You In Christ and Christ in You
Mike Doyle · Oct 11, 2009
You in Christ & Christ in You, No. 41
Holly Hills Bible Church
https://hollyhillsbiblechurch.org/teaching/messages/4926144531890

Transcribed from the recording by SermonAudio, so expect the occasional misheard word.

Although we started into this lesson 27 last week, I'm going to start from the beginning. Those of you who did your homework, did you figure out the pattern I'm after? Joanne says she didn't. The rest of you do your homework. You get here early and do it. I know. OK. So what I did was I gave you a list of verses. I wanted you to look them over and then see if you couldn't pick up in there kind of a pattern of what actually several authors in the Word of God are after.

And the first one is 2 Corinthians 3.18 which is, but we all with unveiled face Beholding as an emir, the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as from the Lord the Spirit. And I think to do this verse right, you have to take the pieces out of it. The first one would be with unveiled face.

If you go back to Exodus 34, you'll find, and you don't have to go there, you'll find that there is discussions in there about Moses being up on the mountain with the Lord, receiving the Mosaic Covenant. And he would come down from there, and his face would be aglow. And he put a veil on his face. When Moses had finished speaking with them, he put the veil over his face. And whenever Moses went in before the Lord to speak to him, he would take off the veil until he came out. And whenever he came out and spoke to the sons of Israel, what he had been commanded, the sons of Israel would see the face of Moses, that the skin of Moses' face shone. So Moses would replace the veil over his face until he went in to speak.

So what caused Moses' face to shine? He went to one of those tanning places. What caused his face to shine? Maybe because he beheld the glory of God. There you go. So he's hanging out with the Lord for an extended period of time. And so his face starts to glow. Why did he put the veil on? He didn't want the people to see his dimension. That's one of the reasons that you hear all the time is that Moses knew that his face shone, but because after a while when he wasn't going to see the Lord anymore, the shine would begin to dissipate and he didn't want the people to see it.

I don't think that's the reason. Weren't they afraid? Who was afraid? The Jewish people. And why would they be? What's that? Yeah. Now think about this. If Moses comes out and he has spent time with God, and there's a reflection of who God is in his countenance, his face, would it not intimidate sinners? Yeah.

And so that's, I think, the reason that the veil was there. because they could not stand the judgment of God because they were sinners. So when our verse says, but we now with unveiled face, is there a transformation, is there a difference between Moses and you and me? What's the difference? Are you different or is God different? No, God is not different. He's not different, so then we are. We have to be. Okay, so to bring this together, if you take a look, drop down to the second group of verses I gave you, Isaiah, and watch this.

And then I said, Woe is me, for I am ruined. Because this sounds like conservatives in 2009. I am a man of unclean lips and I live among people of unclean lips. For my eyes have seen the kings and the lord of hosts. And one of the seraphim flew unto me a burning coal in his hand, which he had taken from the altar with thongs. He touched my mouth with it and said, Behold, this has touched your lips and your iniquity is taken away and your sins are forgiven. Now, what I'm after here is I want us to understand that Isaiah, in this particular passage, has a different has a different response to being in the glory of the Lord.

And what happens is that he says that I'm a man of unclean lips. In other words, I'm a sinner. And I'm really intimidated by being in your presence. I'm shrinking from it because I'm a sinner. And God does this thing with the coal and says to him, your sins have been forgiven so you can cool.

What's the difference between Isaiah and the believer in 2 Corinthians 3.18? First of all, not like Isaiah, you and I would not shrink from the glory. We wouldn't back away from it. Why not?

Second Thessalonians 2.14 unto which he called you by our gospel to the obtaining of the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ. See, the believer has been made fit for the glory. You belong there. Now, we talk a lot about position and condition. We have been recreated in Christ specifically for that glory. We belong there.

Isaiah didn't and neither did Moses and neither did obviously the Israelis. So the believer can go in now to the holiest of all holies and with unveiled face he gets to gaze on the Lord's glory. He can do that without shrinking away. And all the qualities of God's nature are in the Lord Jesus Christ. And I can look at him, I have come into God's presence and holy of holies and what do I find? I find that I belong there. I do not react like Isaiah reacted. I don't view myself as not worthy to be there.

