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About The Episode:

Have you ever found yourself trapped in the tangle of tradition versus heartfelt faith? We’re peeling back the layers on this timeless conundrum, taking a hard look at the Old Testament’s place in a modern Christian’s walk of faith. Our journey through Matthew 15:1-20 brings clarity to Jesus’ message about the essence of true religious practice – it’s not about the external pomp but the state of our hearts. We even touch on a recent headline about a notable pastor’s controversial choices, prompting a robust discussion on how scripture should inform our everyday decisions. Lean in as we seek wisdom deeply rooted in scripture and grapple with the hard questions about living a faith that transcends mere external observance.

In this episode, you’ll hear: 

• A biblical study into Matthew 15
• How to be authentic in our spiritual life
• The debate between law and tradition
• Why we live a life pleasing to God and what that looks like

Where to dive in:

(0:00:00) – The Debate on Law and Tradition (13 Minutes)

This chapter examines the role of law in the life of a New Testament Christian, addressing the debate on whether the Old Testament laws still apply. I discuss the pendulum swing between strict legalism and complete lawlessness, emphasizing the need for a balanced biblical approach. We explore Jesus’ teachings on the heart’s condition versus external adherence to tradition, using Matthew 15:1-20 as our main text. The chapter also touches on a current controversy involving a well-known pastor’s participation in a wedding, which raises questions about Christian conduct in modern society. I emphasize the importance of consulting the Scriptures for guidance in every aspect of our lives, rather than relying solely on human teachers or traditions.

(0:13:31) – Revealing the Heart Behind Commandments (15 Minutes)

This chapter explores Jesus’ teachings, emphasizing the importance of the heart behind actions rather than the actions themselves. I discuss how Jesus challenged the Pharisees’ focus on external adherence to the law while neglecting the weightier matters of justice, mercy, and faithfulness. By examining the Beatitudes and Jesus’ interpretations of the law, we see his call for sincerity and character over mere rule-following. The chapter also addresses the significance of internal cleansing, as symbolized by baptism, and the necessity of self-examination over judging others. Finally, I read from Matthew 23:23-28 to illustrate Jesus’ rebuke of the Pharisees’ hypocrisy and his insistence on the balance between upholding the law and understanding its deeper moral imperatives.

(0:28:46) – Self-Reflection and Prioritizing Spiritual Growth (13 Minutes)

This chapter, I invite listeners to reflect deeply on their lives, examining priorities and the reallocation of time and resources. We explore what occupies most of our time, where we choose to spend our extra money, and the sacrifices we make, urging an honest assessment that avoids self-deception. I introduce my book “You Don’t Need Money, You Just Need God,” emphasizing reliance on spiritual guidance over financial solutions in tumultuous times. The conversation also touches on the importance of who we allow to influence us, stressing the need for voices that promote character and truth. We consider the implications of prioritizing external rituals over internal transformation, highlighting Jesus’s call to obedience and the dangers of reshaping His teachings to suit personal desires. The chapter concludes with a call to repentance and genuine spiritual renewal, distinguishing between habitual sin and the ongoing journey of a believer.

(0:41:37) – Living a Life Pleasing to God (13 Minutes)

This chapter examines the principle that true Christian faith manifests in action, not just words. We explore the idea that love, obedience to commandments, and living as the Bible instructs are essential for experiencing God’s blessings. The concept of selective belief and the misapplication of scripture are challenged, emphasizing that blessings follow those who diligently seek and serve God. We question the tendency to treat the Bible as a mere tool for personal gain, akin to the law of attraction, and highlight the importance of aligning our lives with God’s will. I discuss the pitfalls of hypocrisy and the consequences of not adhering to divine commandments, drawing on the stark contrast between the lives of believers and the final words of noted atheists. The discussion urges listeners to reflect on their treatment of others, mercy, forgiveness, and the pursuit of God’s kingdom over personal desires, to ensure a life in alignment with Christian teachings and an eternity with Jesus Christ.

(0:54:20) – Spreading the Gospel Online (0 Minutes)

This chapter concludes with expressions of gratitude for your companionship and the hope that the content has enriched your life. I remind you to show your support by liking and giving a thumbs up, as this assists in sharing the message with a broader audience. For further communication, I invite you to reach out through my email, available on my website, where you can also find additional resources. Thank you once again for joining me, and I look forward to connecting with you in the next episode.

About your host: Jaime Luce’ testimony has daunting personal mountains and treacherous financial valleys. She was trapped in day-to-day stress and couldn’t see a way forward. But how she started is not how she finished! And she wants you to know God has a plan for your life too, no matter how tough it seems. Today, Jaime has been married to the love of her life for almost three decades, owns two companies, and has become an author and podcaster. God’s way is always the blessed way! 

Free chapter of Jaime’s new book: You Don’t Need Money, You Just Need God: https://jaimeluce.com/book/

Connect with Jaime: 

Website: https://jaimeluce.com

Facebook:  / jaime.luces.page  

Instagram:  / jaime_luce  

LinkedIn:  / jaime-luce-00395691  

Full Transcript

This transcript is auto-generated and not perfect. We hope it blesses you.

