Hearing God (Part 1): You Can Hear God Speak

[Music] [Music] [Music] you were made for something great [Music] hey victory family hey everybody uh hey let's welcome all of our family at hamilton mill and midtown online we got people from malaysia and belize and paraguay as well come on let's welcome everybody today hey guys i have good news for you you were made in the image of god in the image of god he created you male and female he created you that god put his thumbprint on you that god put unique aspects of his nature and his creativity inside you this is why we all love beauty and we all want to love and be loved this is why you have unique gifts and talents and abilities that other people don't that you are uniquely and fearfully and wonderfully made and we are on the journey corporately of emancipating that greatness of getting what god put in you out of you for his glory and the world around you why because we believe that you were made for something great that that's not just a humanistic statement it's a it's a value of who god created you to be of the glory that he put in you of himself that he didn't create you just to exist but to live and to live life and life more abundantly through jesus christ and as we move forward listen i am so excited about seeing what god put in you get out of you but here's what we also acknowledge is that a seed reproduces after its own kind and so next year as we dive into reproducing and making disciples and impacting the world and influencing the world around us next year this year we're focusing on getting healthy so that when we reproduce we reproduce healthy come on somebody and so this year what we're focusing on is getting healthy in god so last uh this this last season the last few weeks we really focused on this thing called forgiveness right because if you cannot understand how to forgive others and in essence forgive god and forgive yourself then you won't be able to move forward into the life that he has for you and we call it quicksand and today what we're doing we're stepping into this next season and here's what i would just simply say i would say that this is the make or break thing it all comes down to what we're going to talk about over the next few weeks when it comes to your health when it comes to your relationship with god when it comes to to being able to move forward in life what we're going to talk about is how to hear god speak how to hear god speak how many of you know it has never been more important in our generation to be able to hear what god is saying than it is right now we have to be people who know how to hear and discern the voice of the lord but let's just call it like it is most of us think that god doesn't talk to us right because we hear pastors say things like well god told me the other day and you're like well you need to talk to him may not know to me right and so we think like hearing god is for the pastors the apostles people have business cards with important titles on them the spiritually elite right but here's the deal aw tozer said this the one who does not expect god to speak will discount every time that god does speak but i got good news we have a god who loves to speak like a lot like he waited a whole three verses to talk in the bible he said let there be light god spoke god is still speaking god spoke to to adam and eve god spoke to noah god spoke to abraham god spoke to moses and joshua and david and and the prophets and god spoke to joseph and mary and simeon and anna they're in the in the temple as they prayed over baby jesus the father communed with the son in relationship god spoke to the disciples god spoke to um saul on the damascus road god spoke to john when he gave him the revelation god spoke to our spiritual ancestors throughout the generations and god is still speaking today god is still speaking today and brother lawrence said this brother lawrence in the 1600s he wrote practicing the presence he says there is not in the world a kind of life more sweet and delightful than that of a continual conversation with god those only can comprehend it who practice and experience it and let me just tell you family i have not arrived or where where i want to be or where god wants me to be but i can agree that there is not in the world a kind of life more sweet and delightful than that of a continual conversation with god and those who live in it can appreciate it everybody else can just tweet about it i'm telling you i'm telling you the voice of god hearing god speak will change your life hearing god speak throughout my life in small ways big ways in the multitude of ways that he speaks that we're going to talk about over the next few weeks has radically changed my life and i want the same thing for you i want the same thing for you i want you to be somebody who says i hear god speak that god speaks to my life and he guides me it brings me in a personal relationship with him changed my life god speaks now here's the deal i know this we tend to put dad on dad right this is we subconsciously do that maybe dad wasn't there for you so you don't think that dad isn't there for you and dad doesn't talk or dad only spoke to you when he's angry so dad only speaks to you when he's angry here's what we have to understand guys yes sometimes god speaks to us to correct us when we need it but overwhelmingly god speaks encouragement and affirmation and direction and guidance come on god smiles when he thinks about you this is the promises of scripture that god rejoices over you with shouts of joy in fact i'd say this is that god's voice isn't something to retreat from but something to run toward and listen if we're ever going to have a personal relationship with god if we're ever actually going to have intimacy with jesus if we're ever going to be able to make it in the world full of lies by standing in the truth if we're ever actually going to know the right way forward then we have to know how to hear and discern the voice of the lord and so what we're diving into over the next few weeks is the fact that god has spoken and god still speaks and how to hear and discern his voice as he's speaking here's the first thing we