Angels, Demons & You [An Exit Strategy]

all right you know we're not passing offering plates and such just yet but we're doing operatory prayers i asked you last week to join me in praying for the for the americans especially but for the americans and our allies that were trapped in afghanistan in fact we took last wednesday to fast and pray and then wednesday evening when we came together we took a special time to pray for that and there has been some progress made there there have been some new challenges and they continue and i expect they're going to continue but i wanted to extend that invitation for one week further at least through this wednesday let's fast and pray that that evacuation will continue in an orderly way and the american citizens and those that have been our allies there will be protected and that there will be both the will and the way for them to be delivered there's no shortage of things to pray about from the those that suffered from the floods here in middle tennessee to those that are bracing for a storm coming ashore on the gulf coast if you don't realize there's something to pray for set an alarm you know in praying for afghanistan it's really a it's a much larger picture i think if we just take those single events we'll always be chasing events we're a nation in need of healing and that begins in the hearts of god's people it's not the fault of someone else i think it's it's a mistake to think in those terms primary role of government is to protect its citizens if a government fails to protect its citizens it's a failed government enterprise that's not about a politician or a party because when we see failures on a significant extent it involves career employees this is about the state department and our military and military leadership especially those bureaucrats it's wrong to think of it in terms of a party or a person uh it's about the heart of the nation those people that we elect to offices are just a reflection of our character and i know that's uncomfortable and that's awkward but that is our truth and so we have to have a heart change within the church you know the chaos and confusion in afghanistan is a reflection of the chaos and confusion along main streets in america the the americans that seem to be abandoned there if not for the outcry of the people but i i highlight that if not for the outcry of the people because i think we were awake enough to use our voices there's a lesson in that i pray we can learn the lesson that our voice matters there's tens of thousands of people i believe that will make their way to safety because of the people who used their voices and said it's not acceptable to turn our backs on them but it isn't just afghanistan we have our borders are open more than two million people this year will come across that border illegally that's beyond the the the many many people who will immigrate legally and coming across our borders are not just people there's all sorts of contraband and things that we have no with the intent of bringing destruction again not protecting our people the lawlessness and the violence in our cities continues to escalate and grow and we act as if we don't notice but we do notice and it's not someplace else it's growing in intensity it's unimaginable to use we've watched the news that we purposefully left billions of dollars of armaments and vehicles and weapons and ammunition for the terrorists of the middle east while we demand that american citizens give up their firearms it's a bit incongruous you know it just we have to have a heart change folks and it starts with us you know one of the things i think is a possibility out of watching the debacle in afghanistan is we might gain a bit of a heightened sense of gratitude for our nation there's been this unrelenting drum beat for many months now about the oppressive nature of our our nation and our history and the the destruction of our history and the rewriting of our history and the taking down of our statues we are witnesses right now in real time to what true oppression looks like as we watch the taliban it's not about microaggressions you're executed for wearing the wrong clothing or for telling the wrong joke women's opportunities are severely limited with the severest of punishments i i've had a couple of ideas around that i think that perhaps the professors and the political leaders and those professional disruptors who have spent so much energy searching through our history to identify the worst chapters and there are some of them there quite candidly but they identify them so that they can gleefully announce that we're a failed nation well i think we need to organize a field trip for those folks it's a short-term trip because i want them to come home but i just think a few weeks beyond the protection of the airport in afghanistan in the midst of another kind of a culture and world view it's there's a there's an opportunity that when they return we might be able to have a bit more civil discourse about the nature of our culture and where we would like to go and right along with i had kind of two ideas i had two ideas in the same week so you should pray but then we've seen all these people in front of microphones and in social media that think it's such a clever idea to defund the police and and take those resources and fund social workers and i'm not an anti-social worker but as a replacement for the police that seems a bit odd to me so here's the it's a second field trip everybody wants to defund the police we're going to allow them to select the social worker of their choice and then as the military draws down we're going to drop them in behind them and see how that works with restoring order with a good social plan a little community work i think when they get back from their field trip we can have a little bit more respect for our law enforcement and our military and those people in authority in our nation but to save you the email i don't want to leave anybody behind i don't want to leave them there we just want the experience so we can come home and give us a bit more balance we have been so blessed and have had so much freedom and so much liberty and such abundance that we have lost our perspectives we're ungrateful and god is awakening us and i pray that we will continue to listen to that but we need to pray this morning why don't you stand with me tell you if i was in kabul today i'd want you praying like all day and for those