Is This God or Just Shame? | When Heaven Meets Tuesday | Pastor Derick Amsler

Grab your feet, grab your Bibles. Go with me. First book in your Bible. Book of Genesis. Book of Genesis.

We are in this series called When Heaven Meets Tuesday. Come on, everybody say Tuesday. Some psychologists say that Tuesday is the most depressing day of the week because the hype from the weekend to get us in gear for Monday has worn off and we still have several days left to go and the job we don't like. But what we're doing is applying God's truth that we encounter and hear and receive on a Sunday. And we want to get it out of church and chapel bell and we want to apply it to our life on the daily.

Come on, tell the person next to you, Tuesday looks good on you after all. Let them know, come on, Tuesday looks good on you after all. By a means of where we're going. If you have known me for any amount of time, you know that I struggle with severe lower back pain and I have for a very long time. With that comes sciatic issues up my leg, up my back, up to my shoulder.

I see a chiropractor on the regular for it. And a while back everything was inflamed, just intense back pain. I preached back then. It was six times. And then I had to get on a airplane for like a five hour flight.

And I don't know if you've ever sat in coach, but a five hour flight between two babies squirming and crying, it puts you in bit of a pretzel situation. My back was throbbing when I got off that plane. To my surprise, when I checked myself into the hotel, there was a spa on the inside. I said, surely the goodness of the Lord has followed me here. I dropped my bags off, I went down there and I said, hey, I know it's a long shot, but by any chance, do you have any openings?

They said, you won't believe this. We do right now. I said, hey, hey. I said, I'll take it. They took me back in the back.

Now, I always heard that if you want to get the most out of massage, it's part mental. So you have to picture yourself as a stick of butter and you're just melting into the table. I was trying everything to relieve the tension in my body. And so I'm picturing myself as a stick of butter melting in the warmth of the table. Now, I don't know if you've ever been to a spa, but let me set the context.

Music lightly played in the atmosphere. The dim lights was harmonizing with the scent of a lavender, also hanging as A sweet aroma of rest and relaxation. The masseuse walked in. I heard the door open close, turned up the volume, turned up the heat on the table, and then she spoke. And it's not what she said, it's the volume in which she spoke.

I promise you, you have never heard in your entire life such a high pitched seismic volume of the dead were raised from the grave. Birds flew for safety. Fish plummeted to the depths of the ocean. I don't want to over exaggerate, but the earth itself trembled in fear. I was no longer a stick of butter melting in relaxation.

She says, Mr. Amsler. I said, oh, Mr. Amsler, I will now gently massage your ankle. In this moment, I started replaying every interaction I had since the moment I walked onto the property of this hotel. Did I present myself as hard of hearing? Did I have headphones in?

Did people think that these were. These were. What is. Why is this woman yelling at me? She was.

And it's not just her volume that was loud. Everything she did was loud. Her breathing sounded like Darth Vader if he had a sinus infection. And Covid, the exhale, the wheezing, the inhaling, it was ridiculous. Scared me to death.

For. For. For 45 minutes, I just laid there in holy fear of what? What in the world was going on? I found out later that she had a sinus infection, a double ear infection.

And she had no idea how loud she was being in that little room. And you say, well, how do you know that? Because I asked her. I was like, this is not fun for either one of us. You're sick.

And whatever you got, you're spreading on my sciatica. And here's my point. And you're like, do you have one? Here's my point. Her volume wasn't malicious.

Her volume was a miscalibration. If you're taking notes, write this down. Volume alone is not a dependable measure of truth. Loudness volume is not an indication of truth or intent. I'm just wondering how many of us have believed the lie, the devil, because it's the loudest voice in our heart.

How many of us have limited what God wants to say to us and about us and about our future and about our past and about our. About our calling in life? Because we have. Ms. We have. We have misunderstood the volume of the enemy as the whispers of the Holy Spirit.

Have you ever found yourself listening to loud condemnation in your life? The loud opinions of the devil over your life? And you overlook the still whispers of the Holy Spirit? Don't you wish the Holy Spirit will shout as loud as the devil? Sometimes it would be easier for us.

It would also traumatize us. Watch this. More often than not, the Holy Spirit of God whispers to us. Because whisper is a relational tone. You gotta feel secure and safe enough to get close enough to hear a whisper from somebody.

Whispers are not a dialogue of strangers. If you're ever walking down downtown Martinsburg and a stranger comes up to you and starts whispering in your ear, walk away quickly.

