Romans 8. There are so many uncertainties in this world. God has the answer to them. In praying about the answers to life's problems, I thought of what God has provided for us as the golden key. And this golden key is like a master key. It opens up the various needs, the various doors to the answers to the needs that we as God's people have.
I think of Christ Himself as being the key. The various doors that need opening, believers need protection, there's a beautiful key marked the Holy Spirit that comes when you have Jesus. There is the need that we have as we face the forces of darkness, a need for authority. And we find Jesus granting that authority when He gives us His Name. There is a need for fellowship. This world would be such a lonely place if we didn't have fellowship with our great Creator, but He provides the best fellowship that there is. Fellowship and real courage again come through Jesus by His presence when He said, "I will never leave you nor forsake you."
Another great need of the human life is identity. People who wander through life as just a little speck of dust out there have no identity with things that are important. We need to have that sense of worth, that sense of belonging, that sense of intimacy. So He provides the key. It's again from Jesus and that's the touch of His hand. Just to feel His hand upon ours provides that intimacy with Jesus Himself. Then another tremendous need that we have, I would say the greatest need of a dying and a dead generation, He tells us we were dead in trespasses and sins. The greatest need of a dead man is not a new suit of clothes or a new automobile. What is the greatest need of a dead man? Life. So the Lord in looking down and seeing the tremendous need says that golden key that opens that door that the entrance of His Word gives life.
There's a key, there's a door marked the Word of God that's opened up and the treasure house of life is made real to us. Then there is another door and this is the door that we're going to deal with today. The other doors we're going into the next 6 Sunday mornings. So often we look for the answers without Jesus. We're looking for little keys. There are books printed by the dozens giving us keys to receiving a whole lot of different things when the Word of God gives us a golden key named Jesus.
Romans 8:1-4. "There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. For the law of the Spirit of Life set me free from the law of sin and death. …..that the righteousness of God"… verse 14, "for as many as are led by the Spirit of God they are the sons of God. For you have not received the spirit of bondage again to fear but you have received the spirit of adoption whereby we cry Abba, Father, my very own Father. The Spirit itself bears witness with our spirit that we are the children of God. And if children, then heirs, heirs of God and joint-heirs with Jesus Christ if so be that we suffer with him we may be glorified together." Verse 26, "Likewise the Spirit also helps with our infirmities for we know not what we should pray for as we ought but the Spirit itself makes intercession for us with groanings that cannot be uttered. And he that searches the hearts knows what the mind of the Spirit is because He makes intercession for the saints according to the will of God."
There are often times when people make the statement, "God if this is your will, will you do it." They are put down or discouraged in making a statement like that because to say God if it be your will is as much as saying that maybe it possibly couldn't be God's will to give the thing that is asked. It is possible to ask things contrary to the will of God. Now the reason why God's given us the Holy Spirit is so that He can take our prayer and rearrange the words just a little bit so that they make sense to God and pray for us according to the will of God. The reason he has to do this, we look at the situation and we see just a little bit of the skin of the situation and so we're asking God, "God we know this is your will, we don't have all the facts, we may have maybe one percent of the information we need but we see God, we command you, we demand you, you've got to do it because I'm asking in your will and I can't change that and I'm going to grit my teeth," and God says, "grind away," the Holy Spirit says, "God don't answer it the way he says it at all, he doesn't have the basis of information but I was down there digging around there a little bit and here's the way it ought to be."
So the Holy Spirit is given to us to help us in our praying and here He said He searches the hearts and knows what the mind of the Spirit is because He makes intercession for the saints according to the will of God. Another companion scripture says he searches the deep things, those things that we don't know about and He helps our inabilities to pray. The Holy Spirit does and so when it comes up before God He says, "Now Father adding to the little tiny bit of information this person knows is the rest of it here and now I am interceding for them according to your will." Hallelujah. People that have listened to somebody else and haven't even thought things out for themselves they've heard somebody say what in the world is the purpose of those tongue talking people, what's the value of tongues? And they immediately without even investigating relegate it to something that is stupid. There as much as saying, "hey God didn't you stop and think what kind of a mess this was going to create when you decided to put this in the Bible?" They have to admit that it says it in here but they think that God didn't use His head in creating a thing like this. But God says, "Take another look. I have given you an aid in every area of your life that you need because your human mind is so limited."