00:00 – Jaime Luce (Host)
But the pendulum folks cannot swing from all the way over it, from the letter of the law and Every possible thing that that could mean, and then swing all the way to lawlessness. We cannot do that. We can’t say, well, they’re wrong. So then I’ve rolled the whole thing out. You’ve heard the term. You can’t throw the baby out with the bathwater. You don’t clean something up and then throw both of them away. You, you get rid of the dirty water and what’s unnecessary now and you keep what is good and right. So these are the standards, these are the commands. So we are given commandments because they are contrary to our nature.

00:50
Welcome to the Jamie Luce podcast. Thanks for tuning in today and spending some time in the word with me. I want to talk today about the way I had a bunch of Little you know titles and sayings as I was writing these notes, and I think what it boils down to is that, as a New Testament Christian, is the law necessary? What do we do with the law? Because there is quite a Debate. There are different I call them, I guess, different philosophies, and if you really boil it down, it’s not just philosophy, it’s what people actually have made to be what they believe is their religious rights or their religious duties, and there’s a quite a pendulum that swings all the way from Every law, every dot, every you know cross, every team dot, every I, every tradition that goes with that, and then you can swing to the opposite end and you can be those who think that the law Doesn’t apply to you and that you don’t have to do what the scripture says and the Old Testament it’s old, you’re now and new to a new Testament, christian and and that doesn’t apply to you because you’re not Jewish and you throw off every restraint, and yet neither one of those is Fully biblical. So we need to take a look at that today and I want to help give us some guidelines.

02:29
You know, if you’ve ever been walking out your, your Christian life and you just wondered Lord, is the G want me to go this way? What? What are you? What are you saying to me about this, and is this something that I am okay to participate in or or not? In fact, there’s a huge right now.

02:45
I’m not gonna talk about this today, but there is a huge debate going on right now in the Media realm, having to do with a pastor who is a very well-known pastor who is a very Authoritative teacher on the Bible. Yet he came out after being very Revenced for so many years, has a great reputation and I’m sure he loves the Lord immensely. I don’t. I don’t even come there. He’s done a great work for the Lord. But he came out and made a statement about attending a Wedding and I I’m not exactly sure I’ve heard two different, conflicting stories on whether it was a homosexual wedding or an LGBTQ Wedding, where there was a male and female, yet One of those dresses as the other. So I’m not really sure about that. I just know that there is a a lot of talk going on now and people are Are going to the word. Thank God, they’re going to the word to say no matter what anybody says, no matter who tells you, I don’t care what position they hold.

03:57
The Bereans were commended because it didn’t matter what they were taught and who taught them. They would go to the scriptures themselves and find out what does God say. And really that needs to be what we do. No matter what we’re facing, no matter what decisions we need to make, no matter what we feel or what we’ve been shown or what has been an example to us of what a Christian is. We’ve got to go to the word of God and see what God himself has to say about these issues. And so we’re going to be reading today in.

04:36
I’m going to read several passages, but our text today is Matthew, chapter 15. We’re going to read verses 1 to 20 and if you want to get your Bibles out, get something to write with, to take some notes. But I’m going to read this portion of scripture to you first and then we’ll dive into it a little bit. It says then Pharisees and scribes came to Jesus from Jerusalem and said why do your disciples break the traditions of the elders? For they do not wash their hands when they eat. He answered them and why do you break the commandment of God? For the sake of your tradition. For God commanded, honored your father and your mother, and whoever reviles father or mother must surely die. But you say, if anyone tells his father or his mother, what you would have gained from me is given to God. He did not honor his father. So, for the sake of your tradition, you have made boy. The word of God, you have a prince.

05:43
Well, did Isaiah prophesy of you when he said this people Honors me with their lips, but their heart is far from me. In vain do they worship me, teaching as doctrines the commandments of men. And he called the people to them and said to them here and understand, it is not what goes into the mouth that defiles person, but what comes out of the mouth that defiles a person. Then the disciples came and said to him Do you know that the Pharisees were offended when they heard this saying? He answered every plant that my heavenly father has not planted will be rooted up. Let them alone. They are blind guides and if the blind lead the blind, both will fall into a pit. But Peter said to him explain the parable to us. And he said Are you still without understanding? Do you not see that whatever goes into the mouth Passes into the stomach and is expelled? But what comes out of the mouth proceeds from the heart, and this defiles a person. For out of the heart come evil thoughts, murder, adultery, sexual immorality that false witness slander, these are what defile the person. But to eat with unwashed hands does not defile anyone.

07:23
Now Jesus, of course, is referencing all the laws, on one hand, that have been passed down to them and they were passed not by the written law that was given to Moses, but by the oral law and the traditions of men explaining what those laws mean for generations by generations. And so they are. That’s why they could not say why do your disciples break the command? Because this wasn’t a command. The question was why do your disciples Break the traditions of the elders? So they are holding the disciples to a man made Standard, not to God standard, and yet this is very offensive to them. And so we want to see that this was not, this was not God’s command. So I would venture to say that there are. This is my explanation, so so please bear with me. It’s almost as if there are two classes of law, that you have the commandments that were given and then the below them were an additional 600 Remember the number? I want to say 630 or 640, something extra.

