Kings Church NYC - Sunday Morning 09.19.2021

and your love is nothing stronger than your love there's nothing stronger than your plan jesus all right [Music] there's nothing strong [Music] jesus there's nothing strong in your love there's nothing strong in your life there's nothing stronger than your plan jesus what separated [Music] where [Music] where you can't find me there's nothing stronger [Music] well good morning everyone welcome to king's church so excited to have you guys here if you're in the foyer please make your way into service we also have earplugs in the foyer as well if it gets a little too loud but i just want to pray real quick before we start service thank you lord for this morning we thank you so much that we can enter your courts with praise and i just pray that as we lift our voices to you god that you will be magnified glorified and in our hearts and in our minds jesus so we thank you and give you this day in your name amen [Music] hallelujah [Music] for me [Music] is is [Music] and i will watch the darkness [Music] [Music] [Applause] is [Music] [Music] sing a little is is [Applause] [Music] is [Music] foreign [Music] gonna hear my praises [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] is [Music] is [Music] today [Music] [Music] [Music] from my enemy [Music] [Applause] [Music] and i'm no longer [Music] me [Music] is [Music] is [Music] [Music] i [Music] is [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] is [Music] [Applause] [Music] oh [Music] [Applause] [Music] my fears [Music] walk [Music] is [Music] [Music] you rescue me [Music] is [Music] a child of god [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] is [Music] [Music] [Music] cause i am is [Music] you rescued me [Music] [Applause] [Music] hey church we're going to take a moment this morning to receive communion and you the elements are right there behind you on your seat i want to read with you out of luke chapter 22 and it says and he took bread and when he had given thanks he broke it and gave it to them saying this is my body which is given for you do this in remembrance of me and likewise the cup after they had eaten saying the cup that is poured out for you is the new covenant of my blood [Music] the first thing jesus says is this is my body and i'm giving it to you [Music] you know the communion is about us remembering the death and resurrection of jesus but communion communion is us remembering that we partake in the body of christ that we are currently living active members of the body of christ i think it says in colossians that there are parts of the body that are lesser parts and there's parts that are to be more honored in parts to be less honored and i was thinking about this as related to communion is there any part of the body by any normal rational actor that's not cared for that's not cherished is there a part of your body that you're like you know what if i lose my pinky no big deal you know if i lose this part of my body i don't really do you know we have great concern for the body and when christ says here's my body receive it he's saying i want you to be part of my actual body sometimes we don't feel cared for by god we're walking through life and the tragedy and the chaos around us makes us think does god even care yes you're his body you're unified to him by the blood of jesus by the broken body and shed blood you're one with him and it causes us to say god i'm so grateful that you would make me part of your body [Music] holy spirit would you examine my heart this morning and could you see if there's any wicked way in me if there's any unforgiveness or if there's any sin i'm so grateful for the blood you shed jesus and the body that was broken for me i'm so grateful for the cross now god examined my heart and i lay aside any burden or weight or hindrance or snare or sin that has been entangling me and i say thank you for your body and thank you for communion that i would be in union with the body of christ lord we thank you for your blood and your butt your blood and your body this morning we receive it with humility and thankfulness in jesus name and everybody said amen you can receive the elements with me [Music] you split the sea [Music] you rescue [Music] you split [Music] my fears [Music] no longer [Music] i'm no is [Music] of god [Music] is [Music] the only cure for everything [Music] i know this is you are the true [Music] and though this is [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] this is [Music] is [Music] wonderful is [Music] peace [Music] is [Music] peace [Music] your name oh [Music] [Applause] oh [Applause] [Music] [Music] [Music] is [Music] i said [Music] us please [Music] [Music] wonderful [Music] we're going to take a moment this morning just to wait on the presence of the lord as is our custom here at king's church and um the scripture says they they that wait upon the lord will renew their strength they'll mount up with wings as eagles and you know it's our current kind of church culture that we're like they that sing to the lord or they that pray to the lord but part of god's economy his system of knowing him is just simply waiting on his presence and if you just take a moment to close your eyes and bow with your head with me we believe that god wants to talk to us we believe that he didn't stop speaking 2 000 years ago but he sent us his holy spirit comforter counselor guide the paraclete is the greek word which means the coach and a coach talks to you he directs you he encourages you he edits your movements it's not all good news from a coach some of it is bad news for the purpose of good news sometimes he edits our movements sometimes he edits our intentions to direct us towards the heart of the father so god we thank you that you're speaking god we just take this moment this morning to wait on your presence and we say holy spirit will you speak to our hearts right now in jesus precious name [Music] [Music] an everlasting father brings some peace [Music] counselor the government is resting on your shoulders [Music] that word emmanuel literally means god with us and when jesus came as god in the flesh to dwell with man he didn't leave and then leave us abandoned he gave us the holy spirit so we would still have god with us so instead of god being with a specific people wandering the desert behind a curtain in a box or whatever the metric was that when jesus came he gave an invitation for any of us to live actively with god we thank you for your name lord we thank you for emmanuel god with us we thank you that it's your desire to be close to the heart of your people that they're not alone that you didn't leave them orphans or abandon them but your holy spirit has been given to lead us and guide us and we thank you for