You can take the example of the Apostle John in the book of Revelation when he gets to see the things in heaven and he sees angels and stuff and he keeps hitting the floor because he's awed by what he sees. But they keep telling him, hey you belong here, get up on your feet, this is your home, you belong here, the glory is what you're about, you've been suited out to be in the presence of glory.

Well, not only Christ hadn't died, but we hadn't been included in his death, burial and resurrection. Now, I'm not only looking at the Lord Jesus, but I'm also looking at his glory. So, what would you say his glory is? What would you say that glory is?

It's a reflection of God's attributes, radiating or manifesting. I wrote this down, it's an expression of the divine satisfaction in Christ according to God's nature. The sum total of God's intrinsic attributes are displayed in Christ. But we have an unveiled face, But then there's that little phrase in there, as in a mirror. What does that mean? As in the mirror. What's the mirror? It's the word of God. So now we see dimly, but then face to face.

OK, so there are those that will say, well, I'm the one. like Moses that reflects the glory of the Lord, that's true, but this verse I think talks about my beholding the glory of the Lord with unveiled face in a mirror image, looking in the mirror you see it, you don't see him face to face.

So it points up the absolute necessity of spending time in the Word of God for that purpose, not so that you can become theologians. I mentioned Matt Lepsis. I'd love to call him up and say, why don't you leave Dallas Seminary and just open up your Bible and behold the glory of the Lord. He'll do you more good. But you know, I was going to ask you about that. You were laughing before.

What is it about Dallas Seminary that I'm not aware of? Dallas Seminary was founded by Louis Ferry Chafer, His ministry for years was he traveled around the country into various cities and when he came, like he'd come to Denver for a month and those who were pastors or would-be pastors would meet with him and he would run them through seminars and teach them dispensational theology and doctrine. And then at some point in time he decided, well rather than me go to them, they need to come to me because there's a lot of them. and he founded a school in Dallas, a seminary, and basically what they originally taught was Schaeffer's Systematic Theology. That's what they taught.

If you've ever seen it, it's eight volumes and it's really solid material. Well, what's happened over the years is they've gotten away from Schaeffer, gotten away from the Apostle Paul, and have instituted what I would call neo-dispensationalism, which is really a move away from grace to covenant theology. That's really what's going on there. And that's why you can't recommend them anymore.

They got so bad that seven or eight years ago they, what was this guy's name, that they brought him in as president. Chuck Swindoll. He rides up the main boulevard in his Harley. And Chuck Swindoll is a psychodabbler and throws in a little bit of theology. He's a great speaker, but his theology is terrible.

So he's the president of Dallas Seminary. Well, 25 years ago they wouldn't have let him on the ground. And I've met lots of old Dallas grads who won't even go back to their school anymore because it's so They've gotten away from solid doctrine, so that's the problem with it.

Do you know who the president is now? No. Is it still Chuck Swindoll? It's not Swindoll, it's somebody else. As a matter of fact, I think they've had two since then. But John Wolbert and some of those other guys stayed there and taught there. I don't know why the Lord doesn't maintain places like that, but he doesn't.

So, we know what the mirror is, we know what the glory is, the next thing is that all of this has an effect on the one who's doing it. What's the effect? The effect is that you get to be transformed. You're changed, you're altered, you're entirely transformed. Into what? What do you get transformed? You get to be a Dallas graduate. What's this transforming thing? Into what? From something to something. You become God. What happens to you? What's the effect on you? What's the transforming? Where do you go? To change. To what? To what? To pay me.

Are we a new creation? See positionally we are new creatures in Christ. And what this verse talks about is a condition of the believer as he grows. And as he beholds the glory of the Lord, he is transformed into the exact same image of Christ. Now notice it says from glory to glory.