08:37
Laws that went along with and I guess in their own right were, were put in place to To emphasize the commandments, to more fully explain them. I guess, if I’m making a case to defend it, it would say that all of these things are really what this meant. So this is what the commandment is, but it means all of this. Okay, so that’s, you know. That’s kind of what the feeling behind that is. But Jesus was not. By answering the way he did, we have to understand. Jesus was not throwing out the law. He was not saying that the law was not valuable. We don’t have to follow the law. In fact, jesus himself said in Matthew 5.17 that he didn’t come to do away with the law or to abolish it, but the law he came to fulfill. He came to fulfill it. Okay, and so there’s a difference. To be able to fulfill the law means I lived according to the law and that way, by doing so, he was then the perfect sacrifice for us. He was sinless. He fulfilled the law. He didn’t do away with it. He simply lived according to it in perfection, so that he could die in our place because we have failed to follow the law.

10:01
The Pharisees were constantly you can read it throughout the Gospels. They were constantly coming, and whether they are chiding the disciples, they’re questioning Jesus. They’re trying to trap him. They’re trying to get him to say something that gets him in trouble with the people. They’re trying to trap him in the law, as if he didn’t know what the law said and that he would react wrongly. So this was this continual battle back and forth with Jesus and the Pharisees, and the Pharisees and Sadducees. The problem in this was that he was always having to confront them. He would have to confront them in front of everyone, publicly, because they were publicly trying to trap and shame him in some way. They acted as if they were the law and they were also judge and jury, so they can say you broke that law, aha, and now you’re guilty. And now we get to condemn everything you say and we get to accuse you and make you the guilty party. They constantly wanted to catch him in breaking the law in some form or another. So Jesus was constantly dealing with this.

11:10
And to those hoping because there’s a scripture I should have written it down for you, but it says these are the ones who like to lord it over you. When Jesus was talking to his disciples, he says you’re not going to be that way. We don’t lord things over. And this was the heart of the Pharisee that they would follow this law to the letter. And then they would then lord that over everyone and put heavy burdens on them and make it unbearable for them to do whatever they could do. And by doing this they were wanting to control the people. And so for Jesus, the reason he was such a controversial figure in this, because he would teach according to scripture that, as would the Pharisees, I mean Jesus said listen to what they say, just don’t do what they do. But he said they hit. The difference was, they would say, about Jesus.

12:05
He speaks with such authority. Now, authority means that you are in a position not only to proclaim, but you have some power in this. Of what you’re speaking, you have the authority. You know people like to use the example of when a police officer is standing in the street and holds out and directs traffic. It’s not that if I could be out there standing with my hands trying to direct traffic, but I have no authority to do that, people aren’t going to pay attention to me. They’re going to do what they want to do, but someone in the the official clothings it says to everybody listening I have the authority to make you follow this law and do what I’m asking you to do. There’s an authority because that means I hold the power of consequence behind it.

12:58
Good or bad, consequence is not a bad word. Consequence doesn’t mean that you have bad or negative results. Consequence simply means what happens after the following of whatever that is, what, whatever decision that is, there is a consequence. It could be a great consequence that, consequently, something wonderful happened according to what I did, that I needed to do, or consequently, I paid a high price. So the word consequence is not a bad word, but we have to understand that Jesus spoke as one with authority.

13:30
Now, that was because Jesus not only was speaking the commandments, not only speaking the law, in such a way that people understood or that he knew there was power, they felt power, but they also understood and could hear what does, what does Jesus have that they don’t have? What is he pointing out about the law that needs paying attention to? Why bother in this debate? And that is because Jesus was saying you’ve heard it said, we talked about this when we spoke about the, the attitudes. Jesus was always saying there’s more to this than what you’re, what you’re putting weight in. You think it’s this, you’ve heard it said to do such as that Jesus. But I say to you and Jesus would point out to you the heart of the command, not just the commandment at face value, but the heart behind it, the motives behind it, the sincerity. Jesus spoke and he would do so with the sincerity of heart to under. He under fully understood what these were and fully, completely, would then teach the truth about what was being not only commanded, but then how we would expect to see the results after the fact.

14:59
So Jesus was wanting people to understand that what was in their heart was more important than the act that they were doing. It it’s more important than the law that you follow. Because what? Because the heart of the issue is the spirit of the man, the character of the man. The thing you do itself is just a work. Now, there are good works that we were created to do, and by following God’s commands with a right heart and a right spirit not to bring control over someone, but to honor and love our Savior, to do that then produces these beautiful results. So it’s the heart of the man that God is concerned with, and that’s why he was constantly dealing with the Pharisees. Their hearts were wrong, they were following the law, but their hearts were wrong, totally wrong. Jesus was right. Man does look on the outward appearance, but God looks on the heart. So it isn’t wrong.

