Greg Ford - Who Am I At The Core?
Let’s start with this. We’ve all experienced the confusion that comes along with, really, trying to get your life right with God, trying to do the right thing, and yet, bad stuff is still coming up out of you. Right? Okay, you come to church, you go, «Okay, I wanna get right with God. I want not only to have my past sins forgiven, but I wanna move forward in goodness. I wanna live a good life. I wanna live my best life. I wanna bear fruit. I wanna be in lock step with God». So, you come into a place like this and someone like me stands up and talks to you about reconciliation between you and God and through Jesus. And if you accept Jesus as your Savior, then the spirit that raised Jesus from the dead will live in you and will produce fruit.
Galatians 5:22–23, the Fruit of the Spirit. And then, these words, these Fruit of the Spirit, these traits of the spirit are what we want out of life, okay? Wealth, who doesn’t want that? Joy, yes, absolutely. Peace, hmm. Patience, yes. Kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. Whoo, that’s the life we wanna live. So, we say you accept Jesus, the Holy Spirit lives inside you, that’s what’s gonna come out of your life, so, that becomes our expectation. We begin to go through the journey of life, and we’re looking for our, you know, love, joy, and peace, and all this to just take over and that would be our state of mind. And yet, at some point, bad things start coming out. Old things start coming out, and it creates confusion.
«Well, if I’ve got this Fruit of the Spirit in me, and I’ve got this spirit that raised Jesus inside, why do I still wanna cuss folks out»? Oh, don’t get righteous on me now, okay? Don’t leave me up here all by myself. You know what I’m talking about. You still wanna tell somebody off. Thank you. One honest person over here. We’re all in the same boat. You’re going, «How come I’m still tempted»? Then we start feeling bad about our feelings. You’re like, «You know, I want to do the right thing. Actually no, I don’t wanna do the right. I wanna do the wrong thing. I want to want to do the right thing. That’s what I wanna do. I wanna want to do the right thing, but I still want to do the wrong thing. I still want to go get high. I still wanna go get drunk. I still wanna go give into this temptation. I still feel weak. Why do I feel this»?
And then, what happens is it gives the enemy a foothold in our life to really question everything. «Is this whole thing just a fairytale? Is it just a fantasy? Is this superstition? It’s garbage. It’s a lie. What’s true and what’s a lie»? So, if you’ve ever been in this place where you’re like, «You know, I’ve given my life to Jesus, I’ve invited him in. Supposedly this love, joy, peace is gonna emerge, but I’m still over here, my flesh is still wanting to do all the stuff I wanted to do before I ever prayed the prayer». What’s up? Oh, you don’t wanna have a conversation today? We’re bout to have a conversation today about this.
Now, the good news is, the Bible talks about this. The apostle Paul in two different places in the New Testament really describes this journey. In Galatians 5:16–17, look what he said. He said, I say, «Let the Holy Spirit guide your lives». In other words, there’s something subterranean. There’s something underneath the surface the Holy Spirit to guide your lives. And he said, «Then you won’t be doing what your sinful nature craves». Okay? So, he creates sort of an antagonistic relationship between what’s inside of me. This Holy Spirit producing this fruit, and then my sinful nature. I want you to flag that, sinful nature, cause we’re gonna come back to that. Verse 17 says, «The sinful nature wants to do evil, which is the opposite of what the spirit wants».
And look what he does here, he says, «The spirit gives desires that are opposite to the sin nature and these two forces are,» ahhh! «These two forces are fighting each other». I can feel the fight inside of me saying, «Say that, 'don’t say that'. Say that, 'don’t say that'. Do that. 'don’t do that'». My will power, I’m trying to referee this fight and I feel like the wrong one’s gonna win. He said, «These two forces are constantly fighting each other, so you are not free to carry out your good intentions». Been there. Galatians 5. Paul also talks about this in Romans 7. He says, «I’ve discovered this principle in life, that when I want to do what is right, I inevitably do what is wrong. I love God’s law with all my heart,» in other words, «I know what right is and I want to want to do right». But verse 23 says, «There is another power within me that’s at war with my mind».
