James Merritt - Growing Up in Your Going Up
You know, if you were a child, you know this, and every child knows this, you get asked a question, you get asked it so many times, you get tired of hearing it, and everybody asks you the question your parents will ask you, your grandparents will ask you, your friends will ask you. Your neighbors will ask you. Your doctor will ask you. Your dentist will ask you. Your pastor will ask you. Even complete strangers don't even know who you are. You're gonna get asked this question over and over and over and over and over. And the question is, what do you wanna be when you grow up? What do you wanna be when you grow up? Now that question assumes you do wanna grow up and that question assumes you are going to grow up. What are you gonna be when you grow up? What are you gonna be when you, what we call mature?
Now, maturing is really vitally important to practically every aspect of your life. Have you ever thought about that we live in a society that measures maturity in so many different ways. For example, from the time you're born until the time you reach pretty much adolescence. When you go to the doctor, what are the way the doctor measures if you are progressing as you should, they measure you. They measure your height, they measure your weight. We do the same thing. We measure ourselves until we enter the end of our growth stage, because we wanna know that we are maturing physically. We measure physical maturity. We measure intellectual maturity. That's why you take entrance exams. That's why you take final exams. That's why you take IQ test because there are a lot of jobs today you can't get, you won't even be interviewed unless you have a certain level of intellectual maturity.
Now, you may or may not know this, but we measure now emotional maturity. How many of you have ever heard the term emotional intelligence? How many of you ever heard that term? If you ever heard that term, you may not be very emotionally intelligent, okay? EQ is very big deal. Now, the matter of fact, you can have physical maturity, you can have intellectual maturity, but there are corporations now that sole value EQ. They give you tests and if you don't pass the EQ, you don't get the job. Because emotional maturity is the ability to manage yourself in relationships and in your career and in your life, so you can maximize your ability to lead other people.
And we now know you may have the physical tools, you may have the intellectual tools, but if you don't have the emotional maturity to get along with people, you're not gonna be what you ought to be. You'll never be a very great leader. Now, if you're a normal parent, you want your children to mature, physically and emotionally and intellectually. That's why you send them to school. That's why you teach them how to play sports. You want them to mature well, I got news for you. God is no different. Our heavenly Father wants us to mature. He wants us to grow up. When you come into your family, you came in as a baby. Your parents do not want you to stay a baby. When you come into the family of God, you come in as a baby.
Now, to be very clear, there is nothing wrong with being a baby. There is something wrong with staying one. And God says, "I want you to mature, not just physically, not just intellectually, not just emotionally. I want you to mature spiritually". God wants us to grow. He doesn't just want us to grow up to heaven when we die. He wants us to grow up while we're on earth. He wants us to mature to be all that we possibly can be. So here is the big question. I'm now convinced one of the greatest single indicators you may be asking right now, this question, how do you know if you're spiritually mature?
Well, what are one of the marks that I am maturing spiritually? I'm convinced that one of, if not may be the single best indicator of the level of spiritual maturity in your life is your prayers, your prayer life. I mean, think about it. If I were to ask you this question, would the content, the level, the direction of your prayers, would it be more like that of a baby, a toddler, a child, or an adult? The first time, I really believe, for the first time in my life I had become an adult. The first time I really felt I really kinda left behind my childhood years was the first time I drove a car by myself. The first time. Dad wasn't with me, mom wasn't with me, nobody was with me. I got in a car and I drove by myself.
Now, I don't mind telling you, I did it with fear and trembling. My dad was in fear and trembling, my mom was. And every driver that met me probably would've been had they met me. But I knew at that moment, okay, I have finally grown up because toddlers riding strollers, kids ride bikes, but adults drive cars. And so I said, okay, I'm now an adult. Well, why did I bring that up? Because I read a book the other day about prayer and this author said something that was so interesting. And the more I thought about it, I never thought about what I thought. You know what? I believe he's right.
This is what he said. "Look around your church and look at yourself in the mirror. Talk to other people about their prayer life and think about your own. You may come to this conclusion that the church, especially the evangelical church, is filled with big kids riding in strollers or bikes when they ought to be driving cars in the way that we pray".
