Let's Grow! Part 21 - Pastors Sean and Erica R. Moore

[Music] you know that's a growth point it's a growth point [Music] when we get to a place where we understand and know in our hearts that god is enough that godliness with contentment is great gain where everything else in life is just an extra it's a it's a plus it's an addition it's a blessing but it's not our life i mean y'all have found your life in god and that's enough that's enough and that's that's what jesus was saying to us in matthew 6 when he said listen you know all of these other things are the things that the gentiles seek after what you're going to eat what you're going to drink what you're going to put on he said man your heavenly father already knows that you need these things but seek first the kingdom of god and his righteousness and all this other stuff will just be added onto you and i found that once i got the source everything else i needed it just got added when it was necessary man and that's a that's a that's a great joy that i have on the inside that i really don't need anything else in life other than god everything else is just the plus that comes from serving them amen man i think they do a great job delivering that that was just awesome that's left bless my little girl [Music] i want to say uh hello we only got one more minute before it's noon time so uh in a minute good afternoon to everyone here in the sanctuary glad to have you out with us here at fcc i also want to say welcome to those of you that are tuned in online glad to have you with us today welcome back to another faith christian center sunday experience amen as you can see i got the misses up here with me again [Applause] [Music] yeah [Applause] we've been together we we've been together including our dating life we've been together for 20 years you guys we have literally grown up together and there's nobody else in this world that i would rather do life together with and uh you are good on the eyes but you're also good on the soul and i appreciate you i love you in the bottom of my heart my girl all right let's pray and let's get into this father we thank you so much for this opportunity to come boldly to your throne that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need and god as we come we come in faith we trust and we believe that your grace your mercy has been made available for us uh we can't say enough god how grateful we are for your word your word settles all questions it resolves all doubts it tells us what to believe and what not to believe as we look through the scriptures today we ask that you would open up the eyes of our heart flood them with light help us to better understand jesus and his will and plan for our lives as a result of it we pray that you'll make us like a fly on the wall let us speak today with specifics and details that transcend our human comprehension but speak specifically into the hearts and the lives of those that are here and those that are watching today we thank you in advance for every life that's going to be impacted and changed by the time we spend together in your presence in jesus mighty name and everybody in agreement with the spirit they said [Music] amen you can be seated all right well listen we have been in a series uh look back on the calendar to see how long it's been it's been 13 weeks so today this is going to conclude the let's grow series this is actually part 21 today praise god and so you know i can tell you i i hope that you have got something out of this series i hope that this your notes that you've taken and the messages that you've listened to you're not just going to store them away and not pick them up again for a few years but hopefully you'll go back and review uh what was shared review some of the things that you receive so that it gets down on the inside of you and you end up producing 30 60 and 100 times as much so in this series on spiritual growth we've been talking about the you know what spiritual growth is how to grow in christ and what spiritual growth is is simply the process of you and i becoming more and more like christ so the reason why we read our bibles the reason why we go to church the reason why we walk in love the reason why we love our neighbors like we love ourselves we do all of these things because we're in the process of becoming more and more like christ we begin this process of spiritual growth when we receive jesus christ as our personal lord and savior when we say god come into my heart come into my life we become a babe in christ in that moment but just because you started there is that's not where you're supposed to stay you're supposed to go from a baby in christ to a fully mature fully committed fully devoted believer and follower of of jesus somebody say amen to that all right so spiritual growth is supposed to lead to spiritual maturity so no matter how long you've been living for god whether it's one year five years seven years 10 years 13 years 35 years all of us should still be growing in our relationship with the lord we talked about how spiritual growth it is a choice it is a discipline it is a process and it requires intentionality so uh one of the reasons why we're up here together is because a few weeks ago if you weren't in church last week would you raise your hand let us know who you're all right so we're going to start over here on this side one by one begin to tell us where you were and why you weren't here live all right so uh just for the sake of those you all that may well maybe weren't here a few weeks ago we we did a panel based on uh questions that had been submitted to the ministry and and uh also we took some live questions we had so many questions come in it's taken us these last three weeks just to be able to answer all of the questions so we're going to continue along those lines uh on today uh like i said some of them we talked about during the first service and so uh these last uh few weeks all three all these last three weeks uh both services after nine and eleven they've all been different so if you only attend the eleven we encourage you to go back and listen to the nine because we answered different questions in those services and it might have been one of the questions that you submitted so let's get into the questions that we have for today first question how do you still honor your