We see only what we think the need is. But the Holy Spirit even looks down inside of us and things that have long been hidden and this vehicle of understanding that passes our understanding. We don't know, that's why Paul said, "When I pray in the Spirit my understanding is unfruitful, it isn't quite getting the point. But the Spirit is making intercession according to the will of God." You see if you did it yourself you would probably say; "Now Lord I know that this is my need and this is my need and this is my need." But if God gave you those needs you'd still be in trouble because the real thing that you needed would still be there. But the Holy Spirit helps our inabilities to get the job done and He prays for us according to the will of God. And whatever is asked according to His will, He hears it and He does it. And the Spirit makes it possible.
Don't try to rule this out of your life by finding a few scriptures here and there and saying, "hey if we put these together in this fashion maybe it will say something else." Why do you want to make it say something else? God knew what He was doing, He wanted to help us. He wanted to help us get the job done for Him. Let's read on, "and we know that all things work together for good to them that love God. To them that are called according to His purpose. For him he did foreknow he also did predestinate." Oh God help us, we get ideas of interpretation and we say it must be interpreted this way, and somebody else says it must be interpreted this way. I heard two theologians. One of them said that the messages in my book were totally unscriptural, another theologian that teaches in another, both of them the same denomination one of them used a different key and he said everything in here is right. And I'm going to teach my students this year what I was teaching them cold truth last year, is going to be living truth this year. So it's possible for two people to begin at the same point by using different keys to arrive at totally opposite destinations.
The thing is with God we need to not try and get Him into a little box and not become analytical and not allow little differences. You can't get mad at a person because somebody's handed him a different key than what you've been handed. But rather knowing that we're all human and we can all make some errors but we have so many more things that are alike than we have that separate. We can major on those beautiful things. I had such an interesting thing at that bookstore in Seattle because the people that were coming in were from all kinds of different backgrounds. And they were throwing questions at me. There were questions that if I had answered one way I would have had a bunch of people saying you're a prophet. And the other batch of people would be saying you're an emissary of the devil. But in answering the questions I showed them we have so many more things in common when we belong to Jesus. And that Jesus in our lives was our hope of glory. And I had those people hugging each other and they didn't know what background they were because they found out when they had Jesus, that was the big thing and all the other little things didn't seem to worry them too much when they knew they had Jesus in their heart. God's going to do things He's planned anyway.
One of the things that I mentioned to my staff meeting was over the idea of the Lord's coming. Some of them were pre-tribulation rapture, some of those people were mid-tribulation rapture, some of them were post-tribulation rapture and some of them were no rapture at all. I had 4 different groups in there and every one of them asked me questions about that. And I knew that if I said it this way I would get ¾ of the people mad at me whatever thing I said because they had 4 or 5 different things they were needing. So I let them know that they weren't to get themselves over a big stew over this. And to let Jesus who is living in our hearts do what He pleases. And one person said, "Well what will happen to all those people that don't believe that Jesus is coming? If He honors these people and He comes, what's going to happen to them?" I said, "Don't worry about them because the criterion is Jesus in their heart. He's not going to open up their heads and see what position they are supporting; He's going to open up their hearts to see whether Jesus is there." And so all-4 groups had a prayer time.
Whom He did predestinate them He also called, and whom He called He also justified, and whom He justified them He also glorified." He has a pattern here. That word justified means declared innocent. And those that He declares innocent, there's going to be a time of glory, glorification, a pattern that God's already lined up, it's already there. What shall we then say to these things? Here's the key, the crux of it for every faith and background. If God be for us who can be against us? And as God looks over the world and His plan and desire to restore men to Himself and His love reaching out to their hearts. If God is for us how can that puny mind be against us. Not if you're willing to give Him half a chance. Then He went on to say why it was so important. "He that spared not His own Son took the best that heaven had but delivered Him us for us all. How shall He not with Him also freely give us all things? Shall He not with Him feely give us all things?" What He's saying is if He already gave us the best that He had it wouldn't be too much to ask Him to give us those lesser gifts. He's already given you the best He had. And this best He had is God's golden key, Jesus in your life. I believe God would like to hear that shout Hallelujah from this whole congregation. That word means praise be to God regardless of what language you speak. You freely gave us your best Lord and you're not going to deny the lesser gifts, giving us all things. Praise your wonderful name forever.
