Destined For Greatness // How The Servant Becomes The Greatest // Pastor Ken Claytor

well this is the last part to a series you guys been on called the way up everybody say the way up and today's message is entitled destined for greatness everybody say this with me i am destined for greatness how many of you all believe that today let me see by show of hands if you believe that you're destined for greatness now the way that faith is released is by the words of your mouth and so there are some things that you have to declare before you ever see it and even if you don't feel great right now even if it feels like you've made all kinds of mistakes in your life even if you feel like you are in in between a rock and a hard place you have to start to call things that be not right until they are so i want you to say this with your chest are you ready say i am destined for greatness i believe that i believe that's why you're watching online and i believe that's why you're here that you are a part of a great church and we're here to serve a great god and that you and i no matter where you are in life we've been destined for greatness but if you believe that like i do i think it's important for us to define greatness the right way because sometimes we define greatness naturally and worldly but we don't define it biblically and it's amazing to me that we can talk about how we've been destined for greatness but that just depends on how you define what greatness is and if you define greatness worldly and not godly you're never going to walk into that destiny and so that's the sometimes you know when i say we're destined for greatness um you might hear when you say that you're thinking in your subconscious that means i'm gonna get me a new tesla well i'm gonna flip that bitcoin think about it for a second i'm destined for greatness that means i'm gonna write a bestselling book or it might mean to some of you guys that i'm gonna have an album that goes around the world i'm gonna have a million followers on social media i'm gonna get the corner office finally i'm gonna have the big business people are gonna know who i am i'm gonna have the fame and the fortune the crazy thing about this one is that you can have all of those things but still not be great in the eyes of god and you're gonna have to make up your mind today whether you want to live your life for the audience of men or for the audience of god and i don't know about you but i would rather have the applause of god than the applause of men any day of the week so we have to define greatness god's way because sometimes when we profess i'm going to be great in your mind that's fame fortune notoriety and money and you can have all of those things but the way the bible defines greatness is through service and this is the tagline that i want to prophesy over you today i came to preach i don't know if you're gonna help me at 9 30. come on we got seven services today i'm gonna drive back to orlando i'm gonna preach this fire until i'm preaching to hungry people today is anybody here hungry for the word of god come on somebody i'm coming back off sabbatical i'm fresh i'm ready to go all right this is the tagline get this the servant is the greatest and i want to unpack that today i want to unfold that today what does that really mean and what does that mean to you because if you're going to be great you can't do it without service it's impossible in the kingdom of god all right now i'm going to give you a few scriptures today and i'm going to give three to you very quickly they're going to put them on the board you ain't even got time to go there and i'm going to ask you a question at the end of these scriptures so let's just go let's go mark 9 35. it says sitting down let's read it together jesus called the 12 and said anyone who wants to be first has to be the very what and the servant of all i just wonder who got up this morning and say you know what i want to be last today i'm going to serve everybody today that's usually not what we think matthew 23 and 11 it says and the greatest among you will be your what servant for those who exalt themselves will be humbled but those who humble themselves will be what luke 22 and we're going to we're going to see what these have in common luke 22 and 24. and the dispute also arose among them as to which of them was considered to be greatest this that's like you know this is his disciples and that's what happens in our church sometimes people want to be the greatest and the dispute will arise from among you about who gets to preach the most who gets to lead the song in worship who was asked to come on staff because everybody gets in the flesh not y'all but just in general and they want to know just like the disciples did am i the man or are you the man you know i want to be great but you want to be great too right and jesus gives them this revelation he says the king of the gentiles lorded over them and those who exercise authority also call themselves benefactors what does that mean so the gentiles those who do not know god like we know god they lord over people all right so maybe you have a boss or a supervisor that manipulates you or controls you to get what they want so what he's saying those who don't have a covenant with god they do that for their benefit and then he gives this revelation he says but you're not to be like that and i love it that jesus is just so plain and simple like the world does this but you ain't supposed to be like that the world uses this language but not you the world thinks this way but you're not the world thinks this way with their sexuality but not you you're supposed to be sexually pure for your body is for the lord i'm here to preach to somebody today because what the world does the church doesn't do is anybody in this place today meaning that they're ha yeah they all do that they all drink and smoke