along the gulf coast for those that have suffered from the floods you know the new cycle moves but the impact of those tragedies doesn't and so we have to be faithful to pray and stand with those people in the best ways that god gives us to do so prayer matters all right so if you if you can join us on wednesday to fast and pray we would invite you to do that if you can be here on campus that's great if not you can join us on the live stream we're going to pray together father thank you thank you for the freedom we have to gather in jesus name i thank you for the liberties that we enjoy for the abundance of our lives you have most certainly blessed us and we pause to say thank you today the lord we stand in agreement for the american citizens and our allies that are are looking for a way out of afghanistan today lord i pray that you would make a way that there would be both the will and the way for those people to be delivered from those circumstances i thank you for it we stand with them against the forces of darkness that would bring destruction and murder and disruption lord i pray you'll protect those that are there from those who would destroy may the plans of the wicked fail but the things they have plotted in the darkness be exposed to the light we thank you for it lord send your angels to stand guard around them we ask for your mercy upon them we pray for them today lord those that had thought otherwise changed their minds those that have stood in opposition may they have a change of heart lord those among us who have been indifferent or distracted or unconcerned awaken us to begin to cry out to you for mercy and lord those who have suffered because of weather and disruptions we ask for your restoration in their lives lord make ways where there seem to be none bring renewal to their hearts and strength to their bodies for those bracing for a storm lord may you may you diminish its impact may it be turned to pathways that minimize its influence we thank you father that you are lord of all and we cry out to you today to ask for your mercy upon us as a people forgive us for our arrogance and our pride for our ungodliness and our immorality lord turn our hearts back to you we cry out to you today and we thank you that we will see the deliverance of our god in jesus name amen hallelujah you may have a seat you should have outlines that you received when you came in they're in microfiche most of that is application there's some relief in that if you're joining us on a digital platform you can download those outlines from the website or the apps we're working through a study on angels demons and you and it's the end you part that is important it moves it from a theoretical discussion to something that we understand impacts our lives and we're asking god to give us awareness of the spiritual world around us i'm an advocate for learning and studying and education i've spent most of my life learning and continue to do so and hope i'll be able to continue to do so but there are other elements to our lives beyond our intellect we're not going to out think evil nor out organize evil or overpower evil with our numbers there is a spiritual world and we need to understand the nature of that the bible says that the things which are seen were formed by those things which are not seen so to ignore the unseen world is to ignore the greater part of the reality this present world order the bible says is passing away well for this particular session i want to talk to you about an exit strategy we've seen the folly of the lack of thereof just imagining evil will play nice that if we just don't talk about it or we can make a treaty with it it will treat us prayer folks the nature of evil is it doesn't play fair that's why we call it evil if you play fair you're not evil we're just having a contest we call that a hobby or sports evil intends your destruction evil exists in our world and the force behind the physical expressions of evil is spiritual that's why you can change the name of the physical expressions of evil the behavior is very similar it's destructive it takes advantage of weakness it's self-absorbed because the the personality behind it is a spirit it's not a government or a military or a corporation there's spiritual forces of evil who intend your destruction it's biblical we've been working on this for a few weeks in this particular session it really is the practical component of this study we're going to look at some ways to to find freedom in our lives first chronicles chapter 12 and verse 32. it's an interesting statement it says the men of issachar's describing the men who who gathered around king david the men of issachar who understood the times and knew what israel should do what we're really talking about is discernment discernment is kind of a fancy biblical term for an awareness of spiritual things and to understand the times we're living in we need more than an economic awareness or a medical awareness we need a spiritual awareness like i think we all feel a bit buffeted by the incompleteness of the information that comes to us the inconsistency of it we understand there's some challenges we're not sure what to trust we need discernment so we want to be like the men of issachar we understand our times and we know what god would have us to do amen that's our goal and our target we're living in a season of unprecedented chaos whether you like it or not the beginning of last year our world changed i know they told us go home for two weeks and you can return to normal but the information was faulty and we're more than two weeks into this and we're more than six weeks into it and we've been through an election and we have a vaccine and normal's still not here so i don't believe the world that we we laughed when we were introduced to this season is in our future i think we're making a new future and i know some that some prefer just not to acknowledge that and to pretend as if that's not true and persist with your vacation plans and your habits i know some are gripped by fear those things aren't helpful i believe god is leading us he's leading us to a better place as certainly as he delivered the hebrew slaves from the brick pits of egypt to lead them to a promised land god is awakening his church and empowering us for a new season so i i would encourage you not to be frightened i would also ask you not just to ignore it i've done dozens and dozens of interviews in these last