This is worth noting the context. This is in the New Testament. Paul is explaining the new covenant and he’s being honest to say even though Jesus lived, died, resurrected, and ascended to heaven, and sent the Holy Spirit that’s inside of us, he’s going, «I’ve experienced all of that, and I still have a war in my mind». He said, this power. «This power makes me a slave to sin that is still within me». How is that possible? How is it possible to be saved and still have ugly stuff coming out of you? Verse 24, «Oh, what a miserable person I am. Who will free me from this life that is dominated by sin and death. Thank God,» verse 25. «The answer is Jesus, Jesus», Spotify, check it out. So, you see how it is. He says, «In my mind, I want to obey God’s law, but because of my sin nature, I’m a slave to sin».
We’re gonna sort this out today. I’m gonna start with a little bit of earth science. This is planet earth. At the very edge, the outer layer of the earth, we got the crust of the earth, alright? This is the surface. This is the mountain ranges, this is everything that you see with your eye on the crust. At the center, what’s at the center? The core. Alright? We got the core. Now, I don’t know if you know this, but there’s the core and the outer core. Okay. I didn’t enlighten you? Alright, we’re gonna keep it simple today. We’re just gonna do three layers. But just so you know, there is an outer core. There’s actually an outer mantle as well by the way. Now, I’m just showing off, but you know.
Alright, so, then you’ve got the mantle, okay? Basic science. Between the crust and the core is about 1,800 miles. If you just start digging straight down, you would dig for 1,800 miles to get to the core. At the core is, you know, magma, lava, it’s all of this that is nickel and iron. Did you know that? Like, liquid nickel and iron that’s at 8,000 to 10,000 degrees Fahrenheit. Pretty warm, alright? And that’s what’s at the center. Now, when something shows up on the crust, you know, tectonic plates. Tectonic plates shift and create earthquakes, or they create volcanoes. You know, these different things happen on the crust. It’s coming up from the inside. When something’s happening at the crust and we know it’s coming from the inside, we just don’t know where it’s coming from. If we take this as a metaphor for us, its very similar thing descried in the Bible as it relates to the things that are in and the things that are out.
So, you’ve got things what’s coming from my core, what’s coming from my mantle? So, okay, I’ve been saved, and I’ve given my life to Jesus, and something’s coming out and Paul is talking about a sin nature. The question is this, if I peel back every layer of you, if I drill to your epicenter, all the way to the center, «What is your core»? Is it clean or is it dirty? Is it pure or is it evil? Because when things come out that are evil, or things that are wrong, or things that are weak, the enemy comes at us and says, «That’s who you really are». The question is, «Who am I really? What’s the real me? What’s the truest me all the way to the core of myself»?
This is really, really, important because your relationship with God, especially as it relates to his righteousness, it’s imperative that you get not only an understanding of his righteousness, but how his righteousness has affected your core. Otherwise, if I believe that the center of me is dirty and sinful and disgusting, even his righteousness freaks me out, because all I do is juxtapose his righteousness to my filth and create more condemnation. Last week I asked you the question, I said, «Hey, think about that verse that says, 'man looks at the outward appearance, God looks at the heart'. How does that verse make you feel»?
If it makes you feel encouraged, or does it make you feel afraid? Because I believe what’s true of me is at the center of me. Who I really am. If you peel back every layer and got to who I am at my base level, at my core, I think it’s broken. I think it’s ugly. I think it’s evil. And this is huge because things come out of inside of us, we just don’t know where it’s coming from. Alright? Where is it coming from? Paul’s talking about this sin nature, what is a sin nature. Is that what’s at the center of me? It’s sin? Alright?
Let’s do some theology here. Let’s take a little journey together. In Genesis 1, God created the heavens and the earth, and in verse 27, it says that he created man in his image. Look what it says, it says, he says in verse 27, «God created human beings in his own image, in the image of God he created them: male and female». And then, in verse 31, it says, «The God looked over all he had, and he said, 'it was very God'». Alright? In chapter 3 in Genesis 3, Adam and Eve sin, and sin enters the world. So, the question is, «Did God create people with a sin nature»? If you’re sort of into theology, you do a little study on theology you’ll find people have differences of opinion on that.
