GYC 2009: unASHAMED

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Generation. Youth. Christ. (GYC)

Ron Clouzet: The Greatest Thing in the World

Ron Clouzet

The Greatest Mystery in the World:  God’s Nature

Father in heaven, we're grateful for the opportunity to be here in GYC this year.

We're grateful for the opportunity to study the Word of God.

And Lord Jesus, based on your loving kindness to us and based on our great, great need for you.

I pray that you may speak to us through a text, through an insight, through a comment, through a story, that you may speak to us in a way that we can understand.

We do not seek to understand everything that is being said.

And somehow a small vignette of who you are may flood the room of our mind completely and absolutely.

And so we pray for that according to your loving kindness and according to your promises in Jesus name, Amen.

I read a story that maybe some of you have heard or have read about a woman who in the middle of the night was driving her small vehicle going home after a long day of work and quite suddenly a big truck moved up right behind her, almost to her bumper and then put his bright lights on.

And she thought, well, you know, how annoying that is.

And then he would not let go so she she accelerated and the more she accelerated the big truck would accelerate behind her and So you can imagine that woman starting to get nervous after a few minutes saying, what's this guy after?

Big rig right behind me, not letting me go.

I think that most of you ladies, if something like that happened to you, you would start, you know, dialing somebody and saying, help.

Eventually, she decided the best way to get rid of that truck was to move away from that highway, exit that, go to a parking lot or go to some place where it would be lit, and stop and see if he would go on.

And as soon as she stopped to her great horror, the man jumped out of the truck, ran to her car, and before she could lock her door, opened the back door of her car, and pulled a man that was hiding behind her.

And then she understood why he was following her.

It was to protect her, to save her from a danger she was not aware of.

That is pretty much what God is doing with our lives.

In many times we do not understand His motives.

Psalm 139 verse 7 and 8 says, Where can I go from your spirit?

If I make my bed in Sheol, the grave, behold, you are there." God is often misunderstood and he takes a lot of nonsense from us.

In John 1 verse 10 and 11, he was in the world and the world was made through him and the world did not know him.

He came to his own and those who were his own did not receive him.

Imagine if my wife and I after raising 3 children, we have 3 children in college, okay, And we love him more than anybody else we know.

Imagine if we go to their home 1 day and they don't want to receive it.

Says you know I don't want you to live with me or I want you I don't want you to visit I don't want I don't want to see you anymore.

You know it would be heartbreaking enough wouldn't it?

The people you have invested the most on, the people you would give your life for, are the ones that are saying, no thanks.

That is what happens by the millions every single day with God, in spite of what He has done for us.

Many ran away from God simply because they do not know His intentions just like that woman did not know the truckers intentions.

They believe in their circumstances what they're able to see more than they believe in God's promises, what they're unable to see.

And that's why it is so critical for us to be in contact with the Word of God.

That is why it's so critical for us to read it, to meditate on it.

You know the Bible was not designed for us to just read it, you know that right?

The Bible was not designed simply to study it.

The Bible was designed for us to meditate on it.

In other words to bathe our minds with the words.

Because the words of the Bible are so simple and yet so profound that sometimes it would take several weeks of going over the same material until 1 day you wake up and say, oh that's what you mean by this God, huh?

Because it needs to pierce through that thick dark veneer of that sinful nature we talked about in the previous session.

Look at Romans 8 verse 28 and 9 we know that God works all things to work together for those who love God, to those who are called according to his purpose.

All things will work together for those who love God.

I would encourage you to write down these texts and to go back and reflect on them when you have some time alone with God.

145 verse 3, Great is the Lord, highly to be praised, and his greatness is unsearchable.

So the scope of what God is like cannot be contained, alright?

There's only so much you can understand, so far you can go with that.

Job 11 verse 7, can you discover the depths of God?

Can you discover the limits of the Almighty?

Obviously this is phrased to expect a no, you know, Obviously you can't.

I can't discover the limits of the Almighty.

I spent some time a few months ago Looking at everything the Bible says when it began with the expression, God is.

And this is the distillation of that study.

This is the principal things that I have found from that study.

It says that God is not a liar, nor does he change his mind.

In Deuteronomy 4, verse 7 we are told that God is omnipresent.

That's the theological word we have for everywhere, omnipresent.

Those are my words combining these 3 verses that are saying the same basic thing.

Awesomely holy, like fire, like a holy fire, it's like uncontainable, it is like so supreme, so superb, you can't touch it, if you touch it you'll get burnt.

Well that's basically what God said to Moses, right?

That's not what he decides on, that is what he is.

Deuteronomy has several of these and the reason is you have Moses who has walked with God for a hundred and 20 years.

He is writing his last, basically a little history of God's people the last 40 years and he's reviewing with the wisdom of having been with God, closer to God than anyone else on earth.

And so he really starts to understand God.

Deuteronomy 4, 31, God is merciful and faithful.

The Greatest Miracle in the World: A New Nature

For those of you who are courageous enough to come back, you know, it's difficult, more difficult for me moving here and standing and talking to realize the temperature, but some of you told me at the end of the second session in the morning that it was freezing here.