months in our community and across our nation and the question that keeps coming up is you know what can we do and if it happens to be christians engaged in the discussion and we talk about those fundamental spiritual disciplines they go yeah yeah i know about that but but what can we do it's exposed some anxiety we have around the tools that god has given to us i got an email this week from a friend a friend that has influenced far beyond anything i know and we stay in touch intermittently just to try to encourage one another and be aware of what's happening but he sent a note and i quote he said the chaos is crazy it takes your breath away and i find myself trying to figure out what to do other than pray thank god we know how the story ends but my heart is broken for those who are suffering that's the hardest part for me i think we can all say amen to that but you know i walked around with that for a bit thinking you know i find myself trying to figure out what to do other than pray because i've heard that sentiment expressed over and over and over and over and over again what are we going to do what's the response well every generation every generation has to learn to listen and obey god now that's the truth the purpose of reading your bible the purpose of meditation thinking about what you've read the purpose of developing a prayer life the purpose of being in community the purpose of practicing obedience is is so that we can learn to listen that we can learn to trust the god of abraham isaac and jacob we're not preparing for a test we're not learning the 12 tribes of israel so we can check the boxes the next time we're asked to recite them we're doing all of those things so that we can recognize god's instruction and we're prepared to take a place on his behalf now that's a very important concept so if you're in a season where the only thing you're being asked to do is pray and familiarize yourself with the character of god you're not on the sideline you're in training there's an invitation coming there's a knock on the door coming there's a there's a note coming there's a place you're going to be asked to stand a place you're going to be asked to hold folks this is not theoretical any longer this is no longer just some practice session then when we're given the assignment we're invited to participate we have prepared ourselves it's too late to prepare when the invitation arrives it's too late so my question is what are you preparing for see here's the big picture idea every generation has an invitation to respond to god every generation that we have lived for so long in stability and we could argue about degrees of stability but if we compare it across history or we compare it across the current global landscape we have lived with stunning stability i've visited many places in the world that if you wanted to own a home you have to pay cash they could not imagine giving you a 10-year mortgage because their economy and their nation's not stable enough to make that kind of an investment in the future we assume that's a right that our children could go to school and the schools would be adequately funded and there would be textbooks and food available and or before school and after school i mean the assumptions we make about the stability of our lives have enabled us to have kind of a pseudo faith we've built our faith so that we could go to heaven and we've invited god to bless us in time but we really weren't certain how dependent we were on him in time unless we got in a really tight spot a medical diagnosis that we didn't want an aberrant choice by a child or someone that we cared about but short of those kind of bizarre turns of our lives we could manage it that feel about right that's a very very unique subset of the world's population but it's diminished our faith biblically and the outcome of that is it's caused us to have little interest we're almost generational christians you worship in the way that your great-grandparents worshipped and your grandparents it's good enough for them it's good enough for me well that's just not how we do it you know i remember going to church with my grandparents and this is what church was like and bless god if it was good enough for granny it's good enough for me newfangled church drums banging on everything they could think of to bang on it's not the way we sang those songs i'll tell you that reading those weird translations of the bible granny read the king james just the way paul wrote it four sanctuaries in one church never heard of such foolishness in my life sitting outside watching the birds and the squirrels lost our minds you got your own lines you can plug right in there and most of them start with well you know i don't know about that i think folks i appreciate that you can think i'm glad i can think but we've got to learn to take what i think and submit it to what god says but here's the biblical presentation you know this we just don't think about it what god those people that came from the brick pits of egypt those slaves that were delivered through god's miraculous hand and we can agree that god delivered them their feet were put on a path that continued to change every day they took a step they'd never eaten manna before they'd never followed a pillar of cloud or a pillar of fire before they'd never seen a tabernacle they'd seen egyptian temples to the egyptian gods they'd never seen a tabernacle they'd never had their own priesthood their priesthood had never had clothing designed for them they never had a specific diet before they ate whatever the egyptians gave them to eat they didn't have a holiday schedule dictated by god they didn't have ten commandments they didn't have a list of dietary roles they got a whole lot of new stuff and every day for them was a challenge they could not say this is what granny did but it didn't stop with them in fact that generation got to the point they said no more we're not changing anymore we're not trusting anymore we're not following anymore you know what god that says god was so angry with them he said you can die in the desert so joshua let the neck crew in they had to learn to be warriors they had to take their inheritance they had to conquer the promised land well that offends some liberal biblical scholars but it's the story the canaanites didn't just surrender because god said i'm going to give this to this other group of people we had a whole generation that had to learn to be