Changing Your Life Starts With Your Perspective

“Refuse to Live by Lies We must also remain true to the truth. Proverbs 29:12 says, “If a ruler pays attention to lies, all his servants become wicked.”
― Dr. David Jeremiah, Where Do We Go from Here?: How Tomorrow’s Prophecies Foreshadow Today’s Problems

As you step out into this new year, where will your path take you whether you realize it or not?
You are a part of God’s unfolding story.
Are you prepared for wherever that journey takes you?
I’m David Jeremiah.
And welcome to Turning Point as we stand at the end of this year and look ahead to the next.
What kind of year would you like to see?
As someone has said, the best way to know the future is to create it yourself, like planning a journey, then setting out and taking the steps one day at a time at the beginning of a new year.
The metaphor of life as a journey is a helpful one.
You see journeys have a beginning and an end, but we can’t always predict what comes in between and that’s where our faith comes in.
We may not know what the future holds, but we do know who holds the future to assist you on your journey for the coming year.
I hope you’ll join me for my message, writing your story on today’s edition of Turning Point.
When we spend every day with Jesus, he opens our eyes to the purpose he has given us in every moment when we spend every day with Jesus.
Every day can be an extraordinary day with God introducing Dr David Jeremiah’s new 365 day devotional every day with Jesus.
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Now here is Dr Jeremiah with his message, writing your story in John Eldridge’s little book called Epic.
He talks about how life doesn’t come like a math problem and you can solve it like an equation into which you plug right numbers and get the right answers.
Instead. He said we should look at life as a story.
Waking up each day is like turning the page in the story of our life.
We don’t know what characters will make an appearance or what will happen or how the plot will thicken.
We don’t know over a year’s time how a chapter will end, whether it will be dramatic or funny or calamitous.
We just have to live out our life one day at a time and be ready for the story to unfold.
Fortunately, Eldridge says, regardless of how our story turns out on any given day, month or year, we can read ahead and we can see how the story of our life turns out in the end.
We were born into a story that God is telling and the most dramatic story in history, an epic of Godlike proportions.
We have a part to play in God’s story of the ages and it’s our calling to find our part and play our part to the fullest.
That’s what goes through our minds. During these days.
We realize we’ve finished one chapter and a new chapter is about to start God’s story is the story of good and evil.
And in recent years, we have seen the struggle of good against evil being played out on our television screens almost every night.
Hard to go through a day without being reminded that evil is a very real presence and very much a part of God’s epic story.
Even here in the United States, our population is divided basically down the middle between opposing political views.
Everywhere we look, there are forces battling with one another for control of power and influence.
The Bible uses a lot of metaphors to describe God’s story. It’s the story of spiritual life.
Paul calls this story a race in another place. He refers to it as warfare.
And in Philippians 2 15, Paul reminds us that this story is a story of well good and evil that can be thought of as light and darkness.
There’s a lot of ways to look at the story. A lot of metaphors in the Bible for the story.
But of all the metaphors for God’s story in the Bible, I believe that the best one is the journey, truly pictures the progressive unfolding of one stage of life into another.
We’re on a journey together. This is God’s story and the story is about a journey.
And in the text that we’re going to look at today.
In Proverbs chapter four, we will see the journey play out in this metaphor, but the path of the just is like the shining sun that shines ever brighter unto the perfect day.
The way of the wicked is like darkness. They do not know what makes them stumble.
How many of you know that when you’re reading the Bible, if you have already discovered something in the Bible that you’re sensitive to all of a sudden, you start seeing it on every chapter at every page So if you think about the journey and you read the Bible with that in mind, you’re gonna find it illustrated everywhere.
And there’s some critical passages in Psalms and Proverbs where the writer saw a journey along the path as a perfect picture of our journey through life with God.
Why? Path? Because the path has a beginning and it has an ending and you have to journey along that path and that’s what life is like.
There are obviously many paths to choose from in life.
And the one we choose determines our ultimate destination, either life or destruction in the New Testament.
We’re told there’s a broadway and a narrow way and the broadway seems like the right way because so many people are on the broadway.