The Holy Spirit comes to us and he whispers. For in the whisper we draw close. And when we're close in his presence, we can feel his embrace. Volume is not always a great indicator for truth or intent. Let me unpack.

Last week, before we springboard into this week, we looked at Romans, chapter 8, verse 1, and it says this. There is therefore. And if you remember, what therefore is there for. In the previous chapter, Paul is talking about this struggle internally. He says, the things that I don't want to do, I do those things.

And the things that I want to do. I can't seem to find the discipline to do those things. Who can help this wretched bipolar of the soul man that I am? I need something outside of me to help me, to reach inside me and to give me the ability to do that which discipline alone cannot do. I need somebody to help me live the life I want to live for God.

There is in that reality, in that context, not the context of perfection, but in the context of process and sanctification. There is therefore now. Somebody shout now. Remember the word now is a time for framing word. It is a word that locates a signature of time.

So not then, not when. Right now. There is, in the midst of a struggle, there is now no authoritative absolute decline. There is now no condemnation, not for everybody, but for those who are in Christ Jesus. Here's the tension we want to unpack today.

If that were true, then why does my soul still feel heavy at times? If that were true, that there is now no condemnation for those that are in Christ Jesus. How can I be a believer? I believe in Jesus is the Son of God, that he died on the cross for my sins. The three days later he rose again to have a relationship with me.

Today he sits at the right hand of the God. And one day he's coming back and he's going to split the sky and he's going to come and take me from where I am to where he is right now, in my eternal place in heaven forever. I believe it. But then why does my Soul feel heavy at times. We talked about last week the difference between condemnation, which is the accusation you are guilty and you know it, and conviction, which is the voice of the Holy Spirit, where condemnation is an accusation of guilt, conviction is an invitation back to Christ and our conscience, which simply tells us something is off.

We're going to stay in that lane again this week because of what's at stake. Because of what's at stake. If we cannot discern the difference between condemnation and the accusation and conviction, the invitation. We will always live a life that is unstable in our relationship with God and wander aimlessly in our spirituality. We will run from God, isolate from God's people, and deny God's ultimate truth in our life.

Elbow the person next to you and say, you need this. Come on, let them know. Come on, let them know. You need this. You need this.

Let's go here. Let's say that following this particular service, let's say that I catch. I caught you out here getting in your car, and I said, hey, just before you leave, can you help me with something? I've got this box. And you say, well, that's what's wrong with your back, because you lift it with your back, not your legs.

But I ain't out here trying to do CrossFit. Just work with me for a second. Okay? Let's say that I come up to you and I say, hey, can you help me with this? It's pretty heavy.

I got some old tools and some parts in here. I'm taking it to the junkyard later. Hang on to this. Can you help me bring it to the truck? Now, when it's time to lay it down or put it in the truck, you're probably going to do one of these numbers.

You're just going to drop it and let it go. Now, if I said after service, hey, come here a second. Come here.

Hey. I went back over there into XR Kids, and I was goofing off with my son. He's nine. And we were horse playing. I put him in here, Okay?

After church, please take him to my car. Now, watch this. Watch this. You're probably not gonna drop him, right? Right.

Just saying. Who's not gonna be working in XR Kids tell you that much? You're not gonna drop him because of the meaning. The weight's the same, the meaning's different. And based upon meaning, you handle weight differently.

So when we do something wrong, when there's a misstep, when sin resurfaces in our life, you're gonna feel something. The Question is not what do I feel? Or. Or. Or.

The question is not how heavy is the weight? The question is, what is the meaning of the weight? You're gonna feel something. Condemnation is going to be a weight of accusation and guilt and shame. Conviction is going to feel weighty, but it's going to be an invitation back to the embrace of Jesus.

If we don't understand the different nuances of the voice and the tone, we'll always mistake volume for truth. And it's not the volume that sets you free. It's the truth that'll set you free. What you believe about the voice inside your heart decides whether you drop what the voice is saying, you hide from what the voice is saying, or you actually open it up and allow it to heal you. Go with me to the book of Genesis.

In chapter. In chapter three, God is having a relationship with Adam and Eve to the point of clarity, relationally. Honesty. The Bible sums it up like this. God would walk with humanity in the coal of the day.

God's on a daily walk with creation. You know the story. The serpent comes along. He tempts Adam and Eve against God's delight, against God's plan and command. Adam and Eve, they ate the forbidden fruit.

And by doing so, they ushered sin not only into the world, but into their own heart. The Bible says that after that moment, God comes back into the garden. And Adam and Eve have ran and hid on the other side of the garden. They have sold fig leaves together, basically to camouflage themselves. The original West Virginia hunters, right here, they have camouflaged themselves and they are hiding from God.