warriors they'd never done that before either then they wanted a king they'd never had a king before samuel said this is what the king will do ah whatever we want one of those we want to fit in a little better you're reading through the historical books right now all those kings and the changes we got to jesus it's not just old testament you get to jesus the messiah came supernaturally attested angelic host big noise in the shepherds fields of bethlehem the messiahs here he was ignored by the power brokers in the temple the messiah arrived and he didn't expel the hated romans the oppressors that humiliated their women and exacted taxes he didn't do what they wanted he only had a public ministry for three years he recruited the disciples come follow me he said come follow me they went all in left their businesses reoriented their families total alignment with jesus and at the end of three years he said i'm leaving you and where i'm going you can't come and i said whoa whoa that's not what we signed up for he said no no you signed up to follow me now follow me they had to change again acts 1 he went back to heaven acts 2 the holy spirit descends up to this point they spent their whole time together 12 of them mary little band following jesus ministering together coming back when they got in over their heads jesus fixed it they brought this person to be healed or to pray be prayed for or delivered and we couldn't get to an outcome so jesus would intervene and bring them to an outcome now jesus is gone he's gone and they're not going around as 12 any longer they're gone by themselves and they're going to go to the uttermost parts of the earth and you watch them struggle to figure it out and the opposition that comes and and the difficulties they get into the point is from genesis all the way through revelation there's not this one stable story god's people are constantly learning listening being invited to change to grow we're not changing the essence of what we believe those things are non-negotiable but how we live it out in the world requires us to respond to the challenges of this generation folks we got to wake up we think well if i could just restore the godliness that the my gran no no no we need 21st century righteousness and holiness we've got to overcome evil with god we've overlooked it long enough this is not some new story it's the stuff of the book we've just been so blessed we didn't have to depend on god god forgive us now we've spent several weeks talking about good and evil and the spiritual forces attached to that we talked a great deal about how to invite the spirit of god into our lives how to cultivate an awareness of of what god is doing in the earth so we become more aware of the good than we are of the evil that's essential well in this session we're going to talk about an exit strategy for evil how do you diminish the influence of evil in your life you better know you better know otherwise you've got an exit strategy that's as messed up as the one we're watching and the consequences will be just as devastating so to get started with there's just some fundamentals you need to know one when we talk about in engaging with evil recognizing that evil exists understand it's it's fundamentally a truth encounter it's not a power encounter we're no match for the devil we're not going to out think him we're not more powerful than he is in fact the the bible reminds us in a very humbling way that our heroes of the faith all struggled because of his plots and schemes isn't that true abraham and ishmael moses the murderer david the adulterer paul the angry violent man peter the one who denied the lord i mean nobody gets through without the challenges so the platform the basis of our freedom the imagination that we can be free is about god's truth love the truth the bible says buy the truth don't sell it there's nothing more valuable than god's truth yield to god's truth humble yourself freedom is is found at the on the pathway that is defined by god's truth that's why reading your bible is so valuable the second beginning point i would invite you to is a is to be aware but not to be afraid sometimes when we talk about unclean spirits unholy spirits demonic spirits fallen angels there's a there's kind of a creeping sense of fear that's not the objective you just need to be aware you need to be aware you need to understand the limits you need to understand what gives it access to your life and then how to to to find freedom when that access has been gained it's not a point of fear it's just a reality in the same way that your body has the most amazing immune system the most fabulous there's so many layers to it it's so effective that the overwhelming majority of the things that would diminish you you're not ever even conscious of but occasionally there's a pathogen or an attack or something in our midst that has been a bit more effective at negotiating that immune system and we have to pay a bit more attention you don't want to live in fear you just need to be aware the same thing is true spiritually in mark chapter four jesus has just calmed the storm he spoke to a storm and the wind and the waves got quiet do you believe that spiritual forces could affect natural phenomena jesus did he speaks to the storm then he turns to his disciples this is what he says to his best friends why are you so afraid do you still have no faith his expectation is by now they'd have a little more faith than that what do you think he would say to us but look at this then it describes their emotional condition they were terrified they said who is this even the wind and the waves obey you see when you bump into an authority that you didn't believe existed or you had failed to recognize or you stubbornly refused to acknowledge it's frightening and if you haven't taken the word of god and allowed it to inform your imagination and your thoughts when you bump into expressions of evil it's terrifying i don't know whether it's true or not i read the story was told of martin luther the reformer that he woke up one night and the devil was standing at the foot of his bed and luther said oh it's just you and he rolled over and went back to sleep if it's not true it should be aware not afraid and the third piece is you've you it's really not optional if we're going to walk in god's freedom we have to learn how to be filled with the spirit of god stop the debate stop limiting what you're inviting him to do