Lisa Harper | Faith Family Church

well we had an amazing Women's Conference this weekend we had wall toall women in this place worshiping God and having a great time and Lisa Harper's graciously um said that she would stay over to be with us today and how many of you are glad she's here we're in for a treat today for all of you guys who haven't gotten to hear but let me tell you a little bit about her in case you don't know her she's been in Ministry leadership for over 30 years she has uh traveled with uh uh Women of Faith how many of you know Women of Faith spoken for 10 years with them she worked for focus on the family if you love James Dobson I do focused on the family she was the ministry National Ministry director women's ministry director for that for those six years and um she has uh if you watch any Christian television you've seen her on TV she's always on she travels extensively over the nation and internationally speaking in conferences and churches she has written 16 books she has done Bible study series both written and and film those and I'm looking forward to to getting hold of those but uh she's just she's got her doctorate in Masters and doctorate in theology so she's really smart everybody say smart she's really smart and does a great job of communicating God's word with depth but with clarity as well and she's also a great Storyteller and really really funny we're going to laugh today she says the greatest accomplishment that she has has has so far is getting to adopt her beautiful daughter Missy who's here on the front row Missy St adopted her from Haiti and she's such a sweet sweet girl so would you give Miss Lisa Harper a good South Texas welcome this morning too oh please sit down I have oh please please please y'all are y'all are way too gracious and it sounded much more like she was introducing Lisa bav than me um I told first service really the only thing Difficult about this weekend we have had so much fun is that I have to keep standing next to Tamara who is much sweeter than me and petite and blonde so um I don't know about you burning your hair before your first date with Pastor Jim but I think you were still probably really hot so I think you may have outputted your coverage Pastor um just it has been such a treat to be with Y all we had such a good time on uh Friday night and Saturday um I think the the environment I'm so sorry I'm a spitter um so always a little baptismal when I get to go um but the environment was just so fertile um that I was telling Pastor somebody could have just gotten up and read the phone book because God was just going to show up with us and it was sweet wasn't it Miss Ernestine it was just a sweet sweet time and so gentlemen I'm going to try to keep most of my estrogen lace terminology out of today's sermon so y'all are going to have to forgive me if it gets a little girly in here uh I'm going to try to try to stay clean but that's going to be uh you may want to fast and pray for that um before we go and Reach Out And Touch whoever you're plop next to gentlemen that applies to you too but if you're not married to her touch her right um and would you pray for the those Saints on either side let's just pray there are so many distractions in culture today that sometimes it takes a minute for us to get rid of the distractions so that our hearts are actually pliant for God what God wants to PL in them through Holy Spirit and through the revelation of his word so just pray for those Saints around you that they'll have ears to hear louder eyes to see bigger and hearts that would be so tender to the things of God that we would be regos spelled this morning that we would see Jesus bigger Jesus we confess as your sons and as your daughters uh that we can't understand the gospel apart from holy spirit so holy spirit thank you that you have already been so present in this Sanctuary Lord Jesus we pray that you would use your true love story that we call the Bible to remind us in a really tangible way this morning that we have the right to call the creator of the Universe father that we are loved that we have hope that extends way beyond our circumstances that as pastors already said we have an accessible peace even when life is hard we can trust in your provision and your protection so Lord I pray that uh we' look back to this season at FFC and go oh my goodness we saw him in the sanctuary we'd look back to the season as Revival Lord we do pray as a family that you would protect Pastor Jim and Pastor Tamara as they travel that you would give them favor Lord a double triple measure of favor Lord we can't wait to hear the reports when they come back and go 50 people were put in prison and the guards got saved um Lord we love you we trust you in a world that is so chaotic we trust your presence your calmness in the midst of all this confusion we trust that you will always make a way where there seems to be no way so Lord turn our hearts turn our minds back towards you in uh in a way that honors you this morning we love you we want to love you more we want to see you bigger and we ask all these things by uh the authority of the name Jesus the name that one day every knee will bow before and all of God's Sons and Daughters said amen um I was thinking when when Pastor Tamron was talking about me