Paul’s Prayer in Philippians 1:9-11 | Mike Bickle

Further notice this is where it will be at 7 30 every friday night okay let's pray let's turn to philippians chapter one philippians chapter one father we come to you in the name of the lord jesus and lord we ask you for living understanding of this very important passage that's prophetic passage for this hour of history We ask you in the name of jesus to mark our hearts to pull us into this on a regular basis the truth of this passage in jesus name amen will paragraph a we all know philippians 1 we pray it

all the time down in the prayer room ephesians 1 philippians 1 ephesians 3. this was really i'm enjoying this because our community is so familiar with these passages so paul prays for believers to abound in Love i'm going to identify three specific ways that we are to pray to abound in love we'll get there in a few minutes and they're not to yield to compromise in their quest to abound in love to resist compromise to be sincere and to not cause offense and that means us causing offense by our action in the lives of others

To go very alert and attentive to not create offense now that doesn't mean we uh compromise the word of god because when the word of god creates the offense that's one thing but paul is saying we don't we want to be very alert and sensitive not to say and do things that injure people again if it's obedience to the word of god that's a separate category Because a lot of folks don't like the word of god they get offended by it well let's read the prayer this i pray that your love would abound he's praying

for the whole church at philippi that your love would abound still more and more we're grateful for whatever the lord's given us by the spirit in our lives but we want more and more no matter how deep we get in the love of god we want More and more then he gives us two qualifiers he goes you're going to grow in love you're going to abound in love by knowledge and you're going to do it by discernment those two things we'll look at in a few moments and here's the results of it so that you

would be sincere in other words resisting all compromise and you would be without offense You wouldn't do things that injure people's hearts and lives and reputations and just just their lives in general by our actions and our words and those kinds of things and you're going to stay with this until the day of christ until you meet the lord now the day of christ is the second coming but if you go to the lord before He comes to you that's the day of christ for you in other words sustain this to the end of your

life this isn't a short-term seasonal emphasis of the holy spirit this is a long-term sustained lifestyle and the results are that we're filled with the fruits of righteousness and this is going to happen because of what jesus did And by interacting with jesus not just by what he did on the cross but this comes by jesus interacting with him called abiding in him it's that ongoing communication that we have with him and the net result is the father is glorified in this age when others look at lives that embrace this in a sustained way in

a deep and sustained way the father is deeply glorified by this Because it's so counterintuitive for us to live this way it's so normal for us to just go the way of just the natural way this is very against the current of our natural mindset and our our natural way we think and process information it's very counter culture now paragraph b this prayer is very important well all the episode prayers are very important But i want to bring some special attention to this one because it has prophetic significance in light of john 17 which is

which jesus prayed john 17 that his family would be one even as him and the father are one now that's happened maybe one percent of the body of christ nearly or a little less than that through history so this john 17 reality is an end-time reality The closer we get to the coming of the lord the more john 17 is going to come into open fulfillment that's obvious to see and in order to walk in that john 17 family maturity we have to walk in this philippians chapter 1 verse 9 we've got to contend for

this in our life and in the lives of the people we love and for the body of christ Jesus in john 17 said there's going to be a mature family and the mature family reality is going to actually lead to the great harvest when a billion unbelievers see the family transformed in this way not entirely transformed it's going to grab the attention of the unbelieving nations in a way because this is actually the greatest miracle this is greater than opening a natural Blind eye it's it's the transformation of the human heart in the most intense

way to walk in this that's why it's happened so little over church history it's the great transformative miracle that's going to happen on a global level at the end of the age but at the very time that this is happening as we Get closer to the lord's return satan this is an end-time reality as well is fueling a betrayal culture in the church by stirring up accusations of believers against believers so two things are happening simultaneously in an increasing fashion the closer we get to the coming of the lord there's millions entering into this Family

mature love the philippians 1 9 reality millions are moving in that direction and the spirit's helping them but they are i mean they are engaging their heart in a serious way in this this doesn't happen automatic this happens because the spirit moves but we engage him and while that trajectory is happening of deeper family love of millions of believers And that trajectory that's already beginning we're seeing just the beginning stirrings of it in the last few years across the nations but satan says not so fast i'm going to create a betrayal culture among former friends

and loved ones it says here in matthew chapter 24 many will betray one another strangers don't betray each other this isn't A stranger on social media uh uh criticizing you or telling lies about you or putting you down that a stranger you think oh what a that's not great why did they say that but betrayal is a close friendship a relationship and the betrayal is going to increase because there's going to be a great falling away at the end of the age so many believers are going to get offended and enter into this betrayal Against

each other at the same time many believers are going to grow deep in the john 17 love and they're going to be used to bring in the great harvest so people say is there going to be a great harvest the billion soul harvest which is kind of a popular way to say it that's not a specific accurate number i think it's more than a Billion is it the billion soul harvest or the great falling away and both of them are happening simultaneously in the years leading to the coming of the lord the family dynamics are

maturing and the betrayal culture is increasing as we get closer to the lord and john and this rebel i mean this philippians 1 9 is right in the center of that tension it's A very prophetic passage i mean it's been relevant for 2000 years but it is really going to be emphasized by the spirit the closer we get to the lord's return paragraph c well paul says i pray the prayer is that love would abound now i'm going to give three ways that we pray for love to abound we're going to ask the holy spirit

