Sunday Message - Month of Entering Canaan 2

10/9/06
<Ephesians 4:1-16>

TEMPLE BUILDING – BUILDING OF THE SPIRITUAL, RATIONALE,

EMOTIONAL AND CHARACTER

• The life of a person is the most important. The life of a person can have victory
over the whole world. Therefore, we should not look at others; each of us must
receive grace ourselves first
• A person who knows how to pray will be able to change all things. It is useless
for us trying to help others using our own means. When we are blessed, those
beside us will receive blessing and grace too
• God’s greatest concern is the life of a person rather than what a person can
achieve
• Have we received the heart of God’s children? Have we received God’s love for
us? Have we acquired God’s trust?
• Our concern should be placed on whether I have done what God asked me to
do or love those whom God asked me to love?
• If God asked us to bless a small child, we should gladly do it and not have
struggles over it
• To establish a covenant with God means to respond to God after hearing His
voice. When that happens, we will let go of our selfishness
• We are selfish at most times
• Paul said that he had never disobeyed the vision from above. This does not
mean that he has done great things, rather it means that he has done what
God asked him to do
• We should receive the God’s love for us if we had established a covenant with
Him before. Only then, will we let go of ourselves and will love God and people
• If you had never established a covenant with God before, then do it today!
• To establish a covenant with God means to trust in God even if we do not have
anything now. We do not aim to get more things by establishing a covenant
with God
• If we cannot believe in God or love God, it is very difficult for us to see any
blessings in our lives
• A church is formed when a group of people who have established the covenant
gathers. The gathering of people who have not established the covenant will
form only an organisation or community

Read <Ephesians 4:1-16>

<Eph 1-3> talks about the mystery of the Gospel
<Eph 1> God has chosen us and given us the seal of the Holy Spirit
<Eph 2> We were dead in the transgression of sins, but God saved us and made
us the blessed ones
<Eph 3> How wide, long, high and deep is God’s love for those whom He blesses
<Eph 4> A church is formed when such blessed people gathered
v.1 The grace and love of Jesus Christ for us are limitless
v.8 We who are called and blessed by God have already received the best, as
everything is prepared and given by God
v.11-12 God’s gifts to everyone is different. However, all these things are meant
for building the body of Christ so as to receive the glory and crown
together
v.14 We who had already got one Father, one Lord and one Spirit should no
longer be an infant. The purpose for us to be together is to build the body
of Christ, build up the lives of each other and love lives
v.15 We should speak the truth with love

1. My Holy Temple (Personal)

• The Bible talks about the life of a person from the beginning till the end
• The Bible did not tell us what we should be doing for God, or what sort of
programmes the church should have
• God’s concern is whether we are receiving grace when we are alone and
what our life is like
• God used His complete life to save ours. Thus, when we go to the church to
worship God, our main focus should not be placed on others
• When we, as individuals, receive blessings, the whole world will follow us,
just like Joseph and Daniel
• We should not be afraid of hardship or the period of hardship
• Even if it was only Moses who received the blessings, the Israelites were
able to overcome the wilderness no matter how difficult it was to cross it
• Even if it was only Joshua who received the blessings, the whole nation
could cross the Jordan river and the walls of Jericho will collapse
• Similarly, our problems will fall, our family will receive grace and doors of
evangelism will open, when we truly understand God’s promise.
• People from 15 countries got to hear the Gospel when Peter was blessed
• The pastor will also be disheartened sometimes, thinking he is running the
race alone. However, God’s conviction for him is as long as he receives
blessings, God will prepare life-long co-workers for him
• God will prepare the spouse, build up the family, bless the career and open
doors of evangelism for the person who is blessed
• We must be clear of the grace of being called. We should build up our
personal holy temple
• God’s greatest concern is “what kind of person are you?”
• What kind of person are we in the presence of God, angels and Satan?
• What kind of person are we in the presence of others and when we are
alone?
• God is interested in the content, thoughts, motives, character and emotions
in us
• Some successful people are very confident and full of self pride when they
face others. However, when they are alone, they are often worrisome and
not motivated.
• Such people draw their strength and motivation from man but not from
God. A lot of church leaders are like this
• There are also some who are filled with strength and joy when praying.
However, they can be hurt by people’s words, affected by the situation or
become jealous of others easily after their prayers
• These people had not receive complete healings, thus there are channels
left opened for Satan’s attack
• The more righteous ones will admit that they are weak and have no joy
both in front of God and people
• These people will not remain in such situations if they’d established a
covenant with God
• A person who does not establish a covenant with God will always remain
the same. He was filled with inferior complex and felt useless in the past as
well as in the future
• However, God will lift up and change the person who had established a
covenant with Him. He will become the kind of person God wants him to be.
• What kind of person am I?

1) Complete
• We have a complete life when we are in Jesus Christ. There is no better
status than now. Thus, we shouldn’t be complaining about our current
conditions.
• No matter how much we are earning now, it is the complete figure given
by God, out of His love for us
• This is the kind of belief we should have - the belief of Immanuel
• Our conditions are complete. There are no better things than what has
already been prepared for us by God
•We need not struggle or compete with others since everything is
complete
2) We should discover and confirm God’s love in depth
•Since we know that all our conditions are complete, our purpose on
earth is, therefore, to discover and confirm God’s love even more, and
3) We should strive to love God and man even more
• Being selfish is our problem. Our selfishness is preventing us from loving
God and man
• Our bitterness comes from the inability to love, care and embrace the
people around us. We are not able to face God and man uprightly