being at focus on the family my mind just just kind of ski to this this incident that happened when I lived in Colorado I used to love to trail run and uh I know some of y'all are thinking she doesn't look like she runs Much Anymore um well I'm 60 so if I run there are parts of me that lag behind um but I used to run all the time in the mountains where I lived and there was this one trail that I ran three or four times a week it was called Pulpit Rock Trail and if you ran it's about a 2 and 1 half mile run up through these Evergreen pine trees when you got to the very top you walked out into this Alpine Meadow just the most beautiful flowers uh Colorado in the summer is even prettier than the Lavender Fields I drove by where was that was by bies is what I know anyway it's prettier than that far as you can see and then if you looked West from that field Pike's Peak was just right there and just shrouded with snow all the time even in July covered with snow I mean it was just picturesque that's where cath Catherine Lee Bates wrote America the Beautiful was that exact sight she was so so impressed by the beauty of it so I would run that trail because I worked at a big Ministry and I don't know if y'all ever noticed but some Christians are just so irritating and so I needed time to be out in God's creation to just calm myself when I felt like saying words that weren't in the Bible and so I'd run this Trail well toward the end of my ten year at focus on the family um they began to warn people about running where this particular Trail was or mountain biking or hiking because there had been a lot of criminal activity and so the televisions and the newspapers started saying especially if you were female not to go on that trail system because there had been a lot of violent crime perpetrated against women well this one day I mean it was like the perfect Saturday just blue blue sky no humidity perfect weather and I thought well surely there won't be any crime today it's just too pretty surely all the criminals are in a pool hall somewhere and I'll be safe if I go to my favorite Park and so I pull into the park it was Saturday afternoon there's only one other car in the parking lot so I kind of glance at that park car I get out of the trail I walk to the trail head and there are new signs that the Colorado Springs Police Department had posted that once again very clearly warned against running in the park until they apprehended the criminal or criminals they weren't sure if it was couple of guys or one guy and I thought I'll be fine today and so I start running that trail and I have a terrible voice I I want to be grafted into the graphs but I know I need to learn to sing first but um so I sing mostly by myself in the woods and so I'm singing worship songs Running up through those Evergreen pine trees I get all the way the top two and a half miles to the top of this trail and I go to step out into this Meadow that I've been in hundreds of times before it's just my any anybody over 40 in the room okay y'all remember that commercial cow gone take me away remember and this girl goes back in a bubble bath that was that Meadow was my my cowone Take Me Away place and so I'm just about to step in that Meadow that I loved and I stopped dead in my tracks because from about me what's your name sir Brandon this has nothing more to do with you I just needed you as a prop from about me to Brandon I'm behind a pine tree from about me to Brandon there's a naked man and I was like oh you are kidding me I mean I've run all the way up this train and I've run right into the criminal in his birthday suit and it just it's so through me and when I get scared I'm like a junior high boy on Mountain Dew I just I can't think clearly and and he hadn't seen me because I'm mostly behind this big old tree and I thought oh my goodness oh my goodness oh my goodness and I only had two thoughts that I'll call logic this morning one was I had read in some hiking magazine that if you uh come upon um a wild animal and and you're you're west of the Mississippi that unless it's a bear it behooves you to advance I'm sorry Bren I'm just use you as a prop for just a couple minutes here but it it it behooves you to advance toward the wild animal with your hands over your head because that makes you look bigger toward the animal and then you're supposed to speak in deep guttural tones and so I remember that and then I remembered seeing on open for Dr Phil or somebody that men who exposed themselves were typically cowards and [Applause] jumps up and he takes off sprinting in the opposite direction and when he takes off sprinting I realized for the first time that he was actually wearing these really small blue running shorts uh you know when men wear those running shorts like serious Runners that are slit up the side you they're so trashy cuz when they sit down that that slit will spay and y'all I promise I promise he looked so naked from where I was standing behind that tree but he took off running and he kept looking over his shoulder at me you thinking I was going to chase him big old girl he was probably like having a devotion for his family or something and I watched him get smaller and smaller and I got so tickled I thought I bet that was his car in the parking lot and he's going to run