Now watch this. God says, adam, where are you? Just so we're clear, God knows where they are. God wants Adam to know where he is. So God asking this question is not for his information.

It's for their revelation. Because they can't move on until they understand where they currently are. Watch this. God says, adam, where are you? Adam responds, well, I heard the sound of you in the garden.

I sensed your presence coming towards me. I sensed you coming close to me. And I was afraid because that's what condemnation and shame will always do to you. It doesn't cause you to pursue Christ for repair. It causes you to run from Christ out of fear.

I was afraid because I was naked and I hid myself. Then God asks a second question. God says, well, who told you that? Watch this. The second question is about discernment.

The first question was about their revelation. The second question is about their discernment. Well, who told you that you were naked? I didn't tell you that. Who told you that you should run and hide from me?

I didn't tell you that. Who told you that distance was the answer to the problem that you just created? I didn't tell you that. Watch this. The first spiritual crisis in all of humanity wasn't disobedience.

It was agreeing with the wrong narrator. Because the wrong narrator became the tempter that led them to misbehave or sin in the first place. The biggest problem of our life is not just the action of sin. It's agreeing with the wrong narrator or tempter of our life that gets us to sin in the first place. So the biggest battle you're up against right now, it's not your boss, it's not your ex, it's not your parents or your kids.

The biggest war taking place on the face of the planet right now is not just after your heart. It's after your ear. Because if the devil can manipulate his voice and the voice of God inside of you, you'll always carry weight thinking that God's mad at you or. Or God is comfortable with what you're doing. The biggest battle is for us to develop discernment of what voice sounds like condemnation, conviction, and what is our own conscience.

One more time. If you confuse them, you will either run from God, and by doing so, you run from healing and wholeness, and you will ultimately spiral into. Into shame. Let's talk about it. Condemnation.

We learned this last week that condemnation is the accusation of guilt, and we know it. So condemnation is a legal term, and it means to be condemned by guilt. It leads to separation after conviction or after. After you've been convicted of a crime. It leads to separation and isolation.

Condemnation. If you're taking notes, write this down. It attacks your identity, who you are. Because if it can attack who you are, it'll create distance in your sense of belonging with God and God's people. It attacks identity.

It leads to hiding, and it ultimately ends in distance. I don't even know who I am anymore. Is this me? And we begin to live our life through a label of. Of our.

Of our activity, our behavior, rather than our identity, what God says about us. Condemnation always pushes you away from God, God's community, and God's grace. And here's why this matters theologically. Okay, here's where I'm gonna go seminary on you. But I know you can handle it, and you like it when I talk Bible.

I know it. Here's why it matters theologically. Condemnation is a courtroom term. To be accused and Condemned of a crime. You're guilty.

You know it. The reason why condemnation uses its voice so loudly is because it's trying to drown out the other legal term in the room. The other legal term in the room can be pictured like this. Imagine this. You're standing before the judge of the universe.

You're standing before the judge. He's already heard the case. The prosecutor laid out in great detail the crime that you committed. You have been caught red handed. You are busted on the spot.

You know what you did. You're guilty. You know it. Everybody in the room knows it. The judge picks up the gavel and.

And before he slams it, case closed, he's going to read the verdict right before he gets to the sentencing. You part the doors bust open. In the back of the courtroom, a figure walks in and says, you, Honor, if I have favor with you and out of my love for the defendant, though they are guilty, please let me take the punishment of their crime and let them go. The judge says, okay, you are justified. Or just as if you never committed the crime, you are justified.

You're free to go. You're guilty as charged. Case closed. The theological word for that is justification. It looks like this, a legal declaration by God where a guilty sinner is declared to have a right standing righteousness because Christ right standing with God, his relationship with God has been credited to them.

Watch this. Now. Condemnation shouts accusations so loud because it's trying to drown out justification just as if you've never sinned. How does justification get into your life? Should we do it?

Should we do it? We should. There's another theological word called imputation. Imputation means he put it there. Imputation to credit something to someone's account that wasn't originally theirs to begin with.

It looks like this. Your sin was put on Christ on the cross. It was charged. The judge took it off you and put it on Jesus. His righteousness was put on you or credited to you by faith.

Condemnation screams so loudly because it denies justification and imputation and only hangs around accusation for the detriment of your very soul.

