#3 in the Sermon Series: The Normal Christian Life: Biblical and Satisfying. Taken from Eph. 4 to 5:21

1. Obedience: God’s Invitation to Greatness
What did I do?
When I was a young man, a woman repeatedly offered herself
to me sexually? A Spirit-filled Christian woman. A married
woman.
My boss at a Christian organization asked me to lie on the
financial reports
God told me to eat a diet of mainly fresh fruits and vegetables:
no meat, no dairy, no chips, no sweets.
God told me to pay more attention to my wife and family and
stop working so much.
The answers later!
Third in the series: The Normal Christian Life: Biblical and
Satisfying
Obedience IS the Main Thing!
As I have read the Bible and listened to the Holy Spirit over the
past 60 years, I am fully convinced that the Main Way God wants
us to show Him we love him is by wholehearted obedience to
what we know to be his well in whatever form that would take.
There is a cost to doing God's will rather than my own. We
have to give up something to get something..something a million
times better than sin.
I am totally convinced that God is passionately committed to
making every Christian great in His sight and rewarding them
lavishly. He wants the best for us, not the minimum because He

2. is the Best Father Who loves His children a million times more
than we can love our children. He can give us the best only if we
choose to obey Him. Our obedience qualifies us for our
inheritance in heaven and for many blessings on earth.
I am convinced that what God demands from us as his adopted
children is simply His way of inviting us to greatness. The only
way to be great in God’s sight is to be like his son Jesus.
The more we obey, the more we become like Jesus in character,
spiritual authority and in purpose.
A book that sold 15 million copies has three principles that apply
to this topic: The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People by Stephen
Covey
His first three principles are:
1. Be proactive:
2. Begin with the end in mind
3. Keep the main things the main things:
In addressing those three points today, I want to reference
Ephesians chapters 4 & 5 mainly
_______________
A. Be proactive: Choose who you are. Don’t let life or anyone
else choose for you! Choose what God says you should be!
A. Think and pray about how you want to live your life. Don’t
just go with the flow. Choose! Every day, choose! God
loves that when we choose His ways even if we do not
do it 100%!

3. Eph. 4:1—“Live worthy of of the calling you have received!”
The rest of chapter 4 and much of chapter 5 tells us how to live
worthy of that calling
Our calling is:
1. Called as adopted children of the Heavenly Father forever!
1:5
2. Called as grateful, rescued children: God sent Jesus to
rescue us from being dead in sin (2:1) before we knew God.
( Count of Monte Cristo & Les Miserables)
3. Called to be like God: Eph. 4: 24 actually says” We are to
put on the new self, created to be like God, in true
righteousness and holiness.
4. Called to to Glorify God to His enemies: To live as part of
God’s worldwide Church that is showing proud, wicked
demonic ranks—rulers and authorities— His wisdom through
His people the Church! 3:10 —-just like Job!
5. Called to be Holy & Blameless: But 1:4 tells us God’s
highest priority for us to proactively choose: “ for He chose
us in Him before the foundations of the world to be holy and
blameless before Him.
How to Choose to Live Worthy of Our Calling each day?
Any suggestions?
Declare a scripture out-loud with force as you get out of bed!
Do it with your spouse if possible. Write them on the bathroom
mirror ( tephilim on head and arms for Jews). Take charge of

4. your mind and life and declare who you are according to the
word of God:
1. This is the day…
2. Gal. 2:20
3. Eph. 1:4-5
4. Rom. 8:28
5. Gen. 50:20
6. Phil. 4:13
7. Rom. 8:32
8. Psalm 23
__________________________________
B. Begin with the end in mind: Decide who you want to be in
5000 years! Decide to live for heaven , not for earth!
What Do you want God to say to you when you stand before
Him? Let’s aim for what Jesus said in His parable about a fateful
servant in Matt. 25:21:
“His master replied, 'Well done, good and faithful servant! You
have been faithful with a few things; I will put you in charge of
many things. Come and share your master's happiness!
We want our full inheritance in the saints:
We are now sealed with God’s Holy Spirit to keep us for an
unimaginable inheritance in heaven! 1:13-14 which 1:18 calls
“His glorious inheritance in the saints. It’s a goal worth living for
—whatever the cost.
To get our full-inheritance, we must become more like Jesus
as 1:14 says:
“until we all…become mature, attaining to the whole measure of the
fullness of Christ. Repeated in v. 15.

