CODY ZORN "SPIRITUAL PRETENDERS"

[Applause] don't you like that i love that song i'm glad he's always been enough he always will be enough matter of fact he'll always and always has been more than enough and uh he ain't just enough he goes above and beyond i serve a god the bible said who can do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think according to the power which worketh in us i i serve a god that said in jeremiah 33 3 call unto me and i'll answer thee and show thee great and mighty things which thou know it's not i'm glad he specializes in blowing my mind yeah amen he he specializes in doing big things we don't serve no little g god we serve the big g god the capital g god the capital l capital o capital r capital d lord amen that's my god that's my king that's my savior that's my redeemer that's him and uh praise god that stirred me up lord of god i want you to take your bible tonight and turn to the book of acts the book of the acts tonight and the story that we'll be preaching from is going to be in chapter five but to give you the set up into chapter five we're gonna read several verses out of chapter four so we're going to read a few verses out of chapter four excuse me uh as we run into chapter five tonight so acts chapter number four this evening and uh we'll begin reading in verse number 32 acts chapter 4 and verse number 32 and then we'll read several verses of our story in chapter number 5. acts chapter 4 verse 32 if you found your place with me say amen and the multitude of them that believed were of one heart of one soul acts chapter 4 verse 32 neither said any of them that all of the things which he possessed was his own but they had all things common and with great power gave the apostles witness of the resurrection of the lord jesus and great grace was upon them all neither was there any among them that lacked for as many as were possessors of lands or houses sold them and brought the prices of the things that were sold and laid them down at the apostles feet and distribution was made unto every man according as he had need and joseph who by the apostles was surnamed barnabas which will be his title or his name his moniker for the rest of the new testament uh he'll he'll never be called joseph after this he'll always be found as barnabas uh with surname barnabas which is being interpreted the son of consolation a levite and of the country of cyprus having land sold it and brought the money and laid it at the apostles feet chapter 5 verse 1 but a certain man named ananias with sapphira his wife sold a possession and kept back part of the prize his wife also being privy to it and brought a certain part and laid it at the apostles feet but peter said ananias why hath satan filled thy heart to lie to the holy ghost and to keep back part of the price of the land while it remained was it not that old and after it was sold was it not in thy own power why hast thou conceived this thing in that heart now has not lied unto men but unto god and ananias hearing these words fell down and gave up the ghost and great fear came on all of them that heard these things and the young men arose and wound him up carried him out and buried him and it was about the space of three hours after when his wife not knowing what was done came in and peter answered unto her tell me whether you sold the land for so much and she said yea for so much then peter said unto her how is it that ye have agreed together to tempt the spirit of the lord behold the feet of them which have buried thy husband are at the door and shall carry thee out then she fell down uh then fell she down straightway at his feet and yielded up the ghost and young men came in found her dead and carrying her forth married her by her husband and great fear came upon all the church and upon as many as heard these things lord we thank you for the scriptures god will want to say we appreciate that good singing we've heard tonight that encouraged us and that helped us and i appreciate it now god i pray that you'd help the preacher of the word of god to do nothing less than that i pray it might instruct us inspire us god where we need it i pray that you would give us for proofs and rebukes and god exhort us to help us to live for you more perfectly in these days which we walk help your church help your people help those that are here tonight uh that have showed up on a thursday night to see hear something from the word of god and help those that are listening by wave internet we'll thank you for all of it in jesus name we pray amen and amen here in chapter four and five of the book of acts we are reading about the infancy of what we would call the early church uh the church is just breathed upon in power by the holy ghost in acts chapter number two uh there's there's much dispute discussion on when does the church begin i'm not here to teach on that or argue that tonight i personally believe the church was empowered bought at calvary but empowered at pentecost in acts chapter 2. that's a whole nother message for a whole another time uh but here we find the infancy of the early church and the early church got off to a stellar start i mean man you just can't ask for a better start than the way the earlier shirts get started three thousand folk get uh right with god uh in chapter two and then we find it rolls over in chapter 4 and verse number 4 and 5 000 more get right with god i mean we're talking about 8 000 people all of a sudden you go from a church of like 12 people uh the apostles after judas fell out they got mathias and put him in his place so you've got a church of about 12 people bear witness of the resurrection all of a sudden overnight it goes from 12 to 8 000. what growth man hey you talk about some real church growth i mean that's really getting her done right there 12 to 8 000 in just a week or two i mean that something's happening when something like that goes off and here all of a sudden they explode overnight and god is doing