to cause our revelation of god's love for us to abound And the body of christ that that's going to be the great transformative kind of catalytic revelation when we see how god feels about us when that revelation of god's love for us when it abounds in us when it gets more emphasized that abounding revelation growing and understanding how he feels about us but it doesn't stop there the next thing Is that we want to abound in our love for jesus not just understanding his love for us but our love for him it doesn't stop there

there is an overflow we pray that our love would abound for one another and the lost now we want to grow in all three of those realities simultaneously it's not like you grow in one stage one to stage two But when we abound in our understanding our understanding of god's love for us increases it fuels the other two it stirs them up and empowers us but again we want to lock into growing in all three of those areas simultaneously romans 5 5 the holy spirit is postured to pour love into the human heart the revelation

of god's love the impartation of love back to god and pour out the overflow of that love To people to weaken broken people the holy spirit lives in us he says my task is to pour it out in you but i'm going to do it as you engage with me as you ask me and make regular decisions to engage in this i'm going to pour it out more meaning in your heart you're going to understand the love of god more you're going to have a greater impartation of love For jesus and it's going to overflow

to people it's going to be incremental process little by little step by step sometimes in my life it's three steps forward two steps back three steps forward but over the months and years you're steadily going forward now i'm not putting that on you that you're gonna go two steps back that's just just my story okay let's look at paragraph two this we're Gonna abound in our love for jesus an impartation of love for jesus this is one of my life verses you get to have a couple life verses john 17 26 i mean this is

remarkable this is jesus praying father the love with which you love me your love for me put it in him impart it to him that we're gonna love jesus like the father loves jesus like Really if anybody besides jesus said that i'm not sure i could fully engage in it i'd go like the father loves him and jesus yes that's where this thing's going so i mean i want to abound in my revelation of god's love for me i mean that's where that's the catalytic that's the fueling of the other two dimensions but i really

want to grow i want the impartation i want to abound In my love for jesus and then for one another paragraph d again the phrase still more and more it's not like we're beginning today we don't despise our growth in love our growth in the revelation of god's love our love for jesus we don't despise the small measure of it from yesterday but rather we stop and say thank you thank You lord it matters we haven't grown as much as we wished we would have but we have grown in it so we say thank you

we don't despise what we have today while we're reaching for more tomorrow we don't choose between the two it's thank you but give me more how much more still more and more how much more Still more and more i think forever that will be echoing through our being still more and more still more and more top of page two well there's two very important ways that we grow that we abound in love in those three ways the revelation of love we abound in love for god and we abound in love for people paul says i

pray that we are bound in Love in knowledge or another way to say it is through receiving knowledge we abound in love through receiving knowledge knowledge of what well knowledge of god's heart well knowledge of the truth that's the same the knowledge of god's personality i'm saying the same thing kind of different ways the knowledge of The finished work of the cross what really happened not just for us but for the people around us that are weak and broken that bug us the work of the cross really did something for them that we need to

see knowledge of jesus is leadership and it's not just that he leads us in goodness that his he relates to us and leads us through this Paradigm of grace that most of us myself included we're not very familiar with his leadership how he really talks about us and thinks about us when i talk about his leadership the way he talks about us to the father the way he talks and thinks and prays about us is remarkably positive i think well that means jesus of course and but paul is saying i want you to grow in

knowledge of this I want you to grasp this more i want you to have knowledge of how god views people how he views you well jesus said in john 8 32 very well known verse you'll know the truth and the truth will set you free the truth will liberate our hearts we know the truth if we have knowledge it liberates our hearts i mean the knowledge Of god these this type of knowledge but it's not just sterile information it's knowledge as we're interacting with the lord it liberates our hearts it sets us free john 8

32 paul said the same thing in a different way he says you'll be transformed by renewing your mind changing the way you think your emotions will be transformed when You change the way you think so my point being this little phrase that paul says abound in love in knowledge or through growing in knowledge is a very significant phrase it's very significant it takes time to cultivate that knowledge is the point we get a little bit of this knowledge on the run but we won't grow deep in this knowledge Just kind of on the run we

got to take time to really invest in it but the net result is our we abound in love we grow in we abound in the revelation of god's love for us we abound in greater love for jesus we've ground and abound and greater love for people it's really worth the effort it takes time though paragraph f paul says well he goes i Pray that you're bound in love in knowledge but it's going to take discernment as well you've got to have knowledge of god's heart and jesus leadership but it's going to take discernment spiritual understanding

is how other bible translations say it many say discernment others say growing in spiritual understanding Meaning this is really big i'm going to abound in love towards you in your weakness and brokenness and those irritating things you do that bug people around you all of us we're humans we're going to abound in love when we discern who that person is and how god views them again it's very counterintuitive to it it's opposite we go like yeah I don't know you know you do this and you do that and the lord says that's not my story

for them you need discernment of how i see them this is not a small point this is a very very big point you need to deserve not just how i view them my truths you gotta you need to discern how excellent my truths are like today There's cultural wars against the sanctity of life and the sanctity of marriage and the sanctity of sex there's cultural wars against the authority of the word of god against the one way of salvation through jesus against cultural wars against his judgments accusing them as being contradiction to love and the