have to wrap our minds around today is this is that we were made to hear god's voice come on somebody say amen we were made to hear god's voice god is relationship the trinity is relationship father son holy spirit three in one that god himself is relationship don't try and understand it just accept it it's too big for us god is relationship now here's the beautiful thing you were made in god's image so here's what that means is that bigger than the gifts that you have that he gave you bigger than the fact that you were created higher than the animals of the earth being made in god's image means that you and i are hardwired with the ability to have relationship with god sin has corrupted that and broken that but thank god he made a way for it but every relationship is built on one thing what is it communication come on married people communication now if you're single then hey maybe you're not that great at communication but what is communication it's speaking to god and listening to god here's what jesus says listen to jesus's words john 10. he says the one who enters by the gate is the shepherd of the sheep guess who's the shepherd in this story all right spoiler alert jesus come on guys the gatekeeper opens the gate for him and the sheep listen to his voice he calls his own sheep by name and leads them out do you realize this do you realize that jesus knows your name come on if you're born again jesus knows your name you ever introduced yourself to somebody like 15 times and they're like hey guy there you are jesus isn't like hey you person no like he knows your name jesus knows your name how amazing is that and when he has brought out all of his own he goes on ahead of them and his sheep follow him why because they know his voice but they will never follow a stranger everybody say stranger they will never fall no they will never follow a stranger in fact they will run away from him because they do not recognize a stranger's voice and then jesus says my sheep listen to my voice i know them and they follow me all right so here's the deal middle eastern shepherds didn't have border collies all right they didn't they didn't stand at the back of the herd and like drive them forward know what they did they actually went in front of the herd and they had a specific call that those sheep knew it's like ah like they literally do crazy things like that right and the sheep know their shepherd's voice and they'll follow their shepherd four he doesn't drive them for it he calls them ford and the sheep follow him in fact you can go online like this afternoon don't do it right now because you're in search but you can go online later and you can actually find videos of modern day shepherds doing just this in rural remote areas of the world and what'll happen is two shepherds will like come together with their entire herds right there their entire flocks of sheep right they're gonna come together and just have a conversation and their whole flocks merged together and the first time i watched this i'm like no what are you doing you're gonna lose your whole flock man and so they have this conversation and then what happens is when they're done they start walking in opposite directions and then they go and the sheep just and the sheep the flux divide back out again why because sheep know the voice of their shepherd and they won't follow the voice of a stranger in fact jesus knows the danger of following the voice of a stranger because jesus saw what happened in genesis 3. come on guys when the serpent a stranger slithered into the garden of eden and what did the serpent do the serpent slithers right up next to eve and what does he say did god really say right did god did god real come on the enemy has no new tricks because the old tricks still work did god really say that you shouldn't eat from any true tree in the garden and you know what eve does he has a conversation with the devil note to self don't have conversations with the devil what are we supposed to do with the devil submit to god resist the devil and the the devil will flee from you right leave the conversations with the devil to jesus all right let him do that you submit to god resist the devil and hopefully from you but today your enemy is still using the same tactics he's saying did god really say because if he can get you questioning the truth then you'll fall for anything did god really say and you better know the truth you better know the truth when he comes knocking and here's what jesus says again listen to jesus's words matthew 7. therefore everyone who hears these words of mine and puts them into practice is like a wise man who built his house on the rock and the rain came down and the streams rose and the winds blew and beat against that house yet it did not fall because it had its foundation everybody say foundation foundation on the rock the only way we're gonna have victory in this life is if our life our house is built on the solid rock of jesus's words instead of the shifting sand of people's opinions that's the only way we're gonna make it guys that is it in fact the apostle paul he goes kind of a step further here's what he says his words ephesians 4 then when we're mature in the faith then we will no longer be infants tossed back and forth by the waves and blown here and there by every wind of teaching and by the cunning and craftiness of people in their deceitful scheming wow pause think about this what he says in the world there are winds of teaching in other words here's one there's one here's one there's one and he also says that there is cunning and craftiness of people in their deceitful scheming in other words in the bible what it says is there are godless agendas in this world and you better be careful you better be careful because if your life is not built on the rock of the word of god you will be tossed back and forth by the waves and listen guys as a pastor this breaks my heart because i see this i see this deceitful scheming i see the voice of strangers everywhere and i see countless christians buying into the voice of strangers and we're we're falling for it listen if if you tune in to cnn let's just make it real cnn will tell