awesome things in the infancy of the early church they had the apostles which also means apostolic signs and wonders which we do not have now they were doing miracles they were doing signs they were doing wanders people were not only hearing the preaching of this gospel message but they were also seeing signs and wonders being done and just thousands were being added to the church on a regular or a daily basis and uh and here we find as soon as god starts doing something don't don't never forget i told you this please always remember this anytime god starts doing something in a great way the devil will always show up and try and counteract everything that god is doing with whether that be in the life of a church or whether that be in the individual life of a child of god let's just let's break it down tighter tonight if you're sitting here and you're a child of god and you have started making leaps and bounds and gains in your christian walk you you're starting to read your bible more pray more god's opening more doors for you to minister or to witness or to lead people to christ or you're just living a more effective christian life mark this down you ain't gonna get by with it without the devil trying to lay siege to your life tonight i was i was just talking with a lady just the other day uh and she was talking about how she's trying to get closer to the lord and uh and then she starts talking about all the obstacles that have started since she's tried to walk closer to the lord and i told her i said honey i didn't coin this phrase but it's the truth uh somebody said years ago the closer that you get to god the closer you also will get to the devil that's a god's honest truth the closer you get to the lord the closer you're going to get to the devil himself you always mark that down you get close to god and the devil's gonna try and get up just as close he can to try and mess up everything that god's doing in your life and that's what happens in chapter number four satan uses intimidation to try and stop the church i don't have time to read all of chapter 4 you go back and read it yourself but them apostles they get out preaching i mean like a brush fire i mean bran there's like a prayer fire going wild brother john they out there preaching and telling everybody they can and when they start preaching and folks start getting right the bible said the pharisees and the higher-ups they all called him in and when they called him in the bible said this the bible said they threatened them i mean they told them look if you keep on preaching in this name of jesus and you keep on preaching uh that salvations by only through uh the name of this man jesus christ and that's the only way justification comes you keep on preaching that stuff and we're gonna hurt you we're gonna throw you in prison we're going to whoop you but they begin to intimidate them and threaten them but listen what i'm going to tell you intimidation has never stopped the true church of jesus christ you read about the church of the lord jesus christ i'm talking about brother from the apostles all the way up through the dark ages and through the days of bloody mary and through the spanish inquisition and down through the years of church history anytime persecution come persecution did not make the church worse persecution made the church better persecution did not kill the church persecution actually pushed the gospel more intimidation don't stop true believers intimidation just makes them want to double down and do more for god than they ever have before uh really intimidation from the devil kind of separates the chaff from the wheat lets us know who's got the goods and who ain't tonight and so watch what i'm fixing to tell you now when intimidation did not work when satan could not stop or hinder or stifle the church with intimidation in chapter four he used infiltration in chapter five if the devil cannot intimidate the church to stop he will infiltrate the church and cause the inner workings of it from the inside to slam on the brakes to a screeching halt now listen to me i've been around church a long time and i'll be honest with you brother holt salsa i've never seen real churches uh get stopped sidetracked derailed or hindered brother brandon because of the world putting pressure on that ain't that don't stop the church i tell you what i have seen stop a whole lot of good churches mess a whole lot of good churches up and hinder a lot of good churches and doing something from god it's not intimidation from the outside but it's when the devil starts infiltrating on the inside it's when the devil starts grabbing a hold of carnal christians in the pew and begins to feel their heart with discord uh and strive to end up stopping the working of what god is doing in here tonight now the two people i'm using as my message this ananias and sapphira i want you to understand something about them tonight these are not lost people i don't believe they're lost people i've studied this whole thing every which way i could up down left right sideways and backwards and i don't believe i honestly don't believe through prayer and study for a lot of years on this passage i don't believe these are lost people i believe they're saved folk i believe they know god i believe they trusted jesus christ obviously prior to chapter 5 i believe they're joined up they're members of the church they've been saved they've been scripturally baptized but that does not mean that they have not give place to the devil in their life to let them be used as a catalyst to try and harm and hinder the work of god tonight now i'm preaching on this thought with that in mind i'm preaching on the thought of spiritual pretenders that's what i believe ananias and sapphira are i believe they're saved people i believe they know god i believe they got saved by listen to that preaching i believe they got baptized but brother there are some areas of their life where they were not sincere and they were