Passage

1 John 3: 3
"And everyone who has this hope fixed on Him purifies himself, just as He is pure."


Introduction

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ,
Let us give all thanks and glory to God the Father who has blessed us to have 2011 Young Adults' devotional service.
I also give thanks to all the devotees who have prepared for this service with all your hearts, minds, and souls.
Dear devotees, in the gospel of Matthew, Jesus gave us a parable to explain about the kingdom of heaven.
A certain king held a wedding feast for his son and invited many people.
How honorable is it just being invited to a feast given by a king?
But they paid no attention and went their ways, one to his own farm, another to his business.
And the rest seized the kings' slaves who came to invite them and mistreated them and killed them.
The king was enraged, and he destroyed those murderers.
Then, he told his servants to go out into the streets, and bring people both good and evil.
Now the wedding hall was filled with dinner guests.
But when the king came in to look over the dinner guests, he saw a man there who was not dressed in wedding clothes.
He said in Matthew 22:12, '"Friend, how did you come in here without wedding clothes?' And the man was speechless."
Since they had been invited to an honorable place, they were supposed to be in wedding clothes if they honored the king.
Knowing this fact, this person came without wedding clothes, so the man was speechless.
They were finally thrown out of the feast.
At the end of the parable, Jesus concludes as follows:
Matthew 22:14 says, "For many are called, but few are chosen."
We are all invited to the heavenly feast given by God the Father.
Many people turn down the invitation to the heavenly feast because they are busy with worldly things.
They refuse the gospel following money and fame, and sometimes they persecuted and killed the evangelists.
But you accepted the invitation of God and you are waiting for the heavenly banquet that will be held soon.
What we have to remember once again is that we cannot participate in the feasts of God without wearing wedding clothes.
Even though you are invited and you long for this feast, you will eventually be thrown out without having the wedding clothes.
That is why today's reading passage also is recorded as follows:
1 John 3:3 says, "And everyone who has this hope fixed on Him purifies himself, just as He is pure."
It means you have to purify yourself if you long for the second coming of the Lord and heavenly kingdom.
Do you have this hope fixed on the Lord?
Through this message, I hope you will realize what kind of life you have to live on this earth as those who have this hope fixed on Him.
You should not just hear and know it as knowledge but realize deep in your heart what you have to do and keep it in the depths of your mind.
I pray in the name of the Lord that, in doing so, you will have increasing hope for the heavenly kingdom.