It doesn't say from carnality to spirituality. It says from glory to glory. Why that? Why doesn't it say from... I get transformed from being a dirty rotten sinner to being a pretty good Christian. Or I get transformed from carnality to spirituality. It doesn't say that. It says from glory to glory.

Why that? When we speak of His glory, are we really speaking of His attributes? The, I don't know, purity or whatever of His attributes and we are changed little by little into manifesting more of the same attributes? That's right. That's exactly what's happening. That is exactly what's happening. So that you're becoming, on a practical basis, on a conditional level, exactly like Christ.

I was reading Ernest Shaffer's book on transfiguration. He makes a distinction between transformation and transfiguration. And the word in this verse 318 is really transfiguration. And he says the believer is subject to transfiguration and not mere transformation which is from outside. The divine presence within is as a light and this is to have its normal outshining and will work great change within the heart where that nature dwells.

Now does everybody understand what she just said? Because that's really an important point. You and I have been positioned in Christ and we have the very life of the resurrected Christ in us. Glorified life. Right? In the Mount of Transfiguration, what happened to Christ? The glory that was hidden in him began to show out through him. The transforming, in this verse, which is the same word, metamorphous word, the glory that's hidden in you starts to come out. You've already got it. It's already there.

It won't come out because you've obeyed a bunch of rules. It won't come out because you've been to Dallas Seminary. It won't come out because you came to church. It comes out only one way, and that's by beholding the glory of the Lord. That's the only way.

And so what happens? It's the life of the Lord Jesus, and all of His glory manifested through you, your person. And so when that's happening, let's say Steve is sitting there and here comes the glory out of him. What's going on behind his eyeballs? What's he doing? That's what he's doing. He's beholding the glory of the Lord. The minute he takes his eyes off the Lord to check how the glory is going, it's gone. Lights off. You see that?

It's a huge privilege that we have as believers. Okay, once you have it, it doesn't leave you, right? I mean... Well, once you have the life already, right? The issue is to get the life to come out. To manifest the life of the Lord Jesus, His glory in your life, through you. So what's in you has to shine out of you. Yeah. Felt by your actions. Asking? No, actions. No, it's not. No? What is it? It's by Beholden. So let's talk about the word Beholden.

Donna went down on Thursday to see the play Wicked. Says it was really good. And it's a musical based on the witches of Wizard of Oz. She said it with the actors and the actresses and the singing was just spectacular. But it wasn't spiritual. So I'm imagining Donna and her sisters sitting there totally entranced with this play. The music is wonderful. and projecting themselves into the roles of the characters. Remember I mentioned how my brother used to do that last week when we went to the movies.

The bad guy would sneak up on the good guy and yell out in the theater, look out! That's beholding. The Spirit of God has been sent to reveal Christ to the believer. The revealing of Christ to the believer is best described in 2 Corinthians 3.18. That's what it's about. We behold as in a mirror the glory of the Lord. And the Spirit of God is doing it all. And what happens is that there's a transfiguring power, which is the Holy Spirit himself, that conforms you, transforms you, to the very image of Christ. Now, what I'm finding, whenever I talk about this, I find that believers don't buy it. They think that this is a bunch of pious platitudes. Because they don't know what it is.

At the same time, without understanding what beholding the glory of the Lord is, you're not going to grow spiritually. Because it is the verse that explains spiritual growth. Isn't it? How do you grow spiritually? Most people say, well, you know, I've got some tough times in my life, I grew. The tough times don't make you grow. They might get you ready for growth, but they don't make you grow. Beholding makes you grow. You see that?

Because spiritual growth is a transformation into the image of Christ. That's what growth is. You said earlier that we receive the glory, the attributes, the life of Christ and salvation in a miraculous way, of course. So if I'm being transformed and it's shining out of my eyes like you were talking about. Or your ears or whatever. Conditional. Positional we already have all of Christ, including all of his glory. So when I take my eyes off him to figure out how much glory am I showing, then...