you that people who don't wear masks are stupid then you go over to fox news and fox news tells you that people who do wear masks are stupid and what the problem isn't that they're saying it the problem is that we're buying it the problem is that christians are buying it hook line and sinker and then weaponizing the voice of strangers against one another we're falling for the voice of strangers we're falling for godless agendas and it's bringing division inside the body of christ and we're seeing even the elect get deceived and fall away because they're being blown back and forth by every wind of teaching because our house our life is not built on the solid rock and so social media tells us one thing and then politics said listen paul i'm just gonna go there all right politics tells us that we should embrace something like the equality act right because it's equality who's not for equality do you not even know that the the the devil masquerades as an angel of light just because something sounds good doesn't mean it is good and we don't understand there is there is a better way listen as as a pastor i believe in loving our neighbors do not misquote me but here's what we need to understand just because a politician said it doesn't mean it's right come on somebody that better get an amen that there's a better way and listen we don't understand is that if if this thing gets passed the equality act gets passed it will destroy christian colleges it will destroy destroy christian businesses and listen take this snapshot right now record me right now if the equality act gets passed in a handful of years they'll go after the church i promise you it's going to happen the problem isn't that the world's trying to do it the problem is the people of god are buying it we're grabbing a hold of it we're allowing the voice of strangers to come in and override the voice of god which is our only solid rock listen social media says that you're you're a bigot if you don't want people who are born boys playing girls sports the problem isn't that the world's saying it the problem is that the church is buying it listen you live in a world that says that you're homophobic i just read this on cnn this morning the world says that you're homophobic if you don't like sign off on three men this is literally front page of cnn three men who aren't married not that that would change it but threwple they're a throuple we're coming up with new words they're a throuple who who paid a woman to be a surrogate mother to birth a child and then they went to court to have all three of their names added to the birth certificate that's the world that we live in and the listen the world's going to be the world the world's going to sin the world's going to do what they whatever they're going to do but listen the problem is when the church buys it the problem is when the church starts caving to it and bending to it and what's happened is we have a firm dysfunction instead of healing it and what we've said is well i guess that's your truth man that how many of you have heard the dumbest try and use that in your math class well teacher this is just my truth two plus two equals eight are you a bigot are you a bigot because that's my truth or could it just be that there are some things that are true that there is such a thing as absolute truth and i know you live in a world that says that there isn't the the world's gonna do what the world's gonna do the problem is when the church buys it that's the problem the problem is when we take our house off of the rock and build it on shifting sand right and what's happened is society has gotten crooked it's like that you're driving a car and the wheels get out of alignment and instead of fixing the wheels now we just build curved roads right because instead of actually fixing something or healing something we've affirmed it we haven't tried to call things back into correction we just said well everybody's right everybody's right everybody has their own truth no there is the truth and then there's lies listen and if you don't build your life on that that explains why your life is being tossed back and forth and you don't know which way is up and which way is down and you're like i don't know is it did god really say right because the enemy doesn't have new tricks he's been using this one since genesis 3 guys did god really say and if you don't know what god said look out because we're listening to our emotions we're listening to social media we're listening to the political left we're listening to the political right we're listening to our teachers at school we're listening to our friends we're listening to our parents we're listening to the spirit of the age but when are we listening to god come on when how much of our life is built on the solid rock of the unchanging word of god i got another email this week another one of of somebody else leaving the church because we require masks during this season to attend another one right here's my question it's not it's not to you because you don't go here anymore but all right i love you listen i love you it's fine we'll be okay i pray you'll be okay too here's my question who told you to leave the church what voice told you to leave the church because if god told you to leave the church i bless you i bless you i want god's best for you regardless but listen if god told you to go go i believe that the lord plants and transplants i believe that did god tell you to go or did your emotions tell you to go did fox news tell you to go did your friends tell you to go because i remember i remember when you grabbed me in the lobby and you said that god told you to come so did god tell you to go because of masks can we just say that nobody likes wearing masks you understand that people are being martyred in around the world and we're leaving churches over masks what's wrong with us what voice are we listening to you've heard me tell the story before in 2003 uh all of our friends left victory like all of them like all of them all of them this is before we were on stuff and um they all had their own reasons but primarily it was race it really was because they're all white and