In Romans 5, they describe this, Paul says, «When Adam sinned, sin entered the world and Adam’s sin brought death, so death spread to everyone, for everyone sinned». So, regardless of how you slice it up theologically, here’s the bottom line. We all have flesh. Human beings have flesh and free will. And a combination of flesh and free will, your flesh is prone to deception. Your flesh is prone to weakness. Your flesh is prone to temptation. You have a free will on top of that which means, it’s only a matter of time throughout this journey that you start to add these experiences to your life. You’re born into this. There’s a process of ramping up and developing your brain. By the time your brain starts even being able to sort things out, you’ve already had life experiences. People have already treated you a certain kind of way. You already came up in a certain kind of family.
And so, you gotta try to detangle, what I’ve been through in my life, what I’ve been told, what I’ve been taught. What I’ve been indirectly taught, what do I believe about all this? As my brain is developing, we end up with all of this stuff in our mantle. Let’s think of it like this. Your crust, your crust is what’s on the outside, it’s your conduct. It’s your conduct or your actions. Your mantle is your conscience. Your conscience and your attitude. So, this is again, how I think about, how I feel about my mind, will, and emotions as it relates to my life. My core is my character or my nature. Who I really am at the center of myself. And so, within the Bible, we learn that people were trying to sort this out because sin entered the world through Adam.
So now, people are going, «Well, we wanna be righteous as God is righteous». So, they did what’s logical. How would you solve the problem? You go, «Alright, if we wanna be righteous, we have to define righteousness». So, they went through a process, then asked God, «Do you help us define righteousness»? And they came up with 613 divine laws of righteousness. If you do these 613 things, this is what righteousness looks like. And then in Deuteronomy 6, they said, «Okay, here’s how you do it». Deuteronomy 6: 25, here’s how you attain righteousness. «If we are careful to obey all this law,» these 613 laws, «Before the Lord our God as he commanded us, that will be our righteousness».
Deuteronomy 6:25 perfectly define righteousness, keep it in your will power. Basically, manipulate your crust to do the right stuff out here. But here’s the problem, every human being has flesh. Every human being has a back story. Walks through life, has relational baggage. Has things happen to them. Has all of this that creates mantle in here. That creates tectonic plates, and earthquakes, and all of this. So, no one can get the crust right on their own. They were trying to get core righteousness through keeping the laws Deuteronomy 6:25. So, predictably, generation, after generation, after generation, it was just failure. And what happens when you try to do that? Well, kind of one of two things. Either you realize that you’re not able to do it. Eventually you’re gonna realize you can’t do it, so you try a couple things.
One is you decide to try to win the righteousness award, basically compared to everybody else, which leads to self-righteousness, essentially. «I’m gonna get it better than ever… I cant get 613 laws right, 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. Year after year, decade over decade, that’s not gonna happen. So, I’m just gonna try to be better than you. I’m gonna try to be better than you and if I can be better than all of you, then I get the award. I get the award of righteousness». Most folks are honest enough to go, «That’s a losing game,» and they just quit trying. That’s your Old Testament. Jesus just shows up in the middle of this, and he’s getting ready to usher in a new way of righteousness. But he starts with saying something peculiar. He shows up in Matthew 5, and in Matthew 5 he says, hey, «I warn you, unless your righteousness is better than the righteousness of the teachers of religious law,» in other words, the ones who were winning the awards for most self-righteousness, he said, «Unless your righteousness is better than theirs, you’ll never enter the kingdom of heaven».