16:10
You know, they would say follow these laws, because that’s what would produce cleanliness. They want to do to be clean this, the the this example in Matthew 15. They’re talking about washing their hands so that they are clean ceremonial in regard clean to whatever they’re going to eat or drink, so that they don’t take in something and then become defiled. And Jesus is pointing out it’s not the act of washing your hands that makes you clean, though we know we wash our hands, of course, and it isn’t wrong to follow the law. Isn’t wrong what they were saying in respect to being clean? So he’s not saying the law doesn’t matter and you don’t need to have the law. It’s not wrong to clean the outside, but not that the outside does not mean that the inside is clean. So it’s not wrong to clean up the outside. In fact, we should clean up the outside, but not all, not at the expense of the other. You, you don’t do one in exchange for the other.

17:16
So someone who is really truly wanting to clean themselves and be cleansed, someone who says, lord, I, I need you to clean me, I need you to clean my thoughts, I want you to clean my desires, I want you to go in and scroll this old, sinful man and make me new again. I want to be saved, I want to be washed and cleansed. Why do we have the? The symbolism of baptism, that I’ve died to this old man and I am resurrected to new life in Jesus Christ. So cleaning the inside is a is the desired goal right, to be cleansed on the inside, to be made new, new creature. But if I’m someone who is diligently looking to clean the inside, the outside is going to get clean if that’s a byproduct. But the inside won’t necessarily be cleaned at all just because I clean the outside.

18:14
So character truly matters, and the Pharisees had character issues, various severe character issues, and Jesus was constantly dealing with that. In fact, they didn’t like when he even said things that were according to scripture. They wanted to remove him completely. They didn’t want him speaking anything, even if it was true. They just wanted to control. They wanted to get rid of Jesus’s voice. They did. They wanted to keep a hold of their authority and their position, and so their character was that of envy. Jesus was getting attention. They wanted the attention. Well, that’s the commandment that you’re not supposed to covet an ending. But of course that’s what they were doing. So even though they were following these outside rules, they were ignoring the inside.

18:58
So we can’t pass judgment on one another as the Pharisees did. We cannot be those who say follow my rules and that’s what makes you good. We have to know that there is a deeper work. There’s something else going on. We have to self-examine. I can’t worry about the spec in your eye. I’ve got to deal with the plank in mind. That takes true self-examination, saying whoa, wait a minute, before I even feel qualified to deal with whatever you’re dealing with. I need to deal with me. I’ve got to make sure I am living right and I’m doing what God is requiring of me and I’m making sure I see myself not more highly than I thought and I’m doing self-examination. And the Pharisees worried about their traditions, but they were not as concerned, like Jesus was, with the actual commandments. So they cared about what was less important more and cared what was more important less. Okay, so let’s look at Matthew 23 and I’m going to read to you verses 23 through 28.

20:02
Matthew 23, verses 23 to 28, and it says whoa to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites, for you tied mint and dill and cumin and have neglected the way to your matters of the law, justice and mercy and hatefulness. These you ought to have done without neglecting the others. He’s saying they’re both necessary. You blind guides Straying out a net and swallowing a camel. Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites, for you. Clean the outside of the cup and plate, but inside they are full of greed and self-indulgence. You, blind Pharisee, first clean the inside of the cup and the plate, that the outside also may be clean. Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites, for you are like white-washed tombs which outwardly appear beautiful but within are full of dead people’s bones and all uncleanness. You so, you also outwardly appear righteous to others, but within you are full of hypocrisy and lawlessness. So what is a woe I mean? Jesus has said here multiple times Woe to you and calls them hypocrites. Woe to you.

21:37
What is a woe? It’s an interjection that denotes pain or displeasure, and in this passage it is used with a very severe tone and it’s said four times and it is repeated abundantly, so that there is great emphasis put on this, so great emphasis put on how displeased and severe this sin is to Jesus. But the pendulum folks cannot swing from all the way over, from the letter of the law and every possible thing that that could mean, and then swing all the way to lawlessness. We cannot do that. We can’t say well, they’re wrong, so then I throw the whole thing out. You’ve heard the term. You can’t throw the baby out with the bathwater. You don’t clean something up and then throw both of them away. You get rid of the dirty water and what’s unnecessary now and you keep what is good and right. So these are the standards, these are the commands.

22:44
So we are given commandments because they are contrary to our nature. Okay, commandment means that you are being commanded to do something that you would not naturally do. If it was, if it came naturally to you, then you wouldn’t need to be commanded to do it, would you? So commandment is, in and of itself, letting you know in yourself without Jesus Christ and his power, without being born again and regenerated, there’s no way you can do this. That’s why, in the Old Testament, they were constantly happy to make sacrifices because they could not. They could not live up to the law. They could not live up to the law. And so we now have Jesus, we now have his resurrected body, we now have the ultimate sacrifice that never needs another sacrifice, living on the inside of us, giving us by his grace, by his sacrifice, the ability to do what we could not do before. We are now able to obey the commands of the Lord because we live for him, we live by his power, for his glory. So it is all about him.

24:03
It’s not about us anymore. It’s not about the old flesh man. It’s not about this, this flesh suit. It is about the spirit of the man, the spirit of the man. Your flesh wars against the spirit.