You get the glory of self. The conditional isn't there. That's right. That's exactly right. And it appears like when you say something like that that I'm going to walk around with my head in the clouds all day. No. No. Beholding the glory of the Lord is something that the Lord Jesus was able to do even when he was here. He beheld the glory of his Father. What does it mean to show His glory? Just by your life? By the way you live? Sure. All of that. And what does that look like? Okay. That's what the rest of the class is going to be about. What that looks like. The transforming issue is like this. I'm going to sneeze, I think.

We are brought into the holiest, and Hebrews encourages us to boldly enter in by the blood of Christ. And when you go in by faith, sin doesn't go with you, because it can't be in there. And that's what qualifies you to behold. There's no sin there. 2 Corinthians 4.6, for God who said, A light shine out of darkness is the one who has shone in our hearts, now listen to this, to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God, where is it? In the face of Jesus Christ. The light of the knowledge of the glory of God is in the face of Jesus Christ. So, you remember when Moses said to the Lord, I want to see your glory. And this is after he'd been there a while. And the Lord said, well you can't see my glory because if you do, you'll die. How come? How come Moses would die if he couldn't look God in the face? Why not? Because of his old self. Sin can't come in contact with the glory of God and survive.

So God said, well I'm going to slide you into the cleft of the rock. My glory is going to pass by and you can peek. as it goes by at the back end. But this verse says, that I can behold him as in a mirror, and that the glory of God is in the face of Jesus Christ, and I can look right at him. And the reason is, is because I have been changed intrinsically. I'm different.

So whenever you get some covenant guy that says that what you really are is an extension of Israel and Moses, bring them to this verse and say, Moses never knew about this, he couldn't do this, but I can do it. So, how do you enter into understanding this verse? In other words, you read the verse and you look at it and you say, oh my goodness, what do I do with that? What do you do with it? You read God's word and you read this verse and you say, what do I do with this verse? What do you do with it?

Huh? You believe it. Or maybe I've got a better word for you. Try it. Try it. In other words, the next time you open up your Bible, go in there with this attitude. and not the attitude you had the last time you went in your Bible. You went in last time because you had to look up the verses I gave you and answer the questions. This time you're going in to behold the glory of the Lord. Try it. Guess what? It'll happen. If you try it, you have to prove it for yourself. Don't you? You can't take my word for it. You can't even take God's word for it. You've got to try it.

It's like grace. What do you do with grace? When grace comes at you, what do you do with it? You take it. You just take it. That's the same thing here. Try it. As an example, if I had a headache and you said to me, you know what, if you'll take a couple of aspirin, your headache will go away. And I say, hmm, I'm not, I'm not. And I never take them. Guess what? I still have the headache.

But if I try it, What I'm saying to you is that God lays this out for you. And by faith, go for it. Don't hold back. Go into the Word of God and open it up with the whole understanding that I'm here to behold the glory of the Lord and I'm dependent on the Spirit of God to do it. Because He said He was going to. What have you said to God? I believe you.

When that happens, you're going to get transformed, transfigured. I put a couple of things in. In beholding the glory of the Lord, we have come to a spot where the flesh can't be. In other words, beholding the glory of the Lord, your sin nature is held in the place of inactivity. It doesn't get to contribute, which is a really cool thing.

So my question is, have you ever been there? And would you like to taste the blessedness of what we're talking about? Would you? You've got to want to do it. It's kind of scary, but you've got to want to do it. And you've got to want to go there. And it makes all the difference in the world.

Because how many of you read The Hungry Hearts? Did you read the one this morning? It's very interesting. I'm paraphrasing the last paragraph that had to do with you can be doctrinally correct, you can have all of the information, but if you don't know Christ, your whole experience will be cold. The thing that makes you real is intimacy with Christ. Okay, any questions?

We've already kind of gone over Isaiah 6. I'll read the contrast between 3.18 and Isaiah 6. It's clear that the glory of the throne, that there is an effect that it has on the person there, but now the glory makes, now watch the difference, the glory makes me correspond to it or match up to it. It's not simply that I'm free and that there's no charge against me anymore, but I'm made to correspond to the glory of the one who has cleared me.