Essentially, he puts the bar to the edge of the human capacity, and then he says, «Hey, unless it’s higher than that, you cannot attain righteousness». To which they went, «Well, we are now effectively demoralized». To which Jesus said, «Now you’re ready to learn. I’m not here to destroy your moral, I’m here to destroy your paradigm. And if you’ve come to the place where you’ve realized,» this ain’t gonna work this way. I can’t purify my core from the crust in. «Now, I’ve set the bar so high it crushed your spirit, I wanna crush your paradigm so I can introduce a new way». Because here’s what Jesus was about to do, and about to teach them, and about to do for them is this. Righteousness is not an award, it’s a gift. But in order for him to help them understand the gift of righteousness, he had to set the bar to an unattainable level. Otherwise, they would keep trying to do the righteousness as an ward. So, he puts it that are high.
Now, here’s what the apostle Paul says here back in Romans 5, he says, «Hey, from the sin of one man, Adam, caused death to rule over many. But even greater,» look at this, «Is God’s wonderful grace and his,» check it out, «Gift of righteousness». His gift of righteousness. «For all who received it will live in triumph over sin and death through this one man, Jesus Christ. Yes, Adam’s one sin brings condemnation for everyone, but Christ’s one act of righteousness brings a right relationship with God and new life for everyone. Because one person disobeyed God, many became sinners». Sin nature, however, you want to slice it theologically, we all were in that boat. But he said, «Now, but because one other person obeyed God, many will be made righteous».
Righteous, it’s a gift, it’s not an award, it’s a gift. And there’s a huge difference. An award is something I earned. I earned an award. That’s why every award show you’ve ever seen, they accept an award and all of the humility is false humility. Self-righteousness is the belief that I can do enough on my crust, to have the best crust. It’s a crust competition. And we all know who has the best crust, it’s papa John’s. Everyone knows that. It’s not even debatable. But, to try to get the crust right, that’s what we try to do is it’s a crust competition, and Jesus said, «No, it’s not an award, it’s a gift». It’s a gift. Righteousness is a gift through Jesus. Look what it is says in Romans 10:4. It says, «For Christ has already accomplished the purpose for which the law was given».
Alright, get this, why was the law given? What was the purpose? To define righteousness. To define it. He says, «Christ has already accomplished the purpose for which the law was given. As a result, all who believe in him are made right with God». Are made righteous. 2 Corinthians 5:17–18, «So this means that anyone who belongs to Christ has become a new person». Okay, this is again, what’s behind the language of being born again. What is behind that language? It’s essentially going, «You’re born with new DNA. With a new epicenter, with a new core. Without a sin nature. You have righteousness at your core». Since anyone who belongs to Christ is a new person. The old life is gone, a new life has begun.
And all of this, look at this, verse 18, don’t miss this, «All of this is a gift from God». It’s a gift, not an award. «It’s a gift from God who brought us back to himself through Christ». 2 Corinthians 5:21, «God made,» look at his, «Him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that we might become the righteousness». We might become the righteousness of God. What does this have to do with anything? Why are we talking about righteousness? This has everything to do with everything because what the enemy will do in your life is discourage you and condemn you. Because even though I’ve given my life to Jesus, and even though the reality is that the gift of righteousness is at the core of who you are, it’s not a sin nature. You have righteousness as your core, something comes out of my mantle that I’m still working on. I’m still trying to figure out. I still want to do something.
We’re back to Romans 7, and I thank God for the honesty of Paul who said, «There’s a war going on inside of me and something keeps coming out and I want to want to do the right thing, but sometimes I don’t even want to do the right things as something bubbles out and the enemy condemns, and says, 'see, look at you. At your core, you’re still disgusting. At your core, you’re still gross. At your core, you’re still broken. At your core, you’re still sinful. You got this sin nature. The nature of you. If we peel back all the layers of you, it’s dirty, it’s bad'. And that’s a lie from the pit of hell».
This is why Paul in Romans 7, goes through this whole convoluted journey of the thing I want to do, I don’t do, and the thing I don’t want to do, I do. And then, he calls himself a wretched man, a tortured man. «What’s wrong with me? Who will free me from this? What is the answer for this»? And he says, «Thank God for Jesus». And he says, and then if you are not careful, you would think that Romans ends at Romans 7, but it doesn’t end at Romans 7, there’s more chapters. It ends, Romans 7 ends right there, but he says, «After all of this, like, why are things coming out of me that aren’t good if I’m supposed to be good at my core»? And he flipped it to Roman 8, and first verse of Romans 8 is, «So, there is therefore no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus. There is no condemnation».