Now, let's just go back, think about this week. I guarantee you, all of us at some time or another, prayed somewhere at some time, somehow this week. I will guarantee you, if you think of every prayer you prayed, if falls under one of three categories, you either said to God one of three things, give me, bless me or heal me. You said one of those three things. Give me, bless me or heal me. Lemme just make something very plain. Nothing wrong with praying those kind of prayers. Nothing at all. But I call that first level praying. I call that elementary first grade, praying. Paul, with this series we're talking about in prison prayers introduces us to a whole new level of praying.
Now, if you don't know who Paul is, I don't have time to give you all he is. Just suffice to say that from the time that Paul died, the church universally and from probably forever will always say maybe the greatest Christian who ever lived was the Apostle Paul. He was an unbelievable preacher. He was a super teacher. Half of the New Testament is all about books that he wrote, letters that he wrote, he even performed miracles. But the more I studied this man, the more I'm absolutely convinced, the reason why I know this guy was at another level, the reason why I know this guy was growing, the reason why I know this guy was spiritual material wasn't his preaching wasn't, his teaching, wasn't his miracles. It was his prayers.
This guy, this man, he knew how to pray and this man prayed about things We never think about. This man talked to God about things that never gets on our radar screen. And I know his prayers got to heaven. You know how I know? 'Cause they started there. The prayer that gets to heaven starts in heaven. His prayers began in heaven because nobody would've ever come up with the prayers that Paul did, had God not given them to him. So I say all that to say this. This is what I want you to learn today. God wants us to be growing up in our going up. Now we're going up. If you know Jesus one of these days, you're going up. But while you're going up, God wants us to be growing up.
And in the book of Philippians, I want you to turn to that book, Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians, right in the middle of the New Testament in Philippians chapter one. Paul, pray this unbelievable prayer that I am absolutely convinced is the prayer that we ought to be praying for our church, is the prayer y'all ought to be praying for your spouse. It's the prayer you ought to be praying for your children. It's the prayer you ought to be praying for your grandchildren. It's the prayer we ought to be praying for ourselves. It's a prayer that will radically change any church, any denomination, any person that really prays it. And Paul says, lemme tell you three things. He said in these Philippians, lemme tell you what I'm praying for you.
Number one, pray that your love will grow. I want you to pray that your love will grow. Now, it's really interesting of all the things Paul could have thought to pray about, the very first one is love. So he says to these Philippians, this is what I'm praying. This is my prayer, that your love may abound more and more in knowledge and depth of insight. Now we all know that God's love and we all know that God tells us we're to love each other, right? The Bible's very plain. Love your friends. Love your enemies, love your family. Love your children. Love your spouse. Love your neighbor. Love one another. We're to love you know, everybody. And I get that. And it even says we're to love ourselves. And then He says, "I want you to love me, most of all".
But then Paul prays, something's kinda strange. He says, look, I know you love, I get that we all know we're supposed to love, but my prayer is, is that your love will abound more and more. He says, my prayer is that your love will grow, my love Is that your love, my prayer is that your love will increase. In other words, here's what he's saying. I'm praying that your love will grow wider, that you'll love more people. I'm praying that your love will grow deeper, that you'll love people more. Because the truth of the matter is real love, the love that we need to pray for is not just love that flows. It overflows, as a matter of fact, that word abound is really interesting.
Have you ever poured a Coca-Cola into a glass of ice and poured it too quickly? You know what happens, right? The fizz explodes. I mean, the Coke just overflows the cup. That's exactly the word that Paul is using here. Paul is saying, oh, I know you'd say you love people. I know you'd say you love your family, your spouse, your neighbors, your friends. I get all that. But does your love overflow? Is your love like Coca-Cola that just explodes out of the cup? Because if you really love the way you ought to love and if your love is growing, it will be overflowing. You won't have to try to love people. You can't help but love people. You won't just try to love God. You cannot help but love God.
I'll give you a great example. You know, last Sunday, Theresa and I celebrated our 46th wedding anniversary. We've been married 46 years. And I've said it before I'm gonna say it again. I honest to God, love her more today than I've ever loved her in my life. My love for Theresa has gone wider. It's gone bigger, it's gone deeper. It's gone stronger now. I loved her on the second date. I told her I loved her on the second date. I meant that I loved her on the second date. But lemme just be frank to compare my love for her on my second date to my love today, that'd be like comparing a flashlight to the sun. It'd be like comparing a Florida Gator to a Georgia Bulldog. I mean, there's just, there's no comparison. It's just so much greater, so much richer and so much better. It's just, you know, it's just there.