down and call the police and say it's a girl girl up there terrorizing everybody y'all scaring innocent men loitering in Mountain Meadows that is mild compared to the damage we do when we look at god with blurry perspective I was behind a tree the sun was going down I was already predisposed to think I might run into somebody's scary wasn't a wasn't a naked man wasn't a bear wasn't anything just a nice guy probably doing a devotional taxes or something but I was convinced that I saw what I saw we do that all the time with God even those of us who've been raised in church who know the Bible we think we know who he is you turn a blurry perspective toward who our creator redeemer is and man you'll get crooked real fast I'm so excited about the series y'all are about to step into because it's talking about the Jesus that we don't know the facets of Jesus maybe that we've seen blurry that we haven't actually seen the way that he's revealed it to us through Holy Spirit through his inscripturated word and one of the facets of our savior that I saw blurry for a long long long time was his accessibility I grew up in the church been in church since I was in utero I got saved when I was 5 years old got saved after my dad left us and I was desperate for a dad who would stay I would pray that God would send me a second daddy who wouldn't leave and uh I was so excited when my mom remarried and then that second daddy turned out to be uh not the daddy I'd prayed for and uh that's what really led me into the arms of Father God I was just so desperate for a dad but by then there been some uh abuse some molestation in My Story by some men who came into our family and pretending to be uncles who cared for us instead did things to my sister and I in the dark that were despicable and I felt dirty from my earliest memory I felt dirty and so even though I was saved I just kept my head down and I thought I've got to be a good girl because if I don't behave God is going to be disappointed that he lowered the bar to let me into his kingdom and so I knew Jesus but I didn't know how to get close to Jesus because I just felt dirty all the time he's such a good god he's such a kind compassionate Redeemer he won't let us stay stuck and I feel like over the last 20 years what God has been revealing to me is that Perfection is not a prerequisite for intimacy with him one of my favorite stories that reveals that is in Mark's gospel chapter 10 I Love The Gospel of Mark you can go ahead and turn there one of the things I love the most about the gospel of Mark is first of all it's the very first gospel account when they canonized scripture which is just a fancy word that means they collated it into the Bible that we have this collection of 66 books they put Matthew as the First Gospel but chronologically Mark is the First Gospel was the very first written compilation of the Earthly life and Ministry of Jesus Christ and do you remember who Mark was written by yeah Mark Mark wrote The Gospel According to mark but remember that if it was a gospel account there had to be an eyewitness to the the ministry of Jesus Christ the eyewitness to The Gospel According to Mark is Peter is't that lovely you got a hot mess I mean he threw Jesus under the bus at his most poignant moment of human need vehemently and vulgarly denied him three times and God says I'mma Choose You I'mma choose you nobody else would choose you you're a train wreck but I'm going to choose you I might actually build the New Testament Church on your frail shoulders because you're never going to forget that you need me you are going to be a pipe Missy and I were at a Joyce Meyer conference recently and I think Joyce thought she had invited Lisa B and was surprised when I showed up but you know all these women come to those Joyce SM conferences there are thousands of women and and I was on these great big television screens and so when I stepped off that evening the hotel I mean the elevator in our hotel there were like 300 women in the lobby and they saw Missy and I step off the elevator and women started screaming and I turned around I thought Taylor Swift must be here and then I realized it was just cuz they'd seen my big old head on those screens they started hollering screaming and hugging us and we got back to the hotel later after dinner and Missy said Mama are we famous and I said no we are not famous I said baby remember those pipes leaning against the house I was having some Plumbing work done on the house those PVC pipes said remember those white pipes that were leaning against the house when we left and she said yes ma'am and I said that's what we are we're pipes and on a really good day when we're not gunky clean water can flow through us and I said so people on the other end of your pipe if they're thirsty and they get water through your pipe they can't hang on to the water so they hug the pipe I said so that's what we are baby we're PVC pipe and on a good day we're not clogged the gospel of Mark you see that over and over again because Peter and John Mark was a mess too he's the one who betrayed Jesus outside the garden of of Gethsemane dropped his cloak and ran off naked so he betrayed Jesus but naked so they're both they're both hot mess kind of men they both have massive mistakes in their backstory but