lord says you need spiritual discernment you need knowledge Of my heart but you need to discern the truth of these things because there's a lot of confusion in the culture on these and our own natural mindset is to see the person that doesn't treat us right or they put us down or they ignore us or they block our goals or any number of things and like you know i don't really like them anyway and the lord says No you're going to abound in love through the knowledge of my heart but having spiritual discernment of how

i view them and having spiritual discernment on those different truths that they're at the very heart of the cultural wars right now that are increasing according to psalms 2. we've got to love god we got to love on god's terms jesus is the only man qualified to Define what love is there's so many definitions of love in the culture and 10 years from now there'll be many more and they're convincing convincing definitions but they're not biblical matter of fact they're they're in opposition to jesus's definition it takes spiritual discernment because the issues can be complex

and crafty and hidden and subtle and layered and like What and the paul says you know you have to have knowledge of my heart and the cross and how i view things but you need spiritual discernment as well which is similar to having knowledge those are very similar but paul emphasized those two different facets paragraph g now i'm i'm going to say this over and over and some of the stuff on the notes i won't cover I've said it the last number of months and years over and over and over and so but this is

more than academic information the most challenging thing is to discern it's abound in love i mean god loves us abound in knowledge of how god loves us i like that one abound in impartation of love for jesus i like that but abounding in love for people again as long as they're far away or as Long as they like the same things you like and they like you it's pretty easy it goes pretty good if they like you and like the things you like but when they're in the family of god and they don't really like

you and they don't agree with you and they don't like what you like they don't like your music they don't like your views they don't like how you live they have criticism that's when it gets Challenging and so this having discernment of how god views them is critical to the family of god entering into john 17 mature love it's supernatural it's you know i remember i've heard this over the years i've been a pastor 45 years now coming right up to it in a few months and uh oh how many hundreds of times have i

heard this and a couple times i was kind of a Little bit smarter like and but i quit doing that and uh the early days they would come and say we want to join your church because my church isn't loving i said do you realize you just said your church isn't walking in the supernatural glory of god the highest level all the time they're not loving of course they're not loving they're broken human beings what are you talking about Whoa now i quit saying that but not loving loving is the apex of the supernatural work

of god that's contrary to how we think now again if they like us and like what we like we think of love is pretty easy except for those few moments here and there where we have run-ins isn't that a problem to like people that like you that's not the issue jesus said even unbelievers like people That like him and like people that agree with them and like people that enjoy the same recreation and music and sports and and stuff that's no problem that's natural it's liking people who don't like you or don't agree with you

that are in the family of god this is a radical radical reality so they would say you know they don't really love Of course this is the apex of the glory of god in my early days i pointed it out it always backfired so i just shut up and said oh just be quiet mike then the next one you hear that which is almost as not helpful as that one how's that that's a good word not as helpful as that one it's this idea oh man and the world they i mean when you get into

church That's when it gets tough i got news for you the world is filled with people who don't walk in god's love this idea that in the church is when it's really tough knowing the church you just have higher expectations and you get closer and you put your guard down quicker the church is far more loving than the unbelieving world when you run into people who don't like You and don't like what you like so i encourage people to drop the kind of the rhetoric and see growing in love is a supernatural unique not unique

but rare something that's going to take all of our strength to throw our life into and we're not going to presume it's just going to happen overnight and it's going to be easy and it's going to be everywhere but rather opposite we're going to be awestruck When it emerges you go wow it's really happening i mean we want it to grow more instead of criticizing the measure we're going to be grateful for it is the point i'm giving at well we're equipped to abound in love by i'm saying again paragraph g but i'm just repeating

myself by growing in knowledge of god's heart and growing in discernment at how god sees people And growing in discernment of how different truths in the cultural wars as well oh these are just two verses i just cannot say enough times i've i've preached on these two passages so many times over the last 40 plus years and the reason i'm telling you that because i want you to do that in the next 40 plus years if we're still if it's still going on like this i want you to look at these passages and Make them

top of your list passages king david says god delivered me because he likes me okay that's that's a big statement right there i just couldn't skip verse 19. i really want to talk about verse 35 but david had just been in a time of compromise and he repented and they said david why did god deliver you he's really in a jam he goes because He likes me and the guy goes he likes you or you were doing some not great stuff here at ziklag in first samuel 27. david said well he likes me that's why

he delivered me what a great revelation that's not the real one i want to put i just can't do psalm 18 without touching verse 19. it's verse 35 and he's praying he goes lord your gentleness Will make me great not only your gentle treatment of me gives me a new beginning day after day not only does your gentleness of the way you treat me give me a new beginning but your gentleness the way you treat me now i am treating others through that lens and that's what constituted david's greatness he viewed people through that lens

in a very unique way not very many People in his day did that beloved you want to be great begin to see people through the lens of god's gentleness and his gentleness towards you and you will be gentle towards them even though they might not like you or agree with you yeah it will change your perspective and that is one of the essence of david's greatness he treated people now he viewed people he interpreted him Through the lens of god's gentleness because he received it himself and then the other passage i love to quote is