The greatest need that believers have around this world is to find the answer to fear. Believers of all kinds are afraid of the uncertainty of standing before God. This is a fact. It has largely come because of the misguided feeling that in order for people to move toward God they had to be made to feel guilty and the message of guilt of believers feeling guilty after they have been in prayer and accepted the Lord and their sins have been completely destroyed never to be remembered against them anymore forever. If they can somehow re-identify you with sin and these things to make you feel guilty you'd probably do some moving toward God. But that's contrary to God's plan and purpose but because of this type of a message; people have fear in their hearts. And I have in my office everyday saints of God afraid of what's coming, afraid to stand before God, what if it doesn't work? What if somehow I haven't reached that point of full acceptance with God, what if? I've had to tell them if you're totally perfect, you've reached clear to the top of the pole you still can't be accepted of God. Because no flesh can stand before Him and be accepted. So if you're the most perfect person in the world you'll never make it. This is a little jolting statement to people but they have to realize it before they can ever rest in the Lord because they can't be accepted because they have their humanity and the faults of humanity. They still have the failures. The unrighteousness means your inability to always do the right thing, for God is righteous. He always does the right thing. There's no one in this building or in the world who has always done the right thing. So God had to let us know that He had a better way, that He gave us someone who was totally perfect, sinless, faultless and righteous. And He said, "I am accepting Him in your place so when you come to Me wrapped up in His love I don't see the things that would cause a separation but I see the reason for accepting you in Jesus." So I wanted to just touch on this real lightly this morning but it is so important. This key opens the door to assurance where we can each day live in peace with God and with ourselves. We can lay our heads down in the pillow at night not worried, "I hope that Jesus doesn't come before morning; I hope He doesn't come when I'm not awake and just in case there might be something that I can do to kind of vault myself in a little higher position with the Lord." But the Lord wants us to know that the power of the blood was so great.
I remember when God so miraculously let me see the message in blood through the Bible. He asked me questions I couldn't answer about the blood. But then He told me regarding the blood that it was powerful enough to open the grave. He gave me Hebrews 13:20. The blood of Jesus was not like any other blood that falls to the ground. Peter tells us that that blood that has redeemed us was incorruptible and not one drop of that blood was ever lost. God let Paul have a look around in heaven and he said it's still there and it will never lose its power. It stands before God as the indication that was accepted because of what Jesus has done for us.
Then you read in Hebrews the 9th chapter that not only is there power to open the grave, verse 13 and 14, there is power to open heaven itself. The Word tells us not by the blood of bulls and of goats, but by His own blood Jesus entered into Heaven. He held it up, it's my badge, I can enter, it's my pass into heaven. By His own blood He entered into heaven for us having obtained eternal redemption. The application of Jesus' blood on your life is your badge, your passport into heaven. Then he said there's power in that blood to open His heart for us. So we can be accepted when He sees the blood. His heart is open because He remembers what it stands for and He remembers the completion of His plan and we are accepted in the Beloved. Jesus is our Key to real assurance. There's so much power. When that blood started flowing, that night when God allowed me to see it, I saw the blood as a great reservoir in God's heart and His love for the world. He took the very best that He had and gave Him to the world and when Jesus died and rose again the dam in God's heart broke loose and a great torrent cascaded out over all of the ages breaking away every barrier. First the great mountain of sin that separated, and then the records that stood in our way were destroyed and wiped away. Then the distance that kept us from God was all removed. We were drawn near to His heart. Then the seeds of death in our life that's sown in every man were attacked by the seeds of His life as His blood flowed through us and it's still flowing. So God reached out His hand on Calvary and He said, "Put her there. I'm not angry with you anymore, my wrath has been spent, it was diverted from you to Jesus."
