Needing Him by Joseph Stowell (Rev. 3:14-22)

Harvest Christian Fellowship began in 1972 under the leadership of pastor grant glory beginning with a Bible study of 30 people today that small group has grown into a church of some 12,000 people harvest Christian Fellowship a ministry for all ages a place where your family can call home it's the prayer of Greg Laurie as well as all the pastor's staff and lay workers that harvest Christian Fellowship will encourage your spiritual growth and revive your passion to share your faith with others Jesus Jesus me Jesus man Jesus this world let's pray together father that is our very prayer this morning we would rather have Jesus we live in a culture that offers so many alternatives to him so many other things we're told to chase after that will supposedly give happiness but for those of us that have sampled some of those things we know it's a lie we know everything that we need in life is found in a relationship with you that's what the prodigal discovered when he went astray he finally came to his senses and realized everything he needed in life was waiting for him all the while back in his father's house now Lord as we've come together with your people as we've come to reflect on what your word says help us to see the sufficiency of Jesus Christ in friendship and relationship with him we invite you to speak to us today we ask all of this in Jesus name Amen good morning well we've been having a great time down there and Irvine for our couple's retreat John mentioned we have some 500 plus people down there reflecting on what the Bible says about marriage and it's been a tremendous time I wanted to also personally invite you to night three of day seven tonight we're in a series that were going through that we're calling knowing God there really is a foundational series for our faith and tonight we're talking about who is Jesus we're going to talk about his amazing birth and consider some of the things the Bible says about him Scripture teaches that Jesus was fully God yet he was fully man how is that possible the Bible teaches he was born born of a virgin mary supernaturally conceived in the womb how could that have happened and we're gonna do some things we've not done yet in day 7 I think you're gonna love and so come out and join us for this time of Bible study of worship as we think about who Jesus is well John mentioned to you already that we have a guest speaker today his name is Joseph Stahl Joe is the president of the Moody Bible Institute a very large ministry that's been around for a few years was actually started by evangelist deal moody and Joe is 1/7 a president of the moody organization that encompasses radio and of course Moody magazine and moody publishing and many other things and God has given Joe a real gift to lead he's one of the great leaders in the evangelical world today one that has loved and respected a man of personal integrity and someone I'm proud to call a friend and I think also in addition to all that Joe's just a great Bible teacher and he loves the Lord and you will see it as he brings the word to us this morning he just was gonna give us the scripture in an understandable way and I think it's gonna touch her heart as it touched those in the first service he's a busy guy but he made time in his schedule to come be with us today at harvest so let's give a really warm welcome right now to Joseph's stole Joe come on thank you so much and what a delight to be here with you with your pastor and my friend and to be at this church that I've heard so much about for so many years and sit with you and worship and sense the presence of the Lord here my heart has already been blessed to be with you this morning and I'm so thankful that your pastor did not mention that the ministries of the Moody Bible Institute are centered in Chicago because whenever mention ed in Southern California everybody gets so envious that you got stuck down here when you could have lived in Chicago I mean what horrid weather you have here I mean it's actually warmer this is true in Chicago today than it is here so y'all come move up to Chicago where where God is at Al Capone Michael Jordan Sammy Sosa and all those other good people well what a delight to be with you an interesting thing happened in my life when I turned 50 not too long ago it's really I have to tell you was a surprise to me my dad's a pastor my grandfather was a pastor so I've grown up in church world I mean I've been hanging out in Bible world for a long time and I was a pastor and have gone to serve the Lord at the Moody Bible Institute and first 50 years I was just busy for Jesus I mean I'm trying to take every frontier I'm trying to get every challenge for the kingdom I can and suddenly as I moved across that 50 line a new thing happened inside I found that my heart had a whole new desire to just stop and get to know Jesus I had this new longing for intimacy with him now I have to tell you you know I felt that is it's not that I live like a Bible pagan my whole life I had I had him I knew him I loved him I appreciated him since I think I was so busy for him and by His grace he planted this new longing in my heart to slow down stop dancing on the stage and start deepening my walk with him this longing for Jesus I began to identify with the psalmist in psalm 42 where he wrote as the deer pants for the water Brooks so my soul longeth after thee O God I'd memorized that and I had lived in it that was my passage and I have to tell you that the more I meditated on those few brief lines from the samus heart I began to realize why maybe earlier in my