And that's what Paul's bring cross saying, look, I want your love to grow. Because love is the glue that holds a marriage together. It is the glue that holds churches together and friendships together and even nations together. And by the way, the kind of love that Paul's talking about is not a feeling. It's an act of commitment. It's a godly commitment. It's not a love that you know that you know word only. It's a love indeed. It's an attitude. It's an action. I, you know, lemme just give you a quote and I'm gonna tell you a story.
C.S. Lewis said this, I thought most brilliant things I think C.S. Lewis has ever said. He said it'd be quite wrong to think that the way to become loving is to sit trying to manufacture affectionate feelings. The rule for all of us is perfectly simple. Do not waste time bothering whether you love your neighbors, act as if you did. When we do this, we find one of the great secrets when you're behaving as if you love someone, you will presently come to love him. I don't do a lot of counseling. I've told you guys this before. I don't do very much counseling, okay? I'm not a good counselor, I'm just telling you right up front, I am not a good counselor. You come to me depressed, you will leave suicidal. I am not a good counselor. It's just not my gift. And I keep all my counseling very, very simple because most people know what they ought to do.
I cannot tell you the number of times I've had a married couple come in and see me. They're about to get a divorce and the husband will say something like this, "I just don't love her anymore". And they're waiting on something real profound for me to say. Or sometimes they're excellent. They really want me to say, you know what? They just leave her. You know what I say when they say, I just don't love her anymore. You know what I tell 'em? I say, okay, I have the solution. They'll say, what? Go start loving her. What? Yeah, just go start loving her. But I don't feel any love. I said, I didn't ask you to feel anything. Go start loving her.
Love is not a feeling. Love is keeping your vow. Love is doing what you told God you do when you got married to her. Love is an act of commitment. And he's exactly right. You start acting like you love somebody. Guess what? The feelings will come back. They do. That's 'cause that's what love is all about. So Paul says, our love is to abound more and more. Then he says this in knowledge and depth of insight. Now, if you're like me, I did the same thing, you'd probably go, what does that mean? When I was studying this passage, I thought, what in the world love is to abound in knowledge and in depth of insight.
Well, wait a minute. How does love grow in knowledge? Well, the knowledge that Paul's talking about is your knowledge of God. And if you think about it, that makes perfectly good sense. If God is love, and if true love comes from God, guess what? The more I know God, the better I love God. The better I love God, the better I love you. So I want my love to grow in knowledge. Lord, I want my love to grow in knowledge of you. 'cause if I know you better, I'll love you more. Guess what? The more I love Jesus, the more I love Theresa. The more I love Jesus, the more I love my sons. The more I love Jesus, the more I love my daughters-in-law, the more I love Jesus, the more love my brothers.
The more I love Jesus, the more I love our church. It all goes back to growing in love. And then he says this, let it grow in depth of insight. That means discernment. What does that mean? Here's what he's saying. This is deep now. He says, look, I know most of you would say that you love people. I know you know who to love. But do you know how to love them? That takes discernment. Now I get it, I use Theresa for an example. I'm not saying I'm the best husband in the world, but she will tell you this, I'm a much better husband today than I was 30 years ago because I've learned how to love her. She has two love languages, service and quality time. Service and quality time, okay?
Took me a long time to love. Literally, it's been on a long time. So lemme just tell you, I'm not a hero. I'm not patting myself on the back. But here's how I start my day, every single morning. I get up, I read my Bible, have time with the Lord, then I make her coffee. Now ladies, before you start swooning over all that, it's just a Keurig. I just put a pod in there, close it, hit the button. It's, it's not a big deal, alright? But lemme tell you what I can do, and I've worked years on this. I make a mean Pop-Tart, I'm telling you right now. I put that Pop-Tart in that toaster and toast that thing to absolute perfection. And every morning I walk into the bedroom. Do I not? Every morning I walk into the bedroom. I give her her coffee, I do it at the crack of noon every day I walk into the bedroom. I give her a cup of coffee, I give her a Pop-Tart.