micah 7 which is an end time passage by the way micah 7 is about the generation the lord returns in context god is going to reveal himself as delighting in mercy he doesn't want uh the end time church in the john 17 maturity we're not going to be tolerating giving mercy to people like well god Gave me mercy i'll just hold my breath and give it to you just hope you don't do what you just did again i hope you don't get in my space again and i'm going to give you mercy lord says no

no i actually delight in it i love giving them mercy and i'm going to cause you to delight in it not just to endure doing it paragraph h paul prayed he says well you're going to bound in love in Knowledge with all discernment and here's a takeaway there's two statements that are when when paul says that that you would approve things that are excellent and that you would be sincere and without offense he has two phrases and two cent phrases in a row that he puts so that the outcome is this he goes you can

approve the things that are excellent It takes spiritual discernment for us to see what god calls excellent virtues in the culture truths in his bible because our natural response is some of those truths i don't really like some of those truths you know deny yourself take up your cross you know there's a number of truths that they preach good but like really like in real time and space to do That but when we see those is excellent that's a transformative time in our life and it takes time and it's not like in one day we

see it all but we're on this trajectory of seeing what god calls excellent we are calling it excellent but it takes time there are there are many things i believe that god calls excellent the church is not yet Embraced they're going uh you know we're not gonna argue against that we're just not gonna talk about it and the lord says i actually want you to rejoice and it is excellent various truths but not just truth it's the way that he looks at people david again well now we're in psalm 16 a minute ago we were

in psalm 18. king david this is this is a very important insight on david's greatness Right here he said as for the saints psalm 16 verse 3 that are on the earth they are the excellent ones and whom is all my delight now the key phrase is the saints that are on the earth the saints up there hey no problem we're gonna have a great time in the resurrection it's the on earth saints That's a great verse as long as it's just a poster there's a poster little sunset you know the excellent ones of the

earth i have taught the life of david i don't know five or ten times i mean right through first and second samuel they were not that some guys i wouldn't want to hang out with in david's inner circle it's like ugh who david because again i don't know the life of David perfectly but i'm pretty familiar with i go who exactly are you talking about i'm looking through hmm i mean abbott gail did pretty good let me see no no no no no no he's kids there's no that one no that wife no oh david

who are you talking about now that that's a major thing and david was intentional he's saying i didn't say they were Perfect i said i'm viewing them through god's lands i'm doing it on purpose this is what one of the things that constituted david's greatness is that he cultivated this mindset this is not automatic this is like uh no wait wait god your gentleness towards me that's psalm 18 now or in psalm 16. i'm going to turn it back on them and one of the remarkable things about david is that how he gave grace Time

and time again sometimes he didn't sometimes he stepped over the line he didn't say he was perfect but he says as a mindset i'm esteeming the excellent budding virtues in their life i see the other ones but i am going with the narrative that before you there's excellence and that's my story about them that is a major i mean it's a very important insight into david's greatness right There well we're going to approve the things that are excellent i think the church and i'm saying this in a nice way it sounds me a little mean

we got a ways to go on this but the lord's leading his church worldwide into agreeing with what he calls excellent the first area of which i've already mentioned is that god's people his narrative Towards them as he sees even the yes in their spirit as as excellence it's not maturity but he values it so he wants us to view the saints in the body of christ in the church down the road and that guy that puts you down on social media he that's a believer he wants us to see excellence not perfection we don't

agree with everything they do but we see their Value and we see how god sees them in the big picture and i tell you and most of you know i mean you've been doing this for a while many of you it takes an intentionality to do this this is a dogged tenacity to sign back up to approve what god calls excellent this is not an automatic thing again the lady they don't really love in That other church whoa that's amazing when people love i mean we're talking about the real love of people who don't like

you and agree with you loving them is what we're talking about that are believers well we don't just love we don't just call excellent god's people look through the lens of grace his virtues his truths Again i mentioned in the cultural wars the sanctity of life the sanctity of marriage the sanctity of sex the authority of the word of god the one way of salvation of jesus and a number of other issues that even in the church there's debate and there's wars that are emerging against these excellent things paragraph two his commandments are excellent that's

what paul said in romans 7 he Goes your commandments are good they're really good they liberate humans well that was an arcade command and this is modern day and i don't know if we really like that one one group of scholars say and we go no god's word is excellent that's where we take our stand studies tell us you've all read them that today many people define love and truth justice by what they feel Is right not by the word of god like well that feels like justice or injustice so it is and the holy

spirit would say no you've got the word of god is the plumb line the word of god didn't agree with what you're feeling right now you need to change what you're feeling and thinking and line up with the word and i have good news for you god is raising up millions hundreds of millions Of believers that are committed to align with the word i mean there's millions right now there's going to be a revival of honoring the word of god and putting our feelings and the cultural debates secondary to the word of god i'm positive

it's it's emerging now well the debates are emerging too where two trends are happening simultaneously there's growing darkness and there's Growing light and glory in the church and glowing darkness in the church both of them are moving at a pretty fast pace right now so we choose you this day who where you're at and we are we believe the word of god even if our minds don't fully grasp it we call it excellent i that you would be sincere this is a prayer to Walk out our sincere intentions to obey and sincere intentions are real