You see the difference there? And I've got a couple of more Old Testament passages that will show that. Not only in the presence of the Lord are you cleared and you realize you belong there, but that glory, you find out that you're fit to be there. Do you see what I mean by that? That you belong there. And that you are going to be, conditionally, just like the one who has cleared you.

Three things result from the glorified Christ by the work of the Spirit. The first one is the Holy Spirit has come down from heaven from the glorified man for what purpose? To connect me with him where he is. It's the Spirit's job to do that. The place where Christ is and has been exalted by God, he is a man. So in the Holy of Holies, in the glory of God today, is a human being. And the glory of God radiates out of him. Now I'm not physically present there like how Malloy is, but the Spirit of God has been sent to make the connection between me and the glory.

The second point is, there is a righteousness ministered from the glory. Now, righteousness is an interesting word, and we had a chat about it last night. What did you read last night that I thought was really spectacular about righteousness? It was Adam Newell's, and it was a statement in there that righteousness was a term that required others.

It's a term of relationship, that God demonstrates his righteousness to others, so there has to be a relationship, whereas holiness, God is holy in and of himself, whether there are others around or not, remains the same, and that was the differentiation between righteousness and holiness. So if there was no other creatures, God wouldn't be righteous because there wouldn't be any need for a relationship.

See that? But he is holy, because that's one of his attributes. So righteousness is a word of relationship. Now, the righteousness of God is demonstrated from the Holy of Holies by this process of manifesting the glory. In other words, it not only clears me from sin and self, that we have that, but the righteousness is ministered from the glory. a righteousness that suits the glory. Now let's talk about that for a minute.

Because God is holy, intrinsic, in and of himself, when sin entered into his creation, it was an intolerable situation because God was holy. He could not tolerate sin. He had to do something about it. It appears like, in the Old Testament, that he sort of covered it up and didn't really take care of it even though he covered over the Jews' sins.

But the cross of Christ demonstrates the holiness and righteousness of God. How does it do that? Because it proves without a shadow of a doubt that the death of Christ was demanded because of sin, because of the holiness of God. You see that? The cross of Christ demonstrates the righteous character of God. You alright with that? The cross of Christ demonstrates the righteous character of God. Because sin could not have been dealt with in any other way. Any other way. It has to be put away through death. It has to be put out of God's sphere.

The fact that we can enter into the glory by the Spirit of God and His work, shows that His righteousness has been satisfied. Because if it wasn't, we aren't going. And the third one is, beholding the glory of the Lord with unveiled face, it's the light of the knowledge of the glory of God. Every ray of divine glory rests on the blessed Lord Jesus. What God has done through the cross and through the work of the Holy Spirit has literally given every single saint, through the work of the Holy Spirit, the privilege of being with him where he is and to behold all of his glory. Even before you leave the planet. That's the cool thing. That all starts now. His love can now come out because his righteousness has been established by Christ's work on the cross.

Now, the third verse, Romans 12.1. Every once in a while, when you're getting ready for a class, you stick a verse in there and you go back to it later and you wonder why you did it. This is one of those times. I had figured out why I did it, I just put it in the wrong place, so we'll cover it later. Now, Psalms and some of the rest of this are going to be examples of what we've been talking about.

Psalm 73. And what I'd like to do, because it's interesting, I'd like to read the whole thing so that you can pick up the character. Verse 1 through 17. Surely God is good to Israel, to those who are put in heart. And by the way, this is the passage that has to do with if you're a conservative in today's society.

But as for me, my feet came close to stumbling, my steps had almost slipped. For I was envious of the arrogant as I saw the prosperity of the wicked. For there are no pains in their death, and their body is fat. They are not in trouble as other men, nor are they plagued like mankind. Therefore pride is their necklace. The garment of violence covers them. Their eye bulges from fatness. The imaginations of their heart run riot. They mock and wickedly speak of oppression.

They speak from on high. They have set their mouths against the heavens, and their tongue parades through the earth. Therefore his people return to this place, and waters of abundance are drunk by them. They say, How does God know? Is their knowledge with the Most High? Behold, these are the wicked and always at ease, and they have increased in wealth.