But the Bible tells us if you get on the broad road, it’ll take you to the wrong destination.
The destination of the Broadway is destruction and death.
But the Bible goes on to say there’s a narrow way and the narrow way leads to life where you end up depends a lot upon what journey you take.
If you get on the broad road, you’re gonna go to destruction.
If you get on the narrow road, you will end up in life. There’s something exciting about the Christian journey.
I thought about that a lot recently because I’ve been on this journey for a long time.
And I have to tell you, it’s one of the most exciting journeys I can’t imagine living my life any other way that I’ve lived it in following the Lord in his direction, in what I do new glimpses of God’s provision are available and we’ve seen many of them during these days.
We’ve heard stories about how God has helped you along the journey when you didn’t expect that to happen.
But we can be assured that on this journey, nothing happens to us that is unknown to God.
And the Bible says, everything is sifted through his hands. He knows the journey.
He knows where the journey ends because he’s made that happen.
But along the way, he knows what’s going on with us as well.
So today we’re gonna talk about this journey from these two verses in Proverbs for, I won’t spend a lot of time on each point.
But I want to tell you five things about your journey from Proverbs chapter four.
First of all, your journey has a definite beginning. Every journey starts somewhere. They don’t just happen.
You don’t just show up one day and you’re on a road.
You get on that road, you on ramp to that road.
Our journey toward God begins when we accept Jesus Christ as our personal savior.
That’s when you began your walk with God until you know Jesus Christ, you’re not on the journey toward heaven.
But when you accept Christ, you begin to walk along a path that’s illuminated by the light of his presence.
And that journey begins with one thing the conviction of sin. Have you ever thought about that?
Why are you a Christian today?
Because one day in the past you realized that you are a sinner, all of us are sinners.
The Bible says, for all have sinned and come short of the glory of God.
Do you know there are no exceptions to that statement?
Nobody’s ever gonna show up one day and say, oh no, I haven’t sinned.
I’ve had people tell me they don’t sin. They make mistakes but no, no, that doesn’t work.
You have to understand that your journey toward God begins when you acknowledge that you’re a sinner.
John 3 19 says this and this is the condemnation that the light has come into the world.
And men love darkness rather than light because their deeds were evil for everyone.
Practicing evil, hates the light does not come to the light lest his deeds should be exposed.
But he who does the truth comes to the light that his deeds may be clearly seen that they have been done in God.
Here, Jesus is saying that if you practice sin, you don’t like the light. Have you ever noticed that?
Did you know that most of the crimes that occur occur at night? Why is that?
Because people like to do things they shouldn’t do under the cover of darkness when you walk in darkness and all of a sudden the light shines you either get on board with the light or you feel very uncomfortable and you head for the hills because when the light shines, it exposes the darkness, it exposes your sin.
And that’s what happens when your journey begins. One day, you’re walking along, feeling pretty good about yourself.
And all of a sudden you realize that you’re out of sync with God and things aren’t right.
And you know that it’s because of what you’re doing and the things that you’re experiencing and the thoughts that you’re having and, and something inside of you tells you that’s not the way it’s supposed to be.
You know what that is, that’s conviction.
The Bible tells us that the spirit of God has come into the world to convict us of sin.
The Bible says that along this way, you meet a compassionate savior who came into the world to be light and show you the way.
And so with your conviction of sin and your compassion from the savior, you meet the Lord Jesus Christ who said I am the light of the world.
He who follows me shall not walk in darkness but have the light of life.
I met a young woman several months ago coming off of a life on the streets in our area.
She’s been living on drugs on the street for three years and she just couldn’t get three.
Then someone told her about Jesus and her life changed in an amazing way.
She went from darkness to light almost overnight.
Her family hardly recognized her when they first saw her after her recovery.
She told me nobody really understands what Jesus can do. I am what Jesus can do.
And I want to ask you today as you face these next months, are you going into the New Year with Jesus in your life?
If you’re not, you need to really understand that the journey you’re on right now is not going to take you very far in the direction you want to go.
The journey begins in a definite way. And then our journey takes us to difficult places.
How many of you know, that haven’t we been through some of those this year?