Why would Paul say that? Because he knows. He knows what we know, which is this, «When you’re in this crazy life, and something is coming out from inside you, you wonder where it’s coming from, and the enemy will use the ugly thing that came to the surface». The outburst that came out. The thing that came out of your mouth, and he’ll go, «If you were really a Christian, if you really had the spirit inside you, you wouldn’t, this just proves it’s all locus pocus and you’re living a fairytale, and this is all a bunch, and you are still tainted». And you’ll see yourself as dirty.
So, God’s righteousness doesn’t attract me because I just think of his righteousness compared to my dirty, nasty sin nature and I don’t understand that actually, righteousness is a gift given to you and given to me through the blood of Jesus. Through the work of Jesus that has declared me righteous, that God made he who had no sin to do this: to give me the gifts so that I might become the righteousness of God. It’s what’s at the center. This is a massive understanding. When my sons were first diagnosed, I was making a mistake on accident. I didn’t realize it, but I was referring to them as «Autistic». So, I say, «Yeah, my sons are autistic. My sons are autistic». And someone corrected me who’s in the field, and they said, «Well, hold on a second. Your sons are not autistic, your sons have autism».
I was like, «What»? They’re like, «No, you gotta understand. There’s a big difference. If you say they’re autistic, or you think they’re autistic, you’ve branded them at their core, they’re autistic». But, they said, «What you gotta understand about autism is your sons and their brains have everything they need. They have everything, but autism is kinda in the way. They bear the burden of autism so to speak». And they said, «Well, we gotta work throughout life, we’re gonna work to try to take the keys. Like, they got all the rooms in their brains that you and I do, but we’re gonna work through life. We’re gonna try to find the right key. We’re gonna keep trying keys and doors to open. And then», so, they actually said, «Don’t think of them as autistic. Don’t put that on them. Think of them as they have autism, but at their core they have everything they need».
I was like, «Ah, that’s good». And they’re like, «Okay, hey, let’s try this». Hey said, «Maybe, one of the keys we can try with your son,» cause my son wasn’t talking or wanting to talk. Wasn’t interested in talking. And they said, «Sometimes the key is, if you get them doing something physical, it’ll unlock the verbal». I was like, «Alright, what are we gonna do»? So, my wife buys a trampoline. When you’re a kid, trampolines don’t wear you out. Did anybody have a trampoline when they were a kid and they were just like, do you remember just jumping for hours? You know, and then you just went and you were fine. I don’t know what it is. When you’re a grown up, you jump on a trampoline, in 30 seconds and you’re like, «Hey, we’re gonna play a game. I’m going to lay down, and you all popcorn me».
It caught me off guard. I didn’t realize how tired I was gonna get. But we go out, I come home, my wife’s got this trampoline. My son is jumping on the trampoline. I go out, I’m jumping with them on the trampoline. And my son who didn’t try to talk, didn’t wanna talk, wasn’t interested in talking, and we’re jumping on the trampoline, he starts saying his ABC’s. He starts telling me, wanting to tell me about his day. He starts saying things back to me, and I was like, «Hey, give me a five-minute break and the we’ll resume. Alright»?
And then, I come back, and I’m jumping on the trampoline, it’s going, there’s a door there, it’s being unlocked, he’s not autistic, he has, he as autism. Now, with you, with you, with you, what do you believe is at the core of you? «I’m an anxious person». No, you’re not. You have anxiety. At the core, you’re working through anxiety. You’re fighting through, at the core of you is righteous. At the core of you is whole. At the core of you is holy. By the way, you don’t have righteousness, you are righteous. That’s what’s at your core. If we strip back every single layer of you, if we get all the way through the mantle to the core of you, what’s at the core of you is righteous.