nobody would ever say this but white people are not used to having their children grow up in majority minority environments and so basically said i don't i can find a church where little billy won't have to grow up around a lot of minority kids um everything inside us wanted to go with them not because of the race stuff but because of friendship like oh my friends are going like we want to go too and there are plenty of churches you can go to that don't bother white parents but what ha what happened was summer and i sat down this is early on in our marriage and we had by far the most difficult conversation we had ever had in our entire lives and what it came down to was this is that god didn't tell us to go god called us here but god didn't tell us to leave so i guess we're staying best decision of our lives listen guys there are a thousand voices in this world and you better look out because here's how i say it if you aren't listening to god's voice you will listen to a voice and if you're in a season of not really hearing god speak you better be careful because dr phil phil's talking and oprah's talking and tony robbins is talking social media is talking the left is talking the riot is talking come on your friends are talking your parents are talking the world's talking culture's talking and if they're talking talking talking and you're listening listening listening then you will be tossed back and for forth you will be tossed to and fro by the wind of teaching and by the deceitful scheming of people who have godless agendas and let me just say this guys let me just say this as a pastor i am tired i am tired of this petty strife over masks as the people of god as the people of god who are on mission to go and make disciples of the nations and we're fighting about mass i'm tired of the petty i'm tired of christian nationalism i'm tired of christians buying into conspiracy theories i am tired of of the prejudice and racism in the house of god i'm tired of seeing friends and compatriots in the kingdom fall for the voice of strangers and follow a false shepherd out into the wilderness because there is one who comes to steal and kill and destroy and he wants to ruin us in the church of god but there is good news because there is one who comes to give life and life more abundantly and as the pastor of this church i urge you to flee the voice of the enemy and to run to the voice of truth we have this privilege listen hebrews 4 16 let us come boldly to the throne of our gracious god because there we will receive his mercy and we will find grace to help us when we need it most when we are born again by the blood of jesus christ and brought into the kingdom of god as children of god the veil has been torn off of our life we now have free access to the throne room of god and he is not far away god he is abba daddy as a little child can crawl up in his father's lap we get that opportunity with god so go to god embrace his truth free the flee the lies of the enemy hear his voice build your life on his words because that is what we were made to do we were made to hear his voice we were made to follow so what do we got to do what we got to do we have to understand that we were made to hear his voice the second thing is we learn to hear his voice so listen just uh here's what i want to do i want to remove some condemnation off of some of you right now because because when we hear hey heaven has opened up to us some of us say well like well like i don't hear god speak so i must not be saved i must not be a sheep right here's the deal heaven is open to you you have the greatest opportunity ever but just because you have it doesn't mean you're seizing it okay we have the the skill to hear god's voice is learned and it's matured over time even just take one scripture right here okay one scripture psalm 46 god says be still and know that i am god and i will be exalted among the nations i will be exalted in the earth and we're going to touch about how to hear god a little bit every single week you know what are what are some of the approaches to it but so i'm not going to go too in depth here but here's here's the question okay what is god saying here he says be still and know that i am god what is god implying he's implying that many of us do not live lives that include stillness and could it be that that's why we're not hearing from god because you can hear culture on the run but you cannot hear god on the run and too many of us you check your screen time on your phone too many of us give hours and hours and hours and hours and days and days every single week to culture and we give minutes on a sunday morning to god and then we complain that we can't hear god speak because we're not creating space let me let me ask you this question what do you do in the natural if you're not getting enough bars on your phone you got to move right right here's how i'd say it i have to reposition so i can get better reception right because in my last house um it was terrible there was like a dead spot over my house i was like dude man i'm like missing all the calls and everything right there and i believe that the lord's saying this a lot of our lifestyles have created dead spots over our life where we can't hear from god because here's what here's what many of us do we wake up five minutes before we're supposed to leave for work run around like tasmanian devil and and then we run out the door and we get in our car and we listen to god knows what on the way to work god help some of us and then we get to work and we work the entire time without taking a breath right and then we road rage all the way home and then we eat dinner while we're watching the tv and then we spend the last three hours of our day you know just scrolling social media or if you're single maybe you're swiping for a few hours before you go to bed right but then we complain that we don't hear god speak but could it be that we've never been still so here's the question what needs to change in my life so i can better position myself i can't force god to speak but i do believe that god is speaking even though we're not listening what do i need to do to position myself to hear