spiritual pretenders this evening we're not dealing with also we're dealing with saved individuals that have been influenced by satan and their own flesh tonight let me illustrate like this i was reading just the other day i read a story that i'd never heard before many of you may or may not know that during world war ii off the coast of north carolina and all the way down to florida uh during world war ii when we were at war with germany on on the atlantic side we were at war with japan on the pacific side but out on the off the coast of north carolina and all the way down to florida many many times there were german u-boats which are submarines that were spotted off the coast they sunk ships all out in the atlantic brother that would be just barely coming out of port uh in north carolina they were patrolling up to the point where many german officers talked about they could get they were so close many times that at night they would come up and periscope and could see the lights of land at north carolina they were that close that's that's how tight the war got to the mainland but anyways i read a story i've never heard before they said that down in the gulf of mexico where the mississippi river dumps out into uh the gulf down there below new orleans they started having ships come up missing they began to be sunk and they thought there was some foul play at hand but they could not find any u-boats they didn't know what was going on and after several boats got sunk they couldn't find anything going on and it kind of just drifted off in the back of people's mind until there were about 10 american submarines doing maneuvers off the the south end of florida down past key west and there was 10 submarines doing maneuvers down off that off the coast of florida and they had a pby one of those uh boat looking airplanes that was flying over and he was taking pictures of the maneuvers that they were doing to be able to help coordinate and send stuff back and take pictures for base and all that and as he got the flying over and they started counting the submarines he counted 11 not 10 submarines there was also be 10 but it was 11. and immediately he radioed down and said we're only supposed to have 10 submarines we've got 11 and they couldn't figure out who it was so the order went out to all of the submarines everybody come to the surface and let's figure out who the extra submarine is we got to figure this out well as soon as they gave the order the 11th submarine dove and took off running for the deep water as fast as it could well then they knew something was a foul and so they sent destroyers out looking for this thing and finally uh they they found this boat through sonar radar whatever and got it to come up to the top and captured the inhabitants of that submarine it was an american submarine but it was filled with german officers the german officer that was in charge in the submarine he had learned to speak a midwestern accent so good that they said this was the submarine that was in the gulf just a few weeks before they had literally docked at different places and with american uniforms on had went into new orleans watched movies in the theaters hung out got intelligence and was actually in the middle of this other pack of american submarines listening to their signals learning what they were doing and even though they looked like them they wasn't them now this is what i thought to myself about that thing that submarine belonged to the united states military that submarine belonged to the united states of america but it was being driven it was being controlled it was being run by the enemy now listen what i'm saying tonight it is highly possible for a child of god who belongs to the lord jesus christ a child of god who has been bald with the blood a child of god who has been saved by the grace of almighty god not being controlled by the one that bought it not being controlled by the one that saved them but instead being controlled by the enemy the devil tonight many times in our churches i believe that we look the same and we bought by the same people but there are some people that even said in the pew that they are not controlled by the spirit of god they are controlled by their flesh and yea even by the devil now this brings up another thing before i get into the message let me dabble here for a minute you say preacher do you believe that a child of god a born-again child of god sealed with the holy ghost do you believe they can be possessed by the devil preacher do you believe that somebody that's indwelt by the holy ghost can also be indwelled or possessed by the devil i i i'll give you this is my answer right here here's the closest answer that i can give you to it uh i've known a lot of christians that the devil got their mouth and i known christians that the devil got their mind and i known christians that the devil got their family he got their pocketbook he got their feet where they go he got their hands what they do listen to me if he gets your mind if he gets your mouth if he gets your eyes if he gets your feet if he gets your pocketbook if he gets your family he doesn't have to inhabit you where you speak some sort of guttural other tone like linda blair on the exorcist i'd say he pretty much got you tonight i know you say you say well is that possessed or not i don't know but i know this i know there's a saved man called simon peter and peter got to speaking brother not from himself peter got into talking more like the devil than he did himself there at one point jesus said get thee behind me satan thou savior's not the things that be of god but things are being men i'm just saying tonight it is possible to become a spiritual pretender here when i thought about that that submarine that looked like the rest of them in the midst of them do you realize that right there they said caused a lot of problems brother travis in behind the lines the friendly lines you know why it caused problems because this boat