We have every reason in the world to have confidence, to have assurance. 2 Corinthians 5:19. This was so important to God that we read that God was in Christ telling men and women you can come now. The word says reconciling the world to Himself. That word reconciliation means peace. You can come now. God took His own Son and poured into Him all of our sin and our guilt and allowed His wrath to strike Him. Then He took all of Jesus' goodness, all of the marks of son-ship and He poured them into us. And let us stand before God complete, complete in Him.
I remember so well a friend of mine who is still a friend of mine though he's on the other side, because passing that river doesn't put him out of existence. Glen was a missionary to China and he caught a very disastrous disease. Glen was in the hospital and the disease took his life and he later was brought back but he said when he was leaving his body he saw himself down there and it seemed as though he was taken to the river he must cross. Because of the feelings of having to somehow by his own merit achieve a relationship with God, he felt like he hadn't been good enough, he hadn't done quite enough, he hadn't merited this and there was such a fear in his heart. He had to cross over that river and he wondered if what he had was good enough. As he stood there looking across that river so fearful he thought, "I wonder if this will stand good now that I'm going to have to face God?"
Then all of a sudden he heard a heavenly choir began to sing, "Jesus paid it all, all to him you owe, though sin had left its crimson stain, He washed it white as snow." And he was transported across that river, he met with the Father, God let him see the glories of heaven. And He said to him, "I wanted you to experience this because there are believers who are afraid to come to the river because they're not good enough," because they haven't merited what they feel a high enough position in God; He said, "I'm going to send you back." Glen said he didn't want to come back but God said, "I want you to go back." God took him back and he said he looked in the room as he came in he could see himself lying there in that still form. He looked on the dressing in that room and there was the death certificate all signed. He had been gone quite along time. God allowed him to enter back into his body. The records are still in the hospital there in Springfield of this great experience. But Glen came back full of strength and courage and a brand new ministry. And his ministry until the time the Lord took him home to stay was based on this theme, "Jesus paid it all." It was based on the theme that it's not only good in this life to trust Him but you can count on Him to stand by you, you can count on Him against that day that He will keep that which you have committed unto Him, the keeping of your soul see, that's what you're committing unto Him really. You can count on Him so that when you stand at the river, Glen's message was, it's still good. He looks for the marks of the blood and judgment passes by.
At this time I would like for those who know Jesus, those who may have had struggles even in their heart and their life and fears come against them over and over again but today, you're going to rest in what Jesus has done. And as he tells us in Hebrews 3, there is a rest for the people of God and those that enter into this rest have ceased from their own struggles, they've been able to recognize what Jesus has done, they've found a key that's marked God's golden key and they've heard that message, "Christ in you is your hope of glory." Not something else, Jesus in you.
Today I'm going to ask believers to stand, I'm going to ask people who are here today who have never known Jesus. By your standing I want you to let God see your acceptance of what Jesus has done knowing that you cannot ever stand before Him in your own strength. But God has given you a key. Your uncertainty hasn't been able to find answers to, but that wonderful key, Jesus in your life. Jesus and His blood applied is your key to assurance. And regardless of what you face in life when you have that assurance that Jesus paid it all, all is well. Would you lift both hands towards heaven? There are many people who are taking their position on God's side in this room, God's heart is gladdened and He's quickly coming to you.
Let's sing that chorus Jesus paid it all and watch the peace that floods into you. I would like to read this verse to you, "and when before the throne I stand in Him complete. Jesus died, my soul to save, my lips shall still repeat." God wants you to repeat it here, he wants you to tell it to the world, he wants you to tell it the devil, he wants you to tell it to yourself, he wants you to tell it to Him. And as you come across with that blood on your life, your badge, your entrance and God remembering those words, "those people who pass with the blood give them entrance."
I want you to sing it now with those hands still raised. "And when before the throne I stand in Him complete, Jesus died my soul to save my lips shall still repeat. Jesus paid it all, all to Him I owe. Sin had left a crimson stain; He washed it white as snow." I would like to have every person who feels as they look into the future as they think about standing before God, I would like for those of you whose faith has been strengthened and today you can repeat and know you can repeat when you stand there Jesus paid my dept. I want you to say a loud amen. AMEN. Hallelujah.
END