but what about you where do you go for peace where do you go for contempt there has to be a difference and so jesus is like instead the greatest among you shall be like the youngest and the one who rules should be like the one who serves for who is greater and i love this question the one who sits at the table or the one who serves is it not the one who sits at the table question mark but he says but i am among you is one who serves now what at least three passengers have in common class ready go well the campus pastor let other people answer the question the man got my notes and everything he's already seen the whole thing like this just so ambitious to speak without letting other people who haven't read the notes have an opportunity what do they have in common serving okay not only that but these three scriptures are what we call a paradox everybody say a paradox what is a paradox i'm glad you asked it is a seemingly absurd or self-contradictory statement or proposition that when investigated or explained may prove to be well-founded or true layman's terms a paradox look like it's this way but it's actually that way it looks like it's wrong but it actually has elements of truth it's actually a contradiction and i've been in ministry for 20 years i've been a lead pastor for 14 going on 15 years now and what i've what i've realized is that the bible's filled with paradoxes the bible says that the way for you to get is for you to give of course motivated by love but that makes no sense to me it seemed like that's that's crazy if i want to get what i should do is i should keep everything that comes to me and i should start a 401 k and a savings account but the bible says give and it shall be given back to you good measure pressed down shaken together and running over for with the same measure that you meet with all shall it be measured unto you again it is a paradox everybody say a paradox the bible says that the way that you have an abundant life how many of you all want to have a good life you want to have an abundant life the bible says the way that you have that life that you want to have is that you first got to give your life away paradox everybody say paradox it would seem if i want to have a great life i should travel the world get on my ig story let y'all see me in paris and london and let everybody think that i got all my stuff together but it says if you want an abundant life you first got to give your life away paradox and then jesus offers us this paradox in luke and he's like listen i've come to you not like the one sitting at the table because naturally speaking we think that the people sitting at the table is great think about the person who comes up to the restaurant driving the lamborghini jumps out with the armani suit on and they have a booth saved for him and his party and he goes to the booth and he orders steak and lobster and some bubbly we would look at that person and say that person's great come on y'all tell the truth today in this church you would look at that person and say i bet they own the restaurant oh i wonder can i get a picture with them you know but jesus gives us a paradox and he says i haven't come like the one that orders the stake in the lobster i've come like the one serving mistake in the livestream god it's a paradox he's saying i haven't come like the one that the world thinks is great i've come like the one who's running the errands back to the kitchen i've come like the waiter and the waitress that's writing down the order making sure that i get it right asking if you won't deserve with that and then he calls us to be like he is and we think the way up is up but the paradox is that the way up is down god i wish i could get this into the minds and hearts of this generation that yes you're destined for greatness yes god wants to increase you more and more yes you want to go higher and higher and god wants to take you up but the way up is not up the way up is not you going out and driving uber and lyft and trying to flip some pizzas here and there and make another dollar and you can't serve in church the way up is not you going out working yourself to the bone trying to climb up some ladder of success the way up is to get somebody else's ladder and hold it and so what the bible tells us is a paradox that you are not supposed to prefer yourself you are supposed to prefer others and as you prefer others god will raise up people to prefer you and that's why some of your lives ain't working right because you're trying to do it out of your ability instead of waiting on the movement of the holy ghost to do it his way and when we do it his way we're moving to his best i told y'all i'm back from sabbatical y'all ain't even ready gainesville it's all right as i is i so today's message ain't just the message it's more of an impartation of the mindset and the spirit of service don't miss that come on are you hearing this keisha this is not just the message because sometimes we give you messages and you get understanding intellectually we want to we want to deposit the spirit of service in your heart which is the spirit of jesus who was the servant of all and so today is not just a teaching come on online you need an impartation of the spirit of christ the spirit of service my prayer is to help you move from serving something that you have to do to serving is something that you get to do that's a shift to something that i don't know if i got time for it to something that you go and make time for come on somebody come on online come on online listen i'm trying to get you today to the place where serving becomes something that you love something that you look forward to something that you enjoy something that you know is a part of your destiny and your privilege to serve the one who served you on the cross with the church say amen and so i don't know if you guys have figured this out