humble yourself if you spoke in an uninviting way about him if you've mocked the holy spirit if you've made fun of what you don't know repent repent we need his help ephesians 5 verse 15 be very careful then how you live that's a pretty sobering warning be very careful how you live not as unwise but as wise making the most of every opportunity because the days are evil therefore don't be foolish understand what the lord's will is don't get drunk on wine which leads to debauchery instead be filled with the spirit actually the statistics from culvert are right there's been too much getting drunk on wine i read the i had some of the dialogue with some of our leaders they said we can't close the liquor stores people that break in to get it we can close the churches it's pretty plain instructions jesus made wine i'm not trying to pick a fight but i'm trying to read you the book spend less time getting drunk be filled with the spirit be filled with the spirit and then it gives you the behaviors that flow out of that speak to one another with psalms and hymns and spiritual songs that's not about what you just read online or saw on cnn or heard on your favorite news channel give yourself a different perspective sing and make music in your heart to the lord always giving thanks to god the father for everything in the name of our lord jesus christ the church has been too carnal for too long again we've imagined our future was secured by things other than god so we could be pretty sloppy a little lazy so the beginning points all right it's about a truth encounter you want to be aware but not afraid and you want to consciously think about on a daily basis behaviors you can engage in to see that you remain filled with the spirit now let's add to that we've got to cultivate the will to resist evil not my idea first peter chapter five this is the big fisherman that jesus recruited he wrote these two letters near the end of his life he's not the brass young man we meet in the gospels he's been tempered by a great deal of life experience he's been ministering since the since jesus ascension on the front line of the church peter preached on the day of pentecost peter was the one that got sent to the gentiles the first time to caesarea to cornelius home he had to explain his actions to the very agitated jewish christians back in jerusalem then peter had to yield a bit of the floor to the rising voice of paul the apostle to the gentiles he had to walk through some challenges with that so by the time we get to the epistles that he's written they're tempered by a lot of life very valuable valuable words to us chapter 5 and verse 6 humble yourselves therefore under god's mighty hand that he may lift you up in due time if you want to be promoted in the kingdom of god the doorway to promotion begins at humility you can humble yourself or you can be humiliated i would encourage you to humble yourself verse 7 cast all your anxiety on him because he cares for you don't be anxious he said there are things in the world that will make you anxious there are life circumstances that cause anxiety i'm not denying they're real i'm not suggesting you don't have reason the instruction we're given is to cast all that anxiety on the lord you cannot live an anxious life and listen to the spirit of god at the same time again we're developing an exit strategy how do we walk in peace centered in god's truth so that no matter what comes in the earth we land in the place god has for us ready to accept an assignment to make a difference cast all your anxiety on him i would encourage you need a daily routine for offloading that anxiety recognize what causes it and then limit your exposure cast all your anxiety on him be self-controlled and alert do you know self-control is one of the fruit of the spirit you have to intentionally cultivate it we live in a culture a society that has diminished the value of self-control well i can't deny how i feel no but you can admit that your feeling's not good well it's what i wanted to do so we have all kinds of language around license to ungodliness and we're exposing ourselves to evil peter is trying to help us here from his life experience and the direction of the holy spirit be self-controlled he said and alert aware now he tells us why your enemy do you realize you have a spiritual enemy that's far more deadly than the taliban or isis k or l or m or n or o or p it's far more deadly than covid 99 percent more than 99 of the people who contract coven survive 99 of the people subject to the devil's schemes don't survive them he's a far more devastating enemy do you have a plan on purpose your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour here it is verse 9 resist him resist him standing firm in the faith and then we're given some motivation you know that your brothers throughout the world are undergoing the same kind of sufferings suffering is universal you know one of the things that suffering does when it touches your life it convinces you you're unique nobody has suffered the junk i've suffered right i mean i know you've suffered but your suffering was small my suffering huge right it says resist the devil standing firm in the faith remember that you have brethren around the earth can you imagine the conversation with an afghani christian today when you told them about the oppression you're enduring well they're making me wear a mask you think you get a lot of sympathy because we have brothers and sisters around the world the assignment is to resist him and then the god the promise the god of all grace who calls you to his eternal glory after you've suffered a little while will himself restore you god is our restorer but look at the outcome it says it'll make you strong firm and steadfast you'll be better at the end than you were at the beginning but the pathway is an intentional choice to resist to overcome evil with good and it's not just about you and your wife your two kids us four and no more we're the light of the world we're the salt of the earth we don't just stand against it when it comes inside under our roof we stand against evil in the earth that's the assignment when god said i'll make you a holy nation a royal priesthood i'm going to make you my treasured possession amongst all the peoples so that all the peoples will see the distinction of a life yielded to god that's not just about me and my own but it's not just first peter in james chapter four submit yourselves