Now some of you guys are sitting there going big deal. It is to her, 'cause that's her love language. And so God through these years, has grown my love. I know who to love. I know to love her, I told her that. But I'm learning how to love and see. We're to know not just to who to love. We're to discern how to love, 'cause by the way, I've heard people say love is blind. Love's not blind. True love's not blind, true love sees. True love knows true love hears true love acts true love discerns. Love in your heart's not put there to stay. Love isn't love to you give it away. Paul says, pray that your love will grow. Then it gets deeper. He says, then pray that your light will glow. Pray that your light will glow. What does that mean? Remember Jesus compared the way we live to a light, He said this, you're the light of the world.
Let your light shine before others that they may see your good deeds and glorify your Father in heaven. Jesus said, our light should shine in such a way. Our light should glow in such a way that people see Jesus in us. Well, guess what? Paul is versely describing exactly the same thing. Paul says, I want you to pray that your love will grow so that watch this, you may be able to discern what is best and may be pure and blameless for the day of Christ. He says, as we pray for our love to grow, let's pray for our light to glow. And that begins with this. I love what Paul says, discern what is best. That word discern means test. It was the word used to describe how you could recognize a counterfeit. How to tell what was fake from what was real.
Now lemme just stop right here. This is gonna be good stuff for some of you right here. If your kids are not here, teach your kids this. If your grandkids are not here, teach your grandkids this. The biggest challenge most people face in life when they make decisions. And this is where most people blow it. The biggest challenge that we face in life is not discerning between what's good and what's bad. That's easy. Anybody can do that. Anybody. A kid can do that. The hard part is discerning between what's good from what's best. God doesn't deal with good God deals with best. And Paul says, discern what is best.
Lemme give you an illustration. We were pastoring, right? My first church outta seminary, we were pastoring in Mississippi. Theresa, I was pastoring. And anybody here from Mississippi? Anybody here from Mississippi? We had a couple of people. Okay, I think a couple of names. Look, I love Mississippi. Mississippi, great people, fine people. It just ain't Georgia, just, it's just not. So my heart wanted to come back to Georgia. I'm just being honest. I wanted to come back to Georgia. Well, there was a church that came open about 30 miles north of here. I was the first student pastor that church ever had. I had a fantastic ministry.
When I found out that church came open, I told Theresa, I said, we're going home. Said, what do you mean? I said, I'm telling you we're going home. I said, how do you know? I said, they're gonna call me to marry their pastor. She said, how do you know? I said, who else I gonna call? Look at me, I'm James Merritt. I was the first student pastor. I did a great job. I'm telling you we're going home. They never called me one time. I ain't gonna let 'em get nothing. I got nothing. And then a church opens up in Snellville, Georgia. Snellville, I never heard Snellville. I called my dad true story. I called my dad up. I said, dad, hey I said First Baptist Snellville is wanting to talk to me to come be their pastor. My dad said, "You don't wanna go to there". So what do you mean? He said, "That's a hole in the wall. Nothing in Snellville".
He hadn't been there in 20 years. He said, they just got a dirt road running through Snellville. That's all they got. I hung up. I didn't know what he did. He and mom got in the car, drove down to Snellville. They come back, called me. He said, get there as fast as you can. God, listen, that's a good church. I would never name the church. That's a good church. That church has never become a third of what that church became. See, I wanted what was good. God said, James, I don't deal with good, I deal with best. Don't try to discern between the good and the bad. Try to discern between the good and the best. Yeah, good is better than bad, but best is better than good.
And then Paul says, the reason why we all choose the best. Why do you wanna choose the best? Why do you wanna make sure you always make the best choices? He says, so that, watch, you'll be pure and blameless. Now the word pure means the real deal. In other words, here's what Paul said and went to God. Every politician in the world would pray this prayer. God, would you help me to be in private what I appear to be in public? Would you please help me to be in private what I appear to be in public? You know, someone put it this way. Be who you is 'cause if you ain't who you is, you is who you ain't. Be the same exact thing. Be pure. Then he said be blameless. That word blameless literally means not being a stumbling block.