24:18
Why do you think that Paul said that he had to die daily? Because, though, my spirit, man, is regenerated, I’m living in a suit of flesh. So because I live in a suit of flesh, this flesh feels from its outside influences. I feel, I taste, I smell, I see, I hear, I experience from a flesh world. So I have got to guard. Why does the scripture say guard your heart? I have to guard the work that has been done in my spirit and allow and walk according to that spirit. I walk according to the spirit and not the flesh, so that I don’t fulfill the lust of the flesh. I want to fulfill the commands of the spirit, and if I am not feeding that spirit, if I am not guarding that spirit, if I am not diligently looking to, why does a someone who goes into combat?

25:18
Why do they wear gear? Why do they wear particular clothing and particular armor? They do that to protect themselves and from you. You wear a bulletproof vest. You’re doing that to protect your heart and your body organs. Okay, so we have to understand. We put on, of course, the whole armor of God and we do that with the guard.

25:40
Our minds were in the word. We’re giving ourselves to prayer, we’re giving ourselves sometimes to fasting, we give ourselves to the commands of God. Why? Because that’s what guards our spirit. If I stay in a place of readiness, then when the world comes to touch me, it can’t penetrate me. There’s a difference. There’s a difference. It might touch me, it might affect me. You know, you can watch the movies and they’ll show how someone who’s wearing a bulletproof vest gets shot and they go down and you think for a moment that they’ve been hit and killed by that shot. But it’s after a moment you realize they’ve simply been stunned and they get up and they are now realized. They’re unaffected. They may have a bruise, they may have some tenderness, but they are okay and they have not been taken out by that bullet.

26:29
Folks, it is necessary for us to be in the word and living according to the word. That means that the law is necessary, the commands of God are necessary. They are there to protect us. They are there to guard against the world contaminating us. We are doing it from the inside out. Those things guard our inside, guard our spirit, guard our heart, so that we are not affected to the degree that we would be on the outside. The flesh will get taken care of if we take care of the spirit. That flesh man will get taken care of. That’s why he says if you clean the inside, the outside will get cleaned also. You have the power from the inside out, not the outside in. So following all the laws, that’s great. Jesus said yeah, do that, but don’t leave the other undone. Don’t think just because I went to church on Sunday and I read my Bible today and I helped this person over here and it gave my title over there, okay, I can check up all my boxes.

27:32
I’m cleansed. I’m clean, I’m growing in my spirit. Man, you can do those things without even thinking of God. Those can become your habitual things that you do in your actions. They may have nothing to do with what’s really in your heart. Did you give because you actually wanted to give to God in the work of God, or did you give because you want people to see you give? Did you give because you’re hoping that?

27:55
Well, if I give, that means that I’m going to be thought of in a certain way by the leadership at this church and they’re going to let me do the things I want to do. Am I going to be recognized? I mean, the heart of the matter is what’s of concern? We look at the outward appearance, we use our fleshly eyes and we look, but God is looking at the heart. The heart matters. So how we see ourselves matters. Looking at ourselves with proper eyesight, with spiritual understanding, according to God’s standards, is important. It’s the plank in our own eye, not the speck in somebody else’s eye. And so in that exchange and understanding what’s required of me, I have to look at what I’m doing to see. Are my priorities correct? Am I living according to the way that God wants me to do.

28:46
So I want you to think a minute about your life. Let’s do a little quick examination, okay, and if you’ve got something right with, write these questions out and really take the time later, if you don’t have the time now, to go over them and think about them for your life. And I want you to do this, and I want you to do it not the way that you hope you do, not the way that you tell people you do, not thinking more highly of yourself than you are, but an honest reflection of what is really going on in your life. What do you spend most of your time doing? What do you spend most of your time doing? Where do you spend extra money? I’m talking about you got the bills paid, you fit for your family, you put gas in the car. Where do you spend your extra money? On what things do you spend your money?

29:41 – Jaime Luce (Host)
Hi, my name is Jamie Luce. I wanted to share with you some information about a brand new book entitled you Don’t Need Money, you Just Need God. It’s a playbook for miraculous provision, and I want to share it with you because it solves the problem we are all facing right now. The economy is going crazy, gas prices are soaring, there’s wars and rumors of wars. We’ve got everything hitting us all at once, with interest rates rising. You need to know what to do, and so many times we think we need the money. But you don’t need money. I’m telling you, the answer is you need God, and that’s exactly what we want to teach you through this book. We’ll give you practical ways to know what to do and how to do it, so that you get answers now. You can find my book on Amazon. You can also go to jamieloosecom. You can also find this book at YouDon’tNeedMoneyYouJustNeedGodcom. This book is available today.

30:42 – Jaime Luce (Host)
What do you give your extra time to? Where and for what do you make sacrifices? What will you sacrifice for? Who will you sacrifice for? Do you listen to certain people and their voice in your life, their input, and not others? And what? Who are those people? Do those people that you listen to, are they those who give spiritual insight? Do any of those voices that you count the most important that you listen to? Are those who are the ones who are concerned with your character? Are those the kind of people who will tell you this is not okay? Do they have permission to speak truth into your life? What kind of people do you allow to speak to you and who do you not allow to speak to you? What kind of things are you willing to listen to and what kind of things are you not willing to listen to?