your spirit in jesus name everybody said amen amen um just while we were worshiping i felt like the lord gave me a word for um you in the denim yes sorry sorry if that makes you uncomfortable um if you don't know that god likes to speak to his kids i hope that you if you take anything away from today that you know the heart of god is for his people and sometimes he tells somebody else something to tell somebody so um i just saw a picture in that last song of like uh honestly it was like i can't remember what the talk there's a what a game show where you like is it option a b c or d and it's like so much is on the line it's like you could win a million dollars and then you're like you picked d and it wasn't d and i saw just like that multiple choice scan thing in front of me i felt like there was just so much immense pressure on you maybe even when you walk with the lord to like have to pick right or it's like they get you're on a tight rope and it's like game over if you choose wrong or if you don't get it right and i just heard the lord say like all my promises are yes and amen like behind every abcd was yes and i just felt like the lord wanted to just reassure your heart this morning like he's with you and it's not a tightrope walk like if somehow that's been built into your mindset with the lord that like one wrong move and it's like it's over but i just felt like the lord like as he relieves those fears from you that you'll walk with more confidence because all of the promises of god are yes and amen and he's cheering you on and with you and not waiting for you to like are you gonna fail and so i just feel like he wanted to encourage you with that so yes be blessed um can i pray for you what's your name rosario god thank you for rosario god thank you that your promises over her god are yes and amen god that your banner over her is love god that you are cheering her on just like a good father would encourage a baby taking steps god that you're not waiting for her to fail or to miss it and god i just ask just that you would um wash off any wrong mindsets or residue of something someone else has told her or fear of missing you fear of uh ruining or the game being over god i just pray that you would instill in her such a trust and a confidence god that you are waiting for her to succeed god that you're waiting for her to discover all that's in your heart for her so god we just speak blessing over our sister this morning in the mighty name of jesus amen we'll go ahead and greet somebody and um say hello to somebody maybe you haven't met before um well good morning king's church before we do anything else if there's a bunch of seats up towards the front if you wouldn't mind if you have seats in your rows scooting in so that the end seats are available or moving up to this lovely second row it's full now okay good um if you do have empty seats in your own you wouldn't mind scooting in that would be wonderful we have need for more people to find a seat do we have any up here do we have any in there how many a couple there's one up front two here there's one here and one up in the front row just raise a hand if you have a seat by you that'll help greg at the back thank you just put up how many with your fingers amazing thank you so much it's a full house well we're not a scary group of people we don't bite well some people might bite but hopefully hopefully not no so fill on in we're so glad you're here this morning if this is your first time here welcome to king's church we are in the two bridges neighborhood it's an official name of this neighborhood and nobody knows it's here but god knows we're here and we're excited to be here meeting together and if you want to know more about king's church you can go to kcnyc.org connect and you can sign up for a group we are launching new groups for the fall next sunday um and they will go for eight weeks until the week of thanksgiving so um stay tuned for that we'll have live sign ups next week and um we also will be hosting a class that we call next steps and we just had it two sundays ago i think we had over 25 people attend but if you want to jump into king's church in a more official way or you just want to know more in depth what we believe who we are what god has called us to do as king church here i encourage you to sign up for that and you can do that at the same link the other really exciting announcement is king's church conference the first one we've ever done november 5th and 6th registrations are live so you can go to kcnyc.org conference and you'll see a big tab at the top and you can register there we're so excited for what god's going to do at conference this year so and it's our first one we've been dreaming of it it's called spirit and truth because we believe you both need the spirit of god and the truth of god to live a life that's effective in the world and rooted and grounded in the kingdom so we're pumped we can't wait we have a bunch of fun people coming out which we will slowly disclose um and then um our family my husband is going to be one of the speakers at an event called march for the martyrs in washington dc on september 25th um and it's really an amazing event to stand with those who have laid down their life for the gospel of jesus christ and to acknowledge those who are facing persecution right now and so be praying for us as we go if you'd like to go you can ask us for more information or you can go to march for the martyrs they have a site and it has all the details it's happening during the day on saturday uh starting at about 3 30. so we're excited to be joining them for that and then if you were a kid between the ages of 6 and 11 tara is at the back tara's waving um if you didn't know we have kids church we have it for babies from the start of worship but for six and up uh after worship so you can head back to tara she'll help you sign in and i think that's our only other announcement thank you dear can we give my wife a hand just for just for wearing a really long t-shirt to church a really long t-shirt dress okay stand with me we stand here for the reading of the word it's a way to honor god's word it's a way for us to say god we value your word it's what we use in our life actually first of all we believe that it's the word of god and second of all we say god we're gonna we're gonna use this map that is your word to direct us through life and not our own ideas and not our own um crazy interpretations but we're actually gonna believe your word what it says amen that's a great idea pastor great idea pastor okay everyone with me first samuel chapter 18 verse 1. we're going to read all the way to verse 9 and then i'll pray all right let's do it and soon as he had finished speaking to saul the soul of