yet or not but this is a great church have you guys figured that out maybe in the back i don't know in the back y'all figured this out yet or not online have you figured this out yet or not but a great church is not a great church just because we have great programming and great amenities great church is a great church because it's a serving church now i know that you look for a church that marks off all the things that you want in a church and we think in our western mindset that a great church has a great choir and we have a great facility and we have a great kids programming and and that's what a great church is and the challenge is and this is where god is taking us because revival wins is blowing in our house and this is where god has taken us because some of us have to flip our mindset because we've come into church with the customer mentality instead of being called to covenant and if you have a customer mentality if we do something you don't like if we do something you don't understand or if we do something you don't agree with what do you do you go find another church that does what you want them to do but god has never defined and called us to go from church to church with a customer mentality we are called to a place and we are in covenant with a place death hell or high water and he grows us in that place meaning that some of y'all want to come to church and you don't want anybody to offend you actually i think god puts people in the church to offend you so you can learn how to override a fence with the love of god and turn the other cheek and overcome evil but some of us come on somebody we're so used to picking and choosing and we treat the church like the carlisle so you know when you go to kia and you want a black on black with leather seats and bluetooth capability if kia don't have it what do you do you go to hyundai and if hyundai you go there and you want black on black bluetooth capability huh they don't have it what do you do you go to nissan and that's how some people pick a church and that's why miracles aren't flowing like we read about in the bible because as soon as something happens that you don't understand you unplug your entire life and put it up somewhere else because you don't understand calling and covenant let me help somebody today let me look in the camera because first corinthians 12 says he places the members in the body as it pleases him you're looking at someone who has preached around the world i've been to churches in india no air conditioning three and a half hour services and all the kids they ain't got kids church the kids are sitting indian style in the front but they're called there and blinded eyes are open and legs grow back because it's not supposed to be convenient or comfortable it's covenant and it's calling and it's service so let me help somebody today a great church is a serving church and the reason why a serving church is a great church is because a serving church is filled with people who have a heart to serve and i believe that's us come on somebody does anybody believe that you are sitting in a great church because we have the spirit of service let me remind you of what we did on july 10th with serve saturday we gave out 300 backpacks we fed the homeless we went and built houses and helped people fix up their house over 130 people from our church came out with serve saturday and we just blanketed our city and loved that's a great church it's not because we're perfect because we're not perfect it's not because we have great programming or facilities it's okay but it's because the spirit of jesus the spirit of servitude okay we just we just came back from los angeles where we took 27 missionaries and we partnered with one day la come on somebody y'all don't get it y'all don't get it and some of us didn't go on the mission trip because it wasn't sexy enough like if we went to ecuador you'd be like oh i'm going to ecuador i need to raise money los angeles is in a spiritually worse condition in many of the places around the world not only is there poverty there's hopelessness and mental disease and we took 27 people and we brought the light of jesus listen we fed people we built furniture for orphans come on we paid off 20 million dollars of people's medical debts around los angeles we preach face to face come on somebody the kingdom of god is at hand and watch this it does not matter this delta virus coronavirus fears back on the atmosphere listen i am not listening to the news i'm listening to jesus and my attention is not on man it is on what has god promised me and i am not stopping being a christian just because there's fear in the atmosphere we're going to preach harder than we ever preached before we're going to lay hands on the sick and watch them recover we're going to see the dead raised in the neck do i got anybody up in this church that is tired of playing church and ready for the kingdom of heaven to be at hand come on somebody that's what a great church is filled with people it ain't about me how can i serve somebody how can i serve my city how can i serve my generation i don't need a parking place i don't need a pat on the back i need to serve my savior oh ain't nobody happy but me i'm ready to go i'm floating like a butterfly let's go come on somebody and so here here it is guys prophetically i prayed over you guys and this is what i feel like the lord is saying now i've preached this message in baltimore and in lakeland the last two sundays but it was really a message for our house now when i preached it there then people took off now i'm expecting the church that i passed them y'all to treat me better than a church that i'm not even the pastor over there was a guy who came up to me in los angeles and he gave me a prophetic word of the lord and this applies to all of us he says god's called your church to be an epicenter of his presence he