God says I'll choose these two I'll choose these two don't for a moment think you are disqualified for Ministry in the kingdom of God don't for a moment let some Pharisee make you think you need to sit on the back row that you can't help that you can't be on the worship team that you can't lead kids in youth ministry that is is a Lie from the pit of Hell it's not biblically defensible God uses the weak and the foolish our culture elevates people with microphone and it's stupid our culture says people with a big mouth like me deserve Instagram memes it's stupid scripture says I'll use the weak and the foolish because those pipes won't forget how much they need the water to clean themselves out and that's what Mark says and that's what Peter says over and over over again they recognize how much they need Jesus Pastor Tamar said some nice things about me let me tell you what the context of that is I've been forgiven over and over and over and over again over and over and over again if I look back over my 55 years of Walking With Jesus I'm 60 55 years Walking With Jesus there are hundreds of pits I dug myself that Jesus reached into pulled me out of slung me over his shoulder and took me to a no place that's called Grace I'm not trying to say sin isn't a big deal and I am a recovering Pharisee too I'm not saying my sin isn't a big deal my sin put Jesus on the cross his grace is greater still his grace he's a good god he's a kind God he's an accessible God he's a compassionate God Perfection is not a prerequisite for relationship for intimacy with Jesus let me quit meddling and start preaching Mark chapter 10 verse 20 verse 46 and they came to Jericho and as he was leaving Jericho with his disciples in a great crowd bardus a blind mear the son of tus was sitting by the roadside if you're comfortable writing in the Bibles in your Bibles underscore that sitting by the roadside and when he heard that it was Jesus of Nazareth he began to cry out and say Jesus Son of David have mercy on me and many rebuked him Circle or underline that too we're going to come back for that in just a second telling him to be quiet but he cried out all the more son of David have mercy on me and Jesus stopped verse 49 and said call him and they called the blind man saying to him take heart get up he is calling you and throwing off his cloak he sprang up and claimed to Jesus and Jesus said to him what do you want me to do for you and the blind man said to him Rabbi let me recover my sight and Jesus said to him go your way your faith has made you well and immediately Peter uses that word all the time in Mark's gospel I think Pete had add because he's always saying immediately quickly Jesus went in a hurry immediately he recovered his sight and he followed Jesus along the way now when we read that story in the black white and red of our English Bibles it's a good story just face value it's a good story because you get a blind man he encounters Jesus and he's able to see again that's that's a good story amen if you read between the lines of the story it gets even better one of my favorite modern theologians wonderful Pentecostal Theologian Nam uh Dr Craig kener he was behind the recent Revival at Asbury Theological Seminary in Kentucky Dr kener says this if you get out of the Bible what you were expecting to get out of the Bible you need to change your expectations it's always bigger it's always better this is not flat text it's a supernatural love story so you've got this guy named Bemus and it's a big deal they name him most of the people that Jesus healed are not named big deal this guy's name so Bart he's sitting on the curb because it says he's sitting beside the road and a great big crowd of people hear that Jesus is coming through Jericho now Jericho is kind of like Gonzalez I stopped in Gonzalez on my way here and went up into the Walmart because I just couldn't resist it and so so Jericho is kind of like Gonzalez they might have had a Walmart they did not have a Dillards I mean it was it was you know a smallish Town people only went through Gonzalez to get to bues or Austin and so Jericho is kind of a small town Jesus is going through Jericho on his way to Jerusalem the gospel of Mark is divided into two themes first part of M Gospel of Mark is all about the compassion of Jesus early service we talked about that word comes from the Greek word splog nitom means from the guts so first half of Mark is all about how Jesus had this gut level compassion for people who are hurting people we just prayed for parents with little girls who are diagnosed with cancer at 5 years of age couples who are trying to get pregnant all through the beginning of Mark talks about the compassion gut level compassion Jesus had for those who are missed and marginalized sick and suffering second half of Mark there's a turn there's a decided turn in the Theology of Mark and most Scholars call the second half of Mark The Passion of the Christ and they're not just talking about Jesus was like drinking bangs or Mountain Dews or something they're not talking about elevated motion they're talking about Jesus set his face on the cross he knew exactly what his mission was Pastor Jim has preached on his mission statement it comes right before this story for even me the son of man I didn't come to