pilgrimage I had not had the depth of longing for Jesus that I was feeling now let me explain when the psalmist chose the deer this type a gazelle who with every sin you taught in his body bounds through the fields and the meadows and the forests one thing that deer needs is water he's so so desperately in need of water to replenish his being so that he can keep doing what he's doing he knows he needs water so he longs for what he needs and in that thought a whole Vista of reality open to me now it's a human dynamic as well isn't it we long for what we need we desire what we need you start getting a little hungry pretty soon you start longing for food and desiring food start getting a little sleepy you need sleep like I see some of you already are starting to signal that to me that so you begin longing first for a bed for a place to lie down so it's a very human dynamic and here's what dawned on me that those of us who do not live as though we need Jesus probably will not desire or long for him you say wait a minute we believe we need Jesus of course we believe neck-up that we need him but few of us live as though we really do few of us really believe how desperately we need Jesus I find it interesting that the psalmist chose a deer for this metaphor this one who so desperately needs water there for lungs for water because deer weren't all that common in Palestine maybe how come he didn't choose a camel I mean that would have been a lot more as the camel longs for water so my heart that would have been a lot better metaphor I think Marty and I were the United Arab Emirates several years ago and and ministering to missionaries and we had a free afternoon so the missionary said how would you like to go on a camel safari that never heard of that before he said he said we'll take out into the desert and we'll ride camels said sounds great let's do it we got in our SUVs and went out over the desert about 45 minutes into the deep part of the desert and there was a camel ranch we pulled up and fences and all these camels laying around now I want you to know I want to make this clear right up front I don't believe that God has ever had a bad day all right it's gonna I want to put that out right at the front but if he ever did camels are exhibit a I mean these are them ugliest smelliest most malformed looking creatures you could ever imagine well they popped us up on top of these camels and tied them in in a V kind of like like geese fly south and this Arab guy was on the front one and he's telling us all about camels and the desert is were on this Safari and one thing he said that shocked me he said these camels are an amazing animal they can live for three months in the desert without water and then I knew why the psalmist didn't use camels because they don't think they need water so they don't long for water and I have to tell you I think a lot of God's people are a lot more like the camel than like that deer because we live as though we really don't need him glad to have him he's kind of like the 9-1-1 member of our lives right got it memorized it's there and we just keep that in front of us just in case something really bad happens and well hit the number we need you now thank you I'll call you later Jesus becomes like a wallet-sized commodity for us aikka like another Charge Card in our spiritual wallet like let's keep him there in less in case I just need something I really can't afford and then I'll flash him then I'll need him and then that's over thank you very much we're so like that I have to tell you there's a word for this problem for those of us who don't live like we need him therefore don't long for him don't desire him there's a word for it and the word is self-sufficiency I just put that down self-sufficiency what's more problematic than that is that God calls self-sufficiency a sin it's not just boy you missed something in life it's like this is a huge spiritual problem now I have to say that we have a lot of sins that are self hyphenated words don't we like if I got up this morning said the message today is about self-centeredness most of you would go stop I'm guilty play just as I am I'm at the altar now right because we all have I know that's a problem self-enhancement you named them I say to you this morning we're going to talk about the sin of self-sufficiency and our eyes glaze over and say good let's go on to the next point well Jesus never goes on to the next point because it's huge with him would any of you like to know what Jesus thinks of a self-sufficient life I don't blame me for what not not wanted to know it's not pretty but he really thinks but I'm glad that many of you are interested so turn in your Bibles to Revelation chapter 3 where we find out big-time and where he leads us through a path of remediation to intimacy and fellowship with him again now as you're turning in your Bibles to Revelation chapter 3 I just want to back up a little bit and put the particular section that we're going to study into the context of the whole book I think a lot of us think that revelation is about the end times it's about prophecy it's about about raptures and judgments and millenniums and about all those important things whereas the book of Revelation helps us understand how the end times will unfold I have to tell you that's not the the major theme that's a subplot the major theme of the book of Revelation is Jesus the fact that he completes the work of redemption that he began at the cross that in the midst of tremendous opposition in the end times Jesus puts our adversary finally and fully away and for all of us who have come to him by faith