jonathan was knit to the soul of david and jonathan loved him as his own soul and saul took him that day and would not let him return to his father's house then jonathan made a covenant with david because he loved him as his own soul and jonathan stripped himself of the robe that was on him and gave it to david and his armor and even his sword and his bow and his belt and david went out and was successful wherever saul sent him so that saul set him over the men of war and this was good in the sight of all the people and also in the sight of saul's servants as they were coming home when david returned from striking down the philistine the women came out of all the cities of israel singing and dancing to meet king saul with tambourines with songs of joy and with musical instruments and the women sang to one another as they celebrated saul has struck down his thousands and david his ten thousands and saul was very angry and this saying displeased him he said they have ascribed to david ten thousands and to me they have ascribed thousands and what more can he have but the kingdom and saul i david from that day on father we thank you for your word and we thank you that um it's pulsing with life even the obscure parts and it's pulsing with the the promises of god that it's vibrating with the way of heaven and god we ask that this morning your seed would be uh your word would be good seed with a genetic packet on it a way of being and living and it would be planted into our heart god and that it would grow up in us god and would produce the fruit of the kingdom of heaven inside of us so everywhere we go everything we do everything we are is is being um trained and guided and growing according to the plan and pattern of heaven that your kingdom would come on earth as it is in heaven in jesus name everybody said amen amen thank you nikki on the keys nikki on the keys nikki on the keys come on nicki on the keys we didn't get a lot of echoing nikki on the keys this morning i'm sad about that pretty disappointed with you guys this morning when i say nikki on the keys you guys say nikki on the keys okay that's how it goes nicki on the keys nicky on the youtube starting again nicki on the keys and this is nikki who is on the keys yes thank you all right hey listen i'm going to mention a couple of things before we jump into the word the first thing is bethany mentioned we're going to i'm going to speak at mark's march for the martyrs in dc next week with sean floyd and i've just been stirred by revelation chapter six now if you know revelation chapter six heaven is opening these great seals and these seals are being released on the earth it's a very obscure piece of prophecy and a a biblical scholar said it best he said revelation is the easiest book to understand in the bible if you understand all the other ones and so you have to have a contextual understanding of what's happening but part of what happens in the book of revelation is that the saints in chapter 6 cry out to god and they've been martyred for two things for declaring the promises of jesus and second thing holding fast to the testimony of jesus so and part one they're actively declaring and part two they're just not denying jesus and there's some of you that are called to declare the testimony of jesus and at a bare minimum there are those of us who are not called to deny us all of us not called to deny the testimony of jesus and they're martyred for holding fast to their faith and we've seen this around the nations we've seen this for the history of christianity we've seen martyrdom happen you may not know that right now in the world there are more christians killed for their faith than at any other time in the history of the world and in revelation chapter 6 the martyrs don't say lord you know what i wish that you would just like like take a wand and like get all those people saved or they actually cry out and say god when will you execute justice on our enemies it's very interesting piece of scripture and jesus responds to them and says when the cup of the blood of your brothers is full when there's a fullness when all of the martyrs are are martyred then i will wrap this thing up and i will execute judgment on your enemies you know we've been listen we've been fed this jesus rainbow's fluffy sheep nonsense message and it's immediately dissipated when you read the actual scripture you can't have this cheap american version of perfect white tooth jesus when you read the actual scripture because listen he's a god of of incredible massive overwhelming mercy to the sinner on the cross the thief who who can do nothing for him but just calls on him he says to him this day you will see me in paradise unbelievable mercy but he's also a god of incredible justice as well he's a god of mercy and a god of justice and the church has for a long time held fast to the things as related to his mercy and forgotten to declare the things as related to his justice and so we have a church that is rife with sin that is corrupting on the inside how do we know that i mean we know that by the fall of pastors sexual sin financial anarchy insanity around the church we also know that by the state of our country you may look at our country be like man i wish they were saved like the reason they're not saved is because of us right the reason that we're not a righteous country is because the church is not righteous it's super easy to be like man pelosi pelosi is the problem that pelosi like i'm not the biggest fan of pelosi's policies to be honest with you you may you may know that if you've ever had a conversation with me but pelosi's policies are not the problem the church is the problem the church not taking jesus seriously is the problem the church not walking in righteousness is the problem the church not seeing their neighbor come to jesus is the problem the church terrified of sharing the testimony of jesus and their life is the problem the church not having a testimony of jesus in their life is the problem you know it says revelation 12 says they overcame by the blood of the lamb and the word of their testimony and their love not their lives even unto death and i just think so many christians i'm like what's i meet with christians regularly as obviously i'm a pastor and um i'm a lawyer pastor so sometimes i meet with non-christians and i help them break the law no i'm just kidding i don't do that and i'm just asking i'll ask somebody like what's god doing in your life and they're like trying to remember what i preach about last sunday what did you say because god is not doing anything for life because god is not doing anything in their life because they're like holding on to the scraps of faith you know i listened to i read a study this week it