, and you are this new creature, then your perspective changes about everything. Because you realize, now wait a minute, this is written to me, new man, resurrected, seated with Christ, blessed with all spiritual blessings. There's no room here to be self-centered. You see that?

So it is, does God increase our faith as we go along? Absolutely he does. How does he do it? We spent five weeks on talking about how he does it. How does he do it? Through trials. That's how he does it. He proves to us without the shadow of a doubt that what he has revealed to us is in fact true. And it works. So we'll trust him. Because we've been tried in the fire. We know.

Well, I was just thinking, isn't it spiritual gifts? Those are all his as well, right? I mean, we find out it's his hope, it's his... Love, joy, peace. It's all his anyway. Sure, it's his life. So to say that in my personal body is, let's just say, prophesied, that that's all I have? That doesn't make sense to me. Yeah, I'm a prophet. I mean, you may have the gift of teaching, but the Lord could manifest any spiritual gift through you, depending upon what the need was in the body, right? Sure. Absolutely. I think so. And if you have the gift of teaching, trust me, it is not a heady thing. It's a humbling thing. Because a teacher's responsibility is for you to get it, not them to get it. Well, and if the Lord doesn't teach through you, then... And if he doesn't teach me... You might as well sit down. Can I sit down?

You've got a question working back there and I can see it. Now I have to tell you this thing that happened where I live. We, you know, we play Mexican train and, you know, Trivial Pursuit and all that kind of stuff. So four of us are sitting at the table and we're talking about politics somehow.

And so the woman across from me said, I just hope that the president will believe in Now, what is it that we came from apes or whatever? Evolution. Evolution, yeah. I just hope that he believes in evolution. Then I opened my mouth and I said, well, I hope that he's a Christian. And then the woman that I really like sitting next to me, she said, well, I'm Jewish. And I hope that in this country they will realize there are other people. That's why you don't talk about politics.

I think the greatest line about evolution and Christianity was Dr. Carson. Some evolutionist reporter was in his face about being derived from monkeys. And so his answer was, he said, He said, you believe that you came from monkeys. He said, I believe that I was created by God. In your case, it's probably true. I posted something I found on Facebook. It's a picture of a monkey, an ape, and it says, and like the monkey's talking and says, please stop saying that you evolved from us. He says, because you guys are a bunch of jerks. Mike? Hold on. Jim?

Oh, well, I just kind of build off of some of the things that Donna was saying. I think, I mean, I've been in situations where spiritual gifts, including the gift of faith in the sense of spiritual capacity to help a believer grow in different areas. It can become such a focus that you lose your centeredness and beholding on the Lord Jesus, because He apportions those gifts.

That word is in Romans 12.3, it's allotted, they're apportioned. It's like He takes a scoop of whatever He wants you to have and He gives that to you, a sign. You don't study them and all of a sudden get them. They're assigned to you.

Could that change? Could God a lot or a portion of the time differently? Probably so. But I think what's interesting is that the source is in Him and the manifestation is in Him. and behold the Lord and his word and as you keep walking those gifts are going to manifest themselves without you having anything to do with it. Yeah, when you realize that believers are PVC pipes through which the Lord does his work, how much credit does the pipe get? None. None. You know, and that makes it real easy. Yeah, like the Ed Will.

Eric read that but I will In Ephesians 4, 15 and 16, this goes to it, but speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in all aspects into him who is the head, even Christ, from whom the whole body being fitted together by what every joint supplies according to the proper working of each individual part, causes the growth of the body for the building up of itself in love. It's cool because the spiritual gifts are not meant to operate by themselves. They're meant to operate together. We can't do our spiritual gift walking with the Lord and manifesting his life without that happening in the body.

I agree, I absolutely agree. So this idea of solo Christianity on your own island, under yourself, being a teacher, doing whatever you know, and not having the body, I mean that just goes against everything in chapter 12. Sure, I agree. One last thing.

Notice in 12.6, it says, since we have gifts that differ according to the grace given to us, oh, it's a grace deal. Each of us is to exercise them accordingly. If prophecy according to the proportion, and the definite article is in front of the word faith there. The faith. What did we learn about the faith? When we see that, the four aspects of biblical faith, one of them was with the definite article in front of it.

