How Do I Do This?

Ephesians 4 22 you were taught

with regard to your former way of life

to put off your old self which is being

corrupted by its deceitful desires to be

made new in the attitude

of your minds and to put on the new

self-created

to be like God in true righteousness and

Holiness and what caught my attention

just in reading it was

you were taught

to put off your old self you were taught

to be made new you were taught to put on

the new self you

were

taught

Paul is assuming that the audience he’s

speaking to in the book of Ephesians has

received instruction on all of those

things to

put off the old self

to be made new in the attitude of your

mind and to put on the new self

and I think there is a difference

between being told to do something and

taught to do it

because if you tell me what to do but

don’t teach me how

I’ll be trapped

I will know that I’m not doing it right

but I won’t know how to do it any

different

I was trying to learn a few moves the

other day

with the guy who was doing jiu jitsu

and I noticed that like

when he would tell me to do something

I would have a really hard time you know

switch this elbow and put this you know

arm now where the other I mean it was

like I’m not I am not a very

athletic guy

um

maybe I shouldn’t say that

maybe maybe that’s me I’m not doing the

new me but what I mean is like I don’t

naturally just pick up

a lot of physical movements and stuff

and I don’t know like the Angles and the

geometry of Jiu Jitsu or grappling or

whatever didn’t come naturally to me but

when he would get down and show me and

go like

and show me I could do a lot better

and I think a lot of times

um as I have preached through the years

it’s been easier for me to tell people

what to do than to teach them how to do

it

it’s easier for me to tell you to

no no

I want to think of one that’s

pretty applicable spend time with God

pray

but the disciples came to Jesus and said

teach us to pray

it’s a big difference between telling

you to pray and teaching you to pray

because one is

you should

and sometimes when somebody’s just

giving us a list of things we should do

it not only gets overwhelming but we

become frustrated

when we give it our best effort and like

with prayer for instance I don’t think

there’s anybody that calls themselves a

believer in Christ who doesn’t feel like

oh man I well I think there probably are

some people there aren’t many people

there are many of us who are followers

of Christ who don’t feel like I should I

should pray more all right so pray more

um how do I do it Our Father Who Art in

Heaven

okay okay but after I pray that prayer

what do I pray well you know teaching

someone something as simple as this can

be helpful that when you pray

a lot of times it’s a it’s a good idea

for you to be more specific about where

you are in your walk with God than being

generic about where you should be so you

know instead of praying like uh God I

thank thee that thou Arts most holy and

I desire to do thy will today I think

that’s awesome and I don’t think that’s

bad and I think we should magnify God

and begin with Thanksgiving and and

praise and adoration I’m not making fun

of that but I’m saying sometimes you

have to start from the place where you

are and go

God I need your help right now

I can’t do this without you

but you are The Great I Am you are the

Mighty God you could do anything God I

know that you live in me I know that you

love me I know that you want to help me

you said in your word that I could do

all things to Christ it strengthens me

right now I just ask you to flood my

body with the energy that I need for

this task and help me to have the words

that I need to say in this situation

because I feel like my own human wisdom

has fallen short I’m running see what

I’m saying and by starting with God I

need your help

it enabled me to tap into my need for

God’s strength and then I praised him

um that’s a very simple

example of it but we could we could go

on and on read your Bible more how how I

read my Bible so if you weren’t taught

to do something but you were told to do

it

you might find yourself

a lot of times feeling ashamed because

you feel stupid because you don’t know

how

and when it comes to this thought of

putting off the old self

a lot of people don’t know how to do

that and what we end up doing is just

hating ourself

oh man I’m so selfish and

I’m so

I’m such an idiot and

God I’m such a like I’m so out of

control and what’s wrong with me and I’m

a screw-up and I’m a failure and you

know all these things that I mentioned

in week one of my sermon that become

identity things like I’m not disciplined

no I’m I’m just not being disciplined

but I am I have the potential for

discipline because of Christ in me so

even the idea of putting off the old

self and Paul’s saying you were taught

to put off the old self a lot of people

weren’t his audience he had taught them

to do it

but a lot of times we haven’t been

taught and a lot of times as I mentioned

several weeks ago on the daily Devo we

were taught wrong

therefore when God is bringing something

into our life to model something for us

you know you meet somebody and you see

oh wow I see an example of what it means

to be kind I see an example of what it

means to be selfless I see an example of

what it means to think bigger I see an

example of what it means to walk in

faith that example that you see that God

will put in your path

a lot of times it’s to show you a

preview

[Music]

of what he wants to do in your future

that he wants to give you some of those

same experiences he wants to use you in

some of those same ways

when we don’t put off the old self

and when we don’t actively cause

ourselves to think like am I nurturing

now the things that are in me that I

will need for what God is calling me to

be later when we’re like short-term

focused

remember my weird scripture

I got to preach it yet but from

Deuteronomy 2019 you know when you lay

Siege to a city for a long time and they

won’t fight you and you have to lay

Siege on the city to try to to try to

keep them

in the city don’t go putting the ax to

trees that can bear fruit you can eat

from them God wants to feed you from

those trees don’t chop them down

and I think of that as being a metaphor

for the things that I cut down in my

life because oh man right now I need

this this tree to be a battering ram you

know I need this relief so let me run to

this I need this I need this need met in

my life so let me get it this quick way

right all the quick hit things that we

do to meet needs

that keep us and limit us from

experiencing something richer in our

future so when I say don’t fight your

future

I’m getting to the fact that a lot of us

weren’t taught

how to deal with the things that come in

our life that God wants to use to

develop us into the person he made us to

be

so when correction comes in our life we

reject it

because we’re insecure we chop down the

tree that has our future food on it when

relationships come in our life that are

new we’re too insecure so we don’t

really step into them or we don’t really

develop them or pursue them because we

don’t feel like we’re worthy of that we

don’t believe that

we don’t believe that God is giving it

to us as a gift and we’re not ready to

receive it so we chop down the tree of

who we could be in the future

and instead of

experiencing what God wants to give to

us

we go for the short term hey thanks for

stopping by my YouTube channel I hope

you were blessed today if you were share

this with somebody like And subscribe

and leave me a comment let me know where

you’re watching from what we can pray

for you about hope to see you back here

again really soon

[Music]