said that people that read the bible three or more times a week have a 60 percent reduction in stress depression and despair in their life it was like it was like christians that feel like they're dry and lifeless if they read the bible three or four times a week they have a 68 reduction in feeling like they're dry can you believe that how crazy is that like it actually works what do you know what do you know you know it's like how do we fix the church what do we do like we need a revival spirit it's like actually what if what if we read the bible and prayed more i have this it's crazy revolutionary ideas it's crazy craziness what if we actually read the bible and prayed more what if instead of my prayer only being related to extreme emergency and chaos in my life desperate football hail mary prayers i used to have this game nfl blitz in the early early 2000s late 90s is that right nfl blitz is that what it is nintendo 64. is that what we're talking about are we talking about nintendo 64. anybody come on get your hands up um i would always be throwing hail mary's all the time like i didn't i didn't want to ever run the ball i didn't ever want to you know do the short passes i just wanted to throw the hail mary's and if you got this booster it was like the booster it was like a fireball hail mary right and you guaranteed get your hit and i'd be playing with um people and just you just run hail mary's all the time you always lose do you know that if the football team runs hail mary's all the time they always will lose like you get a hail mary every once in a while it works and it's like yeah this is fantastic if you have a strong running game you don't ever lose christians play their faith like hail mary like god just please get me out of this disaster that i caused like i'm really i really promise if they just did the basics of the running game which is read and read your bible and pray you would win the game if you moved two or three or four yards every day you wouldn't be dealing with all of this chaos because the word of god would be in you and living and psalm chapter 1 says blessed is the man you know who is planted by these streams of living water that yields his fruit and sieve and whose leaf does not wither and whatever he does shall prosper it's about being connected to the word of god ephesians says husbands water your wife with the washing of the water of the word um what are we preaching about today so we're doing march for the martyrs this saturday and i'm pumped about it our buddy sean floyd who preached a couple of months ago with us is going to be there preaching um with me and gia but because i don't want to preach two services next sunday pastor joe kelly from the hamptons it's called hampton's church from hamptons new york is going to be preaching sunday night with us and joe is an awesome pastor he's older guy and he's been pastoring in the hamptons for something like 30 years and he does tons of missions in india he's got all kinds of really cool stuff going on so if you can make it for next sunday night we would love for you to do that and then i want to just mention something else real quick and then we'll jump into a short i have a shortish sermon this morning there's a lot of people here do we know that so we've been looking for a new building pretty aggressively and i'll share that journey with you in the future but we have really really great we had some really great conversations this week with the catholic church and there's two buildings in our neighborhood one is literally at the end of the block right here and the other one is like a block and a half away and we think pretty quickly we're going to transition our sunday morning services to one of those buildings so um please be praying with us uh god is um clapping is okay flapping is fine we're not against clapping we're not anti-clapping here you can clap anytime probably make me preach better um you know god has done just a courageous thing in king's church and um it's drawing courageous people and it's drawing people that um that want to live a life where this the world is subjugated to the kingdom of heaven where their whole life is about pursuing god and his way in his kingdom and in their that means in their practical and regular life and there's something about there's something about this time where god is rewarding the brave and rewarding the courageous and that may be in a thousand different applications but he has been unifying a people a brave people that are really pursuing god with their whole heart and i actually believe that that is the answer to our nation that's the answer to revival in our nation that's answer restoration our nation i'm an intensely political person i'm actually starting a tv show in uh in a few weeks in october 15th it'll be launching where i talk about politics and current events from a christian perspective specifically from the perspective of a pastor if you want to be involved in that please talk to me after service where um i had a vision one day and i don't do visions i just whenever someone says i have a vision i'm like yeah right you had a vision right yeah you imagined it in your head and now you're making it sound like jesus's idea it wasn't his idea it was your idea i don't but so what so what we believe is that the holy spirit can speak to us and we believe that god is spirit so he speaks to us on in the inner man and uh i i met this pastor one time and i was like i don't get the whole vision thing i don't understand it people say they have visions there's a lot of visions in the bible you know peter is up on a house he's got this open vision there's pigs and like like spot other spiders there's crawling things there's all kinds of weird stuff coming down on a blanket they're crawling all over the place and it means that the new coven is available to the gentiles like there's visions and then there's the interpretation of the vision and i just he said listen this is what you need to pray if this is in your heart and you believe that god wants to show you his voice through pictures through your imagination through what we call in the bible visions um just start praying ephesians chapter two or three where it says that paul is praying for the people he says that the eyes of your heart may be opened that you would see the love of god in christ jesus for the saints that you could actually your the eyes of your heart would be open anyway so i started praying this all the time and then i started having these experiences where i would have pictures in my mind that were out of left field and god was using them it was really cool one time there was a husband and wife and they were in the ministry and the wife was demonically tormented like like serious demonic