obedience doesn't start off mature obedience always starts as a sincere intention and most the time we stumble in that intention for a while and then we catch up with it then we stumble in less and then we get that walked out in a consistent way but the sincere intention is still a spirit of obedience God values it the devil just tells you you're a hopeless hypocrite and you're you know you're a loser because your sincerity doesn't really matter to god the sincere intention obey him you know the guy is saying i am against this i'm

going for that and the lord says yeah i see that i value that the devil says no you're just a hypocrite give up and give in paragraph j we pray for grace that we Would live without offense now this isn't talking about us being offended at people although that's a biblical truth that's a very powerful one that's not this passage it's about us not doing things out of the will of god that offend other people but i have a few verses there verse uh first corinthians 10 paul says when you eat or drink you got

a believer who's Confused about the issues don't strut in your liberty and even drink certain things you have liberty to do but they go oh no and it confuses them and they don't know what to do and paul says just don't eat drink it just serve your brother yeah but the brother's got mixed up doctrines the lord's not no but just don't offend him don't injure his heart just be patient With him it's worth it to to uphold him so that's what the the issue of offense is about here we're we're not saying things about

people that trap them or trick them or hurt them i mean we true to the word of god so people might be offended at that but that's a different thing when it's the word of god but any way that we can Avoid injuring someone with our words whispering about them telling something about them taking something from them blocking their goals that we don't have to it's not it's not the will of god that we do it the lord says back away and do nothing that causes offense to other weak and broken people again i say

it over and over when we're obeying the word it causes offense that's a different category Paragraph three he says we're coming to the end of the passage here and then i'll just give you a few uh ideas which i've covered just about the having the divine narrative which is critical to this whole reality of abounding in love but we're filled with the fruits of righteousness being filled with the fruits of righteousness starts by receiving the free gift of righteousness from jesus His work on the cross but when we receive the free gift of righteousness at

the new birth that sets us in a new beginning sets us in a position where we can relate to god as our father now not just as the creator and judge but he is now our father we're in his family wow it's a free gift this is fantastic happens in a moment the day we're born again but then we start that lifestyle Of righteousness now simply put i'm gonna you know not be super accurate with the words here but i want you to get it being filled with the righteousness some people they only see righteousness

as moral virtues righteous choices in behavior it certainly includes that for sure but i want to say being right filled with righteousness is having rightness right views Right choices right views of god right views of people right views of of of issues in the culture it's having it's having rightness we're filled with going in the right way and yes it certainly has to do with moral virtues in terms of certain behavior patterns but righteousness is bigger than that it's being It's thinking and talking right i just want to simplify it that way and we're filled

with the fruits of righteousness in many areas about our money our words our sexuality our time the way we view others the way we view ourselves righteousness actually has something to do with do you view yourself in agreement with how god views you that's part of being thinking right a lot of folks are living under Condemnation and they're living with this kind of orphaned spirit of of you know just rejection and it's very normal i'm not putting that down saying oh you're horrible if you do that that's extremely human billions of people think that way

but the lord says i want you to be filled with right thoughts even about yourself about my word about my son about your money about activities About what you eat and drink about people about their failures about their weaknesses have right views about them that line up with mine so righteousness is a big subject is the point i'm saying then i love this little phrase that he says and we're filled with the fruits of righteousness by jesus christ well it's obviously his work on the cross the whole thing begins by receiving the Gift of righteousness

but it's the ongoing interaction with him called abiding in him it's that developing that conversation through the day where we're talking to him and he's impressing and inspiring our hearts little by little paragraph one paul connects abounding love with a lifestyle of righteousness of Righteous choices as well in our behavior he says if you love me you'll obey my word obeying god's word some folks think if i cry at a worship service and i feel sentimental which i love feeling sentimental and crying to worship so that's beautiful but that's the essence of worship and after

that you know boys will be boys and hey next time we Have a worship service man i'm going for it and the lord says no i want a holistic view i want you to the theater of which you demonstrate your love for me is when you choose obedience when your being and your opportunity wants something else you choose obedience you're you're demonstrating love that's the theater which your love is expressed to Me like your body your career your reputation wants a god says do be and you're going we choose b he goes you are loving

me paragraph two i'm talking again on the subject of righteousness here one of the primary lies that's promoted today is that god's commandments are burdensome You know say well in the grace of god those commandments i mean that going hard for god like who is i mean what about just resting and coasting and there's four or five definitions of rest that are in the uh conversation the body of christ and two or three of them are not biblical the term rest is but the definitions that are being used in i see conversations like that's not

a Biblical definition of rest this is i don't want to get into that right now but my point is that some folks think anything that cuts against the current of our desire and it's a little bit takes some effort and i don't want to and i don't feel like it and if it's grace i shouldn't do what i don't feel like doing And there's a distorted grace message that's saying that god's commandments they're just burdensome they're out of reach and we're losing out on real life by trying to do this intense christianity thing and these

claims these this false teaching and again i'm not breaking it all down i just i just i want to say it here and there they say well we receive grace so that Deep hunger for righteousness if you go that path you're just going to be a religious proud person and legalistic you're going to be in bondage to religious ways get free of that and i have i want to say as you know gloriously the word of god liberates us and hunger and going deep in obedience and self-sacrificing love and denying our flesh to pursue him