god when he does speak because we were made to hear the voice of the lord we learn to hear the voice of the lord and here's the third thing we hear god's voice in the bible guys we've lost our love for this and that explains many of our problems the most wonderful thing in the world is that god spoke and people wrote it down second timothy 3 16 says all scripture is god breathe that word for god breathed in the greek is theo nustos means god and breath all scripture god breathe and what is it useful for it's useful for teaching rebuking correcting and training and righteousness so that the servant of god may be thoroughly equipped for every good work if you feel like you're not thoroughly equipped i know what the problem is we've got to get this in us how can it get out of us if it doesn't get in us and here's the beautiful thing guys this isn't a collection of man sayings this isn't a history book this is 31 000 verses 66 books by over 40 authors over a thousand years with one message god's pursuit of humanity and we have it in our hands but too many of us have this fatal thing called dbs dusty bible syndrome it affects over 50 million bibles annually it's a tragedy this is the logos this is the written word of god epi meyer said this i love this this is so strong he said the written word is the wire along which the voice of god will certainly come to you if the heart is hushed and the attention is fixed and this is where we start if we want to hear god speak this is the genesis this is the beginning this is the primary way that god speaks to us today right here it's not the only way because in the weeks ahead listen we're going to talk about uh pray hearing god in prayer we're going to talk about hearing god in prophecy we're going to talk about hearing god in dreams and visions we're going to talk about hearing god in sermons we're going to talk about hearing god in a lot of different ways but listen we have to start with the logos we start with the written word we start with the bible because listen to me very carefully god will never contradict this if it contradicts this it's the voice of a stranger and i listen away i've heard way too many stories oh man i went went and saw this prophet he told me to divorce my wife i don't know she hadn't done anything wrong but i did it because god said it is it written because my bible says god hates divorce and if a prophet dares ever contradict this let him be cut off listen if a dream ever ever sends you in the wrong direction if if in a prayer time you hear a voice and it contradicts this it's the voice of a stranger run away listen if i ever preach anything other than christ crucified stranger talk stranger talk stranger danger when the devil was tempting jesus in the wilderness did god really say did god really said to god really say what does jesus say every single time he says it is written because you will not win god's war without god's word and i promise you the devil knows the bible way better than you do so you better know the truth we bet this is our weapon guys the way you're going to win in life the way you're going to be able to stand against the lies of the enemy the way that you're actually going to receive living guidance and direction on a regular basis the way you're going to know the way forward is by the word of god because what i do i take my dreams and my passions and my my goals what what i believe that god is telling me to do and i hold it up to this and i say is it written am i going in the direction that god has for this world what god has already said does my life line up with that is it written and this is not some dull outdated book that's completely irrelevant hebrews 4 12 for the word of god the logos the word of god the logos is alive and active sharper than any double-edged sword you ever been listening to a sermon and you're like ouch yeah it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit joints and marrow it judges the thoughts and the attitudes of the heart in other words this isn't just something that i read this is something that reads me this is something that changes me and if we're not careful too often here's how i'd say too often we read the bible we don't read the bible to listen to god we read the bible to learn more information we read the bible to memorize it instead of actually be changed by it there's nothing wrong with memorizing the bible memorize it store it up get it on the inside of you but you have to let it into you because here's what we do too many times we're like i saw i saw a good pastor he posted a verse here's my instagram post for the day but what we're actually meant to do is and way too many of us are posting scriptures but we're not being spoken to by the scriptures and we've got way too many pastors falling in pulpits because they're dying of hunger when they're feeding everybody else because they don't eat for themselves we have the greatest gift right here we're the greatest gift right here right and the problem is this listen this isn't a surprise to anybody but i came across this this survey this last week it says in last year in 2020 35 of adults in america didn't even touch the bible 35 okay 60 of adults which includes people who say they go to church 60 of of adults said that they read the bible five times or less in the year so what that's doing it's creating the societal shift away from the ways of god okay that's not surprising to any of us okay but we have to acknowledge it so we don't follow it because just because society is doing it doesn't mean it's right because now we have people saying like god's for this and god's for that and they're taking the name of god and they've clearly never read this because god doesn't love that and god's not for that and we have a whole lot of people speaking for god and it's strangers because this is our gift this is our this is our solid rock this is what keeps us grounded and so what i want to do what i want to do okay for the the few minutes that we have remaining is i want to quickly um teach us how to study the bible i went quickly so some of you already have a way i'm not trying to change that if it ain't broke don't fix it but