What did that mean? It could be the whole thing or it could be a portion of it. If you're an evangelist, guess what portion you're focused on? The gospel. So the faith, understanding this verse with the definite article in front of the word faith is really important.

Because he may have you involved in what Courtney just read, and that's where your focus is, that's where he drew you, and that's where you're learning, and that's where you're being used. Or he may have you as an evangelist who concentrates and has a heart only for the lost, only for them. That doesn't mean you disregard someone who comes, a believer who comes and wants to talk to you about something. But you know guys, and Courtney's friend, what was his name?

Sam Dalton. Sam Dalton had the gift of evangelism. You could stand in line at King Soopers with him, by the time you got to the checkout, he had you on the gospel. He did. He was a black guy, he was the coolest guy. And he just had that gift, you know, and I have a buddy who's like that. He just sort of, you know, and you get to talking and the next thing you know, what's the subject of the conversation? Your salvation in the Lord Jesus Christ and you are not offended. He just, it just, bang, it's there. You know?

I have a friend like that and she, although she seems to think that her gift, like everybody's supposed to have it, You know, like, oh, it's all evangelizing, it's hers, and it's like everybody is supposed to do that. Everybody isn't necessarily, like, if I tried teaching, I'm sure I'd fall flat. If I tried, you know, taking on other people's gifts because they think that everybody should have a gift, you know what I'm talking about?

That's what I think, I mean, you just triggered in my mind why I think Being a parent is a spiritual gift because what do you do with those kids? You teach them, you nurture them, you bring them up in the ways of the Lord. All of that stuff takes gifts. And it also puts a big responsibility on you to be learning all the time, growing, so that you're out ahead of them a little bit, so that they don't come in one day and ask you a question you can't answer.

That happens about every week. And the second part of that, you are what you say. I'm not going to teach you something that isn't me. I'm not going to teach you to not cuss and here I am running off at the mouth all the time. I'm not going to teach you to not hit your sister when I'm going to get in a fight with somebody. You've got to be what you say.

Right, and that's what it seems like sometimes, like evangelizing and stuff. It's like, here's how you do it. Do this, do this, do this, do this, and then you will evangelize. without kind of having the... Opportunity for it? Like you go and make your own opportunity? Yeah, there's a lot of people that try to do that.

Miles Stanford used to tell this story that after he was saved, he worked with an evangelist in Chicago for a couple of years. And after passing out tracks and knocking on doors, and I think the same thing was true of Hal. Hal was working with J. Bernard McGee. I forget who Miles was working with. Both guys, the same thing.

They went to their mentors and said, you know, I don't really have a heart for the lost. Miles said, my heart is for the believers. And the guy said, well then that's where you need to go. Now what do you mean? You need to go to the believers? Yeah, you need to nurture them and bring them up and teach them and that kind of thing.

The contemporary church has such an over focus on evangelism. It's all about the nickels and noses. That's all what it's about. I was just going to say, some of you guys know I spend quite a bit of time in that space. whether or not someone would say our family had the gift of evangelism or not never really bothered me or concerned me but I mean I realize that there is there are those that have natural inclination to strike conversations up like your friends and I know of those people as well but when it comes to sharing the gospel take the word evangelism maybe set it aside but when it comes to sharing the saving knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ with someone I still don't think that's a spiritual gift, I think that's a preparation that Peter talks about having for all of us to be prepared to give a defense for anyone who asks to be able to give an account for the hope that you have.

So whether or not you're able to do it eloquently, or enthusiastically, to get all of those adjectives that accompany a presentation of the gospel, you better be prepared to talk about the hope that you have. That's what it means to be a believer. That means you know it, and you can communicate it to another human being, if you're asked. And that says, if you're asked. So be prepared to do that. Evangelism, it's a different topic, and it can be larger, but when it comes to sharing the gospel, It is every one of our responsibilities when asked.

You know what's interesting about that though? I know people, believers, that have an incredibly thorough knowledge of the identification truths, but they're not so sure about the gospel, how to present it. But they could give you a chapter and verse about co-crucifixion, burial, and resurrection with Christ. That is the gospel. I agree. I think it is too, but then if Ralph here is a non-believer and we start talking about Christ, I'm not going to lay identification on him. He's going to think, what are you talking about? Well, you can lay death, burial, and resurrection. But my mother used to say to me when we would talk about Christianity, she'd say, you're always talking about dying.