gives us hell cancelled in heaven guaranteed forever and it's a done deal it's about Jesus and His supremacy and its sufficiency I remember somebody telling me about a custodian who worked in a seminary every lunch break the custodian would read his Bible and one day one of the professors walked by and noticed he was reading his Bible and said what are you reading the custodian said revelation of course a professor thinks this guy obviously doesn't get revelations too complicated so he says well do you understand what you're reading the custodian said yes professor stopped and said really well what's it about the custodian says Jesus wins that's it he got it so this book is about to supremacy the sufficiency of Jesus and it begins with a majestic picture in Revelation chapter one of Jesus walking among the seven golden lampstands holding seven stars from the universe in his hands his hair white as snow his voice like the voice of many waters a two-edged sword coming out of his mouth and it is such a compelling powerful picture of this almighty Jesus that John the beloved of Christ who leaned on his bosom and deep intimacy when seeing Jesus and all of his majesty falls down like a dead man and the big the book begins with this statement about the ultimate supremacy of Christ and all of this puts what we're going to learn in a minute in bold relief then as you know the book begins with seven letters that Jesus writes to seven churches Christians folk like you and me now I don't know about you but I think if you have a clear conscience the mail is the best time of the day we kind of go to my mail stack and I'm so curious anyway and I always look up in the upper left hand corner who's this from and unless it says Internal Revenue Service I'm usually excited about it can you imagine going to your mail stack and getting a letter from that up in the upper left-hand corner it says Jesus Christ king of the universe and it's stamped personal confidential I think you'd pay attention to a letter like that and these letters come to us just like that from Jesus himself and the letters to these seven churches have a general pattern to them usually begins by complimenting on them on something good they're doing all letters but to have then a section of reproof of some things they're not doing well that they must change but there's one letter there's one letter that has no compliments and only reproof in fact the reproof in this letter is more stinging than any reproof in any of the other letters and some of the other churches had some pretty big-time problems they had false teachers that they had permitted into their midst and Christ said they have to go there under girding the truth they're splitting the foundations some of them had permitted the sect of the Nicolaitans to come in which basically taught that to celebrate the divine creation of sexuality sexual immorality in some context was fine it was like a celebration of what God had created and so these churches had some really big problems and I'm saying to myself my goodness what did this one church do to deserve such a phenomenal reproof like this and it's the letter to the Church of Laodicea it's the last letter he writes and in Revelation chapter 3 we begin reading this letter verse 14 now we've read all the other six letters and watched the pattern and we realized the power of this reproof ago my goodness what's what's wrong here and Christ begins and he calls himself D amen by the way that means he's the last word all right Jesus we'll be happy to discuss anything with you you want to discuss but he's the last word he says the Amen the faithful and true witness the beginning of the creation of God says this I know your deeds that you are neither cold nor hot I wish you were cold or hot now I don't know about you but I remember growing up as a boy with the impression hearing a lot of sermons on his passage I remember the impression that what we really do is have to get hot for God we have to get fired up for him we got to set our world on fire the problem with us is we're not hot for Jesus when you read this a little more closely it can't be that he said I you're neither hot nor cold I wish that you were hot or cold so because you are lukewarm 4:16 neither hot nor cold and my translation is real gentle here he says I will spit you out of my mouth now there is no letter that is as strong as this and when he says I will spit you out of my mouth it's a real nice way of saying what he really said what the Greek really says this is and I won't be careful you know because it's Sunday morning and I don't want to be gross here except to say he's really saying you make me sick and this is about now just what's happening in my mouth you make me nauseated way down deep and you know what happens when that gets rolling I said make me want to throw up now they understood this and Laodicea what he was talking about because they had a water problem didn't have any wells in their town he had to transport the water from the springs in the mountains that were the backdrop of the city of Laodicea and they built viaducts in the water the cold water would come out and come down through these via decks and by the time it hit the city of lay to see it it was lukewarm room-temperature and be all right except for the fact that these particular Springs they got their water from were Springs full of calcium and sulfur have any of you ever had water full of sulfur and calcium I mean there could not be a more horrible taste Marty and I've traveled the sites of these cities and I remember the guide pointing out these pipes that still lay in