here's what i know a lot of us say well like i have my way i study the bible once a quarter and uh when i became a christian at 14 i wanted to study the bible i knew i should study the bible but i would open it up and then be like right if any of you all kind of have that approach you're like right what am i supposed to do with that like i don't know right and so you just kind of get discouraged after a while so what i want to do i want to give you something that is super simple it'll take you 10 minutes to do it or more but 10 minutes okay you can start with 10 minutes okay and it's a it's a method called soap soap and so what i'm gonna do i'm gonna run you through it really quickly and then we're gonna demonstrate it and i'll go into a little bit more depth okay so soap here it is this is a screenshot off of my phone all right because i actually write this down to my phone so scripture uh what we're saying is what is the section god highlighted to me today while i was reading observation okay why did that scripture resonate with me today and also what is what's the author saying like what's the big idea what's the eternal truth of god in this application so god said it back then what is god saying today about it what's god saying to me about it and what's going to change inside of me and then prayer and we just say god thank you for this help me to do whatever you just revealed in their soap s-o-a-p okay so what we're going to do is we're going to demonstrate right now how to do soap all right and so we're going to have some people come out at all of our campuses so here in norcross go ahead and come out we got some people down in hamilton mill are up in hamilton mill we got some people down in midtown coming out let's give it up for these these two let's give it up in hamilton mill it's covered up in midtown all right so what we're going to do is we're going to read colossians one or a portion of colossians one and we're gonna do soap for it and then you're gonna read it aloud no pressure there's a few people watching okay all right so here's what we're gonna do we're gonna read you in fact you guys you guys if you have it colossians 1 we're going to read verse 9 through 14. i'm going to read out of the nlt a lot of people ask what's the best version of the bible i believe the best version of the bible is the one you read all right so if you don't understand it you might need to change it all right so verse nine we have not stopped praying for you since we first heard about you we asked god to give you complete knowledge of his will and to give you spiritual wisdom and understanding then the way you live will always honor and please the lord and your lives will produce every kind of good fruit all the while you will grow as you learn to know god better and better and we also pray that you will be strengthened with all his glorious power so you will have all the endurance and patience you need may you be filled with joy always thanking the father he has enabled you to share in the inheritance that belongs to his people who live in the light for he has rescued us from the kingdom of darkness and transferred us into the kingdom of his dear son who purchased our freedom and forgave our sins all right soap and go all right so while they're doing that okay what they're doing is they're walking through soap again which is scripture observation application prayer let me just give you a few little thoughts on how i do this may be helpful to you okay so when i open up the bible i never just kind of like open it up i always pray and i say god here i am speak because here's what happens here's what happens if we're not careful is that we'll um we'll live off of yesterday's bread does that make sense this is our daily bread and uh you ever you ever bought day old bread there's a reason it's on sale not as good and a lot of us we try and live on what god said yesterday and we don't understand that god is speaking today and then tomorrow and then the next day and so what i want to do i say god i'm here give me ears to hear what the spirit of the lord is saying because i believe that these are living words and so i invite you come and speak to me as i dive into this and then scripture observation application prayer so scripture okay scripture scripture scripture so what they're gonna do out of those six verses they're gonna pick one verse they're gonna pick two verses what you may do is you can read a whole chapter usually i'll read a whole chapter so i have some context okay you might read two chapters but out of that one verse or two verses or maybe a theme is going to emerge that kind of resonates with you okay so grab that now observation that's scripture scripture observation observation um why did that scripture jump out to me this is a good spot to talk about the difference between exegesis and isogesis okay i know there's two really big theological words um exegesis is getting out of the text the truth that god put in it isa jesus is me putting in the text what i want it to say all right this is the problem with bible roulette you know bible read that right and that that's how a lot of us read the bible right we're like and this one today for i will give rest to the people of israel i've never been to israel i don't know right sometimes you get lucky sometimes you get luckier but what happens is 30 31 000 verses in the bible and what happens is when we just cherry pick one we end up taking it out of context and we do what's called isogesis i make it say what i want it to say instead of actually actually asking the like how when why where like like who is the original author writing to what was the original truth why are they writing what's what's happening in the world sometimes that's why it's helpful to get what's called a like a commentary or something like a new life application sort of a bible which kind of has some descriptions down at the bottom of a little the things that are going on inside the text so scripture observation then application so i've i've read a chapter i've got like a verse i i okay here's kind of what the author's saying now here's the next thing what am i supposed to do with that this