I thought, boy, I was talking out of the wrong mouth. You know, she was a Catholic, and all she needed was the gospel. And I was growing. I didn't know what I was doing. All I was doing was my mouth was moving all the time. Well, and then it becomes the Holy Spirit. Well, it's always the Holy Spirit. It always is. As a matter of fact, spiritual growth, if it teaches you nothing else, it teaches you what not to say and when not to say it. It sort of puts in you, when the opportunity comes right in front of you, the first thing you do is you go to the Lord and say, what are you doing here? What do you want me to do? I don't know what to do. What would you have me say?

And that's true in a lot of cases. You know, the phone rings and somebody's, my dog died in my pickup truck, got a flat tire. What do I say? Wonderful. This goes back to what I constantly keep saying, all things. Yeah. You know, whether you say it or not, he may be working on you because you didn't say anything or I wasn't prepared. That was what was being used in that, all things. You know, it's all things. He may not be working on the person you're looking at. He's working on you. And he uses all things. And he's in control of all things.

And it's okay. And that's fine. You know, we look at it as, oh man, I've got to do this. Well, Lord's looking at it going, look in the mirror. You know, and that's why I said it's the all things. And he's using all those things. Maybe you're thinking one way and the Lord's thinking the other. We beat ourselves up, but I think the Lord uses all things. I think as you get mature, though, in Christ, that you are thinking the same thing. You're thinking God sucks after him. You are up to speed and resting in the fact that God does work all things. Whatever circumstances come, He's sovereign. And I'm, you know, I'm thankful that I'm just in the flow. Whatever it is, and if it's a gospel or spiritual growth or trials and suffering, whatever it is, you know, you trust the Lord with what he's doing and you go.

I just, one of the things I need to try to understand better is, you know, we're in Christ. The Holy Spirit places us in Christ and we're in Him in the heavenly places and a real functionality is working within Him somehow although we're on the earth. And what I'm trying to figure out is because like I'm always thinking about earthly things and I get paychecks and stuff like that but it's all really centered with us in Him up there. And I don't really understand how it works in real life down here. Does what I'm saying make sense? Sure, it does. It makes a lot of sense.

Two things, the verses that we just covered when we talked about the faith, whether you're called and involved in evangelism, whatever it is, The proportion of faith that God has dealt to you, that's where you function. Second thing is, when it comes to what you're talking about, the fact that you are even aware that your life is hid with Christ and God, that it is there and it's not here, is a step along the way of being able to behold the glory of the Lord Jesus in the Word and recognizing and trusting moment by moment that this is where I am and this is who I am and the paychecks and all the rest of it are because he's orchestrated it and I trust him. And I learned that I'm not trusting him when the paycheck doesn't show or when a circumstance changes. We love routine. We like the things to be same all the time because we're comfortable. We don't have to deal with problems. God, in order to grow us up and get us heavenly minded. And oh, by the way, that's the Spirit's job. You wouldn't even have that thought if it wasn't for him. So you can trust him.

When Paul said 30 plus years in the ministry in Philippians that I may know him and the power of his resurrection, the fellowship of his sufferings being conformed unto his death, none of that had taken place. He knew that that was an ongoing process and the heart hunger for that to happen was greater every day. That he might apprehend that for which he was apprehended in Christ. He wanted to enter into the fullness of his heavenly position in Christ, even though he was still here. He knew that that's where it was. That's what Colossians says, since you've risen with Christ, what do you do? Seek those things which are above, or Christ is at the right hand.

What does that mean? I'm so glad we're going to study the position. Principle of position? Yes, because I don't feel positioned. Oh, feelings have a lot to do with it. So we're done with 21. We'll do 22 next week and 23 will be the last class last session.

Hopefully you guys cooperate. Father, how we thank you for your grace and thank you for your word. How incredibly involved you have each one of us in the movement and the growth of your body of believers here on the earth. We're so thankful that this environment that we're in functions under the heading and with the lifeblood of grace and that we all live under it. And we thank you for the blessings that we have in your son, the Lord Jesus. And we pray in his name. Amen.