WEBVTT 1 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:05.840 Real life presents the Jack Hibbs podcast with intention and boldness to proclaim 2 00:00:05.840 --> 00:00:10.740 truth, equip the saints and impact our culture. Repent for the kingdom of 3 00:00:10.740 --> 00:00:15.100 heaven is at hand. Jesus said that. People get all nervous about the word repent. 4 00:00:15.100 --> 00:00:21.040 Repent for what? They get all up to about it. Oh just stop. It's an old English word. 5 00:00:21.040 --> 00:00:27.660 It means turn around. Isn't that great? You could say this way. You're going in 6 00:00:27.660 --> 00:00:33.580 one direction, do a 180 degree turn. You're going that way? Stop. When you hear 7 00:00:33.580 --> 00:00:38.580 this message, the kingdom of God's at hand, salvation is available to you. God wants 8 00:00:38.580 --> 00:00:42.820 to forgive you of your sins. The next question should be from you. What do I do? Answer 9 00:00:42.820 --> 00:00:45.580 Repent! 10 00:00:47.180 --> 00:00:53.660 You can get the outlines of this podcast by going to jackhibbs.com slash podcast. 11 00:00:54.140 --> 00:00:58.940 Today, if this podcast lifts you up and encourages you to live a more fulfilled 12 00:00:58.940 --> 00:01:03.740 life in Christ, then make sure you leave us one of those five star ratings. To us, 13 00:01:04.220 --> 00:01:09.260 that's like saying, Amen or yes, then that rating will encourage others to listen. 14 00:01:09.900 --> 00:01:14.780 Now open your hearts to what God's word has to say to you. Here is Jack Hibbs. 15 00:01:15.980 --> 00:01:22.780 Romans 14, Romans 15, Romans 16. A great section of the scripture that is speaking directly to 16 00:01:22.780 --> 00:01:30.380 the believer about their walk with God, making it real, because everything about Jesus is real, 17 00:01:31.580 --> 00:01:38.300 and in that, the reality, and I think the authentic faith of a true believer cannot be denied. 18 00:01:39.100 --> 00:01:43.100 When I say things like that, I think of the man Stephen. Remember Stephen in the book of Acts? 19 00:01:43.660 --> 00:01:47.820 Stephen was a man that was full of the Holy Spirit. You really don't know much about Stephen, 20 00:01:47.900 --> 00:01:58.780 but his great moment of the hall of faith, I would say, of course, is when he was a guilty of loving Jesus, 21 00:01:58.780 --> 00:02:05.260 guilty of proclaiming Christ. It's interesting to note that where Stephen was stoned to death for 22 00:02:05.260 --> 00:02:11.900 his witness of Christ being full of the Holy Spirit, what did he do? He proclaimed the gospel, 23 00:02:11.900 --> 00:02:17.340 and one of the eyewitnesses to that, and he was actually the man orchestrating the stoning and 24 00:02:17.340 --> 00:02:26.780 the killing, he's the man responsible, was a guy by the name of Saul, a Pharisee from Tarsus, a Jew, 25 00:02:28.300 --> 00:02:38.940 who no doubt Stephen's stoning to death, Stephen's last words is, I see the Lord standing at the 26 00:02:38.940 --> 00:02:46.300 right hand of God the Father, and Stephen uttered those words just as Jesus, Father, do not hold 27 00:02:46.300 --> 00:02:54.140 this against them, forgive them. It's amazing, that's big grace people. You can't do that with human 28 00:02:54.140 --> 00:03:02.060 power. And Paul saw that, and I'm convinced that that led to Paul's great conversion on the road 29 00:03:02.060 --> 00:03:07.820 to Damascus, that had to be haunting him and preparing him all along the way, a great witness. 30 00:03:08.540 --> 00:03:13.500 So church, getting real with God and man requires us to know who we are, and it means that we must 31 00:03:13.500 --> 00:03:22.140 together love first. And he starts out when he tells us in verse 7, for none of us lives to himself, 32 00:03:22.140 --> 00:03:28.940 and no one dies to himself, for if we live, we live to the Lord, and if we die, we die to the Lord, 33 00:03:28.940 --> 00:03:34.380 therefore whether we live or die, we are the lords. He's speaking to the fact that the believer, 34 00:03:34.380 --> 00:03:40.220 we're living, or if we die, we are the lords. Isn't that amazing? When we hear the word die, for the 35 00:03:40.220 --> 00:03:46.060 believer, we must be clear on this. When we die as believers, we're not, we don't die. Jesus said, 36 00:03:46.060 --> 00:03:51.900 if you believe in me, though you die, you're not dead. That kind of freaks some of us out. She 37 00:03:51.900 --> 00:03:58.060 wouldn't mean he's laying right there, the guy is dead. No, the guy is