- Thank you for joining us today. We here at Let's Go are excited to be part of Kingdom Community TV. We trust that you will be blessed and maybe even a little bit surprised at what you're gonna see in here on our show. So come on, let's go. - Welcome to Let's Go, where our passion is to equip you to serve God and your neighbor as you grow closer to Jesus, even in the midst of these perilous times in which we live. Get ready to hear teachings and testimonies which will help you prepare for what's coming and to be worthy of the Kingdom that we are longing for. Let's go. - Hello everyone and welcome. My name is Tony Nardella and we're so glad that you could be here with us today. Today we're going to do a second part of the series we started on the baptism of fire. And God wants to use this baptism to make us and transform us into His image. And we found out last time and we know from personal experience that this baptism isn't always comfortable, but it ought to be the heart cry of every true believer in Jesus, that Lord, whatever it takes that make me more like you, do it. Not that I want you to go through any difficult experiences, but when you go through those experiences which are inevitable in life, that you will have a greater understanding of some of the good that can come out of it. Suffering through trials teaches us obedience. Let's go and see what the writer of Hebrews says in chapter five, verse seven. In the days of his flesh, Jesus offered a prayers and supplications with loud cries and tears to him who was able to save him from death and he was heard because of his reverence. Although he was a son, he learned obedience through what he suffered. Now that's challenging to me. I remember the first time I read that as a new believer with any understanding and I thought to myself, "Well, what do you mean Jesus learned obedience?" Jesus is God, he's perfect. He doesn't need to learn how to obey, but apparently he did have to learn how to obey. He just never messed it up. It's like you teach a newborn to walk. You know, they don't know how to walk before then, but I would imagine if this analogy were to carry through into this context, Jesus never, as a baby, he learned to walk immediately. I'm not saying he did, but Jesus never disobeyed, but he still had to learn how to obey, much like we have to learn, you know, our times table or we have to learn our alphabet. We have to learn things and this process of suffering will teach us obedience. Now that's a little bit of a mystery to me but perhaps we'll unveil more of that as we go forward. So here's another one. Luke 22 verses 28 through 29. What we're going to see here is that trust is produced by trials and that brings about promotion. So Jesus says in verse 28, "To his disciples," and this is toward the end of his time here with us. He says, "You are those who have stayed with me in my trials "and I assign to you as my father assigned to me a kingdom "that you may eat and drink at my table in my kingdom "and sit on thrones judging the 12 tribes of Israel." Jesus is promoting them to actually be the people who will judge others in his kingdom, judging the 12 tribes of Israel. Why? Because they went through Jesus' trials with him. So at the first level, we see that any time we're with somebody and a very difficult experience and we comfort them and we encourage them or just be with them, there's a greater attachment, there's a greater bond between them. But the part that's interesting to me here too is that just as Jesus went through trials, his disciples went through them with him. So they too experienced the same trials, even though Jesus was perhaps the target. So for example, when it was known that the religious leaders in Jerusalem wanted to kill Jesus and Jesus was not in Jerusalem. He was far away, but he decided that he was going to go to Jerusalem and the disciples said to one another, you could find this in John 11, verse 16. The disciples said, "Let us also go "that we may die with him." Now, they were in Jesus, they weren't the ones that were necessarily the target of the persecution, but anybody with Jesus was a target. They understood that and they were willing to give up their lives to be with Jesus. Now we know that Peter fell and all kinds of other things happened. They all ran away, but in their hearts, they at least wanted to, and they took a risk to be with Jesus, and because of that, Jesus promised them promotion. Well, I think that's pretty cool. Let's look at another benefit of this baptism of fire. Let's go to the book of Daniel, chapter 12, verse 10. Talking about the end times, talking about the saints who will be there. It says, "Many will be purified, "made spotless, and refined, "but the wicked will continue to be wicked. "None of the wicked will understand, "but those who are wise, they will understand." So, as we go through this refining process that is prompted by the baptism of fire, as we go through the ordeals of life, we will gain understanding. Understanding is such a precious commodity to have. I am thankful to God that he is giving us this understanding, no matter how he gets it to us. Remember, the Apostle Paul writes to the Corinthians that these are light and momentary afflictions, but they produce in us an eternal weight of glory. Man, I want that weight of glory, don't you? Praise the Lord. All right, so how do we respond now to these fiery trials? Let's go to the book of James, and it's everybody's least favorite verse, but let's go there, chapter one, verse two. Count it all joy, my brothers. When you meet trials of various kinds, I'm gonna stop right there. I don't wanna rejoice. I wanna sulk, I wanna go to my room, and I wanna hide under my bed, or at least hide in the bed and throw the pillow in the sheets over me. I mean, nobody wants to go through hard times, but when they come, there's gotta be something on the inside that