looked just like them this boat acted just like them but it wasn't being controlled by the same person that was controlling these others do you realize spiritual pretending is much more dangerous and much more hurtful than an actual enemy from the outside i mean look brother if we sing somebody i mean you look here sure enough hate god hate the church infidel it's easy to spot them but somebody that claims to be a child of god and somebody that claims to love the lord and somebody that claims to love the bible just like you do you you they they end up causing more hurt than a worldly than an individual never been saved does you say why preacher because you trust them you never dreamed they would hurt you you never dreamed they'd do you wrong but brother i believe the story is placed here as a warning to all of us tonight you say why would a story like this be in the scripture what in the world would god put a story like this for i mean this is this really just seems like a depressing story it's it's 11 verses of no good to it what's the point of it it's a warning it's a warning in the word of god of not to be like ananias and sapphira so tonight i'm preaching on spiritual pretenders how to spot how to spot spiritual pretending in your own life uh let us all take examination you say preacher how you come up with a message like this reading my bible amen most most of the messages i preached you know i get them from i read my bible and i was sitting on the front porch and i was reading my bible yesterday morning and the holy ghost got to speak into my heart and i got to look in and i got the survey and i said god speak to my heart about this spiritual pretending thing i don't want to be one i want to be real i i want to be just as transparent and real as i can be god god i don't want to have areas or avenues of my heart or my life where the devil has access to them i want to be open i want to be the real thing god i don't want to be a spiritual pretender what are several things we can notice about spiritual pretenders tonight well number one here's the first thing we see uh the first thing we see about spiritual pretenders is we see the envy that they hide the envy that they hide they try and hide their envious spirit now there's something here i've never seen before i i've never seen this brother mike hide i've looked at this passage a bunch of times in years past and i've never seen this before but i want you to notice something there's obvious uh envy at the root of this story jealousy envy is at the root of this story you say where's it at well watch what your bible says watch the progression look at chapter 4 verse 36 and 37 and we'll read down to chapter five watch ver chapter 4 verse 36 look at the envy that they hid or that they hide verse 36 and joseph who by the apostles was surnamed barnabas which is being interpreted the son of consolation a levite and of the country of cyprus now watch verse 37 having land this man barnabas having land sold it and brought the money and laid it at the apostles feet now watch chapter five verse one and two but here's a conjunction we're still dealing with the same narrative but a certain man named ananias with sapphire his wife sold a position watch it and kept back part of the prize his wife also being privy to it and watch it this is just like what we just read in verse 37 and brought a certain part and laid it at the apostles faith do you see something what i'm seeing here i'm seeing there's something that right off the bat has caused them to do what they're doing you know what caused them to even do what they're doing uh by even starting this off we'll get to the part about them keeping back part of the prize but before we ever get there i believe their motives for why they were doing what they're doing were wrong in the first place brother jay here we find it says there's a man named joseph who they surnamed barnabas he sells this big piece of land or whatever and takes all the money lays it at the apostles feed well that sounds like what they're going to try and do in chapter 5 verse 2. you know what i believe is happening here stands ananias the sapphire over there and they're watching what's going on down there at the church and they say hmm well look at what old joseph is doing well look they done gave him a surname i mean they even give him a better name than his own name they gave him the name barnabas oh look they really think he's something over don't they well they you know what i think we'll do i i think we'll just do the same thing he's doing so that way we can get the same accolades that he's getting we're going to get the same pat on the back he's getting we're going to look just as good as he's looking i mean look at here i'm not going to you're here he just ain't going to get all the glory he ain't gonna be the only one who looks good i'm gonna make sure i look good too you know what this is this is pure old green eyed envy and jealousy right here you you know you know what they they sitting back over there somewhere and they're sitting there and saying well i i mean how come it's always barnabas that's getting that part how how come they always talking about barnabas how how how come how how come i don't ever feel like i'm included like barnabas does i tell you what we'll just we'll just throw in and do the same thing that barnabas is doing can i tell y'all something tonight envy is a rottenness in the bones of a church jealousy and envy is a rottenness in the bones of the church that will suck the marrow and the life out of it and we'll absolutely destroy it tonight friend i mean look at here let me let me just let me just cut cut it down close to where the where the where the meat hits the bone here here in the last here in the last month or so something like that i have i've gotten just slide throughs past here in past there and past yonder and i even dealt with it on sunday morning at the church one morning i've got a little slide through here