And the truth is I stayed and I kept working and then a friend came and we were talking and after about 15 minutes of just the 2 of us talking here.

I was shaking So they were really right about that We have asked several people and they they have contacted them and I believe it's gonna be better I think it might be already a little better.

I hope it's not so better that everybody falls asleep and says, yeah, that's so comfortable now.

Because you still have the best chairs in the house.

If you have your Bibles, just open them along with me just to begin with this session.

And I would like to Just read 1 Corinthians 13, verse 4.

You know that word patient in Greek is the Greek word that is used to be patient with people.

It's not being patient with things, you know, like waiting for your train to arrive.

Love is patient, is when you're patient with individuals.

Love is patient, love is kind, and it's not jealous.

Love does not brag and it's not arrogant.

Does not take into account a wrong suffered.

Does not rejoice in unrighteousness, but rejoices with the truth.

It bears all things, it believes all things, it hopes all things, it endures all things.

You know we say certain things don't fail.

We would give it a great deal of credence if something fails a very low percentage of the time.

If something is successful 80% of the time, everybody would be paying good money for it.

Wow, I can count on 8 out of 10 times for this to be successful.

That's a very high ratio on anything in life.

When the Bible says something, you know you can count on it.

And when the Bible says that love never fails, that's a remarkable statement.

When you think about the great controversy between good and evil, and then when you read that statement, love never fails, it means that at the final analysis, God's method of dealing with sin will actually succeed.

And it will succeed much beyond what we expect to succeed, because love never fails.

Let's talk this afternoon about this new nature we talked about the nature of sin we talked about the nature of God began to let's pray together father thank you for respite and for food for lunch thank you for this day which is given to us.

Thank you for the opportunity to be engaged with the Word of God this afternoon.

I pray that you be with every seminar this afternoon and everyone going to the seminars.

Be with the speakers, the presenters, and be with us too.

May we perceive something about your nature, something about your ways and means that may be insightful, that may be helpful to us As we seek to understand you in our relationship with you.

The greatest miracle in the world, in new nature.

If it went by merit you would stay out and your dog would go in.

It makes a lot of sense because the dog always tries to please his master and so a dog would deserve heaven more than we would.

These are some of the most important clear verses regarding how God saves us.

The testimony is this, that God has given us eternal life and this life is in his son.

It is not God will give us, It is not God gives us or might give us.

In other words, that is something that he has already accomplished 2000 years ago.

It is in deposit only for us to withdraw.

So if you want to withdraw that eternal life, it doesn't come in a vacuum.

If you want that eternal life, it is not simply a concept.

It's not something that God says, you know, I gave you flowers and you can, you know, flower seed, you can plant it in your garden.

No, I gave you eternal life and that eternal life comes with Jesus Christ.

That's why when Christians have an over emphasis on the cross, an under emphasis on the power of Christ in your life, it is an unscriptural view of it, because salvation is not simply what Jesus accomplished at the cross, salvation is also what Jesus is accomplishing in your life, based on what he accomplished at the cross.

He who has the Son, this is 1 of the most beautiful verses, every Christian ought to know this by memory, that verse 12, he who has the Son has the life, he who does not have the Son of God does not have life.

And then verse 13, these things I have written to you who believe in the name of the Son of God, so that you may know that you have eternal life.

So he is reiterating what he said in verse 11.

And then he says again, so that you may know you have eternal life.

And the life is not the life we're talking about here of 70 or 80 years.

So in the reference in verse 12 about the life is a reference about eternal life.

Remember we spoke about the fact that sin, this nature of sin is such that it is something that not even God can fix.

How could it be that God who can do everything and anything cannot fix sin.

What he cannot fix is that nature of sin.

It's equivalent of an artist getting good quality clay in order to make a pottery.

And works on that, works with a wheel, and works with the water, etc., but gets interrupted, leaves the work halfway done, has to go, but doesn't come back until a day later.

By time he comes back what does he do with that halfway done piece of pottery?

All he can do, he can try, he could try to fix it.

He could try to put some more water in it to keep modeling and working on it, but what he does do actually is throw it away.

The Greatest Power in the World: The Nature of Faith

I have wondered at times if we couldn't have a little more time to develop some of that, but probably it's the best we can do with the time that we have we heard a wonderful message last night from David Attrick didn't we?

A powerful message with conviction 1 of the things that I appreciate about David is that he hasn't stopped reading.

He doesn't have the formal education that probably would be good for somebody with this bright mind to have, but he doesn't stop reading and that helps make up for some of that and it's a good message that I hope we all take it to heart for 2010 not to be ashamed of the Lord Jesus Christ.

You know that that was the main theme of Martin Luther.

Martin Luther had a love affair with a cross.

That was his thing, with the cross of Christ.

And that is what God used to begin the Reformation.

To really start the Reformation and break loose from over a thousand years of darkness.

And that will be again the way that God is going to do that.

We're talking about the greatest thing in the world, about the nature of love and the miracle of change.

And I want us to read a few verses again before we pray from 1 Corinthians 13.

Again I want to remind you, I want to suggest that we read this chapter every single day.