Well, Paul's talking about is you've got influence with everybody. You've gotta influence a lot more people than you think. You be real careful what you do, what you say, where you go, what you hear, how you talk. Because somebody's always listening. Somebody is always watching. And you wanna pray that you'll never be a stumbling stone, but you will be a stepping stone. Now I wanna tell you a story that came to me at 9:15. And I hesitate to tell it because you may think I'm trying to make myself look out, look like the hero. So lemme just kind of, before I tell you the story, there is only one hero. And that's Jesus. Everybody got that? Only one hero.
I told you this last week, if there's anything good about me, it's that Jesus lives in me. You take Jesus outta me, I am not worth shooting. It's the only thing good about me, Jesus lives in me. But lemme tell you why it's so important to be pure and to be blameless. So last week I took Theresa out. We went out to a restaurant, very expensive restaurant. Somebody had given us a gift certificate 'cause it's not the kind of restaurant I would frequent, you know, quite a bit. So we went to this super, super nice restaurant. This young man's waiting on us. And he's about, he looked like he was 20. He was actually 30. Gosh he looked like a 20-year-old kid. And you could tell just by the way he was dressed, he just didn't have a lot.
So I said to him, I'll just call him Tom. I said, Hey Tom, I said, we're gonna pray for our food here in a minute. How can I pray for you? I've never heard this one before. He said, yeah. He said, here's what I need you to pray. He said, I'm, I'm really trying to work. I'm working here and I'm really trying to find more work because I'm putting my little sister through college. I said, what? He said, "Yeah, I'm taking every available dime I've got. I'm not married, I'm single and I'm taking all the money and I'm putting my little sister through college". I said, man, I'll pray God will meet your need. Well, I won't tell you, Theresa and we just, we teared up. I said who does that? What a great witness.
So I told Theresa, I said, you know what, we're gonna bless this kid. We're gonna give him the biggest tip he's probably forgotten. And we, listen hear me, this is Jesus. I said, we're gonna, I'm gonna give the biggest tip that I did. We gonna give the biggest tip that we've ever given anybody. So when he came by the end of the meal, Theresa had the gift certificate. And she said, "Hey, can you put the tip on the gift certificate"? He said, "No ma'am, you can't do that. You just gotta do it on your own". Said I said, "Man, that works out even better".
So we've prayed about it and thought about it and you know, we didn't even worry about how much the bill was. And we just had an amount that we wanted to give this kid. I've never given this size tip. And again, I'm not bragging on me, I'm bragging on Him. But I wanna make a point. The point is not the tip I gave. When he came back, I'd written out, I'd put the tip on my credit card. When I wrote the tip out, I gave it to him. He teared up. His eyes got this big and he said, "Mr, that's not necessary". I said, no, it's lemme tell you something. You have blessed me. You've given me, and we thought we were coming here to celebrate anniversary. We didn't do that. We came here to invest in your sister's education.
I just wanna thank you for letting us know that you had that need. And then I said, by the way, I said, do you have a church home? And he said, yeah. He said, "There's a church right up the street called Crosspoint". I said, yeah. He said, grand real big, he said, "I know who you are". I never met this kid. Never seen him. They come, got out because of COVID and all. Has a single mom working, trying to make ends meet, okay? You don't think I walked out of there on a cloud? Why? Again, all the glory to Jesus. But there's at least one kid out there that will say about his pastor, you know what that guy means what he says. That guy lives it. That guy walks it.
Now, why? Because of Jesus. Not because of me. The point is, Paul said, when you discern between what is good, I could have given him a good tip. Oh no, I gave him the best tip. When you from between what is good and what is best. He said, you will be pure and you'll be blameless. So lemme just tell you this. I want you to write down three things. If you don't write anything else, write this down. You need to teach what I'm gonna tell you to your kids and your grandkids. If you want your kids and grandkids not to make bad decisions, always make the best decisions. You teach them to ask three questions before they do anything.
Question number one, will this make anyone else fail, falter, or fall? Number two, will it make Christ ashamed of me? Number three, will it make me guilty before God? Will it make this make anyone else fail, fall or falter? Will it make Christ ashamed of me? Will it make me guilty before God? I wanna say something to you as your pastor right now, I am not perfect. Say, what are your faults? She'll tell you just line up. She'll be right out front. She'll be more than happy to tell you. Now you bring your lunch. But she's lived with me for 46 years. I am not perfect, but I'm blameless. I do everything in my power by the grace of God. I want to live a blameless life. To do that, you've gotta discern not between the good and the bad. Anybody can do that between the good and the best.