be served I came to serve and to give my life as a ransom for many so there's this turn we're we're right after the turn Jesus is turned toward Jerusalem and he's headed toward Easter he knows he's going to be crucified and he makes this pit stop this is his very last RNR before his murder very last time he has a minute to himself now I know this is impossible to answer but if you knew you had one last day before you are going to walk into a town where you were going to be killed where you're going to be strung up on a tree you're going to be be crowned with thorns people were going to jeer you and you were going to die you knew that was around the corner for you what would you do your last day off I I would I would get Vats of chips and quesa I mean Vats like like those like 300 gallon you know cattle troughs and I'd fill them with cheese and I'd get so many tortilla chips you'd have to get a a doly to bring in in my tortilla chips and I would sit in the bat of cheese and just double fist tortillas and I'd hire 10 men to massage me I'm I'm not just 60 I'm single I have never been married I'm I'm a hire every cowboy Wrangler wearing masseuse I can find and they're all going to rub up on me at the same time but in a real Leviticus kind of Way Pastor Jim like not not todrey real holy and everything but still I mean if it's my last little time wouldn't you Miss Ernestine I'm like I'm living it up baby this is it yeah I mean you would think Jesus would go I'm checking into the rits I'm a order room service oh you nuts I'm so tired of healing y'all bunch of baby complainer he doesn't it's his last moment before the cross and he's with the crowds with the people now this crowd that's formed around Jesus Mark chapter 10 they don't even believe he's the Christ it's not a crowd of worshippers it's a crowd of rubberneckers they've heard about Jesus they've heard that everywhere he goes paralytics do cartwheels so they've come to see Jesus do tricks they're not there as worshippers they're there to Facebook live there's there to take pictures Rubber neckers and he still has compassion on the crowd and as he's passing through this fella he's separate from the crowd why is he separate from the crowd y'all can talk back because he's a blind man and in the first century if you had a medical condition that was ongoing it was assumed there was unconfessed sin in your life and you were segre ated from everybody else just like the woman with the issue of blood there's there's there's all these issues and medical conditions in first century Semitic culture segregated you from the well so this guy's separated from the crowd and when he hears remember he's blind so he can't see when he hears Yeshua of Nazareth is passing by he begins to yell son of David have have mercy on me what's significant about him calling Jesus the son of David he knows the prophecies throughout trah which we would call most of it the Old Testament he's heard the prophecies that the Messiah the anointed one God's son the savior of the world he's not going to come through the tribe of Levi he's going to come through the lineage of David that's a big deal cuz high priest according to the law could only only come through Levi but the prophecy said the Messiah is coming through the lineage of David So for him to go son of that what he's saying is I believe you're it I believe you're the Christ I believe you're the one we've been praying for for centuries I believe if there's any hope for me it lies with you son of David and then it says many in the crowd rebuked him now that word in our English Bibles is not nearly as powerful as it is in the original text in the Greek New Testament was originally written in Greek a little bit of Aramaic in the Greek that word is epito we get pity from from that Greek word epitom here's what epitomy really means it's not just rebuke it means to command with the implication of a threat how many of y'all have kids in your life your M daddies granddaddies uncles you just help your friends and take their kids out ch cheese and then send him home okay if you've ever taken care of kids you have epitom some of y'all pomide this morning on the way to church if you aimed the rearview mirror and you said y'all better quit fussing or I'll give you something to fuss about that's a pit of I that is to command with the implication of a threat so they didn't just politely say sh sh part and we don't want him to think we're rednecks I mean Lord have mercy everybody already judges Jericho Gonzalez goodness gracious would you just act right that that's not what he's talking about it's not what Mark and Peter describing when they say the crowd a Pitto him the crowd went if you don't shut up we're going to shut you up up it was it was a command you don't belong here bmus you ain't right you don't have it all together you don't fit in a crowd like this maybe nobody's ever said that quite like that to you but I bet a lot of y'all have felt it maybe you feel it every time you walk into FFC CU you still smell like cigarette smoke and some of these Saints judge you cuz you smell like cigarette smoke maybe you've got some colorful tattoos that aren't Christian tattoos I grew up where you weren't allowed to have tattoos unless you were in the Navy my mama said the Bible says we can't