says, you know, this is making me more like Jesus, this is drawing me closer to Jesus, but I've gotta stay strong. I've gotta be pure, let me explain. We're gonna keep reading here, verse three. For you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness. And let steadfastness have its full effect that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing. Man, I wanna be perfect and complete. I wanna be lacking in nothing. And so we see here that God uses trials as a means of imparting his grace to us. So it will perfect us, it will complete us, and we will lack nothing spiritually. I mean, isn't that the goal of every disciple to become like his teacher? I mean, I'm never gonna be perfect like Jesus, but this says I'm gonna be lacking in nothing. I mean, we are going to be much pure on the inside, aren't we? But there's a little catch here, isn't there? You gotta let steadfastness have its full effect. And you know, what I think that means is that when you're in the midst of the trial, when you are there and you're slugging it out and you're praying and you're fasting and you're reading more of the word than normal because you know, only the word's gonna get you through whatever this trial is, that you don't give up, that you don't just cave in, that you don't just say, ah, the heck with it. I'm, you know, just living for Jesus is too much. I'm just, yeah, I'm gonna keep going to church, but you know, I'm just not gonna press in this heart anymore. No, no, we're not gonna do that. We are gonna let steadfastness do its work within us because the longer you stay in the fire, the pure you get. And the Lord knows how much of that fire we can take. You know, Paul also writes to the Corinthians and he says that, you know, he will provide a way of escape for us, no matter how hard the temptation is. You hold your ground, God's there and he's holding you up and he's saying, you keep going, my grace has got you. I will not let you be tempted beyond what you can bear. This is his promise to us, because he knows just how much cooking we need. Christ, am I really teaching this message? I'm not even sure I like this message, but I gotta like this message. And the church has gotta learn to not just like this message, but to embrace this message. (upbeat music) - Well, I've been hearing about these trips for quite a long time. God's got such a love for them. One of my favorite stories so far I was praying for a young lady who's just got delivered from a heavy weight on her heart from years, she said, I've never felt this weight come off my whole life and the Holy Spirit just met her and I was just available. It's not that I have any special gifting or experience. I was just available and God just came through in this beautiful church. (upbeat music) - So what we see here in James' little passage is that trials make us better, but it's conditional, isn't it? It is conditional. If we jump out of the fire before we're cooked, we're just gonna go back in. You can't give up, you can't get angry, you can't despair. There are many people that just despair. You've got to know that you're still in God's hands. He's not gonna let anybody take you out of his hands. Let's go to 1 Peter, chapter one there. There's a lot of similarities between James one and 1 Peter one, but here we see that even though these trials are grieved as they result in praise and glory. So in verse six, he says, "In this you rejoice," talking about these trials. Though now for a little while, if necessary, you have been grieved by various trials so that the tested genuineness of your faith, more precious than gold that perishes though it is tested by fire, may be found to result in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ. Though you have not seen him, you love him. Though you do not now see him, you believe in him and rejoice with joy that is inexpressible and fill the glory obtaining the outcome of your faith, the salvation of your souls. Wow, there's so much, there's 10 messages in there, at least, right? But let's go back to verse seven and look at tested genuineness. Now we all think that we have saving faith, but we gotta ask the question, do we, even if we are very genuine in our faith, has our genuineness been tested? Do you have the faith to believe that God will reward you even if you are going through a hard time? Do you believe that he will reward you no matter what, that he is a rewarder of those who diligently seek him? Even if he asks us to do that hard thing that at the moment makes absolutely no sense to us. It makes no sense. God, why are you making me do this? Why are you asking me to do this? Well, you know, I think he's just testing you and he wants you to die to your own idea of what is right and wrong because there is a way the scripture says this seems right to a man, but at the end it leads to death. Well, Jesus has got better plans for us than death. He's got life for us and life comes in his son and abiding in him and trusting him and whatever he tells us, even if it means that we're going to have to be inconvenienced a bit. Or even if everybody thinks we're a fool for doing what we're doing. I mean, look at what happened to Noah. He was building the biggest boat the world that ever seen till about 200 years ago in a place where there was no water. I mean, can you imagine the resources he spent building that ark? Can you imagine the laughter and the ridicule and the scorn that he received from all of his neighbors? But he kept building that boat in holy fear. He built the ark to save his family. You know, there's something about us that we should fear God. I know that's not a popular concept in many places today, but it's just as much in the Bible now as it was 2000 years ago. There needs to be a fear that when God speaks that we listen, you know, in Philippians it says that we should continue to work out our salvation with fear and