31:48
Begin looking at what you actually do, and if you do, you will begin to paint a clearer picture of what your priority actually is, and that priority will be one of two things either what goes on on the outside or what goes on on the inside. In the passage of Jesus and the Pharisees, he addresses them not because their traditions are bad in and of themselves, but because they were the priority over the heart and the actual meaning of the commandments. In the same analogy as feeding what you want to grow and starving what you want to die, you have to look at the same. You have to look at what’s going on in the same fashion. The small things to them were the most important and the biggest issues were of little importance to them. And until we are intentional about those things, nothing in our life will change. If you’re truly wanting your life to look different, it’s got to be that you are intentionally doing the things you need to do, submitting where you need to submit, correcting what needs correcting.

32:58
Jesus said if you love me, you will keep my commandments. Folks, there is just no way around that. That is a direct statement, it is a definitive statement, it is a conclusive statement. There isn’t any wiggle room around that. If you love me, you will keep my commandments. We cannot throw out the lock. You cannot swing all the way and say that grace covers me and I can now do, I’m free to do whatever I want to do.

33:21
The minute we begin to try to make a way around what Jesus said means that I am now taking Jesus and I’m forming Him into a different mold. I’m forming Him into this new mold that I like, that satisfies my flesh, without having to confront my spirit, without dealing with what’s truly going on in my heart. The minute I form that mold, I have made an idol that is not just that’s not just a word picture. We are forming an idol. That is idolatry.

33:53
I now serve something that is not Jesus Christ and that, therefore, is an abomination to Jesus Christ. It is abomination to God, our Father. Not only is that an abomination, but if you want your year to look different, that means repentance is necessary. We have to deal with what’s going on and repent before God and remove ourselves Truly, cleanse ourselves. Now, of course, jesus is the one cleansing. When I say cleanse ourselves, I mean be willing to get in the water, be willing to be cleansed, be willing to lay on the altar and to say Father, forgive me, give me your spirit, fill me with the spirit of God, baptize me in the Holy Spirit, cleanse me, make me new. You know we can go, and this I’m not saying that making mistakes along the way means you’re not a Christian and I and I.

34:50
Please don’t hear. Hear that. That’s not what I’m saying we all make mistakes and you’ve heard me say in other episodes the importance of getting back up, that a righteous man falls seven times. There can be things that you are working on diligently and you falling does not mean that you need to be saved all over again. That is not what I’m saying.

35:08
But there are some who can realize and recognize I’ve never really I mean I followed laws. I was raised in the church and and I knew I was supposed to do the do’s and don’t accordingly and and I’ve lived that way, but I’ve never really surrendered my heart to the Lord. I’ve lived like a Pharisee. I’ve worried about the rules and regulations and I’ve been in a religious organization and I am a religious person. You know people love to throw the term around I’m a spiritual person. What does that even mean? Everybody is either spiritually alive or spiritually dead. You’re either going to heaven or you’re going to hell, and it is all based off of your relationship with Jesus Christ. That’s just the way it is, and so we can’t use that as a barometer.

35:50
You can’t use spirituality and religiousness as the barometer for whether you’re saved. Whether you’re saved is determined by do you desire to please your Heavenly Father? Do you know who Jesus Christ is, that he was the Son of God and that he died for you? And now, because of what he’s done for you, you want to live your life pleasing him and bringing glory to his name. If you are not in that position yet, then salvation is necessary, then surrender is necessary, and so it depends on where you find yourself. That’s why self-examination is so important.

36:29
Jesus told us in Matthew 6 33 that we are to seek ye first, the kingdom of God and his righteousness. What’s right to him. What’s right to him is the heart, not just the outward. The heart, the inward man and all these things shall be added unto you. There’s only one order of priority that works with God, and that’s dealing with the heart. Now, I’m not saying don’t take care of the natural things. I’m not saying, in order to please God, that you can’t worry about your family and take care of your family. You have a job you have to go to and things you need to do. That’s not what I’m saying. But, folks, we have to understand.

37:06
Do I sacrifice ever during the week to make sure that I’m in the Word, then I’m spending quality time with God, that I’m not just reading and I don’t remember what I read and it has no bearing on my day. It makes no difference to me. I don’t meditate on the Word. I don’t spend any time in real prayer, and prayer is not just me shooting up all the things that I want God to do for me. That’s also me sitting and hearing him through his Word and, in my spirit, the correction that needs to take place and the honesty that goes on of what he’s saying to me about me and about my decisions.

37:41
Do I make sacrifices for that? Do I go and make sacrifices to buy tickets and go to events on a Sunday? And I don’t ever sacrifice and make sure I’m in the house of God, caring about the people of God, being a part of the bride of Christ and being a part of the assembly. Do I not care with my finances? Do I spend money and sacrifice everything that I have on material things and experiences, but I don’t sacrifice for the kingdom of God, for missionaries who are out there spreading the gospel, or for building the church and taking care of the church house itself, making sure that the lights are on and the air and the heating work and the bathrooms are in good condition. And I mean, what do we care about? What are we giving ourselves to?