Love is patient, love is kind, and is not jealous.

It does not seek its own, is not provoked, does not take into account a wrong suffered, does not rejoice in unrighteousness, but rejoices with the truth.

Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, and endures all things.

Father in heaven, This year, 2010, we want to know about that love.

We want to give that love away for the sake of others.

This year we want to pledge ourselves to be totally yours, to surrender all to you, even those little things that we thought were inconsequential, or worse yet, things that we fear really keep us away from God, even though it's only 1 or 2 of them.

We want to surrender all to You so that You can love other people through us, and so that we may experience the full range of Your own love to us.

For we realize, Lord, that if we know your love, it will be nigh impossible for us not to follow you, not to be totally devoted to you, because the love of God, the love of God is the greatest thing in the world.

The subject is the greatest power in the world, the nature of faith, and we're going to talk about faith today.

But you may have some questions from yesterday, various subjects we've had.

I know that some questions will be generated as we talk about some of these subjects.

But if there aren't any now, let's deal with some of those.

Last night, is this a case that the last night, you know, being the end of last year, kind of erased everything from your memory, started new.

Either this means that things are fairly clear or that the questions are so enormous that it's not even bothering.

It's just it probably will take too much to process.

All right, if you do have questions, at any time, just raise your hand.

You can shout after you raise your hand, and I acknowledge it.

But don't do that before that, all right?

You were talking about the different types of salvation.

We were talking about the different types of salvation.

The way in which theological schools understand this type of salvation.

And the way I was taught in baptismal class in the Amnesty Church was definitely Arminianist when I was a young child.

And later on, I discovered the grace at work model that you shared yesterday.

My question is, do you see a big shift in the Amnesty Church from Arminianism to Salvation by God's work?

So he's saying that when he came into the church he was taught a basically Arminian model in that later he learned a grace at work model.

Has the Adventist church shifted from being more Arminian and being a little bit more grace at work orientation.

I think that that depends on where you are in the world.

And let's speak about America, which is our context.

I think you could make an argument for the fact that we have moved a little bit more towards an emphasis on grace-centered salvation, particularly from the 40s and 50s and perhaps 60s, over the last couple decades, we have shifted a little bit more towards that.

Now, I say that, you know, with some qualification because it depends who you speak with.

And there are some people who have shifted so much, they have become basically Calvinists in the process.

And so a great deal of that has to do with their personal walk and development.

In general, if I were to give an opinion, I would say that yes, we have, because we have paid more attention to New Testament teaching on salvation.

And so I think we've learned a little bit more the nuances of that.

Having said that, Let me add that people do not need to do a lot of systematic theology in order to try to understand how a person is saved.

It really comes by studying your Bible, reading your Bible, praying, and relating to God.

The more you surrender to the Lord Jesus, the more intuitively you may understand some of these principles.

Now that doesn't happen, and it would be dangerous to simply pray and surrender to God and not read the scripture.

Because the scripture is the 1 that gives you the framework for what God says and what He teaches.

But if you live a surrendered life that is growing in Christ, you understand, you don't, you're not mixed up about how you're saved.

You know that you're saved because God loves you to pieces.

He just loves you so, in that there's nothing you can do to earn your salvation, and yet at the same time, you recognize it just makes absolute sense for you as a response of thankfulness, a response to that great love, to surrender to Him, and to follow Him, and to love Him, and to obey Him.

It just doesn't—there is no dichotomy for the committed Christian regarding faith and works.

Yes, there was another question back there, a comment?

Didn't have the benefit of the presentation, I'm going to just repeat it.

Since we're saved the same way and the scripture is not cultural.

What is the simplicity of salvation by faith?

What's the simplicity of salvation by faith?

You know if we were to be asked by Jesus as we enter into the pearly gates, why are you being saved?

The only answer we can give is because you decided to save me.

It goes right along with the gospel question.

I was just asking about the relationship between the 4 that you were asking about.

I understand the foundation by words, but I was a little confused about the foundation by human response and how that was a little bit different.

The Greatest Need of the World: God’s Love

I wish I had some time to edit this session to make it a little bit more precise for what we need to do but be as as it is that the Lord is going to bless us and it's going to be with us in that process.

Several of you had questions and I try to answer that.

If you have other questions right now that we could answer right away, We've gotten a microphone now because we're streaming this live on the internet, you know that, so your beautiful voices are being heard sometimes.

Are there any questions that are still hanging over from the last session that you want to ask?

We chose a man who is extremely quick on his feet.

My question is, how do we learn to grow from our sins if we already consider ourselves dead in sin?

You mentioned to Jim previously that we sin, we are obviously ashamed to do this, and then we go on.

I guess my concern is that it seems to lighten our sin.

It seems to take sin lightly, is that what you mean?

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Ron Clouzet: The Greatest Thing in the World

The Greatest Power in the World: The Nature of Faith

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Parts

The Greatest Mystery in the World: God’s Nature

1h

The Greatest Miracle in the World: A New Nature

1h

The Greatest Power in the World: The Nature of Faith

1h

The Greatest Need of the World: God’s Love

1h

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