That's the way to liberty and for a heart that's free and then paul ends it he says and all this is to the glory of god he goes when human beings go through this process that verse 9 10 and 11 he goes god is glorified you know they're on the earth in a dark world there are bright and shining laughs they're not perfect but they're abounding in love in those Three ways they're doing it by growing in knowledge of god they're they're putting effort in they're seeking to discern the things that are excellent and they're

walking trying to walk out godly sincerity their car might i mean uh to resist compromise they're trying to walk it out and not cause offense and not be harmful or hurtful or put down put down other people in any Way trying to love them being filled with right thinking right choices and all this is because of jesus glory and interacting with him and the father goes i am glorified when you go in that way and stay with it even to the day of christ to the day you meet the lord well let's look just for

a few moments we've covered some of this material in the last few months But it's more than academic material this is absolute core to abounding in love this to me is one of the core issues of abounding in love this is the big stumbling block here it's very practical but most challenging and in many ways the one the easiest to neglect the way we view people i mean we can embrace righteous ethics say okay i'm not great at him but i Agree with him but other believers and other ministries and they have different political views

they got different doctrines and they love jesus but there's still some confusion but that's in everyone there's things that are out of whack and the lord says no i really want you to see and say what i see and say about them yeah but i want people to know that i Know more than they know and i want people to know that i'm not afraid to call them out and the lord says no i'm not calling them out that's not what i'm doing right now i'm trying to win them so we go back to and

we're going to be ever so brief on this zechariah chapter 3 and i started sharing this this summer related to isaiah 19 and i'm not going to go into that right now but a few of You are trekking with what i meant i'm really stirred up by zechariah 3 and i made the point earlier in the summer that in zechariah 3 this passage the lord has highlighted it in our prophetic history in the last near 40 years more than any other passage of the bible zechariah 3 dreams supernatural spiritual confirmations zechariah 3 and 4 will

be very important I remember the 80s and 90s going okay i believe you and a number of leaders and not leaders as well but as some of the leaders i've talked to have the lord has given him dreams some of them a number of times zechariah 3 and 4 is like why does this keep coming up well it makes a whole lot more sense now because zechariah 3 is about the collision of Satan's narrative towards one of god's leaders joshua the high priest i mean he's the spiritual leader of the nation and he's got failures

and deficiencies in his life and satan has a storyline about him but god has an opposite storyline and the story lines in a collision with each other i didn't even figure that out for some years i just thought zechariah 3 why is This important well because the end time move of god there's going to be a cultural betrayal in the church of offended believers who in that trajectory of backsliding and on the other side there's a explosion of people moving mature love and that family dynamic and the great harvest but again it's not automatic this

is a day by day choice every believer makes god's gonna have A billion new believers coming to the kingdom into a mature family that's existing that's calling them in so i am very clear that god was going to succeed but millions of believers are going the other direction and now like you could just summarize it just in the sh in the snapshot right here in zechariah 3. again verse 1 joshua the high priest the Top spiritual leader of the nation he's standing before the angel of the lord and satan stands up and says i got

a case against him the angel lord says really he goes yeah he's messed up and you can read the details on your own and the lord says the lord rebuke you i got a different story about him yeah i know that he's messed up his clothes were really dirty but i have cleansed him and i have Commissioned him and my storyline is the one that we're going with paragraph b this uniqueness of david i mean his life the way he viewed god and viewed himself and viewed people again he had his failures but he had

this unique ability to see god's heart for himself and to see god's heart for others well it started when he was about 17 years old When the prophet samuel knocks on his father's house there's eight brothers david's the youngest brother he's the teenager and the other one's a little bit older and the prophet says we know the story one of your sons is going to be anointed bring them all so the father jesse brought seven of the eight sons young david the young one he was out tending the sheep and he was Within view within

sight of the family the family is having the meal with the most famous man in israel the prophet and david's dad and seven brothers have him taking care of sheep mowing the lawn while the greatest prophet in israel is 100 yards away in their house eating dinner so the prophet's gonna looks at the first brother and says wow you're an Accomplished warrior military and he's got to annoy him the lord says no there says no look at him he's you know big and strong and handsome and brilliant and i'm making up a few of those

but he's clearly the one let us know and he's going to saul the prophet satan goes oh yeah we'll go the second one going to anoint him the lord goes no third one no the fourth one no the one No all seven and the prophet goes i don't get it and then god thunders this statement look at this a paragraph b this is profound god does not evaluate like man does according to the flesh god doesn't look at the outward accomplishments they're gifting there are many things he's got another way of viewing people Sam was

going okay well there isn't any other children and jesse goes there he is he was within view down the valley over i'm just guessing a hundred yards or two hey david come on up here david comes running up you know red rosy cheeks and hi wow samuel the lord says that's the one like He hadn't accomplished anything i mean he doesn't have any resume at all the lord says yeah but i see his heart i see what he does what he says to me at night alone singing to me at night when he's 12 and