then to god resist the devil and he'll flee from you come near to god and he'll come near to you submit yourselves to god that's the beginning you've got to be submitted to the lord folks that's not just saying the sinner's prayer and being baptized that's every day lord i'm going to submit to you today we build our plans and we want god to submit to our plans we have our dreams and our intents and they're not evil or wicked but you've got to let we've got to be willing to submit to god amen we're mad at god i don't like what you're doing you're doing a lousy job of managing my plan have you not read it i wanted to be at this position by this point i wanted to have accumulated this or i wanted my children to be here i wanted to be doing that and i'm mad at you what if we said to the lord lord i want to follow you today i want to follow you today i'm not saying it's an absence of planning it's not an absence of structure god is a god of order the universe that we see shouts at us about the order and precision of our god so i'm not talking about living recklessly i'm talking about yielding your will to god most of us are engaged in a debate with god today about something some behavior you're wanting him to bless some plan do you have the courage my life changed i did not want to ask god what he wanted to do with what he wanted me to do with my life i didn't want to ask him that question i spent years i fasted and prayed i read my bible i prayed hours and hours telling god what i wanted to do and asking him to bless it i remember the day i just about finished my undergraduate work in college and had a few minutes after lunch and i sat down on a little daybed in my dorm room and i leaned back against a concrete black wall and picked up my bible and i heard god inside of me i heard the spirit of god say you can go i knew exactly what he meant i could see the whole see i knew i had the freedom for what i'd been asking him for i knew that god just said okay you go and it frightened me to my core because i understood i knew i was a rebel and i knew that i had not one time said to the lord what would you like me to do because i didn't want to know i didn't want to know and i spent a few days walking around with it i knew i was standing at a at a fork in the road and my future would be determined by what i said next and i wish i could tell you it was neat and clean and i said oh lord i'll do whatever you want and you know i changed paths and changed degrees to still graduate on time it took some extra hard work and the path didn't get clear immediately in fact it was years later before it was clear with some tremendous heartache in between submit to the lord resist the devil he'll flee from you come near to god he'll come near to you wash your hands you sinners purify your hearts you double-minded now he's writing to believers the book of james is written to the 12 tribes which were scattered abroad brothers greetings is how it opens it's not written to the pagans and he's giving them the instructions to resist the devil to come near to god and then he's saying to that same group of people you need to wash your hands you need to purify your heart you're double-minded you'll honor god in one moment and you'll honor the world and the next resist the devil it's our assignment you've got to eliminate all the provisions of your enemy i'm not going to walk you through all those passages they're pretty self-evident you can review them on your own in romans 13 verse 14 says make no provision for the flesh watching afghanistan you see what provisions look like you know for the military they need beans and bullets and you we make too much provision for our carnal self you know what it is you know how you make plans to indulge yourself you know what you hide from certain people so that they don't know about it the biblical instruction is make no provision for the flesh if you want to give the flesh less influence your old carnal selfish nature less influence in your life stop making provision for it well i like it therein lies the rub well don't you want me to be happy i'm not opposed to happiness but i would encourage you towards holiness when your desire for holiness eclipses your desire for happiness you'll gain some momentum in freedom and it's not an either or choice serving god doesn't make you less happy happiness is just an idol now i want to take the balance of the time we've got and walk with this is this is this is the closing prayer but it's going to take me a few minutes there's actually seven steps there to a choice for freedom in your life i want you to have them in your portfolio you can tuck them in your bible you can take a picture on your phone you can commit them to memory they will serve you you can help somebody else when you find somebody and they're in a place that they don't want to be when they feel they're like they're dominated by a habit they don't want to be dominated by when they're in a place where the darkness seems oppressive the discouragement is so heavy they have no hope what do you do you know if you can come be with god's people that's a wonderful thing but it doesn't take a lot of imagination to consider a time when we don't have the freedom in the way we do right now you need to be prepared seven simple things it begins by confessing your faith in christ and his sacrifice on your behalf that's the same for all of us that's the truth that brings freedom to us apart from that we have no authority to be free apart from the freedom that's ours in christ we are under the dominion of satan and his kingdom it's what makes jesus so essential for our world it's why we have to preach the gospel in the whole world governments will not bring freedom economic upticks will not bring freedom education will not bring freedom we have to freedom comes to us fundamentally spiritually that's the message of the church folks confess your faith in jesus as the messiah and his sacrifice on your behalf romans 10 9 it says if you confess with your mouth jesus is lord and believe in your heart that god raised him from the dead you'll be saved it's not a bad thing to do on a daily basis jesus i thank you that you died for me and that you were raised to life that i could be justified thank you today each one of these i put a little sentence statement that i'm just going to ask you to say out loud with me we'll do each one and then we'll do them collectively before we dismiss let's read