and there about stuff like this well they got favoritism down there at bible missionary baptist church well they showing favorites down there by a missionary but you know what people mean when they say that this is what they mean when they say that well they're not showing me enough attention the root of all that is pride the root of all that is envy the root of that is that when they say well they're showing favors down there this is what they're really talking this is what they really mean well they're not showing me enough attention the root of that thing is i smack dab in the middle of the pride well they ought to notice me more well they aren't to care about me more whether they ought to talk to me more well they ought to promote me more you know what that is that is the green eyed monster of envy and jealousy and it stinks this evening it's spiritual pretending matter of fact galatians chapter 5 verses 19 to 21 talks about these things galatians 5 19 to 21 verse 22 on down through there talks about the fruit of the spirit's love joy peace long suffering gentleness goodness faith meekness tempers against such there is no law we talk about that a lot we love talking about the fruit of the spirit but don't nobody talk about verse 19 20 and 21 and verse 19 20 and 21 says this but the the the works of the flesh are manifest which are these and before he ever gives us the list of the workings of the spirit he tells us what all of us are capable of if we let our flesh run brother if i let my flesh run if you let your flesh run if any of us let our flesh run and don't yield to the spirit we are all equally capable of committing these deeds of the flesh they are found in chapter number five of galatians and verse number 19 is what it said it said these are the works of the flesh adultery fornication uncleanness lasciviousness idolatry witchcraft hatred variants emulations wrath strife seditions heresies verse 21 verse 21 envyings murders drunkenness revelings such like so on and so forth before he ever tells us what the fruit of the spirit is he highlights to us what the fruit of the flesh is in other words he says before i highlight if you've got a fruit of the spirit i want to highlight how you can know if you've got the flesh working and mark this down i don't have time to preach on all them sins we'll do it another night tonight i'm just dealing with envy that's big enough brother you can mark this down if there's constantly a knowing of envy in your soul at individuals or things in the church that is a sign of spiritual pretending in your life tonight the first thing we find out about these people is we look and we see well there's barnabas doing something well i want to do what barnabas is getting to do all right so then we now i see the envy they hide but secondly we find the element that they hold there's an element that they hold look they hold they hold a certain part of the price back watch what it says verse two verse two chapter five and kept back part of the price his wife also being privy to it and brought a certain part and laid it at the apostles feet and peter said and i asked why satan filled thy heart in the light of the holy ghost and to keep back part of the price of the land here we find the element that they hold now i want to stop here for a minute before i dive off in this point i want everybody to understand something about ananias and sapphira you may be confused about this so i don't want you to be confused ananias and sapphira were not killed because they didn't give everything y'all understand that they did god didn't god didn't strike them dead because they didn't give everything that's not why god killed them god killed them because they didn't give everything but they acted like they did they purported in the eyes of everybody else i surrender oh oh yeah i'll give it all y'all i surrender all and they knew down in their heart they hadn't give it all see the problem with ananias and sapphira is they wanted god help us they wanted to look more spiritual than they really were they wanted everybody to think they had pushed it all in when they knew for a shadow of a doubt beyond the shadow of a doubt they knew for a fact they hadn't pushed it all in they kept part of it back but they wanted everybody to think that they had let me pause here and say this be careful be careful look i know we all like for people to think better of us than we really are that that goes for everybody you know look if everybody really knew what kind of sorry good for nothing snake all of us was we probably wouldn't be here tonight around each other i mean this is the truth but look be careful when you get to the place where you constantly are trying to put on heirs to make people think that you are something that you ain't that's a dangerous game to start playing that's a dangerous game to start playing because you don't ever stop playing that game you caught you have to constantly keep trying to make yourself something that you are not tonight if there's one thing that i want our church to be and i believe that we are i'm just preaching preventative maintenance here man that's what god give me so this is what i'm preaching it's the only message i got it's only i'm like barney five tonight i got one bullet in my gun so i'm shooting it at y'all praise god all right look here if there's one thing i want to trust to be it's real real real people real folk look we ain't perfect we ain't got all the iron we ain't got all the wrinkles ironed out he'll iron him out one day and there but we are striving to live for him and striving to do what's right we're not trying to put on air so that people think we're something that we're not by that same token we're not just sitting there saying well we just are what we are and we just can't help it by the same time we're not just trying to sit here and not better ourselves with the glory of god we're also trying to take progressive steps of sanctification to live more holy