parents if they do not believe in god all right how do you still honor your parents if they don't believe in god well you just tell them that they're going to hell and then after you tell them that i'm just kidding i'm just joking just making sure you awake just making sure you're awake today [Applause] don't do that all right so one of the things that we say here at fcc is that we don't honor people because they deserve it we honor people because we're honorable and i'm you know some people are going to get the best of who you are not because they deserve it they're going to get the best of who you are because you love god with all of your heart and oftentimes when we honor people honor is oftentimes connected to something else so in other words we honor someone because we love them we honor somebody because we're grateful for what they've done for us we honor someone because we respect them well when it comes to our parents we honor our parents because they brought us into this world we honor our parents because they gave us life we honor our parents because they gave us a chance we honor our parents because they gave us their best all right so if you find your why where honor is concerned then you will also discover how to actually go about honoring them now what i would encourage you to do is don't make your relationship with your parents solely about their lack of faith continue to be a witness to your parents let god use you in a way that makes you proud of them and then look for common denominators that help you connect with them and build relationship with them so let's say for example all right you can see you don't agree maybe where your faith is concerned but maybe you both have a love for sports maybe you both have uh like you know doing fun things maybe you both love the great outdoors maybe you both love talking about money and financial matters what i encourage you to do is find common denominators that will help you connect and build relationship with them until they come into the knowledge of the truth lastly pray for them and ask god to show you how he sees your parents so you can look beyond the fact that they don't believe and begin to see them with the heart of god and then ask god to give you creative ways to demonstrate honor to them that's also good i would also add to depending on your ethnicity what part of the world you're raised in what your culture is like certain people think honor means obey right and so like listen to me and i need to be the top influencer in your life well as someone becomes an adult the influence that parents have is not the same right and especially if the person is not leaning toward the holy spirit and they're not giving you advice along the scriptures you no longer are responsible to obey what they're telling you to do if it is not scriptural you can still honor them without yielding your life and your decision making to their wisdom you can still do that in a respectful way that's really good because i mean in the same way that the devil can use kids the devil can also use parents and this is why jesus made the statement you remember when uh they uh he was up preaching one time and when he was up ministering they said jesus hey your mother and your brothers they they searching for you jesus was like who is my mother and my brother and he made the statement is whoever does the will of god the same as my mother and my sister and my brother and so you'll find that sometimes your closest family won't be your blood relatives sometimes your closest family members will be people that you're in relationship with in christ amen next question it says i've heard my whole life that spiritual growth is connected to surrendering to god but i've never heard practically what does surrendering look like how do you give something to god and if you believe in god and have a healthy relationship with him does your sexuality or sexual orientation determine your spiritual growth so it seems like these are two separate questions but to us they're related and this is why surrender simply means obedience it just simply means you are looking at your own opinions your own wishes your own desires and you say god here they are and i'm going to lay them at your feet and if they don't match your plan for my life i will exchange them for your plan we go to the scripture and we say what does god say about this or that and man i don't necessarily agree but i trust that he's smarter than i am i trust that he has my best interest at heart and so i'm going to surrender my will like jesus did when he went to the cross he said not my will but thine be done and i'm going to submit myself and obey what you're telling me to do or not do in the scripture jesus put it this way if you love me you'll obey my commandments so to god love is communicated through obedience so when we say we love god but then we don't align our lives with the way he's instructed us to live that is a contradictory statement so sexuality is an issue of submission as well do i exalt my opinions on what sexuality is over what he said sexuality is or do i find out what he said about sexuality and make my opinions my emotions my body my hormones my biological clock my marital status and everything else submit to what he has said and in life in christian life period that's what it's all about we can say okay god this is what i think this is what i feel this is my plan this is what i want to do and i'm going to find those scriptures that support that i'm going to find that church that might support that i'm going to find that youtuber that might support that and then i'll align my life with them the bible describes it as having itching ears keeping teachers to yourself that supports the error in your own heart or we can say god i see that you're saying this and that about sex i see you're saying this and that about money i say see you're saying this and that about friendship about whatever it is and i'm going to surrender how i feel how i think how i was raised what society is saying normal to that instead and we all have to decide what kind of christian are we going to be yeah are we going to be the kind of christian that lives the way we want and slaps the jesus sticker on top or are we going to be the kind of christian that says what does jesus actually endorse and become that [Applause] now if you do a little bit of research on gender and sexuality you're gonna find several things number one you're gonna find people don't agree um there are some people who say that there are 33 genders there are people who say there are as many as 112 genders scientifically you will see that some people say well there are four genders there is masculine feminine neuter and common some people will say there are three female male hermaphrodite and some people will say scientifically it's just male and female and so again we have to say well what does god say about this so we're going to read just a few scriptures and just a little shameless plug about next month my husband and i are going to do a series on sex because we're brave in the name of jesus [Applause] and so if you want to hear more about this topic you need to come for the month of october this is actually november it's november my bad i was so excited i just wanted to move it up a few weeks i'm glad you're excited about talking about sex [Music] if you want to see me blush and you want to see him embarrass me tune in in november okay so james he's been praying the spirit secretly for this for years okay james chapter 1 verse 8 in the new living translation it describes people and it says their loyalty is divided between god and the world they are unstable in everything they do genesis 1 27 new living translation so god created human beings in his own image in the image of god he created them male and female he created them first corinthians 6 verses 13 through 20 new living translation you say food was made for the stomach and stomach for the food this is true though someday god will do away with both of them but you can't say that our bodies were made for sexual immorality they were made for the lord and the lord cares about our bodies and god will raise us from the dead by his power just as he raised our lord from the dead don't you realize that your bodies are actually parts of christ should a man take his body which is part of christ and join it to a prostitute and don't you realize that if a man joins himself to a prostitute he becomes one body with her for the scripture says the two are united into one but the person who is joined to the lord is one spirit with him run or flee from sexual sin no other sin so clearly affects the body as this one does four sexual immorality is the sin against your own body don't you realize that your body is the temple of the holy spirit who lives in you and was given to you by god you do not belong to yourself i'm going to say that again you do not belong to yourself for god bought you with a high price so you must honor god with your body amen great job explaining what surrender is uh when we surrender to someone or we surrender to something it means that we stop resisting and then we submit or come under that individual's authority so when we surrender to god we stop resisting what god said or what he's asking us to do and we recognize him as authority in our lives we see this played out throughout the gospels you'll find that at times when jesus was addressing and talking about certain certain matters certain issues that oftentimes what people called jesus before they listened to what he had to say determined where they were at in relationship with him so you'll find that there were times when people showed up and they called him lord adonai supreme in authority and there were other times they showed up and they called him rabbi teacher in other words i have not come under your authority but i do acknowledge that you're a good teacher and when we surrender to god as lord what he said becomes final authority in our lives so he said pastor so how do you give something to god well the first thing that you need to do is you need to find out what god said about what you have in your possession once you know what he said and what he expects then it's your turn to prove whether or not he is just savior or whether or not he's savior and lord whether he's just good teacher along with all the other teachers i have in my life or whether he's lord over all the other teachers that i might be listening to to give god my heart means to fulfill the first and second commandment i love god with all my heart all my soul all my mind all my strength and i love my my neighbor like i love myself there's a reason why the first commandments the first commandment and the second commandment is the second commandment the moment you start trying to love people before you love god that's how you end up with secular humanism because we begin to deify humanity's place in god's creation when in reality humanity was made to be submitted up under divinity to give god my body means i give you the right to determine what i do with my body and what i do in my body when i gave my heart to christ and i started you know finding out that uh you know everything the scripture has to say about fornication i started looking up all them fornication scriptures and by the time i got done it was like all right it's pretty clear what i need to do and then it was like god told me no touch no kiss no premarital bliss this temple can't be touched because god's blessing in this world i never forget when the lord told me he said you know i don't want you to kiss a woman or grab her in one of her hot areas until you walk down the aisle i never forget i was in my mother's house getting ready to get in the shower when the lord told me so watch this when i surrender because i surrendered i didn't resist what the holy spirit was telling me and in that moment my body came up under his authority and now he have the right from here on out to determine what i do with my body and what i do in my body now someone said so if you believe in god and you have a healthy relationship with him does your sexuality or sexual orientation determine your spiritual growth now there are certain sovereign decisions that god did not consult any of us on by divine design i am a male by divine design i'm black pastor you ain't black you you ain't black man you two life scared me blood i'm [Applause] so by divine design i'm a male by divine design i'm black by divine design i was born in the more family by divine design i was born in 1997. god did not consult me on any of those decisions sweetheart you were not born in 1997. what did i say i said 1996. 