People always ask me, why are Christians going through trouble? Well, we’re all human. We live on this earth.
We’re walking on the earth and because there’s light shining on our path doesn’t mean it’s always going to be smooth after you become a Christian.
Your problems don’t get solved altogether.
In fact, most people tell me and I seem to remember this to some degree myself.
When you become a Christian, you get a few problems you didn’t have before, you know, you didn’t ever have any argument with the devil before you got saved.
You just did what he wanted you to do.
But now you know, better, you got the Holy Spirit living within you and he’s making you very uncomfortable and all of a sudden you got this thing going on inside of you, this internal struggling because God wants you to walk with him.
You know, I always tell people that when you get saved you don’t lose your old nature. Some people think.
Oh, well, I got saved. I got a new nature now. I don’t have an old one.
Oh, yes, you do. You have an old nature and if you don’t believe that, ask your wife or your husband, they’ll tell you you still have the old nature, but you have the new nature in the past, you couldn’t do anything but follow the, the enemy.
Now, you’ve got a new nature that enables you to follow God.
And when you choose to follow God, you’re walking a new path, the path of light is not easy.
We have learned that this year more than any year that I can ever remember.
Would you rather be on a wide path filled with lots of people stumbling in the darkness or on a narrow path with just a few people walking in the light?
That seems like an easy choice.
The wisdom literature of the Old Testament advises us to take the path of light.
Listen to Proverbs 4, 11 and 12. I have taught you the way of wisdom.
I have led you in the right paths.
When you walk your steps will not be hindered and when you run, you will not stumble.
That’s a good one to remember. Psalm. 37 puts it this way.
The steps of a good man are ordered by the Lord and he delights in his way though he fall.
He shall not be utterly cast down for the lord upholds him with his hand.
These passages are not saying that the path of light is trouble free.
It doesn’t say that the Bible doesn’t teach that, but they are saying that you will not walk alone on that path that God is watching you all along the way.
If you’re going to get discouraged, the first time you hit a rough place on the path, you’re going to have a frustrating journey.
So when you face these challenges, face them with God and know that He’s going to help you through them and don’t be surprised if you’re a Christian that you have trouble.
So your journey has a definite beginning, your journey takes you to difficult places. Here’s the third one.
Your journey gives you a defining purpose.
It says in verse 18, the path of the just is like the shining sun that shines ever brighter unto the perfect day.
Here. The writer is telling us that if you get on the path you get on the right journey, the journey is not only going to take you to your destination, but you’re going to grow in likeness to the Lord.
The longer you walk with Him, that’s the way it should work.
Paul said we’re to shine as lights in the world. What happens is you start to walk with the Lord.
Little by little. You go through some of these challenges and you grow, you develop spiritual muscles that help you deal with the next time you face something.
Each time you face a problem, you discover that God is faithful and he is capable and you, you take that information to yourself.
And so when you’re facing the next problem, now you have some tools you didn’t have before you have the memory of what God has done in the realization that what He has done, he will do and he can do.
And so you are stronger. And so as you walk on this path and this is the way it should work and we should be taking a little inventory about this right now.
The longer I walk with the Lord on this path, I should be coming in some way more like Him.
I should be growing in my faith.
If you can walk on the path toward heaven with Jesus Christ as your companion and not grow in your faith, something’s wrong.
So I want to ask you as you look at your life, have you made some progress this year?
Have you learned some things about the Lord? You didn’t know, have you made some decisions about your own life?
You didn’t expect we find it difficult to maintain a commitment to this world and the next and yet that’s what we have to do.
We’re living in this world on this journey and we’re headed toward heaven, which is our goal.
Now, let me tell you something that might surprise you because it did surprise me when I realized it this week, there is a whole lot more in the Bible about the journey than there is about the destination.
But you know that, I mean, we like to think, oh, we’re going to heaven.
The Bible is filled with stuff about heaven. Really is not.
There’s not a lot of information in the Bible about heaven.
The last couple of chapters of revelation, a few other things.
But there’s an awful lot in, in the Bible about the journey.
Sometimes if we’re not careful, we get all caught up with the destination.