this one together lord jesus christ i believe that you're the son of god and the only way to god and that you died on the cross for my sins and rose again from the dead amen that's number two repent of all your rebellion and sins the fundamental sin is our rebellion but any sin you're conscious of the bible tells us to confess our sins we've kind of drifted away from that we think somehow the catholics took that to a place that wasn't healthy so we don't want to think about that you've got to acknowledge your sin you do you got to say god i'm a sinner and this is what i and i don't mean just back in the day when you before you made your first profession of jesus you got to give attention to that on a regular basis i don't want you to stay guilty i want you to be aware of your tendency to drift into ungodliness why do you think when you're reading through the history books right now the nation of israel seldom stayed on a good path for more than a decade or two we have an enormous tendency to spirit to swerve off path do we not if not you i know somebody you live with do not look at anybody near you right now it will not go well after church repent of all your rebellion and sins mark 1 15. this was jesus at the very beginning of his ministry the time has come the kingdom is near repent and believe the good news repentance opens your capacity to believe god if you have a difficult time believing the bible if you have a difficult time believing who jesus is and cooperating with the holy spirit ask god to show you what you need to repent of i was trying to help somebody one time they wanted to become a christian well educated sophisticated lots of life experience i would explain the gospel to them and they'd say it just doesn't make sense to me so i try again i'm pretty good i mean you give me a half a dozen shots at it i could usually explain why we need to be barney and i mean i was making no progress and so i stopped for a moment and i said may i ask you a question have you ever been involved in the occult do you go to fortune tellers you read your horoscopes you know if you ask for spiritual guidance from something other than the holy spirit and they look at me so how did you know that and i said well would you be willing to repent and tell the lord you're sorry they said well i don't see what it would hurt so i led him in a simple little prayer and i came back and i said let me tell you what jesus did again and they began to cry and they said he did that for me you see repentance opens your ability to believe and if you're struggling to believe ask the lord where you've opened the door for something that is an impediment in your life there's a sentence prayer there let's say it together i give up all my rebellion and all my sin and i submit myself to you is my lord number three claim forgiveness of all your sins all right once you repent you've got to receive the forgiveness you've got to forgive yourself you've got to be willing to do it first john 1 9 if we claim if we confess our sins he's faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us of our unrighteousness if you've acknowledged your sin you've repented of it let it go it doesn't define you any longer hallelujah it's a part of the reason we serve god with such abandon he's been good to us i deserve the judgment but he has forgiven me had when the devil reminds you oh get out of here the lord put that in the sea of his forgetfulness so i brought you a prayer let's say it together i confess all my sins before you and i ask for your forgiveness especially for any sins that exposed me to a curse release me also from the consequences of my ancestors sins look sin is a far more challenging problem that we've acknowledged we've had this sloppy grace this kind of easy believism you make a series of ungodly wicked choices that you knew were ungodly when you started to make them and you get to the end of you oh i'm kind of sorry no no no no god i grieved you i've made your people vulnerable i've opened the door for evil into lives beyond my own god i'm sorry number four forgive all other people who have ever harmed you or wronged you once you think of unforgiveness like a pathogen like a disease process if you harbor unforgiveness you give a destructive force liberty in your life you'll never cause god to agree with you in your unforgiveness there's no case so compelling god will go well in that case i think i'll just hate right along with you you see the the one qualification for being forgiven is our willingness to forgive mark 11 25 says when you stand praying if you hold anything against anyone forgive forgiveness begins as a decision it's not an emotion your emotions will have to catch up that's when you decide you're going to eat healthier for a little bit your decision gets there long before the rest of you dies all right in my mind i'm like i need a little less ice cream but the recipe is going ice cream right then my little mind's going no and it takes a while to turn up the volume on the gnaw and get the ice cream turned down a little bit forgiveness is like that you didn't really yes i did yes i did sunday morning august what's this the 29th afternoon at crazy church out there on that big wide highway 99 i forgave tdot yes i did almost every day [Applause] almost everybody i'm grateful for them they maintain our roads in a beautiful way all over our state no place in the world has roads like we do i will bless them i will you should too there's a prayer there by a decision of my will together by a decision of my will i forgive all who have harmed me or wronged me just as i want god to forgive me and in particular i forgive you can work on that on your own there's names you'll put in there and i'll tell you how to identify if there's a name or circumstance that comes to mind and you get an inner response you need to forgive there's somebody still eliciting an emotion from you maybe 40 years ago you say that's silly maybe somebody that's deceased it's not silly you need to forgive them remember this is about truth and freedom number five renounce all contact with anything occult or satanic the pursuit of any spiritual insight guidance or power other from the the from the spirit of the living god is destructive and it opens a doorway into your life to unclean spirits and their activity so i don't believe that i know it's why we're stopping to talk about it just a moment we've lived in such lack of awareness we've lived