5. How Become Like Jesus?
So, if Jesus is our model, how then do we live? Ephesians highlights
several themes that other books of the Bible stress also:
1. Live for unity based on humble love among Christians (2-16). The
NT stresses this often, especially in John’s Gospel and 1 John. Our
church seems to do this well! It starts at home!
1. Live a life of love: 5:1. Be known for your love!
2. Avoid sexual sins & worldly sensuality (4:19): fornication, same-
sex sexual acts, adultery ( in mind (porn) or physically) or crude
jokes.
1. Sensuality means a devotion to excessively gratifying bodily
appetites, ( gluttony) especially sinful ones. Living for the
pleasures of life rather than for God.
2. 5:3-7: The immoral, impure or greedy man will NOT
inherit anything in heaven. Salvation? Probably.., but “hay,
wood and stubble rewards.” FOREVER!!!
3. Avoiding dishonest speech. v.25. Speak truth in love. Cannot have
real trust with anther unless they tell the truth. Real love demands
trust. Real unity demands trust.
4. Forgive before the day is over. 26. 32. Otherwise, opens door to you
for devil!
5. No stealing: 28—try not to beak copyright laws on digital goods, pay
your taxes, etc.
6. Avoid hurtful talk about anyone or to anyone so you do not grieve
the Holy Spirit: 29-31
1. Don’t watch non-stop TV gossip/slander news shows that
tear down people with rumors and confidential info that is not
public knowledge. That is gossip. It’s a sin the Bible talks
about in the OT & NT.

6. 2. Romans 1 lists gossipers and slanderers as serious sinners!
Gossip is sin!
1. Do not share confidential negative info about
another unless the sharing is necessary to help them
( not “pray for”) or unless you have responsibility to
help them ( parent, pastor, teacher, etc) and must tell
others to get help for the person.
C. Keep the main thing the main thing:
Jesus tells us that if we love Him we must show it by keeping
His commandments John 14:15
John 14:21 is even more clear: "He who has My
commandments and keeps them is the one who loves Me; and
he who loves Me will be loved by My Father, and I will love him
and will disclose Myself to him.”
Today’s message is about obedience to God. Obedience is
crucial to enjoy the fullness of the normal Christian life.
Please do not shrink back in your heart from this message due to
false guilt or false shame. Jesus has paid the eternal penalties for
all of our sins.
Confess sins and be forgiven—every day if you need to. But do
not grow weary in trying to obey. God is pleased with our
sincere attempts to obey—and our confession of sin and cries for
help not to sin again that way.
In fact, God’s commands to obedience are His gracious
opportunities to greatness in His sight.

7. He wants to bless us more on earth and especially in heaven.
His commands are there to make us more like Jesus so He
can lavish His blessings on us more and be more glorified by
our lives as His children!
But to hear this message rightly, you must be convinced that
you are tenderly loved by the best and most gracious Father
and that God is with you. Otherwise, all you may hear is a
demanding Father.
Unless any child, including a child of God, knows that above all
else, his father his mother loves him no matter what he does
or doesn’t do, whatever discipline or correction they bring may
not produce the kind of godly maturity they want or God wants
Sometimes we may need to obey out of the fear of the Lord’s
discipline, but if fear is our normal motivation for obedience, it
will not produce the best version of Jesus’ character that God is
trying to give us. God wants obedience out of love for Him!
To love God well, every Christian must experience the deep
continuing affection of God through the witness of the Holy
Spirit in the Scriptures or messages directly to them by the Holy
Spirit.
To repeat, God’s commands to obedience or his invitation to
greatness, to maximum blessings on earth and in heaven.
This life of determined obedience is the process we call
sanctification—become more like Jesus who learned obedience
by the things He suffered (Heb. 5:8). Our obedience will cost
us, too. But what an incredible trade: temporary pleasure so
sin for eternal glory!

8. That’s God’s pattern for preparing us to rule with Him in heaven
forever as joint-joint-heirs with Jesus!
What did I do:
When I was a young man, a woman repeatedly offered herself
to me sexually? A Spirit-filled Christian woman. A married
woman.
My boss at a Christian organization asked me to lie on the
financial reports
God told me to eat a diet of mainly fresh fruits and vegetables:
no meat, no dairy, no chips, no sweets.
God told me to pay more attention to my wife and family and
stop working so much.
Let’s pray. Let’s choose life. Let’s choose to obey God’s
commands in the scripture and also what He tells us by His
Spirit.