Theologically understanding, condemnation denies. Justification should rearrange. How then we live our life on Tuesday? Because here's the challenge when talking about there's now no more condemnation for those that are in Christ Jesus. If you take that at a surface level, what we hear is, oh, good God's grace forgives whatever I do.

I might as well get busy living or get busy dying. And Paul would say, if that's your response, you don't know grace because Once you understand, somebody took my sentence of death, hell in the grave, and they didn't have to, but out of love for me, they did. Grace doesn't give you a hall pass. Grace begins to kill the appetite that needed forgiveness to begin with. Grace walks in and says, I want to rearrange the way I live.

Not for a relationship with Christ, but from a relationship with Christ. I don't want to keep going back to the very thing that he had to walk in the courtroom and saved me from to begin with. No wonder we call it Amazing Grace. How sweet the sound that saved a rotten scoundrel like me. For I was once lost and the prosecutor reminded me, but now I'm found.

I was blind, but now I see.

Grace then is not a loophole to keep sinning. Grace is power for a new life. If that is condemnation shouting over justification and imputation, what is conviction? Conviction says where condemnation would say, case closed, this is who you are, guilty as charged. Conviction says, come close and let's get healing from that conviction.

Then watch. This is the personal ministry of the Holy Spirit. So Jesus said in John 16 that the Spirit of God would convict us concerning sin so that we don't keep participating in the very thing that's killing us on the inside. Condemnation picks up the box, shuts it forever. Conviction says, let's open the box because something could be hurting you on the inside and we need to be healed from it.

Condemnation is a prosecutor. Guilty.

Conviction is a surgeon that says, let's start cutting away the things that are killing you so you can get back living a life and life more abundantly.

Conviction attacks your identity. Conviction. Condemnation attacks your identity. Conviction attacks the behavior that is leading to separation from God. This is how we learn to tell the difference.

Condemnation will shame you, separate you and isolate you. Conviction will settle you towards something that you needed to be set free from on the inside and healed deeply of. Where's all my parents at? Where's all my parents? Let's have a moment of connection right here.

Have you ever lost your cool and your kids? Come on. Have you ever. Come on. It's okay to admit because we all know it's their fault.

We all know is their fault. We were totally fine until they got involved. And the other day. The other day I lost my. My cool on my kids.

And before you look at me weird, I will walk over here to XR Kids and interview your kids right now if I have to. And I lost my cool. My kids, I've. Man, they're just like, hey, please don't do that. Please don't do that.

Please don't do that. Please don't do that. And you know, two days later, I'm still saying, please don't do that. And they keep doing it anyways. And anyway, so then I responded harshly.

It's like, what's wrong with you? Why can't you just listen to what I'm saying? And what needed a moment of maturity. They didn't receive that. They got an outburst from dad.

Now watch this. Conviction or a condemnation? Condemnation says, well, look at you, you hypocrite.

You're doing the thing that you know not to do. You want to counsel other people do that, but yet you're doing that yourself. You are harsh. You failed as a parent. What a great example, dad.

That's condemnation. Conviction says, you spoke harshly. So let's repair that in the moment. That was an example. So let's leave another example of what repair looks like.

Redemption looks like, Reconciliation looks like, Maturity looks like because you stop doing it. One attacks the identity and wants me to either be defensive or run away and not address it. And then just come back tomorrow and pretend like nothing happened. The other is an invitation for repair. You follow me on this.

Condemnation attacks you. Conviction invites you. When your heart feels heavy over something, the goal is never to analyze yourself into the ground. The goal is to recognize the voice and whose voice is on the inside. Is this condemnation or is this conviction?

Is this a prosecutor or is it a surgeon? How do we know the difference? Let me give you three anchors. Three anchors. Whenever you feel weighty on the inside, first thing we want to do is we want to test the thought.

We want to test the thought. Is this thought pushing me or drawing me closer to God? You know what this is? It's a sense of belonging. Your relationship with God.

Is this giving you a greater sense of God's love? Is it drawing you closer to God? Or is it making you question God's love for you? You condemnation. Conviction number two.

We want to anchor it in scripture. So what does the Bible say I need to do now? We would call this the next step of obedience. So if God is convict, watch this. This leaves you hopeless.

This leaves you filled with hope. Because now there's a next step to take for repair and healing. Watch this. Soul work is not self interrogation. We don't sit in the conviction with God and we just beat ourselves up.

I'm so stupid. Why do I do this? Why can't I get it right? I can't believe this. I'm Worthless.

This is why I can't. That is interrogating and torturing your own soul. Healthy conviction looks like this.