14 and it's 18 years old i see his future i've got a call for him yeah i can see failures but i see like man doesn't see so paragraph c i use two terms and i use This several terms some interchangeably the secular narrative of a person's life what they look like to other people by the natural lie it takes no revelation you look at them you see facts about their life they have five i'm making up five or ten five or ten accomplishments in 50 years that are pretty cool they build a big business

had a big ministry a nice family had some good friends you Know worked out a little bit you know there there you have it accomplished a few things won a few trophies well there's 50 years five or ten failures well there's five or ten deficiencies in their personality their little this their little that and they lack some people some leadership skills but you know he's the best man for the job let's hire hiring That's the secular narrative there's nothing wrong with that but it doesn't take revelation to evaluate that you can look by the eye

and see well he's got some failures some weaknesses got some strengths got some resume okay we'll hire you you're the guy you win the award now these facts matter skills and accomplishments and failures deficiencies but they're not the primary determining Factor in god's narrative of your life they do matter but they're secondary they're down a notch or two the divine narrative god looks at david what at you he sees your call he sees your future and you don't david thought i got a call i thought i was a shepherd boy no no you got a

call like what's my call david didn't even really know it but god knows that he knows the future david sees the sincere God sees the sincere movements of his heart god sees his accomplishments and his deficiencies and his failures but god interprets them different than other people do that's the key god interprets them differently paul the apostle came along and said from now on because we're enlightened we don't regard we don't evaluate Anybody by their outward man like samuel the prophet did to david's seven brothers we don't evaluate anybody that way from now on we

want the divine narrative on that guy or that woman that boy or that girl we want god's narrative and you don't always have it but you're searching for it yeah well they really blew it or they're really gifted or they really did this or they really did that The lord says my narrative is what matters and tell satan the lord rebuke you because i got a different narrative for joshua than you do talk about page four just touch a couple of these points and we'll pray we want to ask the holy spirit here's the prayer

to abound in love again this is the practical core reality of abounding in Love i mean it's glorious this abounded revelation of how god loves us and about abound in love for to jesus okay yes we're in but loving believers that don't like us or agree with us and they kind of great us or they ignore us or they block our goals or they don't just not pick us they stand in our way and they speak upon us a negative voice The lord goes ah bound in love it's going to come to can you see

the divine narrative of their life i don't want to no this is the key this is the miracle issue right here we've got to see here's our prayer and i pray this i don't do it great but i pray it i pray it a lot but i need to do it better i want to see what he sees when he looks At you i want to feel what he feels when he looks at you and i want to say what he says when he looks at you now my temptation is to look at you and

not see what he sees feel what he feels and certainly not say what he says that guy oh keep your eye on him man that guy is troubled and he's just whatever he really thinks he's this lord says i'm not saying any of that Well it's true he does think that the lord says that's maybe true but that's not what i'm saying about him that's not my story i'm not saying it's not true it's just not headline news john wimber some of you know his name by the way a new biography just came out a

few few weeks ago it's fantastic by connie dawson for those of you that know him he greatly impacted my life And in the in the uh late 80s early 90s and but john wimber used to say this to me all the time one of in my opinion one of the great leaders of the body of christ in the last generation he would talk about a ministry but he it would go beyond that he says a ministry runs by the headline stories that are emphasizing that ministry i said what he goes a business is the Same

way he goes find the headline stories that god's behind and tell those stories often because a ministry runs by stories i remember thinking really that doesn't sound right i really believe it's not entire i mean there's it's more to it than that he goes tell the stories over and over and here she says don't let the devil create the headlines in your family story There will be negatives there will be setbacks there'll be disappointments there'll be failures there'll be deficiencies don't let those get into the headlines every ministry every family every person has five or

ten main headline stories that god wants your life to be known by those stories those are the headline stories they're not all it's not a bio of all The facts and figures of everything you did god's narrative is not the facts of your bio well you know in high school i went here and i accomplished that and i invested it here i started this business like with this mentor i went to that mentioned that here those are important part of our of our story in one sense but the headline news is the story god is

saying about you When he's praying for you when he looks at you he sees the negative but he's got a narrative and he wants that narrative in the mouth of his believers for one another paragraph g god's narrative isn't the detailed bio it's the main headlines satan wants your life story to be centered on facts particularly negative facts He wants to find the business that failed or the relationship that failed or the thing you did or the person that you offended he wants he wants your storyline going along facts in your bio and god says

no i want it to be the headline news that i'm talking about now i'm not just talking to you about you saying phew that's good news i am i i would love for you to go wow that's good news But i'm really talking to you about how you view the person by you because this is how the john 17 family is going to move forward i tell the story here about the lady i told this a few months ago some years ago she came to me she goes uh she's talking about this ministry leader she

goes he a b and c i go number one you shouldn't be telling me why are you telling me well i just Feel like you need to know what are you telling him you need to go tell him and try to win him to change she goes no i just i just tell the truth and i said really she goes yeah i'm just into the truth i go let me have you consider this 95 of the truth of that man's story isn't that 95 of his life in the last 10 20 30 40 years Is

the time he laid on his bed and said god i want to obey you the time when he tried to help that one person where he made choices to be helpful where he read the word of god thousands of hours over 40 years 20 years fit whatever that's his story you've only got 5 of his story and you think it's the truth so the negative facts to her were the Truth the 95 percent of the positive was not part of the truth i go tell me the 95 percent i'll give you two hours then i'll