torment in her life she would do crazy things when the husband was preaching she would like stand up i'm not going to make fun of her right now because demonic and she shouldn't make fun of demoniacs i guess um yeah she would be super distracting and i said to my my friend i said listen i think your wife is walking in demonic oppression and we should pray for her and i would love to pray for her so she's not in bondage to this thing for the rest of her life and so he's like yeah i think you're right i've seen this pattern throughout our marriage for the last three or four years so bethany and i met with a couple and we prayed for them and i'm i sit down and i'm i say okay we're gonna pray and ask the holy spirit to just lead us in our prayer and so i say holy spirit we just ask you to come and we're going to pray for our friend and we just ask that you would lead and guide our prayer time and i immediately had a picture in my mind of a red tricycle and i was like oh this is a stupid thing this is a stupid thing i'm seeing and i was saying to the guys you guys feeling anything from the lord you have any sense in your heart are you seeing anything and they're like nope i don't see anything nothing nothing at all and so i'm like well i guess i gotta share that i see this red tricycle i'm gonna sound like a total idiot right and i say hey so this is what i see i see this picture of a red tricycle and the um the wife starts weeping and saying anna do it and the husband says ah so the story is when she was a little girl her sister had a red tricycle and the little sister used to chase around the older sister in the red on the red tricycle and she her whole life wanted to be like her sister well her sister was an atheist that hated her husband that did all this was doing all this horrible thing and the younger sister was my friend's wife had an illegitimate uh essentially idolatry of her older sister which created an opportunity for demonic oppression in her life we prayed for her and she got delivered of demonic oppression she looked different my friend called me like two weeks later and said david my wife is a totally different person she's walking in freedom she's not doing any of these crazy things anymore and so god wants to speak to you and he speaks to you um he speaks to those that pursue his heart and are saying god i i believe you're real you created the world you sent jesus you gave us the holy spirit and you want to lead us and guide us through this life and not just in a silent way but a way that's bounded by your word and that's the christians can get weird that with that they can believe that every like every rock or every leaf or every you know tree the tree is waving that means i'm supposed to move to arizona like weirdo stuff and they're not bounded by the way and word of god um but god wants us to be bound to his heart last week we were talking about this david and jonathan story and we said this word in first samuel 18 1 and david had finished talking with saul and jonathan became one in spirit with david that word means to be knit it actually means to be bound up together one person with another we said it was a familial term we said that the first place we saw it was in genesis chapter 44 where the heart of israel was bound up with the heart of benjamin that there was this knitting together of spirits like even the father and jesus are knit together ecclesiastes 4 11 says this again if two lie down together they will keep warm but how can one keep warm alone verse 12 and though one may be overpowered two can resist moreover a three chord strand is not quickly broken malachi chapter 2 echoes the three-quarter strand has not the lord made them one having a portion of his spirit given to them and why one because he seeks godly offspring so guard yourselves in your spirit and do not break faith with the wife of your youth so ecclesiastes says there's a three chord three-strand chord that's wrapped up together that's not broken and then malachi 2 says the same thing happens when a a husband oh and a wife come together the spirit of god is joined with them so now you have one two and three cords that are joined and wrapped together by the will and desire of god and malachi says in ecclesiastes says those things that are intertwined by the spirit of god should not be broken and we you know obviously we're a church that thinks divorce is a tragedy and we also believe that god if you've gone through that in your life god has redemption and restoration for you like every sin in the in the litany of sins right some are actually more devastating than others we believe that's people have this crazy idea like all sin is the same and that's nonsense it's not biblical it's not you can't point a single scripture to me that says all sins are the same actually in god's economy some sins are far worse and do far far more destruction and if a culture engages in some sins god literally will destroy that whole culture but in christ there's redemption for every sin in christ there's restoration from every sin in christ the worst sins can actually turn into the most incredible places of redemption and restoration and testimony of jesus christ in the lives of the saints you know when you walk through something with god there's a there's a tendency to want to hold it and hide it from people especially leaders or people that you should you're called to repent to and the tragedy is not just that there's sin that that churns on the inside of us but there's a tragedy that god wants to use those areas of weakness once they're taken into the kingdom and restored and redeemed and we're walking in holiness god wants to use those situations as keys for freedom for other people like i don't want to tell anybody that i don't want to share and that's right the enemy doesn't want you to tell anybody about that he doesn't want you to share anything bad you've ever done because he doesn't want any of the redemption of christ to influence other people that are lost and broken because he doesn't want them redeemed either and so in king's church we believe the darkest of sins are all they're all grounds for the absolute redemption conviction of sin and redemption by jesus to walk in freedom and holiness and beauty and feel at peace with god the father through the sacrifice of the son jesus christ not that we continue to walk in sin but that we're freed from sin and that other people don't have to walk in that bondage that did so that much damage on the inside amen so i love this idea we talked about it last week knitting i'm not gonna spend too much time on it but their hearts are knit and joined together and i didn't say this last week but this is really important to the story is their hearts are knit