1997. oh my bad see this is what happens when you start trying to redefine stuff [Applause] i was born in 1977 that's what i meant 77. [Applause] [Music] wow the lord is using you pastor said they've been together for 20 years they've been together since he was two years old he did a quick work all right so god left us out of these sovereign decisions that he made for us all right so when we look at isaiah 45 verses 9 through 12 listen at what's said here what sorrow awaits those who argue with their creator does a clay pot argue with its maker does the clay dispute with the one who shapes it saying stop you're doing it wrong does that pot exclaim how clumsy you can be how terrible it would be if a newborn baby said to its father why was i born or if it said to its mother why did you make me this way this is what the lord says the holy one of israel and your creator do you question what i do for my children now watch this the question was i have a a healthy relationship with the lord now here the lord says are you questioning the decision as your parent that i've made about you as my child do you have something yeah now this is real i want to empathize i know that feeling like you are in the wrong body is a real thing it is called gender dysphoria i personally experienced this as a kid and i grew up in a family that i knew better than to say that out loud because i knew that they weren't wouldn't handle that very well okay but i remember very um vividly arguing with god particularly when i was alone at night in my bed before going to bed i would always say why did you make me a girl if you loved me you would have put me in a boy's body you made a mistake i do not want to be in this body you can do anything and i would literally pray that god would turn me into a boy i would pray turn me into a boy and in the morning i would wake up and i would check to see if i had male parts and when i didn't have male parts i would cry and i would yell at him and i would say you don't love me why did you do this now at the same time i was reading the bible every day see getting the bible in your heart is so good because the word is powerful and it starts to divide between the bible talks about dividing asunder between the soul and the spirit helping us to understand what's us what's him and what's the devil basically and so i was still getting the word every day on my own just reading it by myself we did at that time i don't think we were in a word church so no one was really talking about that and my family definitely was not talking about sexuality or anything with sex whatsoever so i wasn't getting it there but i was getting in the word every day and i was developing a hunger for god and a relationship with him and there came a day that i probably bumped into something like this and i said to god okay i love you i trust you and i believe you're smarter than me and i do believe that you don't make mistakes so therefore if you put me in this body you made me black you put me in this family made me a girl i'm gonna trust that you knew what you were doing and that i will have the best life in this body and i'm not gonna argue with you anymore and i remember saying that i'm not going to fight with you anymore and i will kid you not within that day i no longer felt that way the thought of wanting to be a boy not wanting to be a girl looking at all the atrocities in the world and saying god what's up with women and why'd you make me a woman all that ended immediately and all it took was for me to say god i trust you and if this is the body you put me in okay i'll accept it and if you're dealing with that someone online if you're dealing with that go to god with that and be real he is big enough to handle your honesty he is not going to be upset with you if you tell him hey i think you made a mistake he can own that he can listen to you and he will help you process through those emotions amen that's good let's let's finish reading here in verse 11 it says do you give me orders about the work of my hands i am the one who made the earth and created people to live on it with my hands i stretched out the heavens all the stars are at my command we've got to remember that like when a person that says i am a christian what john 15 tells us is that we didn't choose god but god chose us it also tells us in first corinthians that god set us in the body in a way that pleases him now nowadays what we have to be so careful with is that we are constantly being told things that do not align with what the scripture says you know a lot of believers you know sadly to say have a very secular view when it comes to certain social issues and so in the world we're constantly being told do what's best for you versus in scripture jesus's prayer was not my will but your will be done in the world we're being told pursue the things that make you happy and the world exalts pleasure over purpose in the kingdom the kingdom exalts purpose over pleasure in the world we're constantly being told you've got to look out for yourself in the bible we're told if anyone desires to be my disciple let them deny themselves disregard themselves lose sight of themselves in their own interests and take up their cross and follow after me in the world we're told if you don't like the way you're born change it and then in the bible we are told how can we question the way in which our maker has made us so you see god told us in genesis and then jesus followed up with it again in matthew 19 how he created man male and female now we talked about this several weeks ago you got to remember when jesus came here to the earth and he spoke on certain things he did not just speak as a religious leader because it's historical proof that jesus christ walked on the face of the earth that means that what he said he also spoke as a historical figure so it was a statement of truth in matthew 19 that when jesus put on a body he could have said anything but he made it very clear in matthew 19 that when god created man in the beginning he made them male and female now the decisions that we make on this side of heaven will determine how we are judged on the other side of heaven sexual orientation gender identity the institution of marriage these were all sovereign decisions that divinity made for humanity now i kind of want to use this as an example