How Do I Change?
00:00:00.000 | [Music]
00:00:05.000 | It seems not many people are happy with themselves.
00:00:08.000 | We all want to be thinner or stronger, taller or shorter, happier, healthier, smarter, you name it.
00:00:14.000 | There's a myriad of things we'd like to change about ourselves.
00:00:17.000 | The Christian life includes a process of change as well.
00:00:21.000 | Change away from our self-centeredness and towards God-centeredness.
00:00:24.000 | We call this process of change sanctification.
00:00:27.000 | The Gospel of Jesus Christ makes this change possible,
00:00:30.000 | but that doesn't mean our spiritual and moral growth comes easily for us.
00:00:34.000 | Especially when it comes to patterns of sin in our lives, change can be very hard.
00:00:39.000 | And one of the most important questions in our life then is this,
00:00:42.000 | "Where can I find the power for permanent change in my own life?"
00:00:46.000 | It's a question Pastor John addressed in one of his sermons on John 1, verses 14-16.
00:00:52.000 | The sermon is titled "The Life-Giving Voice of the Son of God," back from 2009.
00:00:57.000 | Here's a clip from that message.
00:00:59.000 | "The Word became flesh and dwelt among us.
00:01:04.000 | We have seen His glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father,
00:01:09.000 | full of grace and truth," verse 16,
00:01:12.000 | "and from His fullness we have all received grace upon grace."
00:01:18.000 | So John saw, heard, and touched the Word of God living, the Son of God.
00:01:28.000 | And he saw His glory.
00:01:30.000 | He saw that it was the glory of the only Son of God.
00:01:36.000 | He saw that glory radiant with, overflowing with grace and truth.
00:01:42.000 | And then he says in verse 16, "And we have received grace upon grace in seeing that."
00:01:49.000 | And so the way I understand it,
00:01:51.000 | when God grants us the eyes to see Jesus for who He really is, that is glorious,
00:01:57.000 | a beam of glory, light, spiritual recognition comes into our souls,
00:02:05.000 | and along that beam comes powerful grace.
00:02:11.000 | Grace upon grace.
00:02:13.000 | And that grace changes you in ways you don't even know need to be changed.
00:02:19.000 | Things will be wrought in this room tonight, today,
00:02:25.000 | that you can't predict and are totally designed for you by your hearing the Word
00:02:31.000 | and by hearing it see the glory of Christ.
00:02:36.000 | Because Paul said in 2 Corinthians 3.18, "Beholding the glory of the Lord,
00:02:44.000 | we are being changed from one degree of glory to the next."
00:02:50.000 | That's how people change.
00:02:53.000 | They see Him.
00:02:55.000 | So, there's the agenda in every sermon.
00:02:59.000 | Unfold some new glimpse of the glory of Christ.
00:03:04.000 | Say it as clearly and as faithfully to the text as I can.
00:03:09.000 | Call down the anointing of the Holy Spirit on me
00:03:12.000 | and the opening of the Holy Spirit for you.
00:03:14.000 | Have the light shine into your heart.
00:03:16.000 | Grace upon grace flows down the beam of that glory into your heart
00:03:20.000 | and the power of God's grace changes you in ways you don't even know that you need to be changed.
00:03:27.000 | Things are awakened.
00:03:29.000 | Possibilities of walking with God that you never thought you could experience,
00:03:34.000 | ways of relating to Him, leaning on Him, enjoying Him, being satisfied in Him, following Him,
00:03:40.000 | rise up in your hearts.
00:03:43.000 | I'm talking about a kind of faith that is an experience.
00:03:47.000 | It's not just knowledge in your head.
00:03:49.000 | It's like eating bread and drinking water, tasting honey.
00:03:55.000 | And the more you see of Christ for who He really is in His Word, by His Spirit,
00:04:00.000 | the more you taste Him, the more you savor Him, the more you know Him, the more you treasure Him,
00:04:05.000 | and it's these experiential dimensions of faith which change you.
00:04:09.000 | As long as you're just thinking thoughts about Him, you don't get changed.
00:04:13.000 | But when you start tasting the glory of those thoughts,
00:04:16.000 | when satisfaction in Christ lands on you, changes happen.
00:04:22.000 | Beautiful. That was an excerpt from the sermon titled "The Life-Giving Voice of the Son of God" from John Piper.
00:04:28.000 | It was preached on September 13th, 2009, and you can find the entire sermon at DesiringGod.org.
00:04:34.000 | Related to this, one of the very earliest episodes of this podcast series is titled "The Essential Warfare for Holiness."
00:04:42.000 | That was episode number 13, way back episode number 13, and you can find that in the archive.
00:04:47.000 | But how do I get to the podcast archives, you ask?
00:04:50.000 | Well, one of the easiest ways to find episode 13 and all of the now almost 400 other episodes
00:04:55.000 | is through the Ask Pastor John app for the Apple and Android devices.
00:04:59.000 | The Ask Pastor John app is free of charge to you.
00:05:01.000 | In the updated app for the iPhone, you can access the entire archive of episodes,
00:05:05.000 | and you will see a search bar at the top of the screen as well.
00:05:08.000 | From here, you can search all the titles.
00:05:10.000 | If you don't see these features in your app, make sure you update.
00:05:13.000 | We've already heard from users who have been at coffee shops with friends who have a question
00:05:18.000 | and have opened the app and searched and found and played an episode and listened together,
00:05:22.000 | which is very cool and very encouraging to us.
00:05:25.000 | On the Android side of things, up until now, Android users could only access the last eight episodes or so in the app,
00:05:32.000 | but our developers are putting the final touches on adding these new valuable features,
00:05:36.000 | the entire archive, and the valuable search function to the Android app.
00:05:41.000 | If you're an Android user, be sure to keep your eye out for the soon-to-come new release of the app
00:05:45.000 | to get all those features that make it really easy to search and browse every episode we have released in the past
00:05:50.000 | and all the episodes we plan to release ahead.
00:05:54.000 | Well, we will be back tomorrow to ask John Piper, "Should we expect to hear the verbal voice of God today?"
00:06:00.000 | Until then, I'm your host, Tony Reinke. Thanks for listening to the Ask Pastor John podcast.
00:06:04.000 | [ End ]
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