38:24
I’m not telling you that Jesus said you should have done one without neglecting the other. So I’m not telling you don’t take care of what you’re responsible for. But you need to evaluate what you’re responsible for and you need to make sure that you are also doing what’s necessary before God. That it’s a both and it’s not an either or okay. So we need to be real honest with ourselves about that. So if I say that I’m a Christian, I need to live the life of a Christian. My heart needs to be that of a Christian.

38:57
To say and not do it is completely irrational. So if, for instance, if I were to say I’m an atheist and I, you know, I believe what atheism believes. However, I do believe there’s a God, okay, you would say that’s not possible. But the very word atheist means someone who believes there is no God. So it’s ridiculous and it’s irrational. It is impossible to do both.

39:28
Yet Christians do this all the time. What do you think the world thinks? Or let’s, let’s do what? Even better, what do you think their family thinks when we say that we are Christians and yet we show no patience, no mercy. We don’t give love. We give evil for evil and not good instead of evil. We don’t ever turn the other cheek, we don’t ever sacrifice. We don’t ever honor the other more highly than us If we are not actually living it. What do those people think? When we say we’re a Christian, it’s no wonder the world says we’re irrational and that we are ridiculous, because that’s what they think of us.

40:11
It’s time that the church stands up and is actually the church. They believe what’s written in this word and they do what’s in this word. They live it, they make the sacrifices, they stand by the word. They have made an idol in a false Jesus. I mean, jesus had to say there’s going to be false Jesuses all over the place. They’re not me. The word that we have tells us who he is and what we are supposed to be believing and doing.

40:39
I wouldn’t tell my child, just because I want them to be encouraged and to feel like the world is there. But what’s that term? Oh, it’s, it’s, it’s not coming to me Anyway. Um, the oyster, I think they say you can be whatever you want to be, you can do whatever you want to do, and and all you have to do is is work really hard. And so if a child comes up to me and I want to encourage this Bolstered self image of my child and they come in with their Superman cape on and their little costume and they say I’m Superman, I say yes, you are going in and get on top of the house and jump off and flop, because I know they’re not Superman Just because they’re wearing the costume and just because they think they’re Superman, or just because I want them to feel good about themselves, I don’t go around telling people, yes, you’re a great Christian.

41:36
I mean, we, we have.

41:37
We. It’s not necessary. We will know one another by our love for one another, the way that we treat one another, the way that we follow the commandments. We will be. No, we don’t have to go around saying or something. I don’t need the encouragement to be told how good I’m doing. I need the words encouragement. I need to know that I’m doing. I’m pleasing God. It’s not about pleasing man, it’s about pleasing God. If you really believe in Jesus, then you need to be serving him with all your heart, all your might, all your mind, all your strength that you have.

42:17
What makes us think that, if we believe, only the parts we like, because this is what so many do. And what is fallacy? What a false belief that we think that if we quote all the scriptures that say we’re gonna be blessed and we do all the things that people tell us we’re supposed to be doing, but that we don’t actually Do what God is expecting us to do, that work. What makes us think we’re ever gonna receive any of that blessing? What makes me think that I can read a scripture randomly in the Bible about blessing Without doing what the Bible tells me to do, that brings that blessing? It’s ridiculous, it’s irrational. And Christians do this all the time. We just, we just quote verses like we’re gonna.

43:09
People think it’s that the Bible is the law of attraction. It is not. The Bible is simply true. And If I live according to the way that God designed life, then I will reap the benefits of that life. If I live Contrary to the way that God says live this life then I will not receive the blessings. I will receive the curses. Read, do the wrong.

43:32 – Jaime Luce (Host)
Read the blessings and the curses, if you do what I tell you to do, you’re gonna be blessed.

43:36 – Jaime Luce (Host)
You’re gonna be blessed in every possible way. All those blessings, all those things, those are yours.

43:41
But if you don’t live according to the way I tell you to live and you disobey the commandments that I’ve given you, all these curses are coming on you. It is that simple, that’s rational, that makes sense. That’s not irrational. What I’m trying to say is that if I look at the Bible, but I’m not living the way the Bible says to live, yet I keep quoting all the Bible verses and proclaiming and lame claim to what they say. I’m not going to receive them unless I’m doing what God’s expecting me to do.

44:20
The scripture says that those that seek him find him. Those who diligently seek him find him. Who finds it, who finds the blessing? The diligent seekers, the diligent seekers. And they’re not seekers of the stuff, they’re not seekers of success, they’re seekers of God. Those are the ones who receive, hebrews 116 says. But without faith it is impossible to please him, for he that comes to God must believe that he is and that he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him. Diligently here means to exert effort or find out or learn something, to seek out and search for. So to seek him is to serve him. So he blesses those that do, not just those who say Ie, pharisees, sadducees, hypocrites, sadducees, sadducees, some Christians.