trembling because it is God who works within us to will and to act according to his good pleasure. It's not my neighbor talking in my head. It's God, when I identify the Holy Spirit speaking to me, I gotta understand that, oh yeah, that's my Lord. He's the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords. I gotta obey him. Even if he tells me to do something stupid or what seems stupid to me. Now, I know there's limitations here, but is there really in limitations? If we know it's God's word, are we really gonna deviate from that? So if you get something that sounds totally ridiculous, you know, go to your pastor, talk to him, hey, you think I should do this or whatever. I mean, talk to people, study it in the word. He's not gonna tell you anything here that isn't in the book here. We have to do that. But once we know, it is the Lord. Once we know that it is Jesus who has spoken to us, we have no choice, right? It's obedience or disobedience. Yes, we are people who have decided to lay down our lives to follow the one who can show us where true life is. Praise the Lord. You know, that's what it means to obtain the outcome of your faith, which is the salvation of your soul. You know, faith is not an end unto itself. Faith is a means to an end. Faith is when we put our confidence in the Lord, not just that he exists, but that he's a rewarder, that he's good, that he's generous, that he loves us. When we do that, then we get the salvation of our souls and we get to be with the Lord for eternity. I mean, that's a deal. And again, light and momentary afflictions on this planet will lead to an eternal weight of glory. So, let's look at verse nine. The goal is to obtain the outcome of our faith, which is salvation. Our participation in keeping our joy in trials will end up yielding or bearing the fruit of salvation in our lives. There's something about joy in the midst of trouble. The joy of the Lord is our strength. Ah, I know, don't, fire hurts, but let's talk about God's grace in all this. And you're all, 'cause many of you are probably sitting there saying, if you hung out this long, you're saying, where's the grace of God in all of this? Well, let's explain the grace of God in all of this. Let's go to first Peter chapter five, verse 10 to start with. He says, "And after you have suffered a little while," boy, I'll find in all the good scriptures for us today, aren't I? "And after you have suffered a little while, the God of all grace who has called you to his eternal glory in Christ will himself restore, confirm, strengthen, and establish you. To him be the dominion forever and ever, amen. By Sylvanas, a faithful brother, as I regard him, I have written briefly to you, exhorting and declaring that this is the true grace of God. Stand firm in it." Whoa, that was a very interesting closing, almost a closing for Peter's letter. What does it mean to say that this is the true grace of God? Well, God's grace, if you go back a couple of verses, it's clear. It's when God restores, it's when God confirms, it's when God strengthens and when God establishes, after we've been through a trial, after we have suffered. The suffering comes first. Then he restores, confirms, strengthens, and establishes. That's how grace works. So stand firm in it. There's no complaining that you want the benefits of grace, but not the means of grace. Let me take you also to another scripture in Titus chapter two. For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation for all people, training us to renounce ungodliness and worldly passions and to live self-controlled, upright, and godly lives in this present age, waiting for our blessed hope, the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ, who gave himself for us to redeem us from all alllessness and to purify for himself a people for his own possession who are zealous for good works. Let's go back up to the grace. I mean, to me, this is probably the most concise explanations of the gospel that you'll see in the New Testament. It's an incredible revelation of God's great plan of salvation for us. The grace of God that brings salvation has appeared. It's shown up, it's like a bright sunrise. We see it in Jesus. And you know what that grace does according to verse 12? It trains us, it teaches us. It teaches us to say no to sin and temptation, and it teaches us to say yes to a godly lifestyle. Now, look at that word training in your Bible. Look at it. That word training is a Greek word, which means parental discipline, even chastisement, punishment. It's the same Greek word that punches Pilate used when he commanded the centurion to go scourge Jesus. Sometimes, and in accordance with Hebrews 12, sometimes fathers discipline their children in a way that they don't like. But in the end, it produces a harvest of righteousness and peace for those who have been trained by it. Look, God is training us by his grace. This is the proper function of grace. Yes, grace is mercy. Grace forgives us our sins, but grace is an empowerment to live a godly life in Christ Jesus. And only through that grace and submitting to the way that is narrow and the gate that is small, only by submitting to Jesus as the way, picking up his cross daily and following him, are we going to obtain the benefits of the kingdom of God? That is the role of grace in our lives. He is purifying for himself, of people of his very own who are eager to do what is good. Come on, let's be honest. Look inside and say to yourself, man, am I really eager to do what's good? That is what Jesus is doing for us. He is making us the kind of people that we really wanna be. He's lifting us up out of the muck and mire, and he's setting our feet on the rock. And so that we can sing a new song of how great a salvation is and how he got us out of the mud of our fleshly desires. That's what we want, isn't it? We want God to change us so that we are not like the