such spiritually reckless lives that it has diminished the belief capacity of the church and we've got to come back and begin to take god at his word it's a long passage in second corinthians helpful it says don't be yoked together with unbelievers the our church the church in america for decades has spent time figuring out how we could do just precisely the opposite of that i don't want us to be angry at them or condemning of them but we're not supposed to be indistinguishable from the unbelievers our lives are supposed to be different how you recreate should be different what you dream about should be different your aspirations for your children should be different than the unbelievers we're not where we were two years ago it's a different season we're not in egypt what do righteousness and wickedness have in common what fellowship can light have with darkness what harmony is there between christ and satan what does a believer have in common with an unbeliever what agreement is there between the temple of god and idols you get the idea we've got to come out from amongst them we've got to be delivered we have to want to be free we're wearing too much camouflage we don't even want to be around people that are that godly we're not sure what to talk to them about it feels awkward we don't want to tell them what we're dreaming about we don't want to tell them what we're excited about because we recognize intuitively we're standing in a different place so we get mad at them we criticize them we blame them i've been there we're looking for a pathway to freedom if you don't want freedom you can ignore the pathway if you want freedom i would encourage you to take it seriously we just put a whole new phone system in the church lord help us i knew how to make the olden work i knew how to use the intercom i could put a call on hold i was a phone maestro now i'm a phone ignoramus if it rings i get kind of anxious can somebody answer that please if it's for me just hold it up i'll talk into the thing we've been a little like that with spiritual things we just didn't want to think we didn't want to pay attention there's one sentence there let's say it together i renounce all contact with the occult or anything satanic i cancel all satan's claims against me then you want to pray a prayer for release from any curse we may come back and look at blessings and curses in some more detail in another session but galatians 3 13 says christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us that certainly includes the forgiveness of your sins but it's not limited to that initiation into the kingdom of god let's make the prayer together lord jesus i believe that on the cross you took on yourself every curse that could ever come upon me so i ask you now to release me from every curse over my life in your name lord jesus christ by faith i now receive my release and i thank you for it and then the last step in this is you've got to believe that you have received and go forward in god's blessing again your emotions will have to catch up with that some of this stuff has been with you for so long some of you have been angry for so long it's how people know you oh you're that angry person or people walk around you on eggshells and you're kind of proud of it they don't don't set them off or something else some of this has been with you so long and you've got just a sense that there's a portal towards being free and i'm saying you'll have to take this and live with this meditate on this i would take this prayer and say it two or three times a day every day until i beg began to find the new freedom the spirit of god will begin to show you some ways to respond maybe some people from who to whom you will apologize maybe there should be some things in your home you need to get rid of you may have to change some habits and some patterns realign some relationships the question is to what extent are you willing to resist the devil to choose freedom or do you think you can accommodate all of that and you'll be okay it's a decision to make the spiritual world is real and you can't accommodate evil and expect the spirit of god just to overcome what you're accommodating we've got to do the part we've been asked to do there's that last sentence there we better say it lord i now open myself to receive your blessing in every way you want to impart it to me then i gave you the summary it's all those statements why don't we stand we'll read them together my time's up but we found a pathway today don't just leave it in the sanctuary don't just toss it in the trash when you walk past it on the way out you'll be looking for somebody to give you a copy at some point in the future then we're going to sell them no we're not no we're not let's read this together lord jesus christ i believe that you're the son of god and the only way to god and that you died on the cross for my sins and rose again from the dead i give up all my rebellion in all my sin and i submit myself to you as my lord i confess all my sins before you and ask for your forgiveness especially for any sins that exposed me to a curse release me also from the consequences of my ancestors sins by a decision of my will i forgive all who have harmed me or wronged me just as i want god to forgive me and in particular i forgive whomever of whatever i renounce all contact with the occult or anything satanic i cancel all satan's claims against me lord jesus i believe that on the cross you took on yourself every curse that could ever come upon me so i ask you now to release me from every curse over my life in your name lord jesus christ by faith i now receive my release and i thank you for it lord i now open myself to receive your blessing in every way you want to impart it to me amen hallelujah give the lord a hand hallelujah go in the freedom of the lord

Channel: World Outreach Church

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Keywords: freedom in Christ, repentance, occult, what does the Bible say about tarot cards, what does the Bible say about Ouija boards, resist the Devil, forgiveness, curses, spiritual awareness, discernment, seven steps to freedom, World Outreach Church, World Outreach Church Murfreesboro, Pastor Allen Jackson, Pastor Allen Jackson Sermons, Online church service, live church service, christian sermons, Murfreesboro TN, Jesus Christ, Interdenominational Church

Id: TZkzv_jUEyA

Length: 58min 54sec (3534 seconds)

Published: Sun Aug 29 2021