God, would you show me you and show me what I need to do next in me both hands. If all I do is think about myself, I'll implode. If all I do is think about God's love, I'll never address what is in me that God does not love. I need both. So Lord, would you show me you and what you say about me, that I am forgiven, I am redeemed, I am chosen, I am loved.

And Lord, would you help me handle this thing different next time? I want to welcome walk and freedom. See, this seat doesn't. You don't work here to earn God's belonging. You work from here.

I don't beat myself up and I don't try to prove myself more so he'll love me more because he loves me. I want to give him my whole life. Holy have you noticed. Have you noticed how hard the devil's working to attack families lately? Have you noticed that turning brother against brother and parent against child and child against parents and siblings against one another.

And the number one reason why the devil attacks families is because if he can get you wounded relationally, you'll always view God and God's sense of family from a place of a wound. So I can't love God and see God clearly as a loving father. If I was raised by a horrible dad, I can't sense that God wants me to be a part of this family if I'm carrying an orphan spirit that nobody was patient enough to love me into family. The devil is working overtime to attack families because it's going to attack your relationship with God. Sitting in a seat of conviction is not about you earning family rights.

It's understanding as family. I can bring it to him and God will come to me and he will heal me. This family vibes. The devil wants you to carry an orphan spirit. That's why God says over and over again, I have given you the spirit of adoption.

All throughout the Bible, God's constantly reminding his sons and daughters, you are chosen, you are free, you are loved. If we were those things, why does he have to keep saying it so many times? For our revelation, in our enjoyment that we have a God who delights in sitting with us. You are chosen, you are loved, you are adopted. Condemnation is the accusation.

You're guilty. You know it. You better separate and run from God. Conviction is an invitation to come back to him. Number three, we stay in communion so we test the thought, we anchor it in scripture.

What do I do next? And then we stay in community. We bring how we're processing the weight on the inside to godly counsel who will not just give us wisdom, but encouragement for our next step. So watch this. The goal of conviction isn't to become an expert in your darkness.

The goal of conviction. Conviction is to become familiar with your shepherd's voice. For he still speaks and whispers.

So here's what I want you to know.

Whatever is in your life right now that is really heavy for you to be managing, whatever's on the inside of your soul. God does not stand at a distance watching you struggle. He's not laughing with the angels over your pain. He's not run from you, though we run from him like Adam and Eve, we can hear his footsteps in the garden drawing us close. What do you do with the weight on the inside?

Watch me. Now, you handle it with grace. Because God says, I put my son on the inside.

I'm wondering how many of us are busy running from God or we're trying to justify our actions before God, or we have shamed ourselves to a point where we no longer hear God. Because after all, why would God want to mess around with somebody like us? And I'm telling you, that is not the voice of your heavenly Father and that is not the voice of your great defender. And that is not the voice of the one who parted the doors in the back of the of the courtroom to walk in and say, wait a. Wait, wait, wait, wait.

They are love, they are chosen, they are redeemed, and they are mine. I've adopted them into my family. Come to me, all who are weary and heavy laden, and I will give you rest. That means peace. That means a new beginning.

That means a restart in your identity.

You feel it.

You feel a little lighter. Maybe he's not mad at you, running from you after all. Maybe he's mad at in love with you like Adam and Eve. I want to tell you the gardener has come back to plant seeds of new beginning in you. Let the Holy Spirit do its work and watch what the gardener can produce on the inside.

Come on, put your hands out like this. Lord, we hold both realities at once. That yes, we are guilty as charged, but we are no longer guilty because of the placement of our sin at the foot of the cross. And so, God, we give you ourselves.

Lord, would you help us to have a fine tuned ear to the shepherd's voice?

Give us the ability to discern the difference between tone and tenor. And volume from the prosecutor and the shepherd, our adversary and the surgeon.

We want to know God, and we want to walk in your freedom. Give us ears to hear the difference between condemnation and conviction. So, Lord, in this moment, when the devil brings things back into our mind, we simply lay it at the cross and we move on from it. In your name, we open up our heart. Surgeon, heal us.

We open up our mind. Tell us our identity in you. Yet again we open up our hands and our feet. May we live a godly life for you. We echo the words of Paul.

There is therefore now no more condemnation, for I am in Christ Jesus. And from that anthem, from that bedrock of identity, and from that pinnacle of truth, we know you, we love you, we follow you. And we release our life into your loving hands.

In the name of Jesus, let us feel what a spirit of adoption actually feels like.

In Jesus name. Do you believe it, Church? Come on. Say amen. Amen.

God bless. We'll see you Wednesday.