have tattoo it does not I Love My Mama but when you have people go the Bible says usually they're stupid that's not what the Bible say now I'm not saying my mom stupid y'all hear me she will to this day wear my hide out my mama was misunderstanding a passage in Leviticus that says Don't Mark your bodies with tattoos God said that to the Israelites because they had lived with the Egyptians for 400 years as slaves and the Egyptians tattooed their bodies with images of little G Gods from the pantheon so it's not about tattoos it's about worship God says don't put other gods on your body yall have tattoos that's not sin I don't care what some old grumpy Saint told you it's not sin but some of y'all have tattoos from a past life that you're embarrassed of you feel a little embarrassed every time you're in a setting like this all of us in some way or another have probably been made to feel like we weren't quite good enough when I was 40 years old I went to a Women's Conference not unlike this weekend and I went to a breakout session on missions and Pastor Jim I thought it was about like India or Haiti but I was surprised when I walked into this break out session cuz this little bitty girl was leading it little blonde girl Tam about your size obviously keto and she walks up to the platform and she said in the Book of James it says if you're a Christ follower to take care of widows and orphans and I was like that's interesting I thought we're going to talk about India or Dominican Republic and she said so the Bible says we're supposed to take care of the least of these there are 14 7 million orphans in the world as we know it today what are you doing about it and I remember thinking she sure is bossy to be so petite you know how sometimes holy spirit will settle on you and you just can't let go of something I just got this sense that I was supposed to do something with regards to Orphan care and I didn't know exactly what that was the Holy Spirit just wouldn't let me let go of it I thought I don't know if I'm supposed to like help with an orphanage or do a short-term Mission there give more of my tithe my offering to Ministries like what y'all are supporting in India I I need to do something more the Lord's just kind of on me that I need to do something more maybe even adopt and so I'm not that smart when it comes to understanding hard things from the Lord the Bible says he's so good he's not trying to punk us and Isaiah it says he will be so specific he'll tell us when to turn to the left and when to turn to the right but sometimes I need help to discern those directions and so I asked Four Women and I was in a small group with at church to pray with me and for me I said y'all the holy spirit's just stirring something in me about orphan care I don't know exactly what it is will y'all pray with me and for me and uh and several of them basically said we've got your back and one of them said if you have time later on this week I'd love to meet you for coffee and process this further now this is free it has nothing to do with faith family and so if y'all get mad that I say say this y'all need to send me an email not Faith Family my name is Lisa bav um if you have an older grumpy Saint who says to you they need to meet you in private because they have a word from the Lord for you y'all need to play dumb and take a friend and instead I went by myself and this woman said Lisa there's a verse in the Bible and that verse says the kid kiss of a friend is better the kiss of a the wounds of a friend are better than the kiss of an enemy now when somebody quotes one verse at you be careful because they're usually using the Bible as a club and that's not what it was intended to be used as she said so I want to be real honest with you I know you're praying about orphan care but just in case you're thinking about adopting a child I want to be real direct with you you have shared with our small group that you were abused when when you were younger and I know you've been to Christian Counseling and all but just in case you weren't fixed you might unwittingly transfer some of the trauma you experienced as a child onto a child of your own so I think you have just sabotaged your shot at being a mother I don't think you should parent a child but I know you want to nurture something so my advice to you would be to go to the Nash na Nashville Humane Society and adopt a dog cuz you're good with pets I was 40 years old been walking with Jesus for 35 years I was on staff at a church I'd already gone to Seminary the first time I knew better I knew better but here's what the enemy does y'all he takes just a grain of Truth and he mixes it with poison and because it smells familiar we drink it I was already afraid I was too damaged to be somebody's mama I already struggle with shame over my past I should have recognized this woman is just a crooked little tree somewhere in her life story she went through something so hard a desert or storm that it bent her trunk and she's not bearing good fruit so let me be respectful to her and kind to her but I don't need to heed what's falling out of her mouth because it's not congruent with God's word because Jesus disciplines us but he does not use shame as a motivational tool but I didn't I didn't instead I took the the adoption form