Main

Dear devotees,
Those who have this hope fixed on the Lord first of all purify themselves.
To purify yourself, you have to check your heart, thoughts, and actions with the word of God, the truth.
You should check to what extent you have cultivated the image of God and change what is not in accordance with the truth.
You have heard so many times that you have to check yourself and change yourself with the truth.
You have heard so much about what you have to do, keep and cast away, what you have to cultivate, and what goodness and truth are.
If you have obeyed what you heard, you must have cultivated pure and holy hearts and become holy men of spirit.
But no matter how much you've heard, it is of no use unless you cultivate it in your heart.
If you follow the worldly pleasures pursuing what your eyes and minds seek, then you will think and act in the things that are opposite of the truth.
You will do the things that God hates.
Now, I hope you will stop living this kind of life and just follow the truth.
I hope you will try your best in your Christian lives thinking about how you should make your heart, deeds, and lips holy and how you can please God.
In order to do this, truth has to be cultivated in your heart completely.
In other words, you must have the ability to listen to the word and understand it properly and not judge or discern it according to your own thoughts.
For example, one of your colleagues suggests you skip the prayer and go to see a movie with her.
You have some desire to see the movie, but you also feel uncomfortable about skipping your time of prayer.
In this situation, some try to justify themselves.
They make an excuse saying they can't help it, while in deed they have the desire to skip prayer.
You say, "If I turn down her suggestions all the time, she would be embarrassed.
I have to be a good friend so I can evangelize her later."
"It's not really a big deal to skip the prayer one day. I will pray harder tomorrow." You justify yourself this way and cheat yourself.
Or, you have some jealousy towards a certain person and you are cold to her, but you don't acknowledge your evilness.
You justify yourself saying, "I don't want to be cold-hearted toward her, but I can't help it because she's never first to realize her wrongdoing."
As above, you must not distort the truth as you see fit and according to your thoughts.
You must have the standard that is the word of God and use it to reflect upon yourself correctly.
Next, in order to purify yourself, you must practice what you have heard and been made clear to you.
Faith without the deeds is dead faith.
No matter how much truth you heard and know, you have no faith if you do not practice it.
But by just knowing a lot of truth, many of you mistakenly believe that you have great faith and you live in the truth.
How is it with you?
If God says 'Cast away' you must cast away.
If God says 'Don't do that' you must not do it.
If God says, 'Do it' you must do it.
Only when you practice the word can that word change your life.
If you just keep on hearing the truth and storing it as knowledge over a long time in your Christian life, you will not bear any fruit in your life like the fig tree without any fruit.
Some of you must be mourning over your own lives because they are not bearing any fruit.
Perhaps you feel sorry thinking, "...I've been a believer for a long time so I must have gone into spirit.
I should receive blessings at home and work to give glory to God. But, I have not borne any fruit before the Father."
Even so, do not be disheartened but start from this moment once again.
It is not difficult because you have now listened to many messages.
You can just check whatever disobedience you had and just begin to obey.
Galatians 2:20 says, "I have been crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me."
I hope you will cast off all your desires and thoughts and be able to profess the same.
You should be able to boldly profess that only the Christ lives in you and there is only the will of God and not your own will in your heart.
I hope all you young adults will expend all your efforts to obey completely and purify yourselves.
Dear devotees and other members,
Those who have this hope fixed on the Lord, secondly, must live with the Lord always.
For those who live with the Lord, everything will be orderly and holy in their lives.
God is watching all your actions 24 hours a day, even the moving of your eyes in their sockets.
I so surely believe that God is always watching me.
For this reason, there is no difference in my mindset and appearances between when I am in public and by myself.
Even when I go to bed, I comb my hair and make myself neat.
It's because I want to appear lovely in the sight of God the Father.
Even when I am alone, I know angels are watching me, so I always behave myself.
Many people pray that the Lord be with them and keep them with His blazing eyes.
If they really pray so with truthful hearts, their lives will change.
If the Lord is with them, would they still make jokes and talk about other people's faults while passing judgment?
If you really believe that God the Father is watching you, would you go to a place that you should not visit and see things that you must not see just because others are coaxing you?
Would you still take the flesh and follow the worldly pleasures even while the angels are watching you?
God is searching the depth of our hearts, and what do you have in your heart and on what kinds of things are your thoughts focused?
Are they filled with holiness, your duty, saving souls, Heaven and rewards, and things to please God?
Or, are your minds focused on dating somebody or thoughts of your family, your work, and worldly success to the point that you don't have any room for the Lord?
If you walk in the darkness, the Lord cannot walk with you.
Your guardian angels cannot help you either.
When the evil spirits come and give you tests and trials, they can only watch sympathetically from a distance.
I hope you will walk in the truth not just in the church but at your work, at home, and when you are walking on the streets, and when you are speaking or eating.
Always remember that the Lord is watching you, listening to you, and is always with you.
Then, you can quickly adorn yourselves as pure brides who are worthy to be the brides of the Lord.
Dear devotees, and other members,
Those who have this hope fixed on Him, thirdly, must cry out towards the Lord.
Jeremiah 29:12-13 says, "Then you will call upon Me and come and pray to Me, and I will listen to you. [13] You will seek Me and find Me when you search for Me with all your heart."
You have heard so many times that you have to pray continually with all your heart, crying out to God.
But just attending the prayer meetings does not mean that you pray very well.
You have to cry out in your prayer thinking as if the Lord is standing right in front of you, and believing that He is listening to you.
If you have the earnest desire to receive the answer, you will soon be filled with the inspiration of the Holy Spirit.
With the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, you don't have to try to make a loud voice; you will naturally cry out with a clear voice.
As you pray everyday, you might pray with similar contents everyday.
But even though you pray for the same thing one hundred times, you have to pray with all your heart and with new inspiration every time.
If you really cry out to the Lord, without changing you will continually seek to fill up the measure of your prayer.
It is the evidence that you have faith to cry out to the Lord in your prayers.
In Luke chapter 18 is the parable of a widow and an unrighteous judge.
The widow has a story and visits this judge everyday to plea, and the judge finally fulfills her wishes.
It's not because the judge was good or righteous, but it was because she was persistently coming to him that he finally had to listen to her.
Luke 18:7-8 says, "Now, will not God bring about justice for His elect who cry to Him day and night, and will He delay long over them? [8] I tell you that He will bring about justice for them quickly. However, when the Son of Man comes, will He find faith on the earth?"
It means that when God's children cry out with faith, God the Father will quickly answer them.
But it also says, "When the Son of Man comes, will He find faith on the earth?"
At the end draws near, it is difficult to find people who have true faith and those who cry out with faith.
If you have faith, you will cry out in prayer.
If you are drowning, how loudly would you cry for help?
In the same sense, in this sin-filled world going towards the end, how earnestly do you think you should be crying out to keep yourself from worldly things and to cast off sins and evil?
You cannot just pray with lip-service when you ask God to enable you to cast away sins like hatred, envy, desires, adulterous mind, and anger.
These sinful natures have been combined with your body throughout your lives.
To cast off these fleshly attributes, you have to pray so fervently and earnestly.
You have to pray with earnestness just like Elijah who brought down fire from heaven.
If you pray that earnestly, then that earnestness will remain in your heart even after the prayer in your daily lives.
So your heart and deeds will actually change and sins and evil will be cast out from you.
Not just the devotees of young adults mission, but I hope the pastors, elders, and all others members will check your prayers.
You know very well that Jesus prayed until His sweat became like drops of blood falling to the ground.
And how do you pray?
Even though you cannot make your sweat like drops of blood, do you cry out until you sweat with a truthful heart?
Only those who cry out with all their heart can be said to have the true faith that acknowledges the Lord, and only these ones can walk with the Lord.
They are the ones who have true hope for Heaven.


Conclusion

Dear devotees and other members,
Those who have the hope to receive the Lord who is coming again, first of all, purify themselves.
In order to do that, you must have truth cultivated in you completely, and you have to practice what you hear and understand.
Secondly, you have to walk with the Lord.
It means you have to make your thoughts, words, and deeds perfect, sensing the eyes of the Lord all the time.
Thirdly, you have to cry out in your prayers.
Those who have this hope fixed on the Lord will truthfully and earnestly cry out.
Their heart and deeds will be purified through their prayers in which they cry out with all their heart.
Leave behind all the times during which you did not live in the truth and you did not purify yourselves.
From now on, I hope you will change yourselves with a freshly renewed mind of a person who is born again and quickly become the person God wants you to be.
Then, you will realize in yourself that how happy a thing it is to cast off evil from your heart and replace it with the truth and to make yourself obedient to fulfill the will of God.
To the extent that you cultivate the kind of heart that God wants, you will have a true life, peace, joy, and happiness from above.
I pray in the name of the Lord that you will look up to Heaven in this happiness and joy and advance into the better heavenly dwelling places everyday.