And so we don’t know what to do on the journey.
I remember when I was teaching on the life beyond amazing.
I had quoted an author who said that there are two thresholds in the Christian life.
One is the threshold when you get saved and the other is the threshold when you go to heaven.
And he said the problem is most Christians have no idea what to do between those two. They get saved.
They know they’re going to go to heaven, but they don’t understand what to do in between. If that’s true.
It’s not because there isn’t any information in the Bible.
There’s more information in the Bible about your journey to heaven. Then there is in the Bible about heaven itself.
Friends. Until you get to heaven, you got to live on this earth until you arrive at the door of heaven.
You gotta figure out how to live on this earth. And you say, well, how do I do that?
This book is full of it. I mean, the Epistles in the New Testament, our half there, half application.
Every one of them. You read the first three chapters, you’ll find doctrine, read the next three chapters.
And it’s all about how to take that doctrine and put it into practice in your life.
If we learn anything as we go into this new Year, learn this.
If you want to understand how to walk on the journey to heaven, there’s only one place you can get any information about that.
And that’s in the holy book, we call the Bible.
And if you learn to look for it along the way, you will find all kinds of principles that will help you negotiate the journey.
And then number four, our journey is a developing experience. We move along the path and something happens.
The Bible says we shine ever brighter. One scholar put it this way.
He said the righteous are like the light of morning that keeps on increasing and not like the afternoon light that keeps on diminishing.
If you’re a Christian, you’re walking on this path, you should be the like the morning light, you’re getting brighter and brighter as you trust the Lord to help you do your journey in his faith.
I love to meet old saints who’ve been walking with Jesus after spending time with the Lord on a personal level, I remember as a seminary student, we had some of those guys who taught some of them that I don’t mean this in a negative way.
They were so holy. I didn’t feel worthy to be sitting in the class.
It was intimidating to be in the class with these people.
These men who had studied the word of God, many of them had learned the languages of Hebrew and Greek.
And they spent their whole life immersed in the scripture and walking with God.
And I thought often, I hope I can grow older like that.
I hope that my life is reflective of that as I get older.
You know, the last thing you want to be is a grumpy old man.
The last thing you want to be is somebody who doesn’t reflect Jesus. And I’ve known people like that.
Have you ever known people? You thought they were great Christians when they got old and start having some age issues, they just turned out to be not very nice.
We should pray that God would help us as we go on this journey.
According to Proverbs, we should be shining brighter and brighter until that day we should be growing in Christ and becoming more like him and learning to live for him in such a way that brings honor and glory to his name.
Some people when they get to heaven, it’s going to be a major adjustment from the way they’ve lived.
Other people. There won’t be any adjustment at all.
They’ll just go right on into heaven because they’ve learned how to live the Christian life in such a way.
Well, there you have the first four principles and there’s one more our journey is toward a destination.
That’s the obvious thing when you get on this path.
According to the book of Proverbs, when you walk into this New Year, if you’re a Christian, you may go through the whole year and you’re still walking on the path.
Some of us in this room, maybe in heaven next year at this time. Who knows?
But the most important thing is the destination of everyone who is journeying on the path of the just is unto what the Bible calls it the perfect day.
Have you ever had a perfect day?
I mean, we probably said, oh, maybe at night, you said this is a really, this was a perfect day.
No, it wasn’t. There’s no such thing as a perfect day on this earth.
But one day when we get to the end of our journey, and we step out of this life into, into the presence of the Lord, the Bible calls that the perfect day and that perfect day will last forever.
If you’re a Christian. Listen to me. You’re on a journey toward a perfect day.
Someone gave me these words many years ago and I think I slipped them into a file ultimately into my bible.
One day. Here it is. Life is a story in volumes three, the past and the present and the yet to be the first is finished and laid away.
The second we’re reading day by day, the third and last or volume three is locked from sight in eternity.
What we’ve lived already? We can’t undo God doesn’t make done things undone.
You may look back on this year and say, you know, I haven’t been walking on the right path like I should have been.
You can’t just pray and make that go away.