gone. The Bible tells us to be 38 00:03:58.060 --> 00:04:04.700 absent from this body, to be present with the Lord. And Jesus is the Lord over the living, that's 39 00:04:04.700 --> 00:04:13.020 all of us here right now, and those who died in faith. Imagine as you sit here this morning, 40 00:04:13.020 --> 00:04:19.580 those who have died in faith are standing before him in eternity, based on the blood of the everlasting 41 00:04:19.580 --> 00:04:25.900 covenant, and based on that fact that as Paul has been teaching us, who are we to judge another man's 42 00:04:25.900 --> 00:04:31.660 servant? And who are we to say this or that about the celebration of any particular day that you 43 00:04:31.660 --> 00:04:36.460 might hold sacred to God versus someone else holding some other day? We're not to judge people 44 00:04:36.460 --> 00:04:43.100 on that. The bottom line was, whatever you do, if you eat or if you do not eat, if you drink or 45 00:04:43.100 --> 00:04:50.460 do not drink, if you pick this day or that day, bottom line, do it unto the Lord, give God the glory, 46 00:04:50.460 --> 00:04:58.140 honor His name, and I love the grace that's involved in that. Grace to be victorious in Christ, 47 00:04:59.740 --> 00:05:06.060 but a great liberating truth. And the fact is that I am not, I cannot live my life to myself. 48 00:05:07.260 --> 00:05:13.820 Watch this everybody. We don't, listen, we're not far from Hollywood. It's all about self. 49 00:05:14.300 --> 00:05:23.980 Everything is about stardom. Everything is about the idol worshiping of the performer, so to speak, 50 00:05:23.980 --> 00:05:31.420 right? And if that's such a great thing, why are not those people fulfilled in content and happy? 51 00:05:32.220 --> 00:05:39.900 Instead, so to speak, owning the world, they're drugged out. They're drunked out. 52 00:05:42.380 --> 00:05:47.900 They often end their lives in suicide. The Bible makes it very clear right here that for 53 00:05:47.900 --> 00:05:52.940 you and I to love one another and even love our enemies is the fact that you and I must realize 54 00:05:52.940 --> 00:06:03.020 that none of us live to ourself and we do not die to ourself. You're not an island, no matter what 55 00:06:03.020 --> 00:06:09.580 Paul Simon says. You're not an island. No, I'm just going to live my life to myself. You can't do that. 56 00:06:11.260 --> 00:06:16.940 Listen, there's a big craze going on in our new world. I was speaking to an expert on this last 57 00:06:16.940 --> 00:06:26.780 night in Arizona and this stuff of AI and now a shocking poll. I don't know who did the poll. You 58 00:06:26.780 --> 00:06:32.540 can Google it later, but there's a poll that's out and young people today are choosing. They want 59 00:06:32.540 --> 00:06:39.900 to have a synthetic relationship with AI friends rather than actual humans and their argument is this. 60 00:06:39.900 --> 00:06:46.540 It's too complex to have a relationship with another human. Too much drama and you can literally go 61 00:06:46.540 --> 00:06:53.900 and you can engineer through AI, you can make your friends. You can create your friends. Listen, 62 00:06:53.900 --> 00:06:59.180 this is freakish. This is sick and it goes in a thousand different directions. But listen, 63 00:06:59.180 --> 00:07:09.260 today with AI, your kids are creating friends in their own image and it's not a joke. You can't 64 00:07:09.260 --> 00:07:16.700 tell that these things are not real on the screen. They look exactly real. By the way, sad to say it, 65 00:07:16.700 --> 00:07:20.620 but it's not just friends that you communicate with. They actually carry on conversations and 66 00:07:20.620 --> 00:07:25.340 dialogues. I don't know if you've seen this stuff going on, but you can ask AI Alcons and stuff, 67 00:07:25.340 --> 00:07:32.140 and if you ask in a rude manner, tone a voice, I don't know about you, but you can say a nice word 68 00:07:32.220 --> 00:07:40.780 with a wrong tone. Didn't sound good. Did you know AI knows this? It has tone. It's very convincing. 69 00:07:40.780 --> 00:07:47.660 Problem is it's not real. It's not real or is it the new real whereby I think demonic powers are 70 00:07:47.660 --> 00:07:57.100 going to seize upon such things. Hey, why pray when you can ask AI for the answer? Hey, what should I 71 00:07:57.100 --> 00:08:03.580 do about this or that? Think about that. The discipline of prayer is hard, but you're going to 72 00:08:03.580 --> 00:08:09.420 get your answer from God. People don't want to deal with that. No, I want an answer in the next 3.5 seconds. 