after david's act of courage and bravery right like it wasn't just they were just hanging out he's like hey i like your cut g you know it wasn't it wasn't about how he looked it was about the act of david defeating the giant and then jonathan's saying there's something in this guy and i want to be close to him and i just wonder how many believers are not walking in courage and they feel isolated and alone and can i say acts of courage and acts of bravery bring like-hearted people to join you and i the enemy tells us the opposite it's like you're already alone if you step out and do something brave you're gonna even be more alone and that's not how god's economy works you know elijah when he's running from jezebel who wants to chop his head off and scatter him abroad he's like god you know i'm alone and i'm i'm stuck here there's nobody like me there's nobody standing up and and there are how many thousand prophets in hiding three thousand three or seven seven thank you you're you're the pastor of the church now no they're because like listen you're not alone there are seven thousand like you and when you stand up then you attract those who are like-hearted and that's what happens we're here with david and jonathan and their acts you know their hearts are joined when jonathan sees the act of david and we see that with christ here in john chapter 1 when jesus saw nathanael approaching he said to him here is an israelite in whom there is no deceit and nathanael said how do you know me jesus said i saw you while you were still under the fig tree before your brother philip called you then nathaniel declared rabbi you are the son of god and you are the king of israel and so so so nathanael sees jesus walking in boldness in the spirit of god and he says that's a guy i want to follow i declare you know i see his position in his heart is joined to him judges 7 3 says this now therefore proclaiming the hearing of the people whoever is fearful and trembling may turn back and leave mount gilead so 22 000 people turn back but 10 000 remained i love that because in in the story of gideon they have this little tiny group against this massive army and god keeps whittling the army down right and they have an incredible task before them they have a task of the restoration and redemption of the nation of israel the protection against their impending enemies and doom and chaos that keeps coming in and stealing their goods and leaving them broken and poor and they're walking according to man's way which is we need the most amount we need the most people we need the most stuff and god's like you know what i don't want any scared people i don't want them tell them all to go home tell everyone who's terrified to go home we don't need them and the victory actually ends up being for them this is the crazy thing about the grace of god the victory ends up being for them and for all of their people but in the battle god says i don't want anyone scared with us i don't want a single person that's terrified you know we we um shut down our church last september excuse me last i think it was march or april may maybe i can't remember one of those months of 2020 and everybody was shutting down and i i just thought that's what we were supposed to do and then i met all these pe i met this group of pastors that had opened their churches and they were like oh yeah we don't they're like we're not listening to the government we're not letting the government telling us how to run our churches we're not doing that i was like yeah you guys are my people and then they're like and this is the reason why here's the scripture here's hebrews 10 25 that says you're not allowed to abandon the assembly the congregational gathering of the saints it's in the scripture you can't do it so it doesn't matter what anyone says and then you know all of these other scriptures that are about freedom and liberty and you know freedom is an idea that comes from our system right do you know if you're in north korea if you're under a secular system freedom is not highly valued there believe it or not you know in atheistic regimes whether it was under mao or under uh lenin do you know those regimes don't value freedom do you know why they don't value freedom because they're not god's systems god's system values freedom that's like we have people that live as secular humanists that think oh yeah we just thought freedom was a good idea no christianity declared freedom is a godly virtue that's why we as a nation value freedom it's not because we just thought it was a good idea because the scripture says where the spirit of the lord is there is freedom and so when i see australia locked down beating their own citizens with clubs and spraying them in the eyes with pepper spray because of a disease that has a 99.5 survival rate i say that's evil not because i have a political position because where the spirit of the lord is there's freedom and freedom is a biblical value now you can say well david i mean aren't there scriptures about people getting sick in the old testament and all that kind of jazz yes there are yes there are in leviticus if i can find this here i got lots of notes somewhere in leviticus you can look it up there it is 45 the leprous person who has the disease shall wear torn clothes and let the hair of his head hang loose and she he shall cover his upper lip and cry out i am unclean i am unclean leviticus 13 45 46 and the person with leprosy shall remain unclean as long as he has the disease he is unclean he shall live alone and let his dwelling be outside of the camp what can we derive from that principle we can derive the concept that a government has a duty of the protection of his person of their people and if somebody has an immediately contagious disease this is how contagious leprosy is if i have leprosy on my hand and i rub it on your face you got leprosy baby you now have leprosy face sorry just gave it to you we're not talking about a disease with a 99.5 which is generous survival rate we're talking about you get it your arm falls off it ain't it's not fun and so we can see a really cool scriptural principle that it's actually in a godly society in the purview of the government to say hey bro if you have something incredibly contagious that's going to make people's arms immediately fall off you come over here right we're going to work on you hope you get better you're going to clean yourself that's perfectly appropriate what the scripture doesn't say is if one person has leprosy in israel lock everybody down in their houses and they're not allowed to function or have commerce or relate to each other or leave it doesn't say that because there is a value of freedom of course there's reason of course we're reasonable of course