that I had secretly printed out and I put it in the very back of my file drawer and the next day when I got off work at the church where I was working as a women's ministry director I drove to the Nashville Humane Society and I adopted a chocolate lab with bladder control problems name Sally she a sweet dog she's dribbly but sweet it was seven more years years before I trusted in the kindness of God enough to dip my toe back in the adoption Pond seven years all it took was one crooked Saint to pour water on the hot coals of my faith and I backed up don't do like me don't do like me when they tell barus to shut up what BART says is my only hope lies with him so I don't care if you give me stink ey I don't care if you judge me and it says he cries out all the more son of David he here's one of the most beautiful phrases in all four gospels Jesus is on his way to Easter and Jesus stops ain't that beautiful and Jesus stops he puts Easter effectively on pause for this one broken discouraged man who nobody else will give the time of day to bring him to me can you imagine I bet you that crowd got real quiet then oh yeah yeah I like he's my cousin sure sure sure come they bring BART to Jesus and Jesus says to the blind man what do you need on his way to Easter stops for Bart what do you need I always imagine Bart saying Jesus I need to see my son round third and slide into home my son's a great baller Jesus and I've never actually seen him play I lost my sight when he was a toddler but he started in t-ball and my boy bats forth now he's really really good Jesus he's probably going to get drafted out of Victoria High School Jesus I'd give anything I mean when my son plays I cheer myself horse I can never even talk after his games but I've never seen him round third Jesus I'd love to see my boy score Jesus I love to see my wife smile again her smile is what captured my heart I was in a coffee shop and Gonzales work on my dissertation and the bell rang on the door and I turned around just to see who it was and there she stood and I mean when she smiled it was like Christmas morning I mean she just had me first time I saw her smile Jesus I haven't seen her smile for 11 years I'd do anything to see my sweetheart smile again says Jesus gave him back his sight right then right there Jesus gave him back his sight and that could be the end of the story but it's not I actually don't think it's the greatest miracle in this story in Mark chapter 10 I think the greatest Miracle it's kind of hidden it's a couple of verses after that it says bmus followed Jesus along the way do you know before we were called Christians we were called followers of the way do you know bmus is counted as being among the few who witnessed Jesus death at golgatha do you know bmas is counted among early church leaders in the book of Acts so he goes from being completely discounted depressed just checked out of life on the curb to being one of the great spiritual leaders leaders one of the reasons we're meeting in a house on a Sunday morning is because of the way the church was carried on the backs of men like barame when he encountered Jesus the kindness The Compassion of Jesus he didn't become religious he became a lifechanger changed the world for the sake of the Gospel so undone by The Compassion he received that it changed the trajectory of his life and really the trajectory of the world have you met that Jesus have you encountered that kind of intimacy that kind of kindness when when you felt completely invisible nobody was even listening to your story he said you're not an interruption to me come closer you are not an interruption to me you do not have to clean yourself up first you bring every everything don't curate your emotions you bring everything to me all your grief all your disappointment all your loss you bring it to me I love you you matter to me that's the story of the gospels he is Holy and he is transcendent but King Jesus condescends to be so miraculously accessible you're not as far away from Jesus as you think he's as close as your next breath all you have to do is acknowledge I can't make it by myself I need that kind of love I need that kind of compassion well y'all bow your heads and close your eyes Pastor Jim is going to come up and he's going to wrap up this family meeting before he heads to the airport and flies to India to share hope with some other pre precious people who are desperate for it hey can we all bow our heads for just a minute and close our eyes and man I know there are people here that you heard those words and you're saying man that's me man that's me maybe she helped you laugh at you maybe she helped you cry at you maybe she made you mad at people who invaded your world but I like to say that sin messed us all up man all of us know what it's like to have sin messed us up but to know what it's like to have Jesus step into that mess and do more and better than you ever dreamed could happen that's a gift it's called The Gift of Salvation so real quick we don't need to take a lot of time but if you know in your heart today that you don't want sin you want him and you say I know in my heart I don't have him the way I need to have him but today I want to I'm just going to ask you real quick to shoot up your hand I'll pray for you at your seat you