and to be closer to him there's nothing wrong with that either so here we find the element that they hold it said here twice it says they kept back part of the price uh they aren't all in now i want you to notice something about this this is real interesting to me i want you to notice something about this i just close my bible here but in our text it said this it said that they made themselves look like they was all in so in front of the church in front of peter and in front of the apostles in front of everybody they look like they're all in but i'll tell you where they're not all in at look what the bible said in chapter five verse two said to kept back part of the price his wife also being privy to it come all the way down to verse number nine then peter said unto her verse 9 how is it that you have agreed together to tempt the spirit of the lord you've agreed together so obviously this is what this tells me brother kidman it tells me that behind closed doors away from the church away from the church they were conspiring to the fact that they were not all in now in front of the church they put up a good show like oh we love we just praise god glory be to jesus love my church love our church and love y'all but brother when they was outside of the church they wasn't all in him listen to what i'm fixing to tell you tonight you can always spot a spiritual pretender by the fact that when they're here they're all in but when they're out there they ain't all in can always spot a spiritual pretender by the fact that when they hear i'm all in with y'all i'm all in with the preacher i'm all in with the membership i'm all in what's going on in the church but as soon as they get around somebody out yonder that they feel like they can conspire with to the fact that well we just you know we we quite all they'll jump in with them too that's spiritual pretending tonight all right so we see not only the element they hold we see the envy they hide but then we find the enemy that they harbor i got to hurry and close i didn't mean to preach this long we see the enemy that they harbor look at verse 3 verse 3 watch the enemy that they're harboring but peter said ananias why hath here's the enemy here's the enemy why had satan filled thine heart to lie to the holy ghost and to keep back part of the price of the land you know the sad part of this whole story this is this really is sad to me brother carl i'll tell you what's sad about this story because i believe this man this woman are saved people i believe they're both born again saved people so you know what's sad about this story to me what's sad is that these two people could not tell that satan was using them for his own purpose well sad what's said brother fred to me is here's a saved man here's a saved woman and they were ignorant of the fact that they were getting played by the devil that's sad it is sad when a child of god cannot see past his own spiritual pretending to realize long enough hold on now time out is this the holy ghost using me to do this or is this a devil use of me to do this you know what's sad is when a child of god a child of god gets to the place where they can't tell filtering any deed filtering any word filtering in it they don't they get the place where they don't even realize it's the devil using you to do what you're doing can i say tonight be careful filter your heart and your conversation through the scripture and the holy ghost and say god is this from you or is this from the devil who is this from i don't want to be a pawn of satan i don't want the devil filling my heart something gets filled up you know how something gets filled up it doesn't just happen boom like that do you realize feeling something is progressional if i tell where my kids go they all in there there they all are if i tell my youngins hey go fill my cup up i mean they don't just do bewitched you know mine and then boom it's filled up again you know it's just it's it's empty now it's full a feeling is progressional you start pouring something in and it works its way to the top slowly that's what that's what it doesn't just all of a sudden stop it's there and bam there it is no it it rises and it said satan filled his heart in other words brother blackwelter this ain't something that happened overnight this ain't something that all of a sudden bam there it was no no no for whatever reason this fellow's heart got filled on a slow gradual it was the frog in the bowling pot brother cliff he just slowly started letting the devil seep that little root of bitterness in just seep that little root of lime to the holy ghost in and it just started filling up progressively more and more more until all of a sudden he didn't realize who had even done it be careful be careful that you don't harbor an enemy in your heart that ends up hindering the work of god ask yourself am i being used to hinder what god's doing or am i being used to help what god's doing because ananias and sapphira they wasn't helping they was hindering what was going on so we see not only the enemy that they harbor and we see the envy that they hide and the element that they hold but lastly and this is to you and i tonight we see the example that they highlight the example that they highlight here's the example for us tonight verse number four he said why was it remained was it not in thine own uh was it not thine own and after it was sold was it not in their own power you didn't have to give it all you could have give part of it just be honest about it you didn't have to give any of it it was not required of you to do so it was in your power you could have done whatever you wanted to with it ananias you didn't have to lie about it why hast thou conceived this thing in thine heart that has not lied unto men but unto god you say what's the example that is highlighted for us as christians it is to be careful of what you conceive in your heart your heart is a birthing ground it talks about a lot of times it says it here