i remember when i got saved when i gave my heart to christ i'll never forget one of my friends asking me when he when i told him i wasn't gonna have sex anymore until i was married his exact words were you don't love women anymore and my response was it's not that i don't love women i love god more than i love women and i i just realized that listen i love women but i am not going to hell for anybody there there is no i'm trying to say this in a nice way to keep it clean all right i'll keep it pg there is not a woman on this face of the earth that is fine enough for me to go to hell for and watch this folks in revelation the bible tells us the sexually immoral will be cast into the lake of fire what always jacks me up is i mean especially when i was single i was like i would hate to be in the bed with somebody at the time that the rapture happens [Applause] and get left behind i would get up like no i don't like you made me miss the rapture and so so i'm i'm saying all of that because my attitude as a single person was listen to me if i never get married i'm gonna stay holy as a single cause i'm not going to hell just because i love sex i'm not doing it and so the thing about it is that people are placing so much emphasis on something that god has already made clear where he stands at it on this side of heaven and watch this when we get to the other side it's not even going to matter anymore look at matthew chapter 22. matthew chapter 22 beginning at verse 24 same teacher now remember now when you call them teacher that means all right we're going to listen to what you have to say but we're not we're not looking to submit our lives up under your authority moses said if a man dies leaving no children his brother shall marry the widow and raise up a family for his brother now there were seven brothers among us the first married and died having no children left his wife to his brother the second also doubt died childless and the third down to the seventh last of all the woman died also now in the resurrection to which of the seven will she be the wife for they all had her jesus replied you are wrong because you don't you you know neither the scriptures nor god's power for in the resurrected state neither do men marry nor are women given in marriage but they are like the angels of heaven so watch this people that are fighting for this here on the earth when god is already established where he stands could lose it all when they get ready to cross over to the other side and watch this had they just made a decision to honor god in this life once you cross over to the other side your sexuality isn't even going to matter because in heaven we're not married nor are we given in marriage anymore so what happens is we have to submit our desires of under christ's authority if i was someone and i was struggling in this area then my my mentality would be all right because i love god i'm clear on what the scripture says concerning this subject then that means i am [Music] that means if i have to be a eunuch until i until i go to the other side because i don't i don't know that i can completely kill these desires then in an effort to honor god what i will do is i will just commit myself as a single person i'll fight the good fight of faith i'll ask god to give me new desires because he can do that here's the other side is that the desires you have are we talking desires of the flesh or are we talking desires of the spirit every desire you have isn't a spiritual desire and the sin nature resides in our bodies that's why when we die you won't even be identified as male or female i'm not trying to get super deep but the bible tells us in galatians in christ there is neither male nor female jew nor greek bond nor free we're all one in christ jesus that's how in heaven as men christ can be called our husband on earth to be like hold on i don't know about that i'm struggling no no no kind of struggling with that one but it makes sense when you get over to the other side and there is no male female we're like the angels of god folks just in a love relationship with christ almighty that's so good all right next question how do you grow with the holy spirit eventually speaking in tongues how can i grow my understanding about speaking in tongues and interpretation of tongues and what does prayer look like throughout your day how do you stay in conversation with the lord continually all right let me ask a question how many of you are are filled with the spirit of the bible evidence of praying in the tongues raise your hand all right now keep your hand up just for a second now i'm gonna tell you if i was a christian and i hadn't received my prayer language yet i would look around the room be like hold on one second you mean to tell me there's a gift out here that other people have that i don't have i'm about to i'm about to get my gift sir so after receiving jesus and getting saved and born again there is another gift available to you as a new christian and that is the baptism of the holy spirit with the bible evidence of praying in other tongues now the baptism of the holy spirit does not have anything to do with you getting into heaven receiving jesus christ acknowledging his lordship and what he did and dying on the cross at calvary is what will get you into heaven the baptism of the holy spirit empowers you for service the baptism of the holy spirit will take your prayer life to a hnl a whole another level the baptism of the holy spirit will also give you greater revelation of the scriptures and the will of god for your life now the the baptism of the holy spirit the bible tells us is a gift it comes from the greek word charisma the word gift what it means is a free gift it is a gift of grace uh it is a favor which one receives without any merit of its own so it's not so much that you grow to a place that you you kind of earn your prayer language or you you grow to a place where now it's like now i understand it well enough and i can receive it children receive the baptism of the holy spirit and they get it with just an open heart you know several of our kids have been we've ministered the baptism of the holy spirit and they've received as a young child without necessarily you know 14 steps on the reason why you ought to be filled with the holy ghost they just saw it in their parents and said