is what i ask my kids all the time when they come home from church what did you learn all right noah build an ark okay why does that matter right this is where we mess up when we read the bible we never actually asked the question of why why does it matter okay god said it back then but what is god saying to me right now through it now i don't just want information because knowledge puffs up but love builds up right so i want i don't i want the information but i also want transformation through this what is god saying to me today and then i'm going to make a goal off of that what needs to change in my life in my being or am i doing or my thinking based on the word that i just read and what you'll see is is here in the campuses is they're probably on their phones this is what i do so when i'm when i'm doing it i actually pull out my phone i'll start a note tab and i title every single one like it's a little mini sermon and uh uh then i write the the scripture observation application prayer right there because what i can do is i can go back to it and i can read it later because i i love being able to see how god spoke in my past and so as as i'm writing these things down specifically here in colossians 1 what i what i'm saying is did i focus on this or this or this or this and what i can do i can do it alone we can do this in a small group we can share it or we can we can just do it between us and the lord and here's here's why i say all this is because it is absolutely crucial listen it is absolutely crucial that we have to learn how to feed ourselves i believe in the power of corporately receiving a sermon i do obviously right now it's happening but we can't rely on other people's quiet times we have to start having our own because you cannot rely on my life being built on the rock jesus says if you build your life on the rock if you listen to his words and then you do them your life will not fall your life will not fall and so we have to make it a discipline to get the word in us to allow it to transform us and so here's the deal we're going to go back all right we're going to go back and we're going to hear what these two here said and so you're going to hear as well as the campuses so let's go ahead and break away at hamlet's mill let's break away at midtown so everybody here let's give it up for hamilton mill in midtown as they continue on that i pray that soap is a blessing to you all right and so we're going to come over here live unrehearsed and you just had soap all right so go ahead and introduce yourself tell us what you do around here these are two staff all right well i'm lizette mendoza or liz a lot of people know me as um i am with our online campus i'm the admin so it's been really exciting just to see all that yeah and everything so tell us tell us what did god speak to you today okay well the verse that stood out to me was verse 10. i have a two-parter then the way you live will always honor and please the lord and your lives will produce every kind of good fruit so that kind of spoke to my perfectionist in me um because even in my humanity i can honor god it takes the pressure off of me um i'm still pleasing god he honors that i'm not perfect i'm not perfect at all at all and he made me not perfect he made me that way the second thing that really struck me um the second part of that verse all the while you will grow as you learn to know god better and better and i need better and better i never want to have an i've i've arrived mindset with the lord um or my relationship with god i pray that i'm always growing with him one day whenever i reach heaven i want to be i want him to say no we grew together she did her best to know me with everything she can i never want to put a i never want to put a cap on the lord i can never in my humanity i can um i guess the action is i need i need to prioritize and be really protective of my quiet times um a coffee date or my appointments with him uh makes a little more personal i wrote down bullets because although i'm i'm it's easier for me to journal and to talk to him i need to protect my listening to him through the word um that's great [Music] yeah for me i uh hey toast your name oh i'm earl i'm earl i'm the community transformation pastor here at uh the north cross campus um yeah i um for me i think it was kind of the hinge point at the start of that um of colossians uh 110. um they prayed and then they were then kind of stuck out to be uh um i don't know why it seems like a lot of times i'm kind of not allowing um that's the best way to say it i'm not allowing grace for people in their journey and i feel like paul allowed grace for people in their journey thinking through this hey i stop daily i pray for you i make certain that i have this opportunity to pray for you and i think that we we don't really give uh grace anymore we kind of expect people to hey you got saved okay great stop doing everything you're supposed to do so for me the grace in actually praying through it and actually allowing them to grow um that then was really important to me um and then kind of with uh 112 the word enabled kind of jumped out as well like enabled means i mean it enabled us to share in the inheritance that belongs to god i mean that means god flips a switch i don't have to flip switch and kind of the application piece for me i'm kind of walking a journey with with the young man right now that i just want to knock up side of the head a little bit and i'm just like i just want to i want you to get it i want you to understand it i get kind of frustrated that he's not getting it but it's not me that's going to flip the switch god's going to flip the switch god's going to enable him to share it so that's i really want to just give him that grace and be able to allow him to journey and to really understand god who god is for himself and the application piece i would say the bigger piece of it for me is earl have you stopped praying for him i believe i stopped praying through the process and i believe i just expected him to get there and i just i don't want to have that expectation anymore so i want to pray through that if that's okay yeah pray for even right now