says and you will be known around for the presence of the lord being tangible meaning that when people get out into the parking lot they'll feel god and when they come into the doors they'll feel god before worship before the word of god come on somebody anybody excited about the tangible presence of the lord and i was like i was on the bus right and i like oh that's a good word that's pretty good and i had to go and look up what episode was i said we're epicenter yes what is that and it says it's the place beneath the earth where the earthquake happens the point on the earth surface is the epicenter so when god is shaking something spiritually we are right above what god's doing come on somebody and i believe there is a shaking and there's a moving and the word and the lord gave me a word the shaking that you went through in the last season wasn't for the breaking but for the making yeah and some of you all had your marriages shaken and your relationship shaken and your calling shaking but the shaking wasn't for the breaking it was actually for the making and you thought god was against you but god was actually for you i wish i had anybody who's went through a season of shaking and i thought it was for my breaking but it actually was for my making and so this is what i believe mark my words listen listen listen to this there's a great harvest of souls that are on its way the harvest is white people are scared like they've never been scared before marriages are falling apart mental disease is on the rise there's so much division and the sin is running rampant like never before has there been a time for the church to shine and i want you to know that god has positioned us to have an evangelistic mantle to win the lost in this season but that's something that you guys have to run with we believe that open heaven is now now you might like all that stuff that i just prophesied but all of that happens because somebody's serving cause you can prophesy with no servants and nothing changes if we don't have thousands of people that say it's not about my agenda and what i want but i'm here to use my gifts and everything that god has given me to be a part of something that is bigger than myself get ready for the nations to be changed [Applause] i don't know how much time i got but i don't care but let look let's look at the word i really don't know how much time i got joshua 24 15 it says this but if serving the lord seems undesirable to you then choose for yourselves this day whom you gonna serve whether the god of your ancestors stir beyond euphrates of the god of the amorites and whose land you're now living but it's for me in my house come on joshua we will i love this joshua is basically like it's reckoning today y'all you're going to have to choose like for real you cannot be stuck in the valley of decision oh i might serve i might not right now it really doesn't work out with my agenda uh i don't know i went back to school right now and joshua was like listen you gotta start you gotta make up your mind are you gonna serve or not like choose today what are you going to do and i love it that he says i will serve the lord because servant ain't based upon your feelings how many all know sometimes you don't feel like servant come on somebody you ain't being truthful in this church come on online sometimes i don't feel like leading a small group this semester come on i don't feel like going to no huddle no rally and why they keep sending me emails from playing the center no no no no i got stuff going on in my life can anybody keep it real in this place that sometimes i don't feel like serving but thank god it ain't based upon how i feel because i choose that i will serve the lord no matter what i feel like because my feeling is like the weather and the weather changes every day but what i choose to do because of what he's called me to do shall not change so i love it that joshua was like choose today what you're going to serve and i know some of y'all don't y'all don't know this is the god of the iphone rights or the amorites and the bible has all these ideas i don't have that god i love jesus but maybe it's the god of your education or the god of your career or the god of your ambition or the god of your children because some of us have made our kids our idol and you have put it under the mark of being a good parent but the truth is the truth is is that your children have become an idol the greatest thing that you can do for your children is live a god first life before them joshua 24 he says for me and my house we gonna serve the lord i love joshua includes everybody in there he didn't say i'm gonna serve the lord he's like everybody here like everybody that i've made all them kids and everybody y'all gonna start the lord like for real though if you're gonna live in this house with me come on i don't told my kids like this is what i tell my kids i got three kids i got a high schooler a middle schooler and an elementary schooler so i'm an uber driver in the evenings that's all i do i run around to all these practices and this is what i say my kids i said if you want to play basketball i'm with you let's do that if you want to play soccer with you yeah let's do that track cross country with you yeah ninja american ninja warrior you want to okay cool let's do that mathnasium mass tutoring monday wednesday ninja tuesday thursday yeah let's do that this is like my real life i'm not even making that stuff up all that i just gave you like this that's that's what we do okay and i'm like listen i'm your boy you want new sneakers you need nike yeah we want you to get you we're gonna get your nike bag we'll get you nike cleats you're gonna be lay out there looking fresh and i'll do whatever you want me to do cause i love you you're my kid but if you want me to do all that the first thing you have to do is serve in the house of god