pieces on the ground and showing us one and the calcium sulfur deposits had almost totally closed it off if you lived in Laodicea you hated your water your water made you sick they had to transport water from colossi that was the cold water the next town away and their hot water came from a town to the south of them they knew exactly what Jesus was talking about said you're lukewarm like your water makes me sick they say well what have they done to deserve this kind of reproof keep reading verse 17 because you say to yourselves I am rich and have become wealthy and have what does your Bible say need of nothing the sin of self-sufficiency and when they say I have become rich and wealthy and have need of nothing that includes that they don't live like they need whom right thing got it Jesus is deeply offended by self-sufficient lives we have three grown married children they all live in a Greater Chicago area let's say that I get a call from my oldest son one day and he says hey Dad and let's say I have a lot more money than I really do say dad we got to move around a buy a new house I need an extra five grand for a down payment yeah I Love You Man all right you check put it in the mail never hear from them again till about twelve months later and says hey Dad well my friends have boats dad I need about 10 grand for a boat all right all right you check put it in mail never hear from them again eight months later you say dad dad all my friends are taking vacations in the Caribbean right right check for $3,000 put it in the mail never hear from again do you think I'd be concerned about that absolutely what on offense well the kid does is take it off the top gives me no time of day gives me no space see one thing you and I have to remember that everything that we have has come from where thank you James chapter one every good and perfect gift is from above is a gift of his hand and what really condemns our lives is that by his marvelous grace he showers us with all the influence of all the things that we have in our lives and they're all from him and we get lost in the gifts and forget all about the giver we take the grace with no gratitude to the supplier I just want you to think about that I want we get to take a moment just let that filter down I want you to think about everything you have that it's all from him by his grace and yet our lives give so little space to the one who has given it all because we become dependent on the gifts and not dependent on the giver God knew this was being problem he warns about it all through scripture when the children of Israel are getting ready to go in the land of Canaan in Deuteronomy chapter 6 he writes when you have gone into the land that has cities that you have not built and wells that you did not dig and vineyards that you did not plant then beware lest thou forget the LORD thy God who has given you these things and it is the sin of self-sufficiency that is such a deep offense to our Lord one thing about living a self-sufficient life is you end up living a self-deceived life because you think life consists of the stuff you have enough and you have all you need and that's life and that's who you are and that's your identity your identity is the car you drive the house you live in the size of your bank account the clothes that you wear it's the but that's your identity and quite a horrible deception because when God sees us he sees all the way through that look at his commentary on these affluent self-sufficient people the end of verse 17 you do not know that you you are wretched and miserable and poor and blind and naked a life that gets consumed in the gifts begins believing that the gifts are the mark of their life the life that's consumed in God the giver is a whole different perspective so that's the problem well what's the Lord gonna do about a church like the church at Laodicea that's Lord gonna do with folk like you and folk like me who have forgotten how much we need him but I think if I was the Lord I'd probably just annihilate the church and start over again I get myself some better folk to work with is there anybody here that delights in the fact that Jesus is so remedial he doesn't say you guys are out of here he says I want to help you you have to change and the rest of the letter is about remediating their self-sufficiency to a christ sufficient life which just might hold the possibility of your longing for intimacy with him and it's a three-step process three steps to remediation let's walk through them together number one he says in a text that you need to refocus your desires verse 18 I do want to go shopping for something good I advise you to buy from me gold refined by fire so that you may become rich when that one scripture speaks of gold a toy is speaking of purity that's which counts of character I guess we we know we live in a world that that flashes its credentials as though that's what counts and behind the credentials there's no character there's no purity how easy it is to live a life gaining everything you can and to be hollow and impure and compromised at the core he said if you come to me if you know that you need me I will make you like gold I'll build the character of your life I'll make you good to the core of your life then he adds refined by fire which is a biblical metaphor for the trials and the problems that come that are a part of that refining process gold mined out of the hills has to be run through through a hot fire to get all the dross out of it so that it's pure and as James one has taught us that when trouble comes into our life it's intended by God to to get the bad