okay well yeah i want to be filled with the spirit too and they received as a young child and you got to remember that in the kingdom you don't have to be a genius to receive spiritual things you just have to be humble and open all you need to receive these gifts is number one you've got to be saved because jesus is god's gift to the world the holy spirit is god's gift to his church secondly you got to have faith to believe that the promise of the holy spirit is available to anyone who is ready to receive them all right so when it comes to interpretation of tongues first corinthians 14 and 13 says wherefore let him that speaks in an unknown tongue pray that he may interpret so if a person is interested in the interpretation of tongues god just told us in this passage it's available you just need to pray and ask god to give you an interpretation of what you're praying so ask god lord i ask for an interpretation of what i'm praying it may not come to you in that given moment it may not come until later on the interpretation of tongues works very similarly to the gift of prophecy if you've ever prophesied over somebody before or received the prophecy yourself oftentimes it never all comes at one time it you'll get a word you'll get a phrase you'll get a sentence and as you step out and share what you receive then that's when all the rest starts coming the interpretation of tongues works the exact same way oftentimes you may feel something bubbling up on the inside of your belly you share you or you you speak out what it is that you get and as you speak it out the more begins to roll out now i taught a series uh several years ago called take the limits off god i'm gonna tell you where to go and get it it's free six parts you go on our website click the get connected tab at the top click next steps and you're gonna see the series pop up on the screen take the limits off god in that series i go over everything from what are all the arguments as to why people say you know you shouldn't be filled nowadays did holy spirit go out with the apostles those that believe in cessationism so i go through all of the tough questions because i believe in this gift because it has added so much value to my life that it has put my nose in that book to answer all the tough questions to get these hindrances out of the way so that people can receive all that god has for them the last part of the question what does prayer look like throughout your day how do you stay in conversation with the lord continually well what i would say about that is i have a relationship with god and so i engage god in normal conversation just like i'm engaging you know another human being i ask god questions throughout the day knowing that sometimes he's not going to answer me immediately because if i'm if i'm if i'm listening in that moment my mind might get involved and so god will wait for a time when spontaneity has a little bit more freedom in my heart but i asked by faith he he said if i lack wisdom let him let us ask by faith so i ask a question by faith believing that even if you don't answer me now because you're a good god you're going to answer me eventually later on amen and then i'll just uh you know pray in tongues throughout the day you know put worship music on that keeps me you know mindful of the presence of god listen to sermons because sometimes especially you know other than myself you know i listen to other sermons because they provoke thought sometimes the reason why people can't get out of where they are is because they're they're they've got the same recycled pattern of thoughts going back and forth in their mind over and over again so i'll listen to some sermons down and get me thinking a little bit differently just so that uh i can uh you know hear what it is that god may be saying to me in that given moment amen that's all so good as he was talking i sensed that some of you want to be filled with the holy spirit right now you're not filled but holy spirit's available so let's just ask together and expect you to pray in spirit right now so father in the name of jesus we come into agreement with our brothers and sisters those who want to be filled with the holy spirit those who want to pray in tongues those who want to grow in this gift so god we come into agreement that we join our faith with theirs that you don't say no to good gifts you give good gifts to your children and holy spirit is the best gift so is salvation thank you so much for salvation thank you so much for holy spirit holy spirit come and fill your people and give them a heavenly language that they didn't learn thank you in jesus name i want you all to pray by faith in the spirit thank you father thank you so much for the gift of holy spirit thank you so much for filling our brothers and our sisters with the gift and the ability to speak in tongues amen amen amen did any of you pray in tongues for the first time lift your hand so we can celebrate with you did anyone pray in tongues praise god amen if you prayed in tongues for the first time online go ahead and say that to me i prayed in tongues for the first time congratulations now if you did not hear yourself speak you're like me i was in a meeting like this everyone was getting filled with the holy spirit i saw my mom speaking saw my stepfather speaking tears are coming down their face i felt the presence of god i did not hear myself speak took me about two months because i was in my head what's it gonna sound like how come i don't sound like them took me two weeks to get up two months actually to get out of my head and finally when i was probably very relaxed and in the shower i prayed in tongues every single day i asked the lord hey i know you've given me the gift of holy spirit i trust that you know he's here holy spirit you can pray for me through me today and nothing i did that for two months and finally i spoke so if you feel like what's wrong with me there's nothing wrong with you you might just be very analytical and in your head and the enemy might try to talk you out don't listen to him he's a liar god loves you you've done nothing wrong holy spirit loves you jesus is your lord and you can pray in tongues yeah amen and listen uh we're we're uh we're here for you so you know if you are interested in being filled and you need someone to minister to you just let us