Surely in vain I have kept my heart pure and washed my hands in innocence, for I have been stricken all day long and chastened every morning. If I had said I will speak thus, behold, I would have betrayed the generation of your children. to understand this, it was troublesome in my sight. Is that not a testimony of a believer walking around on the earth today? Now what's the next line? Until I came into the sanctuary, then I perceived their end. Now, can you see the effect of being in the presence of the Lord has on an Old Testament believer?

What's the effect? Here he is complaining. whining crying about what a terrible world he lives in and how everybody around him seems to get all the breaks and all the evil people are all the rich ones and they mock God and they they pass health care cap and trade and all of this other stuff, and there's taking all the money from me and giving it to those bums that don't deserve it. Right?

Until what happens? It's very interesting. Until I came into the Sanctuary of God. And then what happened? What was the effect? When he came into the Sanctuary of God, what happened to him? Then I perceive their end. So what happened by doing that? What happened to his viewpoint? It got totally changed. Why? Because he stopped looking at things from the world's viewpoint and went into God's sanctuary and looked at them from God's perspective.

Threw the paper away. I live in the news. When you buy the Denver Post, what are you buying? I don't need them. When you turn on the news at 10 o'clock, what are you watching? You're watching death. You're watching what happened in the world today. You're watching this.

But shouldn't you be aware? I mean, I'm aware and it's just so sad. Let's say you weren't aware. Would it change your life? Well, I mean, how would I vote? You'd have to know something. Well, take your pick between these two guys. They're both evil. Take your pick. But the viewpoint, it would be that God has everything under control. I mean, that's really where your arrest comes from. See, that's the point.

What the psalmist is writing here is that the psalmist was viewing everything as it related to him. He had not considered how it related to God. But when he goes into the sanctuary, he now begins to perceive things as they relate to God. When you and I enter into the Holy of Holies and behold the glory of the Lord Jesus, your perspective changes. You do not look at it as the Denver Post looks at it anymore. or the press or the media or anything like that. You do not look at it from that perspective because now you see it from God's perspective.

And I don't know what part that is of the temple, but he saw a lot of slaughter and things, because remember they're doing all the sacrifices. So maybe, I don't know what's happening. Well, his perception had changed. In other words, when he's talking about this, he's seeing the success of all of the evil. And when he went into God's sanctuary, he saw their end. He saw that they weren't going to get by with this forever, because God was going to intervene.

When you're in the sanctuary or you're beholding the glory of the Lord, you're occupied with everything as it relates to God, not as it relates to you anymore. In the sanctuary, the psalmist's judgment was changed. I think every believer knows what that sentence means. How many times have you ever had an attitude or a viewpoint about something and then you went to the Lord about it and your mind got changed just because you went to Him about it, right? You're angry about something, you go to Him and it's gone because you see it differently now.

In the sanctuary I'm not looking for help as much as I'm looking for the effect of His companionship If I go there looking for help, that's okay. But as you're there, His companionship will become the primary thing. We know that His grace presents Himself to us and we know the practical effect of it. We know, we learn, that being in the presence of the Lord has a profound effect on us. Right? Or not?

The next one is Philippians 4.6. Paul says, Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving, make your requests known to God. So, in the previous one, the psalmist went into the sanctuary and got his mind changed. What about Paul?

When you go to the Lord with prayer and supplication and make your request known, where do you go? Where do you go and talk to Him about it? Anywhere. No. Where do you go? Into the Bible. Where is He? Where is the Lord Jesus Christ? In your heart. Where? He's in glory, right? He's in the glory. And what's the Holy Spirit's job? For you to behold His glory. as in the mirror, right?

So when you go in to pray about something, you have to understand that you're going into the glory of God. That's where you make your requests. That's where you talk about it. And you're right, He's with you wherever you are, but you're going to Him. You understand that? And when you go to Him, you've got to know where He is. He's not in Westminster. He's in the glory. And the Spirit of God will will open up your understanding about beholding His glory and that's where you make your request. Okay? You alright with that?