stuff out and to leave us with character purest gold at the end of the day is there anybody who would get up in the morning and say Lord what I really want is to be pure good I want character in my life we find me by fire and desired that from him who alone can give it not just character but righteousness keep reading he says in verse 18 and white garments so that you may clothe yourself and that the shame of your nakedness will not be revealed now you sit under great Bible teaching here so you know that there are two kinds of righteousness there's positional righteousness and when you accepted Christ as your Savior he clothed you in his righteousness and that's the only way you can become before the Father in prayer is that Christ has wrapped you in himself so that he presents you faultless and blameless before God the Father so that in Christ we are positionally righteous and presentable to the Father and can have fellowship with the father there's another kind of righteousness even though I'm wrapped in Christ I'm still having trouble with Monday how about you I just have trouble in a couple of relationships how about you I just have trouble with that temptation how about you so there's a practical righteousness where we're growing to become more and more like Christ every day and he says that's what I want you to long for in your life I want you to long to be righteous in your living in your relationships and the way you handle temptation and money and dreams and desires I want you to to wear the white clothing of righteousness that only I can supply to you refocus long for what only he can give and then thirdly the eye salve to anoint your eyes so that you might see is he talking about here well the Laodiceans knew because one of their their most important products in fact the backbone of their economy was eye salve well the powder that they mined out of the hills and mixed with certain elements that created a salve they sold all over the world that's why they were such a wealthy affluent town is that this I said was what they were known for if you had eye problems in that day you wanted some layer to see an eye salve to help you see better and he says you know what you really need because you're so blind and you're self-sufficiency you need the eye salve I will give you so that you can see what he's talking about here is wisdom seeing life from God's point of view seeing every person every relationship every decision from God's point of view so you can open your eyes and have an accurate perception of the world in which you live let the viewpoint of God fill your perception of the world it's saying only I can give you wisdom about how to live come and buy that from me so step one moving from a self-sufficient to a Jesus sufficient life from living like you don't need him to knowing how desperately you need him is to refocus your desires for character righteousness wisdom which only he can supply and step two and here's where you know how serious it is he says you have to repent verse nineteen those whom I love I reprove indisciplined therefore be zealous and repent of this sin now you probably know that the Greek word for repentance is the word Metanoia which basically means to change the way you think and as a result of that to change the way you live basically repentance although godly sorrow may be a part of it is not falling at an altar at a church weeping in a gracious emotional outpouring of how sorry you are for your sin that may be part of it but true repentance is known when you change your mind about that and change the way you live about that and some of us get in these real repentance motifs like we take for years to get it done it's like this huge u-turn like I'm comin I'm comin alright I'm making it true repentance is never like that in fact the grammar here does not permit that this is like hitting a wall of realization like yeah I'm a self-sufficient person I don't really live like I need Jesus I've been so lost in the gifts that the giver has not had a space in my life and you fall in a crumbled heap at the wall of that realization and pick yourself up you turn around and you go the opposite direction you think differently I do need him I will not let this stuff cloud my desire for him I will pursue him remember when I was processing this text in my own pilgrimage suddenly this scenario came to my mind I was in a room with everything I had and Jesus walked into the room and he said Joe this is all that I've given you it said I'm gonna take it all away and one by one he began to do that took my golf clubs away took my vacation plans away just put him out there gone took my checkbook it's gone took my savings cow it was gone it took my health was gone took Marty my wife of 34 years she was gone my kids they were gone took my friends and they were gone took the presidency of moody their days when I'd kind of like it to be gone and it was gone and I was left in a room with him and nothing else just me and him and it's as though he said to me then Jo am i enough am i enough I looked into his face I said you are enough you if I have you I have everything I need he said good you can have your golf clubs back brought my checkbook back I said well I'm glad to have they soap that's back out again there's put that back out he brought it all back in but now I thought differently about all of it life was not about that life was about him and if I had him I had everything I needed how would you know if you had really repented I'll tell you how you'd know every decision you'd stop and be dependent on him you pray Lord I need you right now help I