73 00:08:12.060 --> 00:08:17.900 And it's been said today that kids don't even know how to learn now. All they know is how to 74 00:08:17.900 --> 00:08:24.300 search for the answer. But you can now create a world around you that's synthetic and it's not even 75 00:08:24.380 --> 00:08:32.060 real. And people are choosing that. But there's no love. It's fake. It's false. Oh, but it's 76 00:08:32.060 --> 00:08:37.420 convenient. Look, you're in church right now. And I know I'm going to get mail on this. I always do. 77 00:08:37.420 --> 00:08:43.340 If you ever since COVID have gotten into the habit of not getting together with believers because 78 00:08:43.340 --> 00:08:49.340 it's what? It's what? It's convenient. It's convenient to stay home and we do church in our jammies. 79 00:08:49.340 --> 00:08:55.980 You're not doing church. You may be listening to a Bible study, but you're not doing church. 80 00:08:56.780 --> 00:09:03.500 Church is where you have to fight over seats and dive in for the parking spot. Be nice to let 81 00:09:03.500 --> 00:09:09.660 people out of the parking spot. Church is having to bump into people. Church is having to deal with 82 00:09:09.660 --> 00:09:15.740 stuff. We want to know. We want a synthetic world and you'll never be able to love other people 83 00:09:15.740 --> 00:09:24.300 in a synthetic world. Maybe I see it differently or maybe more vividly or maybe I've thought about 84 00:09:24.300 --> 00:09:33.660 this a long time, but my God did not send an angel to reveal who he is. He came himself. He didn't 85 00:09:33.660 --> 00:09:43.500 even lean on an angel. He came in human skin to reveal himself to you. Real love that can be 86 00:09:43.500 --> 00:09:48.460 experienced. In the Scriptures, if we live, we live to the Lord and if we die, we die to the Lord 87 00:09:48.460 --> 00:09:54.060 therefore whether we live or die, we are the Lord's. We are to be his example. First Corinthians 3, 88 00:09:54.060 --> 00:10:01.580 verse 13 says, then each one's work will become clear. For the day will declare it. Because, 89 00:10:01.580 --> 00:10:06.620 listen, it will be revealed by fire. This is the judgment of Christ, the judgment of God, and the 90 00:10:06.700 --> 00:10:14.380 fire will test each one's work of what sort it is. If anyone's work which he has built on endures, 91 00:10:14.380 --> 00:10:19.820 I'll come back to this in a moment, he will receive a reward. If anyone's work is burned, he will 92 00:10:19.820 --> 00:10:26.460 suffer loss, but he himself will be saved yet so through fire. Listen, talking about loving one 93 00:10:26.460 --> 00:10:32.300 another, you and I could perform miracles. That doesn't matter. Do you hear me? Listen up. 94 00:10:32.380 --> 00:10:37.500 People are going to, Jesus said it over and over again. The disciples, the apostles said it, 95 00:10:37.500 --> 00:10:42.380 and the last days there's going to be times of great deception done by miracles. 96 00:10:45.340 --> 00:10:54.140 So that's not the defining point. The defining point is true love. Actual love that God puts within 97 00:10:54.140 --> 00:10:59.900 your heart to minister to other people because let's be honest. Miracles are fantastic if they're 98 00:10:59.980 --> 00:11:04.700 done by God. You say, what do you mean if they're done by God? Because the Bible makes it clear that 99 00:11:04.700 --> 00:11:12.620 when Pharaoh encountered Moses, Moses, remember the serpent, Pharaoh's, or Pharaoh's magicians, 100 00:11:12.620 --> 00:11:19.340 had their staff, their rods, and that they turned them, Satan turned them into snakes, and then 101 00:11:19.340 --> 00:11:25.820 Moses, it's so awesome. Moses will buy himself. He's standing there, old man. You got to see all 102 00:11:25.900 --> 00:11:30.700 these young punks. They got their, you know, they're the counselors. They're the priest of all these 103 00:11:30.700 --> 00:11:38.300 various Egyptian gods, and they put down their staffs, their snakes. And I just got to see Moses 104 00:11:38.300 --> 00:11:45.980 standing all alone. It's just like, yeah, I bet everybody else is going, snake, that's amazing. 105 00:11:48.220 --> 00:11:55.420 And Moses throws down his staff, and his staff turns into a snake and eats up all the other 106 00:11:55.420 --> 00:12:08.300 snakes. It's just like, listen, miracles, miracles are tied to a message. And there'll be miracles 107 00:12:08.300 --> 00:12:14.700 being performed in the last days by religious people who are not preaching the gospel of Jesus Christ. 