come on come on somebody come on parents come on you got to set the temperature for your house do i got any joshua's do i got any dads that are like for me and my house we will serve come on any single moms that are leading the way like for me and my house we gonna serve the lord we need some bold people then i say listen i'll do all that but first you got to serve in church and if you don't serve in the local house of god i'm not running around here because some of us have made aau our idol and we've made the glee cup our idol and we've made football our idol and you know your kids ain't gonna be in the nfl that it is such a small chance you know you have to teach your children to do something that has eternal value something that the angels of heaven will be applauding when they show up he said for me and my house we shall serve the lord let's move on let's look at another scripture first corinthians 15 58 it says therefore my beloved brothers and sisters be steadfast immovable always excelling in the work of the do you all see this what would happen if you served and you were steadfast immovable and always excelling could we raise up a generation of people that wouldn't be moved with the seasons of their life or what they heard that they heard that they heard that they heard but they were just unmovable like i ain't going nowhere like you can you can set your clock to me i'm unmovable i'm steadfast always excelling in the work of the law lord and watch this attitude always doing your best and doing more than what's needed you know how some people they show up and they give you their lease well i'm tired what if you went over and above and you did your best and more than what was needed even to the point of exhaustion we're going to come back there in the in the lord it's not futile wasted and it's never without purpose one translation says that when you serve the lord this way nothing you do is in vain now i've been in ministry 20 years and i don't know if you've ever been serving people and people just get on your nerves and you almost feel like forget people i'm take care of myself no for real it's almost like you do so much good for people you show up to the hospital you buy them things you give them opportunity you do all of these things and not only do they misunderstand it they go out and talk about you and all kinds of stuff and you almost are tempted to be like forget that i ain't i no i'm not leaving no small group no i don't want to be no team leader i want to come and i want to sit in the back of the church and i want you to sing me songs that i really like and i want you to preach me a good word so i can go home before anybody wants to have a conversation with me because you have compassion fatigue and the bible says but nothing you do until the lord is in vain and you're tempted to feel like i've wasted my time like all those calls all those meetings all those sit downs and what has it amounted to but the bible says nothing you do until the lord is in vain it feels like it's wasted it feels like it had no purpose but god says you do it as unto me and the reason that we quit serving is because we want people to applaud us and we want people to notice us and we want people to appreciate us but if we did it for people we didn't do it with the right motive for what we do we do is unto the lord so people can never congratulate you enough they can never appreciate you enough people can never promote you enough because your promotion doesn't come from people your promotion comes from god so even when you leave me without thanking me that's not gonna stop me because i know i didn't do it in vain because what as i did as unto the lord god will reward me openly and so if we go back to first corinthians i love this part here because this is a part that you don't see a lot it says be continually aware that your labor even to the point of exhaustion somebody say exhaustion how many of y'all know that serving is sometimes tiring and i wish we would keep it real with people you know we have a gift oriented ministry so when you come to growth track what we do we're fancy so we give you like a personality test and we give you a spiritual gift assessment and then at the end what we say to you is that we want to help you find a place where you can use your gifts so that you can be fulfilled but the problem with that is that it's all about you and sometimes serving and got nothing to do with you oh my god and so i wish that we i'm here to balance some stuff out come on anybody watching me still online i'm here to balance something out because we need to tell people the truth like if you come before it's going to be tiring it's going to be exhausting sometimes like sometimes you're not going to feel like getting up at 5 00 a.m to come to church after i don't work all week long and they want me to call somebody back and i don't even know them people man it's going to be exhausting you're going to be tired but thank god that jesus didn't get tired when it was time to go to the cross thank god that he didn't get tired of getting beat with a catamaran tails and say well that's just not in my schedule right now i just got a baby i need to put my kids over here and right now i just took another job and really my heart and this is i've been saying this to the churches i've been preaching at like because and this is not about you guys this is just in general it's amazing when we go through things in life the first thing we want to do is stop serving in the church and it's almost we act like it's the church that has us in a stress position and it's all the other stuff you got going on in your life that got you in a stressful position it ain't the church it's the babies you decided to have god bless them it's them two jobs you're trying to work it's how you staying online all night you netflix and then chilling and talking to