desperately I need you what's the wise thing to do here what's true righteousness what's character every time you made a decision when every gave you something you'd be grateful you wouldn't get lost in a gift it would make you love him more wouldn't it it's a gift the one I need it has blessed me like this gratitude gratitude is the sign of a Jesus sufficient life and every gift the more he pours it on the more you love him like I can't believe how good you are to me all right you just give it maybe you gave it to me for a day or an hour a week or a year I don't know but I love you for this that's how you'd know and he asked them to repent and put him back which leads us to the third step in a remediation verse 20 behold I stand at the door and knock refocus repent and celebrate reunion with him again behold I stand at the door and knock if anyone hears my voice and opens the door I will come into him and will dine with him and then with me we've heard this if you've been around church world you've heard this verse all your life and we usually hear it in an evangelistic context don't we like if you want to accept Christ let me assure you that he's knocking at your door and if you open the door of your life to him and he will come in and all of that is true when I was six years old and told my dad I he had just preached a sermon on the second coming and I knew if Jesus came back my whole family would go except me well wasn't sure about my sisters but I knew my mom and dad would go and I remember saying dad how can I and this is the verse he opened to me Jesus knocking let him in and I did and I'll never regret that so this verse works like that but I have to tell you something the fundamental intention of this verse is not to unsaved people he's writing to followers of his fact a lot of people struggle with this they don't like this verse to work into the church at laodicea so they end up saying can read in some commentaries at the church at laodicea we're all unbelievers it was an unbelieving Church well that's hard to deal with because he calls him the ecclesia the called out ones at the beginning and if that doesn't work for you back in verse 18 or verse 19 he says those whom I love I reprove and discipline that is always a formula for how God treats his own children not the Lost so get this picture this was such a dramatic metaphor that those of us who are living self-sufficient lives have excluded Jesus and he stands on the outside of our lives humbly bent at the door of our lives knocking wanting to come in and be a part of our lives again and I'm struck by the fact I knock on doors that nobody answers I finally walk away don't you Jesus never walks away from your door he's still there if in the midst of all the clutter and the din of all that you are and all that you have listened he's knocking at the door he desires intimacy and fellowship with you and he's still knocking out there what a bold contrast this is at the beginning of the letters he's that Jesus in the lampstand with the Stars and the voice like the voice of many waters such a compelling image how can it be that that majestic worthy Christ in Chapter 1 could be so humbly excluded in the end of chapter 3 this Jesus pushed to the outside celebrate reunion open the door let him in you say wife I let him in he's really got a clean house well amen but that's not what it says in this text he says you know why I want to come in I want to eat with you I want to dine with you now he's not saying let's both grab a tray and watch the six o'clock news because in that culture in these Greek words here he's speaking of the dining where they used to at dinner spent three four hours together dining in that culture and according to the words here is is a season of deep fellowship and bonding of where intimacy is developed this is this is friendship time this Almighty Jesus desperately wants to be your friend wants to be needed by you he wants intimacy with you he says would you just open the door and let me in I see a whole picture don't you when you need him you'll hunt for him and there he is wanting to come in and have intimacy and reward your longing with his presence at the center of your life who wants to be your friend so the problem is not with him I remember flying back from Europe a couple summers ago and that was by myself I was flying back and I was back in the coach section and when you fly transcontinental II in the coach section of any plane you know what the most important consideration is seat assignment and on this particular plane it was two five two and I always liked the aisle seat so our little room to lean out into the island gets slaughtered by the tray come cart coming down the aisle and so I had my favorite seat 20 B and as the plane began to fill up I noticed that no one was crawling across me to sit in 20 a I couldn't believe it I mean this was like not only do you want the right seat but if you have an empty seat next to you it's like yes how could this be flight a it enhance my prayer life I'm praying people buy my seat like Lord keep him rolling and it enhanced my worship life when they kept walking I'm so thank you Lord I love you some and the plane was almost full and that nobody was sitting there and some of the last people to board the plane were a family that slid into the five seats across the aisle from me had a little girl she looked like about 7 and as soon as she slid in there she burst out into tears falling brokenhearted and I heard her say daddy you promised me I could have a window seat the Holy Spirit had me in a full-nelson against the seat in front of me like