there's protection of course we're not insane of course i'm not like licking people in the mouth with covid of course but in christianity there's a value of freedom and when we stood up last september and said look we value freedom and we value the church of jesus christ being able to stand up we all of a sudden started gathering the brave and their hearts began to be knit to ours it's not because of our political position it's because of a christian position listen truth resonates like your political party may not resonate with me but truth always resonates and there's a beautiful thing in the binding of hearts this is what happens when jonathan's heart is knit to david's heart in first samuel 18 3 it says and then jonathan made a covenant with david and because he loved him as himself jonathan took off the robe he was wearing and gave it to david along with his tunic and his sword and his bow and his belt and there's something about when hearts are knit together and moved it's like it's like i everything that i have of value my my weaponry my the things i'm great at my strategy i'm giving them to you because i see the move of god to are on you and i and i feel like our hearts are being knit together by the spirit of god that's what malachi 2 2 says it says that when this joining happens the spirit of god actually moves together and you can feel that you ever have a connection with somebody a friend and you're like where immediately i felt like we were brothers i felt like we were family i felt like like that's a something that god does there's a sovereign joining that happens and it can even happen with a people with a group of people where we say like this is not just some kind of transient church that god's building but god is building a people that would be joined together in their hearts that would be for each other whose swords would be given one to another whose cloaks would be given to one to another and that's exactly what happens in the book of acts acts chapter four and with great power the apostles continued to give their testimony about the resurrection of the lord jesus and abundant grace was on them all there was no needy ones among them because those who owned lands or houses would sell their property being excuse me and bring the proceeds from the sale and lay them at the apostles feet for the distribution to anyone as he had need there is extravagance that is inherently related with loving jesus now you may be in college you may be a college freshman and and when i was a college freshman i specifically remember somebody saying listen the bible is communist communism is great communism from the bible blah blah blah here's the scripture david no one had need and everyone who owned stuff sold it and brought the proceeds of the sales and gave it to the apostles doesn't that show that we should all be communists and i said show me in that scripture where it's the government that forces people to do what they don't want to do it's actually quite the opposite it's people that are moved with compassion at the move of god that give freely of themselves sacrificially that say god is doing something special and i want to give what i have to it the whole craziness of the insanity of the leftist welfare movement is like i'm going to be super beneficial i'm going to bless ace i'm going to bless ace ace has a green hat right there he's the greatest guitar player at least in this building um i was going to say in new york but i'm like i don't know i don't know about that ace is right there and i'm gonna bless him i'm gonna bless him huge okay here's what i'm gonna do i'm gonna i'm gonna be pointing to ace and then when people are looking at ace i'm gonna kick royce in the face as hard as i can i'm gonna steal his wallet and give ace the money from royce's wallet because i'm so compassionate because i care so much for ace and i love him so much i'm stealing royston's money and giving it to my friend so he plays guitar every sunday morning at our church that's not the kind of binding when david loved jonathan so desperately he just said here's my sword here's my bow here's my jacket here's my tunic here's my belt you know like to hold up the pants because he gave the belt away like here are these intimate elements these things that i wear that i give to you that is love love is not stealing or taking or forcing someone else to give to you and then distribute it as you feel like it that's not love and maybe appropriate in some context i don't know if you know this but in the old testament there is this principle of the year of jubilee where every family in israel gets a piece of property do you know about that it's really cool it's really cool it happens once a generation it doesn't happen every day it doesn't happen every week because that creates a system of cyclical tyranny you're not relying like an adult man pathetically relying on his mom and living in her basement it's not that it's not that shameful act it's actually saying here here's a piece of property now i'm not going to give you anything you better treat this thing faithfully you better grow and develop this thing because this is what you get once a generation so we see these really cool competing methods of love and care in the biblical model that's the correct model that's the model that creates abundance and cares for the broken you know what's what's interesting about jonathan's giving is it's superfluous it's unnecessary he doesn't need to do it you know what's interesting is like david doesn't want a sword in the like he just he was given saul's armor and he's like i don't even want this stuff he didn't kill goliath with a sword and a bow he had his own equipment that was really appropriate and deadly the giving of jonathan the gifts of jonathan were unnecessary there is a church culture that i've long i've been on staff with lots of churches where people's hearts are like you know i'm going to only give when i see a need that's fine cool rock and roll but that's not the kind of giving that we see in the bible that's not the giving out of love that's the giving out of like there's a there's a philosophical concept called egotism or egoism or being egocentric abraham lincoln adhered to it one day he was on a train and he was riding on the train and he saw a pig in the mud outside at the stop so goes the story and he jumps out he's all in his full suit and he takes the pig and gets him out of the mud the pig is like i am a pig i'm going to die in the mud that's what was the idea he takes the pig out of the mud and he had been debating about egoism with this guy on the train and gets back on the train the train's moving and he says to abraham lincoln the guy who's like hey look you can't be an egoist because you