people you know you don't need to be talking to and you ain't even feeding yourself and then you got the nerve to come and say i need six months off my god thank god he didn't take six months off of giving me breath to breathe or my heart beating or giving me his grace and mercy and i get it sometimes i'm a guy that just came back from sabbatical i get seasons of rest i get that we need a vacation but i also get that sometimes we stop the one thing that we should continue in because we haven't been told that when we get tired his grace is come on do i got any come on pastor will i'm talking about oh do i got any old school saints listen people now they come to church like 1.7 times in a month oh yeah i'm coming to church maybe i went to church 17 days in a row one season i'm talking about monday night a monday night men's meeting tuesday night bible study went i mean ministry school wednesday night bible study thursday night choir practice friday night prayer meeting saturday night outreach door-to-door ministry sunday three services started again on monday and i feel like we have punk christianity can i say that don't know what i mean by point i'll serve if you can just fit into my schedule right now we got to make sure that everything is okay with me right now and if it gets too hard i need to back out of this right now because you know i got a lot of things going on in my life but we haven't realized that if you want to be great in the kingdom of god the way up is not up the last thing you should quit doing is serving in the house adjust your serving find an area that's grace-filled but don't stop doing what jesus commanded us to do because he uses that act of humility to exalt us am i preaching all right today y'all just saying the other churches i've been telling yeah you're talking to me i gotta do something about this jesus all right oh man i don't know what time it is but whatever matthew 10 42 watch this one and it says and whosoever shall give to drink unto one of these little ones a cup of cold water in the name of the disciple i say unto you he shall no wise lose his reward i like to say it this way if you're too big for the little things you're too little for the big things many times we gravitate to big things oh i want to lead the song and i want to preach no you don't every new level is a new devil and some of you guys think that the platform is about fame fortune and notoriety the platform is about greater opportunities to serve that's it you want to be in business that's an opportunity to serve your clientele you won't get married that's an opportunity to serve your wife and to serve your husband see some of your marriages would be fixed if you took the attention off of you and you just started to serve your spouse some of your prayers have been backwards you've been god fixed my husband god fixed my wife but really god wants to fix you and if he fixed you see our prayers are wrong we're saying god fix them when we say god fix me because if he just fixed you your marriage would be okay if he didn't even touch them if he didn't do nothing with them and he just fixed what's going on up in here friars were your eggs y'all remember that y'all remember that you already been around looking up but anyway um so many times we gravitate to the big things i want the big things i want to be great but god says what can you do with the little things can you look out for the needs of everyday people can you do the little things i remember oh lord look a crazy story i'll go quickly so there was a guy who's a part of our church and um he used to be a leader in our church and then season went through and we didn't need him to do this or that anymore and then i was talking to him i was like well you should just get on the dream team and he said what am i supposed to be an usher and i know he didn't mean anything but but to me i'm like is an usher beneath you is don't you understand david said i'd rather be a doorkeeper in the house of god and dwell in the tents of the wicked but sometimes we think that the little things are too little for us but it's the little things that produces the big things i love how pastor stephen said last week that jesus he had his rabbinical robe on he was a rabbi so he had his rabbi uniform on but he took off that to put on his towel and even though he was lord of all he had the position that i'm gonna wash feet like i don't like feet to be honest with you i don't want to wash feet we never did that here because i don't like folks feet like i won't be touching your feet but jesus the lord the messiah emmanuel with us who could speak things in the beginning was the word the word was with god and the word was god he humbled himself so much that he washed folks bunions that blows my mind but you're too big to be an usher were you too small to do anything big i love the little stuff and i don't think we should just serve in church i think servants should be like our mentality like everywhere we go outside the church we should be servants serving is not something that i do a servant is who i am i'm that guy i love to get on the elevator and i ask everybody what floor you got cause i want to punch it for him that's just the attitude of a servant you got 11. okay i got you all right what you need five okay i got you i love to open the door for everybody let everybody get off the elevator first i got you let's go let's go servant i'm talking about outside the church i get on the plane you know and i like to sit on the owl because i got some short bladder and that y'all pray for me so i like to be on the house so soon as the plane stops i'm the first one up and what i do first is i look for elderly people so that i can get their luggage for them because i've been working out you can tell right so i might as well put this to use what is that so when you come to church do you come to take i don't