people we don't like, right? I mean, we wanna be generous people because we like hanging out with generous people. We don't wanna be stingy people that when you ask them, "Hey, bank, I borrow five bucks, I'll pay you back tomorrow," that they say, "No." No, we wanna be the people that say, "Yeah." Yeah, if we want to receive generosity then we, of course, need to be generous. Let's keep moving here. But this is God's grace. Don't forget that. Now, Revelation, chapter three, verse 18. God disciplines us and allows fiery trials, this baptism of fire in our lives because he loves us. Verse 18, "I counsel you to buy from me gold refined in fire, "so that you may be rich and white garments, "so that you may clothe yourself "and the shame of your nakedness may not be seen "and solve to anoint your eyes, "so that you may see those whom I love "I reprove and discipline, "so be zealous and repent." Our part, our part is to eagerly repent, not to go about kicking and screaming and whining and complaining, but to say, "Lord Jesus, whatever it is you want me to do." And you know what I find at this point in my Christian life is that there are things that I have been doing for a long time, which have not been that pleasing to the Lord, but I was blind to. But when he comes and he allows me to see, he puts solve on my eyes so that I can see. All of a sudden, the things I see are good things and then I see some things that like, oh my gosh, have I really been doing that for 40, something years, Lord? Forgive me, Lord, help me to change, I repent. We don't get mad that he's showing us the light, we embrace the light, thank you Lord. Just the light shows truth, and Jesus is the truth. He's the way, he's the truth, he's the life. If we go the way of following the truth, we will get life. Don't say no to the light that he's shining in your life. He's not judging you, he's illuminating things that he's carefully wanting you to choose to get away from so you can live a righteous life in Christ. So when you're confronted by somebody and they say to you, hey, you know, Tony, this thing you've been doing, maybe it's not real scriptural, that we don't push them away. I remember back when I was like a couple of weeks old in the Lord and I still had a mouth on me that was not very redeemed if you know what I mean. I was in law school of all places and I had a friend who was a brother in Christ, but he was only like six or seven months old in the Lord too and he had grown up as an atheistic Jew and then he got saved just before he went to law school. Well, anyway, he comes to me one day and he shows me a passage out of Ephesians four where it says do not let any course joke and come out of your mouth, but only that which is helpful for building up God's holy people. And he kind of confronted me, you know, I didn't like it. You know, I was like, oh, who's this guy to tell me what to do? But you know, the Lord got ahold of me and my mouth isn't perfect, but I made some changes that day. And I thank God that he used another human being to bring those changes to me. Sometimes we get those changes directly from the Holy Spirit, sometimes we get them from reading the word, we can get them in a variety of ways. But I want to tell you, being humble to receive correction is what's necessary if we're going to change. You know, and you know, the real question is, do we have ears to hear? You know, I think the word teach is very clearly that God is pleased and will not despise those who are broken and contrite in spirit. In Psalm 51, it says the sacrifices of God are a broken spirit, a broken and contrite heart. Oh God, you will not despise, you know, there's a lot of people that say they're sorry for stuff, but I don't think there's any real repentance without brokenness. But with that brokenness, God is with us. That's when he is more real to you than just about any other time. You know, brokenness and humility for sure leads a greater intimacy with him. Listen to what he says here. He says, for thus says the one who is high and lifted up, who inhabits eternity, whose name is holy. I dwell in the high and holy place. And also with him, who is of a contrite and lowly spirit to revive the spirit of the lowly and to revive the heart of the contrite. Wow, you know, I'm one God with me all the time. I just do, but sometimes that means I gotta have a heart that's in the continual state of brokenness where the fire has produced in me a humility that enables me to stay there and of a lowly spirit. I know everything in Christianity seems to be reversed than what's in nature. But God is saying that he opposes the proud, but he gives grace to the humble. I wanna be humble. Amen. You know, God is not waiting for you. He's knocking on your door in revelation. It says, "Behold, I stand at the door and knock. "If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, "I will come in and eat with him and he with me." Guys, Lord wants to have intimacy with you. It comes through opening the door and letting him in. So in conclusion, we have to overcome our pride and our expectation and we have to get intentional, run from our wounds and run and open the door that Jesus is knocking on. Embrace the fire, my friends. It's good for us. So I thank you for being with us today. I wanna ask you to pray for us that we will continue to have the resources and the ability to continue to bring these messages from God's word to you. And I also wanna encourage you that if you like this kind of message to come on back, but also go to our website, which is on the screen. Go to our YouTube channel, which is on the screen. And there you're gonna find all kinds of stuff that's gonna help you and your walk with the Lord. I wanna thank you for being again with us today. And we look forward to seeing you on our next episode. God bless you. (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (gentle music)