Lemme give a a true story when I'm talking about what he's talking about. When Tiger Woods was playing with Nike clubs, Nike sent him five prototype drivers. Wayne, this will be worth you coming to church for. They sent Tiger, five drivers. They said, "Tiger, try out the five drivers and tell us which one you like best". So Tiger tries out these five drivers. He calls 'em up and he says, "Hey, they're all good. But I like the one that's heaviest". They said what? He said, "I like the one that's heaviest". They said, "Tiger, they all weigh the same". He said, "No, this was the heaviest". He sent back to clubs. They weighed the clubs. The one he said was heaviest was heaviest. Are you ready? By less than one ounce.
He had such discernment in his hands, he could tell less than one ounce which club was the heaviest. That's what Paul is saying. I want you to have the kind of discernment in your heart and in your soul and in your mind. And in your spirit. Y'all that's good but Lord, I'm not gonna settle for the good I wanna settle for what is best. Pray that your love will grow. Pray that your light will glow. And you do that watch. So then you can pray that your Lord will show. You can pray that your Lord will show.
Now I'm gonna make a great statement about prayer worth you listening to. 'Cause I have sure messed up in my prayer life a lot of my time as a Christian. The primary purpose of prayer is not the gifts you can get from God. It's the glory you can give to God. The primary purpose of prayer is not the gifts you can get from God. He knows what you need and he can handle it. The primary purpose of prayer is the glory that you give to God. So why do you pray that your love will grow? Why do you pray that your light will glow? So that Paul says you'll be filled with the fruit of righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ to the glory and the praise of God.
Now hang with, but we're gonna wrap this up pretty quick. God demands, God deserves and God desires us to live a righteous, life every day. Every day that ends in Y. God says, I want you to be righteous. But then why does he talk about the fruit of righteousness? I want you to bear the fruit of righteousness. Well, you know anything about agriculture, it is the root that determines the fruit. It's not the fruit that determines the root. Well, what is the root of righteousness? It's not the what? It's the who. Because Jesus said in John chapter 15, "You remain in me as I remain in you. No branch can bear fruit by itself. It must remain in the vine. Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in me".
So here's what he was saying. You take the most beautiful branch on a tree you can find. It can have the greenest leaves you've ever seen in your life. But if you cut that branch off from that tree, that branch will never bear fruit because it's not the branch that bears the fruit. It is the root that bears the fruit through the branch. Now I want you to learn this righteousness, we so confuse this. Righteousness is not what you do for God. It is what God does through you. It took me a long time to realize, you know what my number one job is every day I live my life? The number one, my job that I've got in my life is not to show Jesus what I can do for Him. The number one job in my life is to show others what Jesus can do through me. That's my goal. That's my desire because it's only His righteousness that counts.
I mean, think about an apple tree. When you see a tree that has apples, the apples didn't produce the tree. The tree produced the apples. And the only righteousness, I finally learned this, the only righteousness that God will accept from me is the righteousness that God produces in me. Now you say, pastor, I got a question. So what is the difference between my righteousness and His? What's the difference? Why does it matter whether I'm doing something for God or God's doing something for me? Real easy. If it's your righteousness, if it's what you are doing for God, you get the glory. But if it's His righteousness and what He does through you, He gets the glory.
That's why the Bible calls all of our righteousness. The Bible says, some of you know this, our righteousness is just like what? Filthy rags. Why does the Bible say that? What do you mean filthy rags? Does that mean a bad man can't do good things? Sure, a bad man can do good things. Here's the problem. A good thing is a bad thing if it's not a God thing. Did you hear what I said? A good thing is not a bad thing if it's not a God thing. That's why Solomon said in the book of Proverbs, "Even the plowing of the wicked is sin".
Here's a man minding his own business. He's a farmer, he's just plowing his garden. He's minding his own business and you say he's doing a good thing. No, no, no, he's doing a wicked thing 'cause he doesn't even know the God that gave him the ability to plow the land. He doesn't even know the God that created the land to begin with. He gives no glory to the God that gives him a harvest. That's why Solomon said, "Even the plowing of the wicked is sin".