know look around and see if you see a mom with a toddler over here pushing a stroller trying to work man it's not the parking lot team that goes and serves them it's everybody you look for people crying can i pray with you i'm here to serve people inside the church outside the church so i love to do things like open car doors for people you know i love to hold conversations and randomly you know ask them you know is there anything that i can do to help them i love to smile at people some of the smallest acts that just get a huge result i remember years ago back in 2004 five before i was a pastor i was in real estate my wife and i was making over five hundred thousand dollars a year and i was in washington dc and it was snow y'all know what that is it's the white stuff that comes down don't worry about it um florida people and um i remember that i had someone cooking for me cleaning my house i had a nanny taking care of my one child that i had making a whole lot of money and i would leave my house and walk over the snow that i did not shovel for myself but go shovel it at the church that service y'all i remember i was a very successful businessman and i would go to the church i put on my adidas pants and walk me y'all remember walkman's back in the day i put on walmart and cleaned the bathrooms vacuumed the church and i didn't need anybody to applaud me and people would say well how are you so successful in business why do you why is god's hand on you so much because i'm serving and the servant is the greatest god i'm trying to help somebody today i'll give you one more and we're done galatians 6 10 so then while we as individual believers have the opportunity let us do good to all people unsaved people save people right let us do good not only being helpful but also doing that which promotes their spiritual well-being and especially somebody say especially watch this be a blessing to those of the household of faith born-again believers believers some of us would say well pastor i serve my family and i serve my kids but do you serve in the local church let's just keep it 100. do you serve the household of believers this community where god's people come together do you serve in some capacity that way people we read about they love the gathering of god's people together god loves it this is his bride you are with me some people will say well pastor i serve in the soup kitchen and i serve on you know in mission field that's great keep that up but do you serve in the church the place that's the house of god where disciples are made and there's an anointing and an oil in this place you don't touch nations individually we touch them together so i want to give you an opportunity to accept jesus today because he served you through his life he served you through his life his death his burial and his resurrection and the best thing that we could do is say jesus i surrender my life to you i want a relationship with you listen this is not for the people that want some stale religion that just wants to go through the motions but if you say i want a relationship with god with god where he speaks to me and you hear his voice and he directs your path it starts with a relationship with jesus it's jesus over everything and i would love to pray for you today and so every head about every eye close even those of you are online and if you're here today i'm actually going to ask you to raise your hand in just a moment if you're here and you're saying pastor i have sinned in my life but i want to be forgiven of my sins here's the good news we've all sinned we've all fallen short of the glory of god and you don't have to pay the price for your own sin jesus did it for you he served you with the cross and all you have to do is surrender your will to him you don't have to be a perfect person to be a forgiving one you just have to surrender surrender is this i give up my way of thinking i don't know everything god i want to trust you and so with every head bowed and every eye closed if you're here and you say pastor i'm not sure where i would spend the rest of eternity if god forbid i was to die today i'm not sure that my sins have been forgiven or if you're here and you're like you know what i want a relationship with god i want to get this thing right today he has served me and i want to accept him today i'm going to have you raise your hand on the count of three and if that's you i simply want to pray for you please lift up your hand on the count of three if you say include me in that prayer in one two three lift it up high all over the building thank you i see [Applause] all over the building with that shoe thank you i see your hand you can put your hand down and even if you're online just raise your hand god sees it god sees it your hand and your heart is connected it's saying god i give you me nobody prays alone matter of fact we're going to pray this prayer together and so repeat after me say lord jesus come into my heart today forgive me of my sins from this day forward i accept you what you've done for me on a cross and i make you my lord and my savior from this day forward i am born again i am right with you not because i'm perfect but because you are i accept you as my lord and savior right here right now in jesus name amen come on george would you put your hands together come on y'all you can do better than that amen well welcome to the family of god there were so many people that had their hands lifted and those of you all who you online if you lifted your hand please put the word saved in the message below or there's going to be a text number that comes up on the screen we want to connect with you and help you take your next step how many all say that that word was for you anybody here was it okay all right a couple of you all maybe not maybe not it's okay i'll incur oh girl one more time how many of you all say that word was