45:36
Our society has taken this pendulum and swung it in its dogmatic format from one end to the other. We have to resist the temptation to do this. I can’t say that everything is available to me and nothing’s off limits, and I cannot also live at the other end and say nothing is available to me and I am not able to do anything. Freedom in Jesus Christ, yes, but my, my goal is not to seek out what I can, can’t do. My goal is to serve him. In serving him, he opens doors to me on what he, what direction he wants me to take and the freedoms that are available to me. But that is all made manifest by my serving him. So let me ask you some of these questions how are you treating people? Are you showing mercy? Do you forgive? Do you turn the other cheek? Do you return evil with evil or evil for good? Do you seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, or your desires and your own wants, or what other people want, for that matter, to be a people pleaser instead of a God pleaser? I know these are hard questions, but if you are banking on living your life Eternally in the presence of Jesus Christ and not separated from him. Then you will ask these questions so that you know where you will truly spend your eternity.

47:16
I’m going to finish by reading you some quotes of some very famous atheists, all on their death day. These are their last words. This is vital for us to understand what truth is and to live it now. We don’t have another chance at this life. We’ve got one chance at this life Caesar I’m going to say his last name wrong Caesar Borgia, borgia Borgia, an Italian nobleman, politician and cardinal.

47:47
And he said while I lived, I provided for everything but death. Now I must die and am unprepared to die. This was a cardinal who said this. Thomas Paine, leading atheistic writer in American colonies, said Stay with me, for God’s sake. I cannot bear to be left alone. Oh Lord, help me. Oh God, what have I done to suffer so much? What will become of me hereafter? I would give worlds, if I had them, that the age of reason had never been published. This is the work he did. Oh Lord, help me, christ, help me. No, don’t leave me, stay with me, send even a child to stay with me before I am on the edge of hell here alone. If ever the devil had an agent. I have been that one. Wow.

48:48
Sir Thomas Scott, the Chancellor of England, said Until this moment I thought there was neither a God nor a hell. Now I know and feel that there are both and I am doomed to perdition by the just judgment of the Almighty. Voltaire, famous anti-Christian atheist, said I am abandoned by God and man. He said to his physician, dr Fogging I will give you half of what I am worth if you will give me six months of life. When he was told that this was impossible, he said Then I shall die and go to hell. His nurse said For all the money in Europe, I would want to see another unbeliever die. All night long he cried for forgiveness.

49:47
David Hume, an atheist philosopher famous for his religious skepticism. He cried loud on his bed and said I am in flames. It is said his desperation was a horrible scene. Napoleon Vodapart, the French emperor who brought death to millions to satisfy the selfish ambitions for world conquest, said I die before my time and my body will be given back to the earth, such as the fate of him who has been called the great Napoleon. What an abyss between my deep misery and the eternal kingdom of Christ. And the last, I’ve got two more.

50:33
Sir Francis Newport, head of an English atheist clone. To those gathered around his dead bed he said you need not tell me there is no God, for I know there is one and that I am in his presence. You need not tell me there is no hell. I feel myself already slipping riches seats. Your idle talk about there being hope for me. I know I am lost forever. All that fire, all the insurmountable pangs of hell, all that. I could lie for a thousand years upon the fire that is never quench, to purchase the favor of God and be united to him again, but it is a fruitless wish. Millions and millions of years will bring me no nearer to the end of my torments than one poor hour. O eternity, eternity, forever and ever. All the insurmountable pangs of hell.

51:30
And finally, antoine Levé, satanic Bible author and high priest of the satanic worship religion. His dying words were oh my, oh my. What have I done? There is something very wrong. I know that that is very sobering and I pray that it is as someone who is trying to live this life the way that God is asking me to doing my best and following sometimes and getting back up and trying to live a life following after the spirit and not after the flesh, even in that knowledge, even knowing that I have been saved. That was chilling to read, that. It’s very sobering.

52:27
Folks, this life is not a joke. I don’t want Jesus to look at me and say Whoa to you. You hypocrite, you count what’s important and it’s not important and what is important you don’t do. I want to live this life so, reminded, ready for Jesus return. We will. We do have the promise of ruling and reigning with them, folks, but that means we do it here, now, that we win people by our love for Jesus, for our love for his word and his commandments.

53:03
I’ve quoted this often, but it’s so true. It’s just as King David said that your commandments, they are not burdensome. It is not a burden to live this life for him. It is our great joy and pleasure, it is our great privilege.

53:20
Can I pray for you, father? I thank you for your word. I thank you for the sacrifice of your son. Oh, the great sacrifice you made for us because of your great love for us, and we are so grateful. We could never repay the debt that we owe you, but it is our desire to live this life to bring you glory and honor, to magnify the name of Jesus Christ among everyone that we come in contact with, and that we would live this life to bring pleasure to your heart. Help us, father, to live as Christians authentically, sincerely and from our heart. We love you. Give us your grace to live according to this great commandment, your word, your perfect word, the truth that sets free, and we promise Lord to give you all the glory and all the praise, and it’s in Jesus’ name we pray Amen.

54:20
Thank you for being with me today. I pray this was a blessing to your life. Hit the like button there and a little thumbs up and give us that like. That helps us so much to spread this gospel out to as many as we can reach. You can go to my website and reach me there by email at mail at jamielewscom, which is J-A-I-M-E-L-U-C-E. I also have other content there on the website that you might want to take a look at. Again, thank you for being with me today. We’ll see you next time. Bye-bye.