I don’t believe love is just doing the right thing. I don’t believe love is just keeping commandments and I don’t believe love is just being patient and kind and … that’s what love looks like when it walks and talks but that’s not love. Love is passion. Let me ask you a question, “Do You Have A Passion For God?”, “Do You Desire Him?”, “Do You Long For Him?”
Yes, we all go through times in which our hearts are dull. Yes, we go through times when we need to be encouraged.
Yes, we all go through times when our eyes are mesmerized by things they should not be.
Yes, we all struggle in that but if someone would look at your life would they say, “This person has a passion, not for ministry, not for missions, not for evangelism, but for God.” The sign of a genuine work of God in the heart is that you began to hate the sin you once loved and to love the righteousness you once ignored. The question is not, “Do you agree with that?”, or “Are you challenged?” The question is, “Is that a reality in your life?” Is it, young lady, young man, elderly woman, elderly man, middle age man in the prime of life? Is it a reality in your life? Are you continuing to grow in your hatred of sin and your love for righteousness? That’s the question.
So it’s not a question, “Do you want to do the right thing?” or “Do you want to be moral?” or “Do you want to have a good life?” It is this, “Do you desire Him?”
I hate preaching that goes something like this, “You know you got a wonderful life there, yuppie. You got a really nice house, a really nice job and you got a really beautiful wife and you got 1.2-5 children. And you got three cars, and Subaru’s and Suburbans and you just have a great job. You got a great life. Everything fits perfectly in place. You just lack one thing: you lack Jesus.” That is the most disgusting thing that you could ever say.
What would be more appropriate to say is “Sir, your life is nothing. It has no value at all apart from Jesus Christ.” He is not some little accessory that a yuppie puts on top of his life as though it were cherry on top of ice cream. You have Jesus and Jesus has you or you are barren and wasted and lost. So it’s not a question of “Do you want a better life?”, “Do you want to go to heaven?”, “Do you want to fix your marriage?”, “Do you want all these things? No. Do you want God? Do you desire Him?
Everyone knows they are a sinner, they just don’t realize how heinous and terrible that is, nor do they want to let go of the very thing that they choose to drink down as though it were water. You see the question is not, “Do you recognize you are a sinner?” The question is, “Sir, as I was speaking to you, or maybe it’s long term discipleship over a period of time. Sir as I was sharing with you and discipling you, “What has God done to your heart?”
People come to me all the time, “I have a new relationship with God” But I say, “Do you have a new relationship with sin because if you do not have a new relationship with sin, you don’t have a relationship with God.”
Has God done such a supernatural work in your heart through the Holy Spirit that although prior to that you lived a life of ignoring God; of hating God. You now see Him as esteemed above all things and you desire Him above all things.
God is infinite. Heaven will be an infinite chase, an infinite tracking down of the glories of God. But most don’t want that even most who attend evangelical churches don’t really want that and I can prove it: they don’t want it now. If you don’t want it now, you won’t want it then because eternal life doesn’t begin with dying and going to heaven. He says in John 17:3 that this is eternal life that they may know You. Know You and that begins the moment He regenerates your heart and reveals to you…
This place ought to be a contradiction. First Baptist Church of Muscle Shoals ought to be a contradiction in every sense of the term. Our theology should be high and even it should be called academic into some degree. People should think that the only thing we think about is theology and truth and yet, when the worship leader gets up here this place ought to go wild!
Do you desire Him?