• Our Lord is with us always (i.e. Immanuel). Thus, God will give us the things
we need, timely
• We should build up the holy temple of ourselves
• In order to build up this holy temple, we will need to have a spiritual belief
• When this was built, we will not compete with others. When we believe, we
are able to see God’s presence and love among our bad conditions, careers
and families
• It is the promise of God that we are believing in
• A person who believes will not have inferior complex. We should restore
such lives
 • How then, should I believe?
• The things we believe in must be rationale and not imaginative. We must
test and examine the will of God and what He had prepared for us. Our
beliefs must not be done on the lips only. We must know how God is loving
us now
• An example of our confirmation: problems and illness exist to make us go
nearer to God
• We are only hypnotising ourselves if we say we believe that God loves us
without letting this pass through our rationale thinking
• Our beliefs are not only on believing and learning about God, we must love
God. This is the emotional aspect of our beliefs
• We need to love God. A person who loves God and has confirmed God’s
love on him will obey God naturally
• We must also have character when we want to build our personal holy
temple
• God will definitely mould our characters if He really want to use us
• A person with character will be upright in the presence of God and man. He
will speak the true with love, his ‘yes’ will be ‘yes’ and his ‘no’ will be ‘no’
• A person without character will be nice to another person on the surface
only. Inside him are jealousy and competitiveness. Or he will not be able to
control himself and just react to things or people’s words / actions
spontaneously
• David is an upright person with character. We read from <Ps 78> to know
that he led his people with an upright heart. Therefore, all his people were
willing to give their lives to him.
• No matter who we meet, are our concerns and love be placed on the lives
of people?
• We know that suffering produces perseverance and perseverance produces
character
• Would God give an era to a person without any character? God will only
give the world to a person with character
• We should be not a typical person. How can we be as ‘kiasu’ as others and
always strive to climb higher and boast about ourselves? Such people are
without character
• We can tell whether a person has passed his spiritual, rational, emotional
and character aspect of his belief from his facial expression
• The Bible asked us to keep the unity among church members and be joined
and held together as one

2. Holy temple of interpersonal relationships

• God’s concern for those blessed ones are their interpersonal relationships
• How are the relationships of our family, colleagues and congregation?
• It does not matter that we didn’t attain a very high educational level, or we
don’t do that well in our work. Our interpersonal relationships are the most
important and we must receive blessings from them
 • The most important thing in the interpersonal holy temple is to know what
God’s concern is
1) God’s greatest concern is: centred upon edifying lives
• Our concern should be to bring others to God
• Our focus should not be on friendship. Friendship can be gone very
quickly
• Our focus should not be on benefits. We are being self-centred and filled
with personal motives if we only think about benefits
• Our focus should not be on social favour. This is done out of politeness
and it is a shallow relationship
• The reason why we spend time and money to bless others is to help
them in edifying their lives before God
2) We have problems with interpersonal relationships because there are
differences
• There are different gifts, time-tables, services, opinions, methods etc.
• To Paul, the greatest number of differences exist in the church
• Therefore, the church will be filled with problems if it does not have
Gospel in it
• Although many differences exist in the church, if you are able to unit
them because of the Gospel and God, you will definitely receive your
crown
• It is alright to have differences as long as the purpose is the same, which
is to build up lives
• E.g. there are many differences between you and your parents. If you
can look beyond the differences because of God, you will receive your
crown
3) Expansion
• Our relationships need to be expanded
• If we have the desire to discover, it is not difficult to see that there are
many people around us, wanting to receive our blessings and listen to
the Gospel. Our weaknesses caused us to be selfish and thus unable to
see that people need the Gospel

3. Altar of the Church

• It is difficult for us to establish the personal holy temple and the
interpersonal holy temple because obstacles and opposing forces. Thus, we
must continue to follow the altar of the church
• The altar of the church talks about the message and vision of Jesus Christ
• We must follow the mainstream of the church in order to follow the altar of
the church. Therefore, the mainstream is very important
• The mainstreams are the people who are willing to share and follow the
message and promises of Jesus Christ. To share about Jesus Christ means to
share about His promise (method: prayer) and vision (purpose: evangelism)
• The mainstreams are the ones who follow Jesus Christ clearly. Those who
follow Jesus Christ will become the mainstream naturally
 • Those who are already the mainstream must not look down upon
themselves and should build up their spirituality, rationalisation, emotions
and characters

Prayer and Sharing Topics

1 ． “ A person’s life is greater than the world”. In fact, God’s greatest
concern is my ‘individual’ life. Therefore, what sort of a person must I
become in front of God, angels, myself, and others? This week, God
wants to use the altar message to build up the spiritual, rational,
emotional and character aspect of my belief. Please establish a
covenant with God if you have heard His voice today. After that,
examine: in order to build up my spirituality, rationalisation, emotion
and character, in which area should the Lord add another step?

2 ． If I am really a blessed person, God will really want to use my

interpersonal holy temple. Please examine:
(1)Is my current interpersonal relationship centred upon edifying
lives?
(2)If there’s any difference between you and your family or church
congregation, have you acquire a set of methods, relying on the
Gospel, to join and hold together, helping each other using the
different roles and skills?
(3)Is my interpersonal holy temple continually expanding and thus
discovering more people who need my prayers and blessings?
Please pray more about building up your interpersonal holy temple
this week

3 ． The only mystery for building our personal and interpersonal holy
temples is to rely on the “altar of church”. In this aspect, it is crucial
to build up the mainstream of the church.
Please confirm: Who is the mainstream of the church? What are the
requirements to become the mainstream? Am I centred upon the
mainstream in my current church living? If I am determined to become
the mainstream of the church, how should I follow the altar of the
church and get equipped in the coming 2 years?