too about conceiving something in your heart that's a birthing term be careful what kind of seeds you allow the devil to plant in your heart that then begin to germinate and grow until it produces something in your life be careful your heart is a seed ground your heart is a fertile ground that will grow something so put the right kind of seeds in it don't let the wrong kind of seeds germinate in your heart to where they produce the wrong kind of fruit in your life tonight put the right seeds in so it produces good fruit in good ground then it says this and here's the example here's the example we we know what happens to both of them they both die i mean look at here we we're preaching there is no apostle here so praise god amen uh we finally know she drops over and old sapphira she drops over and let me say this about these two people i was reading today and anytime i'm ever studying individuals in scripture and i'm going to preach on individuals i always look up their name brother tiger names mean stuff and i always look up the names and you know what their names mean ananias's name means jehovah has given jehovah gave him he was a gift and sapphira her name comes from the sapphire stone which means beautiful so here we have a woman whose name means beautiful and here we have a man's name a man whose name means jehovah's given i mean look here those are pretty high calling names beautiful and god's gift you know what the bible said to whom much is given much is required god gave a lot to these people and god required a lot out of them god's given us a lot so we are required to do much with what god has given us much of but here's the example look at verse 11. here's the last part of the example here it said and great fear came upon all the church and upon as many as heard these things can i tell you fear's not a bad thing uh we live in a day where where nobody you know everybody wants to act like we or not to be scared and don't be fearful and i agree about you know different things in life god's got it and don't be fearful but when it comes to getting on the wrong side of god you better get nervous in the service it's a fearful thing to fall into the hands of a living god the fear of the lord is the beginning of knowledge but fools despise wisdom and instruction a good healthy dose of fear is a good thing you know what kept me from doing a lot of stupid things that i would have done as a younger man i scared what my daddy to do if he caught me amen y'all i'm gonna be honest with you i'm a 36 year old grown man with four youngins of my own and one of them's 14 the oven just turned 13 living on my own for a long time now and they steal some things i don't do because i think dear god my daddy might find out that you say that that don't happen overnight that's a healthy dose of fear that god put in me from a little boy ain't nothing wrong with that and i'll be honest with you we've lived so long in this age that you know jc is my homeboy you know jesus yeah j.c my boy you know all this kind of crazy stuff no he hints your boy the lord is not your buddy he ain't your girlfriend your boyfriend don't want to date with you he's the god of heaven and it's about how time we get back to place or we just stop looking at him like he's our buddy and he's our friend and we start reverencing him as god and he's holy again and he expects something out of our life tonight and the last thing he wants is spiritual pretending anywhere down in our heart he wants us to be open and honest transparent not just with him but in the church as well not not not a mask that we wear and we put one mask on we talk to this person and we pull that mask off and stick another one on we talk to that person and then we pull that off we put another mask on we go out there no no honesty and transparent openness to where we just give him everything where we just give him everything spiritual pretending tonight god i pray this evening that you would help us to heed this short little warning from the word of god god i i don't know why you put all this on my heart tonight i was sitting on the front porch reading my bible and and come through acts chapter 5 again for the uptick doesn't time and lord just these things started just coming to my heart and i appreciate it lord it helped me god i want to i don't want to just be a hearer of the word but i want to be a doer god i don't want to preach to others and then become shipwrecked or cast away god i want to take these truths and use them in my own life god you know i don't want to be fake phony uh god that's not what i want to be at all won't be real and god tonight i pray that you would help us lord to grab roots of envy that may be in our heart root them out uh lord grab areas of our life where we may be only going halfway part of the way with god and we'd say i'm tired of being a part way christian i'm going to go all in i'm going to give god everything of my life god tonight help us to cast down imaginations and every high thing that would exalt itself against the knowledge of god lord anywhere in our heart or in our life that the devil would have a toehold the devil would have a place where lord he would try and hinder the work of god help us to get it out god to not help us not to be ignorant of the devil and his devices help us to see it for what it is when we hear things or see things help us to see and hear with spiritual understanding and know that our enemy is so smart that he'll use even the smallest of things to get a toehold in our life or in our church god help us to to stop it when it comes to us and we'll thank you for it now in jesus name we pray amen all right god bless you church i love you i'll see you sunday morning god willing 10 o'clock sunday school 11 o'clock hey uh sister brother cliff and miss amy got

Channel: Bible Missionary Baptist Church

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Id: RKKVC0wj1S4

Length: 43min 42sec (2622 seconds)

Published: Thu Jul 30 2020