right father i'm sorry i'm sorry for having an expectation on your son that is not okay father i'm sorry that i um just expected him to arrive at a certain location without your grace and your love for him i pray right now for all of us who have had that opportunity to kind of walk with someone on the journey god ask that you just give us the grace for your people it's not our grace that we're extending it's your grace it's your love and we ask right now god that you will just allow us to help them finish the race in jesus name we pray amen and i think what's so cool about this is you guys pretty much had the same verse i don't mean out of those six verses but it was it was completely different what god said to you because you're lit you're two different people right i don't know if you noticed that and so uh god is not a copy-paste guy she looks way better right um and even you know me so i did this the other day and cautions won that same skir that same section and i was kind of attracted to that but right before it talks about living holy lives it talks about knowledge of god's will and then you'll be able to live a holy life when you know god's will and so god really started speaking to me about that and thinking about my own life and the times i've been most disciplined the times i've been the the most passionate for god is when i know what god's calling me to do know when i'm alive but when i'm disconnected from god's will that's when i drift and so what i my application was like god i need to make it a regular occurrence i actually said you know a handful of minutes every single morning to be like god why am i alive what are you calling me to do with my life to be reminded of god's will for my life because then that sparks that that hunger for hope for holiness in my life and then i took that and gave that to him in prayer and be like god you know in my own weakness i'm not able to do this so help me be able to remember remind me in the mornings you know help me to set reminders those sorts of things and because i believe that god speaks to us each uniquely individually and so what's really cool here is you could do this alone or this was even kind of like with the family member or the spouse or with a friend some of our small groups are starting to do this we're doing this and stuff and so again i just want to give this to you as a tool uh to be able to do and study the scriptures as you move forward this is going to be victory's way of studying scripture so all right so let's give it up for these two right here as they step off all right let's go ahead and bow our heads uh in prayer god thank you god thank you that you have spoken god thank you that you are still speaking and i pray father that you would give us ears to hear what you are saying god that we would not listen to the voice of a stranger but we would listen to the voice of our father and thank you for the gift of the logos god is here in the bible that we meet you as creator and redeemer and restorer and shepherd and friend it's here in the scriptures we meet the heroes who have gone before us it's here that we receive faith from your many precious promises it's here that we receive courage from your faithfulness in the past it's here we receive comfort that you love us even in our weakness it's here we receive conviction whenever we depart from your ways it's here we receive peace that your grace covers over our sins it's here we receive salvation because the holy spirit highlights the logos the written word of god and uses this word and the power contained in this word that caused it to seep through the cracks in our hard hearts to get us to open up to jesus it's here that we receive hope that this world is not our final home but our real home is in heaven where our savior is it's here that we receive joy that jesus is coming back for his bride it's here we receive strength to persevere until that day it's here we receive our mission to go into all the world and make disciples that it should be hard to go to hell in our city it's here that we receive your love that you loved us so much that as a good father you wrote love letters to us so we would never be alone thank you for your word thank you for your word and right now father i i believe that there's there's a move of god in this moment that's opening us up to say i believe that the word of god is truth that you are who you say you are that you will do what you say you will do and jesus is who he says that he is and jesus will do what he said he will do so here's what i want to do i want to offer the free gift of salvation in jesus christ because it is written that we are saved by grace through faith in jesus and if today that your heart is opening up to that i want to invite you to pray in the family of god we're going to pray this together let's pray like this say jesus you are the son of god who died for my sins on the cross so i could be free so right now i repent of my sins i turn from my way to go your way and i believe i am forgiven of my wrongs against god i am free and restored and redeemed i am a child of god you are my father heaven is my home i believe it i am saved i am born again because of jesus christ and i'll live for you the rest of my days in jesus name god right now i thank you that it is written that there is an angelic party in heaven because of people just coming to faith in jesus christ god i thank you that it is written that you rejoice over us with shouts of joy like a good father and it is written that you will never leave us and you'll never forsake us so may we be people who love the word who store up the word and our heart who build the house of our lives upon your word because when the storms come and the wind and the waves come we will still be found standing for your name and your fame and your glory in jesus name we pray and everybody said amen amen let's give god praise for everybody who just came to the lord

Channel: VictoryATL

Views: 2,476

Rating: 4.9259257 out of 5

Keywords: Emancipating Greatness, Hearing God, how can I hear God, Victory Church, Johnson Bowie

Id: vvIKutTWBNE

Length: 54min 52sec (3292 seconds)

Published: Mon Mar 08 2021