know and i i love getting people filled with the holy spirit my favorite thing is is when i'm i'm praying i remember i remember joseph i remember when joseph got filled with the spirit we i was leading him in the prayer i ain't even finished the prayer he was already my colleague and that's what happens is people get so hungry and they want it so bad that man you don't even have to wait on it it just it just all of a sudden it gets released and so uh you know if you need if you want to be ministered to at the end of the service you can come on down front one of our ministers would be happy to minister to you in this area let's try to get through a few more questions then we're going to close there's a few more we're going to try to finish this few more is that okay oh that's 10 of you what about the rest of you is that all right amen this question says let me say this real quick and listen to me don't be the kind of christian that shuts down when you hear things that you either don't believe currently or have heard contrary teaching in the past this this shuts believers down from so much stuff the reason why we teach you the word at faith christian center is so that you can discern when something is biblical and when it's not we give you enough verses here at fcc to know that we ain't trying to pull the wool over your eyes amen and lead you lead you as sheep going astray to the slaughter ain't not trying to do that amen amen what if i have a hard time reading the bible what if i feel like every time i attempt to read the bible i literally fall asleep anybody can anybody be a witness to that hallelujah you are not alone hands all over the building that's never happened to me that's an uh we have an altar for liars sir i'm just joking the same way i said i was born in 1997 is the same way that what i just said was not true this person says in addition i'm not really a reader i don't read books regularly at all all are alternative methods of meditating on scripture just as effective as actually picking up a physical bible and reading it i've heard people say that listening to the bible on cd while driving or working out etc is not good enough is that true so i'm gonna start there i get sleepy every time i read the bible and i've been saved that was probably two okay so you're talking 40 years because i'm 42. okay it does not mean um that you're spiritually mature it just means that you live in a physical body and you might just get tired when you sit so there's certain things you can do you can walk and read the bible i've done that my husband used to stand up in the tub with water uh-huh you gotta do what you gotta do you gotta do what you gotta do right i mean the same way you would discipline your body if you're on a diet you don't buy twinkies and you don't buy oreos you don't have them in your pantry so you can't eat it because it's not there set yourself up for success right go to bed early so you know you can wake up and be energized don't go to bed at 3 a.m come on i'm going to pray at 5 00 a.m or read my bible you're not you're gonna be sleepy okay so you want to set yourself up for success okay stan and yes the word hearing is what increases faith right the bible says faith comes by hearing and hearing by the word of god it doesn't say how you hear you can my family will tell you i pretty much live with my headphones on all day long in my in my house i do the laundry i have the audio bible playing i have worship playing i have someone praying in tongues literally and i pray right along with them i am constantly trying to saturate my heart my spirit and my body with god's presence to constantly be aware so there's nothing wrong with that but i love what minister angela has says a lot there's a difference between quantity with god and quality with god so we want quality time you want to just like any relationship you really want to develop you have to set aside time in your schedule to be one-on-one with that person so you should have some time where okay this is just me and god the door is closed people aren't going to be interrupting me i'm not checking my phone you know and it's just me and him so have your quality time but quantity is important too because sometimes we get our quality time and it's like okay god i'll see you tomorrow we left our prayer time we left our word time we don't talk to god at all literally until 24 hours later and so we want to cultivate both it's not either or it is both all right so i listen to the bible while i'm driving i pray while i'm driving while i'm ironing i'm listening to the things of god all right we're gonna do one more question then we'll close uh let's let's do this one right here what does the bible christianity say about our sisters and brothers who are of other religions like jew muslim amish amish mormon etc often reference matthew 7 1 that says judge not for help and insight all right so uh what i would say about this one is the bible tells us in first timothy it talks about that we need to pay attention to seducing spirits and doctrines of devils and there is a doctrine of devils that is out here as it relates to what love is and what judgment is and it's really all designed to muzzle the church and make love such a great area that nobody can speak to what it really is all about today in the world and that is letting me have my own way and let me do what i want to do and don't say something bad about it right and so this really has nothing to do with judgment at all but the world will paint the picture people just know those two words judging out they don't know nothing else that the lord says about judgment i would encourage you go do a study on judgment the bible tells us for example in first corinthians that if you judge yourself you won't be judged one of the reasons why people deal with judgment is because they don't judge themselves jesus didn't never said that you could never judge anything and there's so many verses in the old testament the new testament on judgment alone and in order to have a healthy perspective you got to find out what it is no difference in love you know love today just means let me do whatever i want to do and that's just not the way the bible defines love and we have a doctrine of devils out here when it comes to what love is and what happens is that if unbelievers know our bibles