You can ask for forgiveness and go forward, but you can’t do anything about the past, the past is over.
So if you’ve done things you shouldn’t have done in the past, get them right with God and then forget it and get on with your life.
But you can live your life today. This is Volume two. You’re on the journey.
And ultimately, one day you’ll be in heaven. If you’re a Christian, we’re writing our story every day.
We’re walking in this journey every day.
And if we walk with the Lord, not only will the ultimate destination be the perfect day, but every day we walk with him on the way will also be enjoyable.
You know, there’s a song that someone wrote that goes something like this.
If there weren’t any heaven for me to enjoy, and I still had the chance to walk with Jesus.
During this life, life would be worth it all.
I want to tell you something that I believe with all my heart, the Christian life with all of its challenges and especially now with some persecution.
The Christian life is the best life you’ll ever have on this earth.
The journey with Christ toward heaven is the most wonderful experience and the greatest adventure you’ll ever have in your whole life.
I wouldn’t trade it for anything one day. I’m going to see Jesus and I’ll enter into the perfect day.
But I want to tell you something. The journey has been amazing.
I’ve had some hard times and had some incredible times.
But most of all I’ve had this steady walk with the Lord all these years knowing that he was involved in my life and he cared deeply about what happened to me and he would guide me and direct me and help me do the right thing.
The journey is worth taking. The journey is a wonderful way to spend your life on this earth.
The Bible says we’re pilgrims and strangers. We don’t belong to this earth. This world is not our home.
We’re just passing through and let the journey be a delightful one.
Don’t complain about the struggles, rejoice in the privilege you have of walking with the Lord through these days of uncertainty and knowing you have one up on everybody who doesn’t know the Lord Jesus Christ, you have the creator God living within you.
He knows the way he won’t let you get lost.
He will stay with you all the way to the end. Amen.
Dr Jeremiah will return to close today’s program right after this.
Thank you for watching. Turning point.
When you support this program with a gift of any amount Dr Jeremiah would like to thank you by sending you every day with Jesus his new 365 day devotional for 2022.
Inside this beautiful leather soft volume, you’ll find 365 daily inspirational readings from Dr Jeremiah paired with selected scripture to challenge and encourage you in your walk with God.
This devotional is also perfect for sharing with others And with a generous year and gift of $120 or more.
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Contact turning point today. And now with one last word for today’s program here is Dr Jeremiah.
We may not know where our journey in life will take us but God does.
The psalmist wrote that God knew us while we were still in our mother’s womb.
He not only knows us, he loves us.
And as our faithful father, he desires for us to walk in his love.
How do we become a child of God?
Well, he’s provided a way of salvation for us through faith in his son, Jesus Christ.
So as we enter God’s family, we become the spiritual siblings of the Son of God.
If you would like to become part of God’s family, please allow me to send you to resources to help you on your spiritual journey.
One is our booklet called Your Greatest Turning Point and the other is our monthly devotional magazine called Turning Points.
We’ll gladly send both of these resources to you free of charge if you will just contact us here at Turning point today.
Back again, this year, the home for Christmas channel from David Jeremiah and Turning Point ministries fill your season with all your favorite holiday traditions, music, carols, laughter, scripture, pageants, inspirational bible teaching and more.
Start streaming your Christmas favorites and discover new ones completely free and enjoy the home for Christmas channel at home in the car or anywhere you need a little Christmas simply go to turning point dot TV.
Next time on turning point, Paul says, forgetting those things which are behind.
I press toward the mark for the high calling of God in Christ, Jesus.
And what Paul wasn’t saying is do away with my past.
But what he was saying is I’m not going to let the past control my present or my future.
Thank you for being with us today.
Join us next time for a powerful how to move forward interview with Dr Jeremiah, hosted by Sheila Walsh here on turning point experience the setting of the Bible firsthand.
When you travel with David Jeremiah to Israel in spring 2020 to join Dr Jeremiah, as he teaches from God’s Word in the very locations where biblical events took place.
It’s a Christian travel experience that strengthens your faith, refreshes your soul and makes the Bible come alive.
Don’t miss this trip of a lifetime call or go online for more details.