for me i got something out of today something out of today right hold on nobody moving please listen i've preached probably thousands of messages and what i've realized is that it doesn't matter how good the message is that you hear if you don't do anything with it it means nothing i can make you laugh i can be up here sweating like crazy and the bible says this don't be a forgetful hearer of the word but be a doer of the word because it's the doers of the word that shall be blessed it's easy to hear but it's better to do and so i want to give you an opportunity to kind of do something with what you heard today and i'm going to ask you just to man if this message hits your heart and you know that's you you're not currently serving in church and god is leading you to begin to serve in church we have 30 different teams here i mean kids church production worship parking lot people say well i don't know what i'm called to do usher that's what you're called to do for now parking lot those are two across the across the board it's just like start there and then we'll figure it out later this ain't it ain't got to be deep you ain't got to figure out no ideogram for this one it's just like what can i do to serve just get somewhere preach this in baltimore 240 people became a part of the dream team i preached this in a little city called winter haven outside of lakeland 220 people stood up to do something with this world i think we should have more when i'm at home this is what i'm believing for i'm believing for a hundred people at each campus today just to take a step towards service to not let this word fall but to do something with it and just say god i'm here if that bears witness with you and you say god i want to serve you can you please stand if you're not currently on the dream team but you're saying i'm willing to be please don't please thank you come on give it up for all these people anybody else and remain standing for just a minute come on give it up for these people all right 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 come on give them a big round of applause god bless you god bless you come on somebody ain't nobody mad but the devil ain't nobody mad but the devil if you just stood all right and i've understood pastoring that some people have problems following instructions but you seem like a bright group if you just stood get this card the bright yellow one with black writing on it get this real quickly because it doesn't matter if you stand we need to hear who you are so we can help you get plugged in onto a team okay so here's my instructions for you and this is the next part to do if you need a pen or card lift up your hand and somebody will bring you one this is very simple if you say pastor i want to serve in the church i want to be a part of the dream team we're going to have a conversation with you help you find a team we don't know what it to be we'll have a conversation with you help you get in the growth track help you find a team all right and so we have seven services today if you're online there's gonna be a link all right now for those of you all online because you're scared of the pandemic you need to come back to church you really do i'm gonna be honest with you because i love you you need to come back to church why because you've been going to the grocery store and you've been going to work and you just mask up mask up come stand on the wall get in the back but listen my wife just came through a cancer battle but she still came to church and what she found out is that when she missed even though she's been a pastor for many years there was something in her spirit that wasn't right there's something that you get here that you can never get there now we will continue to do this to reach people around the world but if you're a part of this church you need to get here if not we're going to pray god send seven more people that's more on fire ready to serve than you but i want you to be a partaker of what god is about to do so hope to see you next week but here's the thing fill this thing out somebody's gonna reach out to you online and this is what i want all of you guys to do here you're gonna take this card to the connection center i'm going to have all my staff pastors team leaders are going to go out to the connection center they're going to get your card they're going to have a conversation with you if you've went through growth track have you served before and there are a few of you all who used to serve but something happened in your life and you don't serve no more god oh my god i'm going to keep on going jesus jesus help us you know what i found out about that is that the people who stopped serving for whatever reason have the most opportunity for the devil to sift them like wheat in a later season they think it's so honest well i'm just not serving right now because of school and i'm not gonna serve right now because it is and i know if you have babies you need a few months off something happens you're going through chemotherapy you need to that's the balance but the truth is the majority of people stuff happens in their life but what i've seen is six months later two years later three they're in a bad place and they didn't know that it started with a simple drift i'm just too busy right now i can't do that right now because serving in the house of god connects you to the heart of jesus i gotta go so anyway um check the box whatever applies to you take it to the connection center we're gonna get you in the growth track we're gonna get you on a dream team and you're gonna walk into the greatness that jesus has destined for you to walk in i love y'all pray for me i got three more soldiers

Channel: Alive Church

Views: 1,112

Rating: 5 out of 5

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Id: TLRR3tFBefE

Length: 47min 10sec (2830 seconds)

Published: Mon Aug 02 2021