The only righteousness God accepts from us is the righteousness that God produces in us. Maybe illustration. I want you to imagine a child. Say you got a child. Every mother in here, listen to this show. You got a child and your child's been playing outside and you told that child not to get in the mud, but the child gets in the mud. He gets in the mud, he gets in the dirt, he has filthy. I mean he one side or the other and you don't know it. You tell him, look, "I'm gonna the grocery store. I'll be back in a little while, you know, you stay outta the mud and the dirt".
So you leave and he gets in the mud and he gets in the dirt and all of a sudden he realizes, oh man, I've blown it. So he starts thinking to himself, you know, what in the world am I going to do? He says, I know what I'll do. So he goes into the house and he goes to the living room and he picks up all of his toys. And then he goes to the kitchen, he puts all the dishes in the dishwasher. And then he goes up to his bedroom and he makes his bed and he makes sure everything is perfectly in place. And mom walks in. Somebody tell me, what does mom see? Mud and dirt everywhere.
Can I tell you something? All his righteousness was just like filthy rags because that mom did not need that kid to do something for him. That kid needed that mom to do something for him. He needed a bath, he needed to come clean. And the same thing is true of us. God says, "Not only do I not need your righteousness, you don't have any. And I wanna accept it. You need mine". And that's why we need to pray every day. Lord, I want my love to grow and I want my light to glow. Not so I get the glory, but so you get the glory.
And see, here's the point. It's time some of us woke up and realized bad grammar, great theology. You ain't the star of the show. He's the star of the show. You don't deserve any spotlight. He deserves all the spotlight. That's why I've just learned and it's not fake with me. I appreciate any compliment you pay me. But you know what I'm gonna say me verdict. I give all that to Jesus and I do, 'cause I'm gonna say it again. Anything good about me, anything is that Jesus lives in me. That's what's good about me.
So in the Chinese language, there's a word for righteousness, very interesting. And it's absolutely a combination of characters. This is a symbol for for righteousness in Chinese. It is the figure of a lamb and the other figure is a person. But here's what's interesting. The lamb is on top covering the person. And that's what the Chinese call righteousness. Whenever God looks at James Merrit, whenever God looks at me, I'll tell you what I want God to see. And I'll tell you what I better hope God sees. And that is Jesus covering me. I want my Lord to show. I want everything I do, I want people to say that's because of Jesus, James. That's not because of you. You didn't do that for Him. He did it through you. He gets the glory. He gets the honor. He gets the praise. Yeah, we need to be growing up in our going up because the major purpose of our prayers ought to always be to bring glory and honor to Him.
So again, let's just wrap up and let's just get real honest. Most of our praying privately and publicly is almost about everything except the things we just talked about. What do we prayed about this week? We prayed about our finances. We've prayed about the gas prices. We've prayed about our security. We've prayed about our health. We've prayed about our family, we've prayed about this need, we've prayed about that need. We've prayed about our safety, our security. But here's what Paul is saying. When you just simply pray, God, I pray that my love will grow and I pray that my light will glow and I pray that my Lord will show. God says, wonderful. I will take care of everything else.
Would you pray with me right now with heads bowed, with eyes closed? If you're watching my computer, watching my television right now, lemme just say this to you. You can't pray any kind of prayer like this till you know the God you're praying to and you can't know the God that you're praying to. If you don't come through Jesus Christ, you cannot know God without Jesus. You can believe in God. You can know a lot about God. You cannot know God except through Jesus. And so if you're watching right now and you'd say, "man, that's the kind of prayer I want. I'll tell you what I want. I want my life to count. I wanna be the best I can be. I wanna be all I can be. I wanna be all that God wants me to be". It all starts with knowing God through Jesus. And you could say right now in your own heart, something like this:
Lord Jesus, I'm a sinner and I need a savior. I need you. I've never trusted you. I've never surrendered my life to you, but I'm gonna do that today. I'm a sinner. I'm lost. You died for my sins. I believe God raised you from the dead. I believe you're alive right now. And I'm asking you today to come into my heart and save me and forgive me.