108 00:12:14.700 --> 00:12:20.220 They will deny the fact that Jesus died in the cross for their sins and rose again from the dead. 109 00:12:20.300 --> 00:12:24.780 They'll be inspired and empowered by satanic influences. And you got to watch out for that. 110 00:12:26.220 --> 00:12:31.580 We live in that kind of an age. But the Bible tells us that we as believers, whatever we do, 111 00:12:31.580 --> 00:12:36.380 first Corinthians 13 tells us, it's going to be done by love. If you have all the gifts of the 112 00:12:36.380 --> 00:12:41.740 Holy Spirit and you operate them, the bottom line is their junk, without them being operated by 113 00:12:41.740 --> 00:12:50.940 the love of God. Think of that for a moment. The simplicity of God, and yet it's impossible for 114 00:12:50.940 --> 00:12:59.820 us to obtain without his miraculous touch upon our lives. And so we move on to this. We continue on 115 00:12:59.820 --> 00:13:08.700 in verse 9, it says, to this end, Christ died and rose and lived again, that he might be Lord of 116 00:13:08.700 --> 00:13:15.740 both the dead and the living. This is the Jesus of the Bible. People often argue, 117 00:13:15.740 --> 00:13:21.660 how is it that you worship God? You see Jesus is God, Father, Son, Holy Spirit, one God, 118 00:13:21.660 --> 00:13:27.980 manifested in three persons. Explain that. I really can't. And don't talk to me about ice and 119 00:13:27.980 --> 00:13:37.580 vapor in the egg and the shell and the yolk and the... It's beyond us. But that very truth is found 120 00:13:37.660 --> 00:13:42.380 in the very first verse of the Bible, in the beginning God created the heavens and the earth, 121 00:13:42.380 --> 00:13:54.700 and that word is Elohim. Singular, singular, Al, Elohim, singular one God in multiple. 122 00:13:56.700 --> 00:14:05.740 And the Bible tells us that Christ was the architect builder, if you want to put it that way, 123 00:14:05.820 --> 00:14:10.380 in Colossians and in the book of Hebrews as well. But doesn't the Bible tell us that it was the 124 00:14:10.380 --> 00:14:16.620 spirit of God that hovered over the waters at creation? Just in the very first book of the Bible, 125 00:14:16.620 --> 00:14:22.700 the Trinity is there. But Jesus Christ died and rose again. That is the message. 126 00:14:24.300 --> 00:14:30.140 Whatever religious pursuit you may be flirting with, if you don't know Christ Jesus, 127 00:14:30.220 --> 00:14:37.900 you don't have what we have. What do you have? We have a risen Savior. His resurrection proves 128 00:14:37.900 --> 00:14:42.700 everything the Bible says, and on top of it, the Bible said in advance that this is what he would 129 00:14:42.700 --> 00:14:51.580 accomplish for us, that he would in fact be resurrected from the dead. Matthew chapter three, 130 00:14:51.580 --> 00:14:57.260 verse two says, repent. This is the gospel. Repent for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. Jesus 131 00:14:57.340 --> 00:15:04.300 said that. Repent, change your mind. We all get weird. I mean, we shouldn't, but people get all 132 00:15:04.300 --> 00:15:10.300 nervous about the word repent. Repent. Well, what? They get all uppity about it. Oh, just stop. 133 00:15:10.300 --> 00:15:17.100 It's an old English word. It means turn around. Isn't that great? You could say this way, 134 00:15:17.580 --> 00:15:24.060 you're going in one direction, do 180 degree turn. You're going that way? Stop. When you hear 135 00:15:24.060 --> 00:15:29.500 this message, the kingdom of God's at hand, salvation is available to you. God wants to forgive you 136 00:15:29.500 --> 00:15:35.500 of your sins. The next question should be from you. What do I do? Answer. Repent. What does that mean? 137 00:15:36.140 --> 00:15:42.860 Turn around. Stop thinking about Jesus the way that you have been and think differently. 138 00:15:45.020 --> 00:15:52.620 Stop running from him. Run to him. And please, please, think about it. Oh, I can't run to him. I'm 139 00:15:52.620 --> 00:15:58.300 such a sinner. No, you don't understand. If you are such a sinner, you're the one that can 140 00:15:58.300 --> 00:16:09.020 bring him greater glory. God loves sinners. But don't stay that way. God loves us enough. Listen, 141 00:16:09.020 --> 00:16:14.380 people will say, I love you just the way you are. Well, of course, okay, that's nice. God loves 142 00:16:14.380 --> 00:16:20.060 us just the way we are, but God loves us so much He won't leave us the way we are. He changes us 143 00:16:20.060 --> 00:16:26.860 by His power. And all that requires of us is to repent that is turn around, realizing knowing that 144 00:16:26.860 --> 00:16:31.020 the direction I'm going is the wrong way. You know that inside. Every human knows that inside. 