Am I qualified to go there? Do I belong there? Do I have to clean up before I go? Nope. I belong there. So I can go in there and all the effects and blessings associated with being in His presence I get. Why? Because I'm already qualified to be there. He made me qualified. My position in Christ makes me qualified to be there.

I don't have to go through, in the Old Testament you read about the high priest going into the Holy of Holies, he's got to do all those washings and put on the clothes, you don't have to do any of that. You're already qualified. The transforming The process of the Spirit is what qualifies you conditionally. The more you go to the Lord about situations, the more transformed you are and the more ready you are to go the next time.

Now let me ask you a question. In this verse, I'm to make all my requests known to God. So what? I make them known. What is He going to give me? I want the Republicans to win next time. Okay, Mike. No problem. I'll take care of it. What's going to happen there? I go in and I make my request known. What's the rest of the verse say? It's not in your page. You've got to actually look it up in the Bible. What's the rest of the verse say? What's he say he's going to give me? He's going to give me the peace that passes understanding. Wow. So there's two things that happen.

By my going to him, I'm affected by where I am. So whatever the big deal was when I went in there isn't such a big deal from my perspective anymore. Because now I'm looking at it from his perspective. And oh by the way, I have been to him about it. And he's the God of the universe and I have seen his glory. You think I'm quieted in my heart about whatever the circumstance is? Absolutely I am. He's changed my mind. He's changed your mind but God already knows what you were going to say before you say it. And that's fine. It's fine that he already knows.

The problem is I don't know. And that's why I went there. I trust God that he knows everything. The problem is I'm the dummy. I don't know what's going on. I got a viewpoint. It isn't helping me. I need to go to him and talk to him about it. You see? It's just the fact that I went to him that matters.

Another example of that, probably won't get through it, 2 Corinthians 12, 7-9. Because of the surpassing greatness of the revelation, for this reason, to keep me from exalting myself, there was given to me a thorn in the flesh, a messenger of Satan, to torment me, to keep me from exalting myself.

Concerning this, I implored the Lord three times that it might lead me. So with prayer and supplication, he went to the Lord three times about this thorn in the flesh. And he said to me, My grace is sufficient for you, for power is perfected in weakness. Most gladly, therefore, I would rather boast about my weakness so that the power of Christ may dwell in me.

Why do you think the Lord allows this thorn in the flesh, especially right after his return from the third heaven? This thorn in the flesh, whose idea was it? It was God's idea. It wasn't Satan's idea. Satan was used of God. So why does he say the thorn in the flesh is there? Why is it there? So that it reminds you of him? No. Why does he say? What's the verse say?

To keep me from exalting myself. To stay humble. That's why it's there. Gee whiz, I didn't want it. I mean, I'm complaining about it and I go to the Lord about it and I say, you know, can't we do something? But it's there for a specific purpose. The point, with this last point then we'll quit, is that the three trips by Paul to the Lord about this changes Paul's mind about it. You see that? The fact that he's in the presence of the Lord, discussing his situation, beholding his glory, what happens? He gets transformed. To what? To the very mind of Christ, about the circumstance. That's the whole point.

As we go forward with this, we'll use more and more examples, and that's what they're about. That's why it's so important for us to understand that God desires our company. He wants us with Him. He wants us now beholding His glory in fellowship with Him on a constant basis. It's all over the New Testament if you just look for it. There it is.

Does 1 John 1.9 come into play at all? Confess your sins?

1 John 1.9 is a remedy that God put in place to restore you to fellowship. entering into the Holy of Holies, it's not a prerequisite that you confess your sins.

Because otherwise you've made a, well, I can't go in until I clean up my act. Well, positionally I'm already clean, so I can just go in. And sometimes I go in and talk to them about my sins. My sinfulness, I can't, this sin is dogging me, I can't deal with it. Well, you go back out and confess it and then come back in and see me. No. That's close. Dear Father, how we thank you for your grace. and the privilege you give us, that we would behold the glory of your son. Father, we thank you, we pray in his precious name. Amen.