say why do you do that well the Bible says everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved doesn't matter if you're standing in front of me or in the back of the church what matters is that you call upon him so we're going to give you a chance to do that uh if you want to start a relationship with Jesus there may be some people need to restart and we'll pray with you too so are you ready one 2 3 if that's you shoot up your hand all over this place awesome awesome awesome fantastic awesome awesome awesome just wave it quick you can put it back down awesome awesome thank you ushers awesome okay church family you can look up let's put our hand on our heart let's pray with those awesome people who just lifted their hands let's say Jesus Jesus this is why you came this is why you came and we thank you and we thank you for coming to Earth for coming to shall we know we know how loved we are how loved we are and how incredible your ability your ability to bless any person to bless truly is TR today Lord today Lord we thank you we thank you for forgiveness for forgiveness for restoration for restoration for healing for healing for all the good things for all the good things you want to do you and we say yes we say yes to your salvation to your salvation the Lord of our life we pray the Lord of our life pray amen hey can we give the Lord a good hand and amen and for those who pray that good hand is for you too and I'm going to be real quick but I want to encourage you you already gave him the offering didn't you right now you can give another gift you can give all the other church members in town first shot in the cafeteria all right just by not being in too big of a hurry I'm going to be quick cuz I know you're you're hungry but aren't you glad Miss Lisa Harper came to Victoria Texas yeah and that was her fourth message and she was that good every time y'all so I doubt there are any books left but if there are I wouldn't I wouldn't I I you can get more of that also she has podcast and things you can listen to you know one of the smartest things I did there was a man that stood up and he preached on Hebrew Hebrews 11 11:1 on faith and I heard that message I was a 19-year-old baseball player who wasn't excited about there being a Revival really not that bad but but when I heard him I thought am I going to live the rest of my life not experiencing the plan of a God who exists am I going to live the rest of my life that way or am I going to learn to live by faith and I didn't have the money to buy his stuff but fortunately somebody in the dorm had all of his stuff and that year I listened to one of a cassette tape back in the day right I listened to a cassette tape a night until in my heart I said okay I know how to live by faith I'm going to live by faith for the rest of my life so sometimes God will use a speaker in your heart and you want to listen to the podcast and let God start let God finish what he started in you today can you'all give me a good amen hey real quick I'm not going to say much more but if you prayed that prayer we have white packets for you they help you get off to a great start there's a book 30 Days A New Beginning some other things that can help you there free gift just pick one up as you leave today and then uh Jesus said believe and be baptized because when you go under the water all the shames washed away that's what you're celebrating when you come up you're celebrating the fact God promised to bless your future how many of you know you can't be so messed up God can't fix your future right right so we're going to put a this up on the screen we make it simple for you to either be baptized or to talk to somebody about it but Tech you can text baptism with that number scan the QR code on your seatback or there's a Salvation card that's in uh that's in the seatback you can fill it out at old school if you want to and then the final thing I want to say is if you are a woman in this church and if you had a part in this conference I just want to thank you whether you sang whether you spoke whether you served whether you smiled and strengthened somebody with the hug how many of you know the Women of Faith Family Church are awesome Amen the men are banned from the Women's Conference unless they're security right so I know you guys probably did some stuff this weekend I probably shouldn't tell you this but I watched my grandchildren Friday night I was up in the cry room all right I watch Cece and Michael and CeCe uh I'm sorry copelan and shei Michael and Christy's two kids it's late okay shei let papa J change a diaper for the first time in 30 years y'all wasn't that a gift right what a gift only for my granddaughter my grandson pooped his pants and' be like you get get down wind no I'm just kidding I would have helped him all right come on you're hungry get up I want to speak the blessing over you before you go may the Lord bless you may the Lord keep you may the Lord make his face shine upon you and be gracious to you may the Lord turn his face towards you and give you peace God bless you thank you for being in this house today [Music] amen

Channel: Faith Family Church

Views: 59,558

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Id: DG6rP_KRGUo

Length: 49min 51sec (2991 seconds)

Published: Mon Mar 04 2024