Reevaluating Habits: Strengthening Our Relationship with God
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It has taken this period of total pandemic lockdown for me to realize that I don't read the Bible and pray when I'm stressed out. I had never noticed that all I do is eat, sleep, and watch movies in my most stressful times. This is exactly what I did in the first two weeks of quarantine. I thought it would change, but after months, I still have found little time to commune with God. It's both scary, sad, and I'm really unhappy and tired. [00:00:22]
The least we can say is that your experience in the last two months has shown that you do not love and trust God the way you should. And my question is, why would I say that? Why is there a correlation between eating and sleeping and movie watching and saying you haven't trusted and loved God the way you should? That's my first question. [00:01:10]
Loving God means that God holds a place of value in our heart that it makes us want to know him better and enjoy him more and be near him in friendship and fellowship. Movies are not well designed to do that. In fact, most of them are well designed to hinder that and to undermine the very thing that the love of God implies, namely a passion to know him, a passion to enjoy him and be close to him. [00:02:39]
First John says love for God delights so much in pleasing God and being close to God that obedience to his commandments is not burdensome. And then he attributes that sense of burden-lifted enjoyment of God to the fact that we have overcome the world. In other words, that worldliness is not the dominant controlling force in our lives anymore. It has been broken, overcome. [00:03:57]
Faith receives God, receives all that God is for us in Christ, receives him as such a precious deliverance and help and treasure that the world loses its power to be the most attractive thing in our lives. So, love for God and faith in God are, in John's mind, overlapping or interlocking realities. Each one is part of the other. [00:04:36]
Repent now with great seriousness about the failures of the past. Name the sins and problems that you see. Tell the Lord how you feel about that. Renounce unbelief and lovelessness and disobedience and worldliness, and then make a decisive turn away from the past toward the future, the future of the next five minutes and five months and five years and five decades and five centuries. [00:07:29]
Be all the more diligent to confirm your calling and election, for if you practice these things, so he's talking about what to do right now and henceforth into the future, if you practice these things, you'll never fall. For in this way, there will be richly provided for you an entrance into the eternal kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. [00:08:11]
Assurance of salvation does not primarily come from the analysis of the past, but from the God-given earnestness of present and future faith and obedience. So my word to our young friend is, turn away from the failures of the past two months, turn away from speculations about whether your love and faith was ever real, turn to the Lord of mercy, Jesus Christ, and turn to the future. [00:08:58]
The problem with entertainment is not necessarily that our movies and our TV shows are inherently sinful or celebrate sin or show no consequences for sin. All of that is a problem, a big problem. But the most pervasive problem with entertainment is that it presents a worldview in which God is obsolete, and he's presented as irrelevant to our lives. [00:10:10]
Zero section on God, not one paragraph on God. I mean, the most important reality in the universe gets zero attention in the newspaper. Same would be true of most movies or, like you say, if he does get presented, it's presented in a way that does not inflame our love for him but questions his reality and his use. [00:10:47]
The confirmation that we are truly called and truly elect, truly the children of God, truly Christian happens. The confirmation happens by stepping into the future with faith and obedience. Assurance of salvation does not primarily come from the analysis of the past, but from the God-given earnestness of present and future faith and obedience. [00:08:53]
When this young woman indulges in the excitement of movies with more pleasure than she gets from the riches of God's word, John would say there is a defect here in love for God and in faith in God. That's my answer to the first question, why would we suggest a defect of faith and love if she's just spending all her time eating, sleeping, and watching movies? [00:06:06]
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The least we can say is that your experience in the last two months has shown that you do not love and trust God the way you should. And my question is, why would I say that? Why is there a correlation between eating and sleeping and movie watching and saying you haven't trusted and loved God the way you should? That's my first question. [00:01:10]
Loving God means that God holds a place of value in our heart that it makes us want to know him better and enjoy him more and be near him in friendship and fellowship. Movies are not well designed to do that. In fact, most of them are well designed to hinder that and to undermine the very thing that the love of God implies, namely a passion to know him, a passion to enjoy him and be close to him. [00:02:39]
First John says love for God delights so much in pleasing God and being close to God that obedience to his commandments is not burdensome. And then he attributes that sense of burden-lifted enjoyment of God to the fact that we have overcome the world. In other words, that worldliness is not the dominant controlling force in our lives anymore. It has been broken, overcome. [00:03:57]
Faith receives God, receives all that God is for us in Christ, receives him as such a precious deliverance and help and treasure that the world loses its power to be the most attractive thing in our lives. So, love for God and faith in God are, in John's mind, overlapping or interlocking realities. Each one is part of the other. [00:04:36]
Repent now with great seriousness about the failures of the past. Name the sins and problems that you see. Tell the Lord how you feel about that. Renounce unbelief and lovelessness and disobedience and worldliness, and then make a decisive turn away from the past toward the future, the future of the next five minutes and five months and five years and five decades and five centuries. [00:07:29]
Be all the more diligent to confirm your calling and election, for if you practice these things, so he's talking about what to do right now and henceforth into the future, if you practice these things, you'll never fall. For in this way, there will be richly provided for you an entrance into the eternal kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. [00:08:11]
Assurance of salvation does not primarily come from the analysis of the past, but from the God-given earnestness of present and future faith and obedience. So my word to our young friend is, turn away from the failures of the past two months, turn away from speculations about whether your love and faith was ever real, turn to the Lord of mercy, Jesus Christ, and turn to the future. [00:08:58]
The problem with entertainment is not necessarily that our movies and our TV shows are inherently sinful or celebrate sin or show no consequences for sin. All of that is a problem, a big problem. But the most pervasive problem with entertainment is that it presents a worldview in which God is obsolete, and he's presented as irrelevant to our lives. [00:10:10]
Zero section on God, not one paragraph on God. I mean, the most important reality in the universe gets zero attention in the newspaper. Same would be true of most movies or, like you say, if he does get presented, it's presented in a way that does not inflame our love for him but questions his reality and his use. [00:10:47]
The confirmation that we are truly called and truly elect, truly the children of God, truly Christian happens. The confirmation happens by stepping into the future with faith and obedience. Assurance of salvation does not primarily come from the analysis of the past, but from the God-given earnestness of present and future faith and obedience. [00:08:53]
When this young woman indulges in the excitement of movies with more pleasure than she gets from the riches of God's word, John would say there is a defect here in love for God and in faith in God. That's my answer to the first question, why would we suggest a defect of faith and love if she's just spending all her time eating, sleeping, and watching movies? [00:06:06]
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