give you five minutes for the last five percent i want to hear the truth she goes ah i go oh and before you give me the two hours of his of how he sought god and for years and all the times he repented chris we don't really know those details but I knew she you know she got the message i said but before we since you so are committed to the truth before you tell me the 95 percent for a couple hours before you tell me the five percent of the negative first tell me the

five percent negative about you because you love truth tell it to me i want to hear the bad stuff about you love truth right you this isn't right no this is the point i'm making the truth About that guy is much bigger than his failures and deficiencies that's the narrative well let's look at paragraph i and we'll just end with that when god tells the story i love this and i got this from john wimber by the way the man i just talked about paragraph he said this a number of times i loved it all

the time when god to paul the apostle paul the Apostles a thou two thousand years after abraham and he paul is lives a thousand years after david because abraham was 2000 bc david was 1000 bc god says 2000 years later let me tell you the headline news about abraham he didn't waver well paul did you really read genesis he did wave her and god says no that yeah i mean yes he Did wave her but the headline news my story is through the lens of graces he didn't i love whatever always says he goes in

my house that was wavering anyway he said that every time and i died laughing abraham wavered a handful of times the point is the god headline of his life he didn't waver and that was the truth it's in the word of god yeah but we got some wavering back there but that was only written After his death it's written 500 years later by moses wow god says i know how to relate to my people by grace then david paul lives a thousand years after david david had some pretty big mess ups and paul says a

thousand years later here's god's narrative david acts 13 22 did all the will of god i went paul did you read first and second samuel you need to take my class on the Life of david he had a couple of major mess-ups and paul says thus says the lord he's a man for god's own heart he did all of god's will wow is this how this works it doesn't mean they didn't really do those things but god says there's a narrative that's bigger than the bio and the end time church in john 17 that's abounding

in love has to anchor into it for themselves so They cast off their own spirit of condemnation and rejection and they got to do to others so they cast off a spirit of judgment towards the believers that don't necessarily like them or like what they like well amen and amen let's just end with that let's stand before the lord father we love you we love your leadership jesus Nobody would do it this way beside you lord i have hope for the end time church because you say satan i rebuke you that's not the story of

joshua there's a different story i'm telling lord we want to see what you see feel what you feel and say what you say about our brothers and sisters beloved every one of us we got family members we got churches back home we got ministries on The other end of town on the internet and the lord says i want you to see what i see about them say what i'm saying not what social media is saying don't take them on unless i'm really giving you a prophetic unction and that's another you know for another time but

we want to say what he says i'm committed in my heart and i don't do this perfectly but i go lord i just want To say what you say about people i don't want to say the other stuff i don't even one sentence off of the divine narrative i want to stick on the divine narrative father all over this room i'm asking you to wash us with this grace perspective this abounding in love cry in our spirit let us see our parents brothers and sisters our children Our siblings we're in the kingdom but they've uh

[Music] we've all got five or ten people we need to say what god says about them lord i come again to repent that i can't but i'm saying yes to you i want to [Music] the more i seek you [Music] the more i find you The more i find you [Music] feel [Music] is [Music] [Music] godly sincerity [Music] all being filled with right thinking the right choices [Music] [Music] lord i ask for the spirit of grace to come across this room [Music] i ask you to encourage words right now in this room to touch them

by the spirit the more the more the more i see the more we seek you jesus the more we love you jesus still more [Music] Brother that we're [Music] what you see and what you said we don't want the dark [Music] your narrative let us know your heart holy spirit moving power across this room come and rest on hearts right now come by the fire of the holy [Music] what spirit say what do you see [Music] let us see when you look at them [Music] is [Music] is [Music] [Music] [Music] see what you see [Music]

just raise your hand everybody let's get around them just a little bit you can be in arm's distance and be behind him you feel more comfortable doing it that way we're here together as a family and jesus is present his spirit is here he's a healing the name of jesus lord i say extend your Hand to heal right now that physical ailment that injury what i pray for isaac and the surgery he had on his knee yesterday was late yesterday ask for healing right now pray for eric pray for different ones in our minds that

are right now their bodies are hurting in the name of jesus the fire of the holy spirit Release your power right now jehovah rapha i am the lord that healeth thee right now in this room and across this spiritual family the people at home listening to the internet that are sick in their body their family members are i speak grace [Music] in the name of jesus release healing power in jesus name release healing [Music] attack against bodies right now [Music] right now we ask for healing we pray for molly right now in her body that's

suffering but the glory of god head to toe touch [Music] here [Music] we say no to this virus we take authority over this disease that's Moving around the city [Music] we say no in the name of jesus the sickness that's raging [Music] no to injuries restore the leg restore the arm the body the back that's broken [Music] yes we believe you can do it we believe it lord we take authority Over nightmares people having disturbing disturbances in the night in their sleep in the name of jesus they speak east [Music] lord release the prophetic spirit

all over this community increase of dreams and visions to move in the spirit even tonight and tomorrow and the next day not tomorrow or tonight tonight we ask For healing power [Music] attack against him right now we cut off the enemy's assignment against him given through some of the dreams [Music] shield jesus him and his family right [Music] [Applause] [Music] now [Music] [Applause] [Music] is [Music] [Music] um [Music] [Music] you