know what you got to do so I tap the mother in the shed if she wants to sit over here she can I'd say it's the only time in my life I wanted to look like an unsafe person but I must not the mother said to this little girl Stephanie this nice man here says you can sit in that seat and I'm figuring the kid's gonna be too shy to sit by a stranger not this kid she took her doll and her blanket bounded over her mom bounded over me landed in the seat I said can I help you with your seat belt No thank you I fly a lot she said as she put it on and this kid this kid never stopped talking she told me her puppy Duke the Rottweiler pup was down in the hold and what her parents did and I got a tour of the airport we took off yes and talk talk talk about 25 minutes into the flight she finally she said hey you want to play a game I said yeah let's play a game Stephanie and she said all right what's my favorite animal I said well I said Duke no Dukes my dog's silly all right so I'm thinking of everything a little girl would hate like snakes yeah I hate snakes spiders I hate spiders and so finally after I she said do you want a hint I said yeah give me a hint she said it's got four legs and a tail I said can I call a friend she said finally she said do you want me to tell you I said tell me Stephanie she said a horse I said what Stephanie horses are wonderful I know why no wonder I know why you love horses terrific I'm glad they're your favorite and she got real quiet and she kind of pulled her stuff up on her lap and I thought maybe she was gonna take a nap and I reached I reached for a magazine and just as I did that I got this little elbow on my side like that I looked down and she said hey Joe what she threw out her little hand I said hey Joe want to be friends I said well not really Stephanie actually I have more friends than I can maintain as it is but I mean I like you and all but I didn't say that I said sure Stephanie let's be friends and in this moment Jesus throws out his nail-scarred hand to you this Jesus who's been too long on the outside and says to you I want to be a friend it should be my friend and he keeps asking and asking and asking until he hears our heart singing I need Thee Oh I need thee every hour I need Thee do you know this Oh bless me now my Savior - I need the all I need every hour I need Thee Oh bless me now my Savior dear Lord you have been so good to us if you never did anything more than die for us and redeem us it would be enough to keep our hearts praising you the rest of our lives but in addition all the gifts of your grace we've gotten lost in those gifts forgotten where they came from and how much we need you in every turn of our life in every moment 24 hours a day seven days a week 365 days a year and our hearts are humbled and ashamed when we see you as the Almighty Savior marginalized to the edge of our lives you're still knocking we can't believe that more you're still there help us still open the door of our hearts to welcome you in to celebrate how much we need you to long for you to desire you that we might have fellowship and intimacy with you our Savior and our friend help us in Jesus name Amen Thank You Jo that's great nuts all standing up wasn't that wonderful such a blessing to have Joe with us here today and listening to those words and maybe God has spoken to your heart and a recommitment is order and I think the best way you can indicate that is just by changing your behavior and not marginalizing the Lord and making room for him in time for him mentoring into that fellowship and closeness with them and there might be some of you that have joined us here this morning who have never really opened that door and asked Jesus to be your Savior yet and he is knocking there too and he wants to come and have relationship with you and if you would like to ask for his forgiveness if you would like him to come into your life we would like to meet with you immediately following the service we'll have some folks waiting over in our counseling room which is in the corner over here to the side in fact you can even make your way over there as we're closing in song right now and just go on the back and say hey I heard Joe's message and I want Christ in my life or maybe you need to make a recommitment of some kind well some counselors back there and also some of our pastors will be appear in the platform as well to help you so please take advantage of that any of you that need to make that commitment you can head on over there right now as we close in song and I thought that closing with I'd rather have Jesus which we sing earlier would be apropos in light of what we've heard this morning Harvest Christian Fellowship providing spiritual services for the body of Christ for an entire listing of all the programs that will benefit your life for your family encourage your walk or answer any pressing questions or concerns or if you just need someone to pray with you please call harvest Christian Fellowship at 909 six eight seven six 902 for spiritual growth materials visit the harvest cafe books Bibles videos music greeting cards gifts and for the little one in your life be sure and visit the Children's Center where you can find materials that will help nurture their spiritual own no matter what the age the harvest cafe has it all an ideal place to relax enjoy a pastry or genome and pickup resource materials that will encourage your spiritual walk across the harvest cafe it's not your typical bookstore

Channel: Robert Curran

Views: 10,806

Keywords: VTS, 01, 1

Id: L-CI6yVT9QY

Length: 57min 31sec (3451 seconds)

Published: Sun Oct 14 2012