better than we know them then they will reference verses the way that the devil did when jesus was tempted in the wilderness and if we're not able to rightfully divide the word then we'll say yeah the scripture does say judge not and not know the rest of the counsel of god on that particular subject that's so good i also want to highlight what this person said in terms of um what does the bible or christianity say about our sisters and brothers who are other religions like like and then they go on to list well the first thing that highlighted for me is if someone has not confessed jesus christ as lord and savior like i have then we're not in the same family they're not my brother they're not my sister the bible talks about how when we come into the kingdom we're adopted we're engrafted in and and we become a child of god and we're born again and so there are people all over the world who don't look anything like you but they're your brother and they're your sister because they've received jesus and then there are other people that might look just like you but their father is not god jesus literally looked at the pharisees and he told them you are of your father the devil i know it's hard to think that but the reality is everywhere you go there are only two families god's family and the devil's family and before we came into adoption and we received jesus christ we were walking breathing and talking in the devil's family and thank god for his mercy that he still sent people to love us he still sent people to pray for us and he knew that there was a time that he was going to adopt a sin he already provided that for us but until a person makes that decision they are not your brother they are not your sister um i remember i was in college and i was getting ready to pledge for a sorority right and the lord stopped me in my track and he said why would you join yourself to a group of people and call them your sister and most of them don't even know me why would you do that i said okay fine so i didn't pledge now i'm not telling you what to do i'm telling you what god told me [Applause] and that would be an example of something that okay this is the way the lord dealt with her uh but there's no verse in the bible that says thou cannot pledge justice not joinith a fraternity and a survey the other thing if you're going to evangelize be respectful and be kind most people love to talk about themselves right so even if you are not well versed on what their religion believes ask them oh wow you're you're a wiccan what does that mean what's a wiccan i bumped into a lot of look at y'all y'all like what is a wiccan bumped into a lot of wiccans when i was in college they basically believe spirit is in nature so um you know the desk that we sat at in class was god you know all of that yes there are real tree huggers out there you guys they are so allow them to talk and as they talk the lord starts bringing scriptures to you to explain okay this is the error and this is the similarity because in every other religion you will find elements of truth because the devil can't create anything new he just skews or uses deception right and so you say oh wow that's similar to what i believe too and then you just point out the difference and the seed is getting planted they might not get saved right then they might get saved later but be kind and be respectful when you present the gospel because it is the love of god that draws men and women to repentance amen well listen we hope you got something out of this series out of these questions that we answered today [Applause] let's bow our heads for word of prayer father we thank you so much for this time that we've had together today and uh lord we just thank you for what you're doing in the hearts and the lives of your people uh father our desires to see them grow in the things of god like they never have before god i pray that people take what has been received over these last 13 weeks god that they get this word deep down on the inside of him we pray that if anyone got offended by something that was said god we pray that they cast that offense off lord and just receive your love receive your word today sometimes you you you offend the mind in order to test and reveal the heart so god if we got offended today then we just we we got a chance to see where we're at and now we ask today god that you will give people grace to be able to get through the truth stomach the truth hold on to it long enough that they produce 30 60 and 100 times as much god the same way that we've seen our congregation grow over these last 13 weeks may this growth continue throughout the rest of the year i'll give people the strength that they need to make the tough decisions that need to be made so they can take the next step in their walk with christ i pray you're raising up disciples you're raising up leaders here at faith christian center that will go after jesus and go after the things of god with everything that they have on the inside thank you lord we're free from apathy we are free from lukewarmness that there is a zeal and a fire that burns on the inside of our hearts as we pursue you with everything that we have and no matter where anyone is in their walk with christ we thank you lord that everyone is being encouraged to take the next step we give you praise and we give you glory for all of this in jesus name and everybody in agreement today said a man praise god all right well listen we hope again you have enjoyed the series if you're a first time visitor we want to thank you so much for hanging out with us today we look forward to having you back with us again uh on next sunday and uh so if you're a first time guest we have people from our team that have some light refreshments some snacks people that want to answer any questions that you might might have today about the service about the church and we'll be happy to answer them if you need prayer for anything when the service dismisses we'll have a minister down front to pray with you and to pray for you so we want to say goodbye to everybody tuned in online and also to everybody here in the sanctuary have a fantastic week we'll see you again you are dismissed you

Channel: Faith Christian Center

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Length: 55min 43sec (3343 seconds)

Published: Sun Sep 26 2021