just self-sacrificially pulled that pig out and abraham lincoln is like i couldn't live with myself if i just let this pig die so i wasn't doing it for the pig i was doing it for me and it's a very it's a utilitarian kind of very uh um transactional kind of love i'm not doing it out of this desperate love i have in my heart i'm just doing it so i don't feel bad i don't want to feel bad about someone jonathan doesn't give to david because he feels bad he gives to david because he feels great he feels encouraged and brave and ready to battle i love the i love the picture uh jesus is with the woman in matthew 26 i was reading it this week i'm gonna read it with to you right now while jesus was in bethany in the home of simon the leopard a woman came to him with an alabaster jar of very expensive perfume which she poured on his head as he was reclining at the table and when the disciples saw it they were indignant one of the other books says specifically judas who is the greedy one who betrayed jesus for 30 shekels right that he was the one that was frustrated and he said it says and they asked this perfume could have been sold at a high price and the money given to the poor aware of this jesus said to them why are you bothering this woman she has done a beautiful thing to me the poor you will have with you always but me you will not always have verse 12 says and when she poured this perfume on my body she did it for my burial verse 13. truly i tell you wherever the gospel is preached throughout the entire world what she has done will be told in memory of her if you ever wonder why you ever read that story and said jesus a lot of things happened why did you say that whenever the gospels preach around the entire world specifically this story will be declared why is that i think it's because the heart of god is moved by extravagant love and i think it's because jesus act of the cross was extravagant love poured out on you and on me and her act of extravagant love was the preparation for his death and resurrection it was a prophetic symbol it was saying i'm going to pour out all of this incredibly valuable thing it's disproportionate it's superfluous it's too much it's not necessary because i love you so much and jesus does the same exact thing for us that's why the jonathan david story is incredible because jonathan is the son of the king and he sees the potential he sees the bravery he sees the courage in david and he says i'm giving extravagantly to you to empower you to strengthen you and i think that's exactly what jesus does to us jesus is the son of the king he's the son of god and you know the scripture says like jonathan gave david his robe and his tunic the scripture says to clothe yourself in christ to put away the things of the world to put on the extravagant nature of the love of god [Music] i'm i'm grateful for a god that would love me so much that he would knit his heart with mine that he would bring me the holy spirit that the scripture says that the spirit of jesus lives inside of us when we call upon him as lord that there's a there's about there's a binding it's familial like first samuel 18 like genesis 44 where we get brought into the very family of god [Music] and that we receive the extravagant unexpected superfluous love of god as his sons and his daughters amen i want you to stand with me this morning god we thank you for your love god we thank you that you are an extravagant giver god that you gave your son jesus that he gave his life to us that he was poured out as a drink offering that we would be changed and restored and renewed that we would walk in newness of life that we would turn away from the old and the dead and the broken ways of this world and we would turn towards your goodness and your love god remind your people this morning of the generosity of your heart of the binding of your goodness and of your great love in jesus name amen [Music] is [Music] [Music] say [Music] is [Music] is [Music] oh [Music] oh [Music] my fears [Music] [Music] my fears [Music] is [Music] is [Music] me [Music] you split the sea so i could walk right through my fears [Music] see [Music] going to take a moment to receive tithes and offerings this morning you know the funny thing about that david and um jonathan's story is is jonathan is is um influenced by love he is he is um compelled by this great love and saul does the opposite he's compelled by fear and so he looks at his life and he says literally this what can david take except the rest of the kingdom from me people that live in fear life are in scarcity mode and everything can possibly be taken at any moment but people that are compelled by love live in an abundant life and everything they have can be poured out as god leads them amen there are a couple of ways to give a king church you can text kcnyc to the number 77977 or there's a box out there in the all in the foyer so let's pray god we thank you for the opportunity to give to you out of our great love this morning that we're grateful for your abundance and your superfluity and we asked god that we would be just like you in our finances and in our world god we would be great with taking off a jacket and giving it to someone lord god to with walking in generosity lord make us like jesus amen [Music] come on sing it you split the seats [Music] dancing see [Music] is [Music] thank you jesus hey church listen we're gonna have um a couple of people over here in the window bay if you need prayer if you need encouragement if you're going through something tough and you just need somebody to join you in prayer if you need healing in your body we believe that god actually heals we believe he's actually real he actually does stuff like that we love to pray for you and if you don't know jesus we love to pray for you if you say i want to know a god that loves people that amazingly could he actually love me that much yes through christ jesus he does and so we're going to pray for you if not be blessed go in the grace and peace of a good god who loves you and gave his son for your church pray for us as we're looking at these buildings this week and um if you're around we'll see you at the six o'clock service for those of you who are coming out that's it anything else johannes this is a brown shirt day anybody else have a brown shirt on skyler that's kind of brownish yes yes brown shirt yes be blessed you have a comment no it's just fall fall that's right we're ushering in the cold weather thank you guys thank you hey be blessed we love you we'll see you next week you cover the mountains the valleys of your below wings

Channel: Kings Church NYC

Views: 144

Rating: 4.6363635 out of 5

Keywords:

Id: UMt6k4vMAT8

Length: 94min 5sec (5645 seconds)

Published: Sun Sep 19 2021