145 00:16:31.020 --> 00:16:37.180 They're convicted by the Holy Spirit. Believer or not. Jesus said so, that the Holy Spirit will 146 00:16:37.180 --> 00:16:44.940 convict the world of sin. What does He do that to be mean? No, to get you to change your course 147 00:16:45.260 --> 00:16:55.180 and to come to Him. The scripture goes on. Mark 115. The time is fulfilled. The kingdom of God is 148 00:16:55.180 --> 00:17:02.460 at hand. Repent and believe in the gospel. The gospel that Christ died for you. And He rose again 149 00:17:02.460 --> 00:17:07.660 from the dead. And by putting your faith in Him, He issues to you the free gift of eternal life. 150 00:17:07.740 --> 00:17:15.420 You may be here today or you're watching right now and you're thinking, yeah, I don't know, I doubt it. 151 00:17:17.340 --> 00:17:22.140 You know what, you're just going to stay in that condition unless you taste and see that the Lord 152 00:17:22.140 --> 00:17:30.060 is good, folks. Can you imagine this? You've become so accustomed to living in some form of mitigating 153 00:17:30.060 --> 00:17:37.900 your shame. You think maybe no one's going to find out about it or you've covered all your tracks 154 00:17:37.900 --> 00:17:44.460 and maybe you have, but down deep inside, you know there's this nagging presence that God knows. 155 00:17:46.220 --> 00:17:50.220 And do you know what He wants to do? He wants to go to the heart of the matter. He wants to go to 156 00:17:50.220 --> 00:17:58.860 the core of it all and He wants to touch you right there and expose you, not expose you to the world, 157 00:17:58.860 --> 00:18:04.780 expose you to yourself. He already knows everything about you. But what we do as humans, we look, 158 00:18:04.780 --> 00:18:11.340 we learn this from Adam and Eve, mom and dad. They taught us this. Hide, so fig leaves, do whatever it 159 00:18:11.340 --> 00:18:20.860 takes, cover it up. And you could see Jesus come along and just pull one little thread. Hey, what is 160 00:18:20.860 --> 00:18:29.260 that? He pulls on the thread in the hole. The whole garden falls off of you. And you're exposed. 161 00:18:29.260 --> 00:18:36.220 And you say, Jack, that's terrifying. It is terrifying, but that's not all. You're exposed before 162 00:18:36.220 --> 00:18:44.620 Him who is mighty to save. And He says to you, you are now naked and open before me. I know 163 00:18:44.700 --> 00:18:52.140 everything about you before you ever born. And I've seen it all. And I'm speaking to you and I'm 164 00:18:52.140 --> 00:18:59.020 asking you, you come to me, you bring me your shame, your guilt, your sin. I'll take it away from 165 00:18:59.020 --> 00:19:06.700 you. If you've never experienced Christ, you are still living under a cloud of shame and you need 166 00:19:06.780 --> 00:19:14.620 not live like that anymore. Let Jesus take it away. Let him remove it. One of the great, 167 00:19:14.620 --> 00:19:21.900 beautiful, liberating strengths about being a follower of Jesus Christ is the stuff that in my memory, 168 00:19:21.900 --> 00:19:29.740 my mind, I'm embarrassed of and I'm ashamed of in some of those things. Nobody, nobody knew about 169 00:19:30.060 --> 00:19:39.340 them. And then Jesus knocks on your heart and it's like, oh my goodness. And instead of him saying, 170 00:19:39.340 --> 00:19:49.500 sit down while I beat you up. He says, stand up and I'll make you hold. He does this. Let him do that to you. 171 00:19:49.660 --> 00:19:59.580 This Jack Hibbs podcast as well as all the broadcast outreach opportunities are listener 172 00:19:59.580 --> 00:20:06.940 supported. Will you consider partnering with us through a special gift? Go to jackhibbs.com to 173 00:20:06.940 --> 00:20:14.140 learn more and stay connected. You're listening to this podcast so I know you've got a curious 174 00:20:14.140 --> 00:20:18.940 mind. Here's a helpful fact you might not know yet. Drivers who switch and save with progressive 175 00:20:18.940 --> 00:20:24.780 save over $900 on average. They make it super simple. Pop over to progressive.com. Answer some 176 00:20:24.780 --> 00:20:29.420 questions and you'll get a quick quote with coverage options tailored to your choices. 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