Rev. Jeff White - A Spiritual Checkup

[Music] [Music] all right stand together jeff will lead us to the number this evening [Music] hallelujah he abides with me i'm rejoicing night and day as i walk them they're away for the comforter with me once my heart was full of sin once i had no peace [Music] hallelujah he abides with me i'm rejoicing night and day as i walk [Music] [Applause] [Music] just for the spirit has control jesus satisfies my soul since [Music] he abides hallelujah he abides with me i'm rejoicing night and day as i walk the narrow way [Music] amen we'll sing another verse we'll ask the ushers to come forward for this evening's ties and offerings and gift offerings as we say there's no thirsting for the things of the world they've taken away long ago i gave them up an instant thing all my night was turned today all my burdens rolled away [Music] hallelujah [Music] [Music] henry if he'll pray for us this evening is [Music] he prayed a thousand prayers but still the answer hasn't come and a thousand hopes left broken can't begin to tell you why he's asking you to wait but here in the silence [Music] he won't let go [Music] our god is always dear to those who call upon his name and he said that he'd be with us when we're walking through the flame so tell your heart to trust him in [Music] cause he will make [Music] many times before and if there's one thing i know for sure [Music] is [Music] [Music] sometimes i try to tell what jesus means to be and i find myself searching for words to say just what i need i never can't quite describe how good he's been to me but i know whatever [Music] that's just what he is [Music] [Music] this world has [Music] foreign [Music] for foreign [Music] many times before when it's been announced that i was going to preach i've heard what what sounded like groaning moaning wailing gnashing of teeth i don't know if you noticed it this morning when you said it uh there was almost like a a response it seemed to me like uh everything was right in the world just you know people like oh it's a holiday it's the holiday preacher yeah there's there's worse things to be known for i i guess than that but uh someone asked me uh before service tonight why the holiday preacher what what's that all about and will through no you know conscientious choice the first several times that i stood it's been about i think coming up on three years that that we've been blessed to be here uh with you guys but um i think the first time i preached was super bowl sunday the second time was valentine's day the third time was st patrick's day the fourth time was memorial day and i thought wow there's a pattern here somewhere just get ready for the next holiday here it comes so but thankful to stand tonight and the holiday preacher is back up everything's returned to normal life is good everything's going to get better turn in your bibles if you will to uh proverbs the book of proverbs chapter 4 verses 20 through 27 is where i'd like to read from proverbs 4 20 through 27 as you're turning to that i thought about this tonight if you sang the chorus of he abides tonight then you've already said hallelujah right says hallelujah he abides with me so if you're the shy type and have a hard time expressing it you've already been saying it you might as well say it during the message can at least say it at one time when i say and finally you'll say hallelujah he's done proverbs 4 verse 20 if you found it will you stand to honor god for the reading of his word proverbs chapter 4 verse 20 through 27. god's word says my son attend to my words and cline thine ear unto my sayings let them not depart from thine eyes but keep them in the midst of thine heart for they are life unto those that find them and held to all their flesh keep thy heart with all diligence for out of it are the issues of life put away from thee a froward mouth and perverse lips put far from thee let thine eyes look right on and thy eyelids look straight before thee ponder the path of thy feet and let all thy ways be established turn not to the right hand nor to the left remove thy foot from evil god we thank you for this opportunity to stand for these good people to hear what saith the lord so lord we'd ask tonight that you would use me god as you've called and ordained and anointed me lord i i know that i'm your man i know that tonight is is the turn uh in in the order of things god for me to bring the message that we should hear so lord being obedient unto that i pray that each one that's here would be equally obedient lord allow the words then to come to our ears and better still to our hearts dear god where we would hear what saith the lord and and respond dear god as you would urge us to respond we don't always have to come to the altar dear lord but if you urge and you desire for us to come lord i pray that we'll be we would be obedient to the spirit of god to the urging and ministering of the holy spirit here tonight have your will within the message within me dear god within each one of us we glorify you we praise you now in jesus name amen i was at the uh the gym the other day and uh um i uh uh ran into a guy that i knew there i picked him up after a knock me down though we we just we just talked to one another and and he what i noticed was he has a teenage son that was there with him most times and now that school's back in session he was still there and so i asked him i said is your son not enrolled in school or you know what's good and he said we homeschool our son and i bring this up to say this that i immediately said to him and please no disservice to anyone that's a public school teacher i said i would at least have my child if i had to do it all all over again in the world in which we live in today i would have my child in a private school or i would have my child home schooled because i i just i cannot believe the agenda that is being set forth by our government to try and indoctrinate world views contrary to the word of god into all of the children and and i say that this is a great message if i was preaching on teaching that this would be good it's not i i lay this as a foundation that we should as a church then be thankful for the church that we have be thankful for the school that we have be thankful for the teachers that we have be thankful for the guidance that they give be thankful for the parents that we have that are instilling what saith the lord into the children that's a great message too bad that's not anything to do with the message i in thinking about school starting i remember one of the things that that happened and even for myself the dreaded physical exam is part of school coming back and uh i can remember this uh i went in to see a doctor one time uh just to set the stage i was a sophomore in high school i was five foot seven and a half inches tall and he proceeded to do a scan on me because of scoliosis i was kind of you know bent over at the time and and uh he said the hand scan says when you get done growing you'll be around six feet six inches tall and i remember true story i laughed in his face five seven if i do my hair up right well he wasn't too far off i'm just i'm just saying but the the physical exams that we have if you're in cheerleading if you're in any kind of athletics if you're in band if you're in full contact chess club whatever whatever that is you have to do a physical examination it's got to be done and and so i i thought about this that this portion of scripture that we just read from tonight allows us to examine ourselves and i believe that as god sets this up and lays this out for us he's given us an opportunity if you will to do a spiritual checkup on ourselves many of us are long removed from school and yet this type of checkup is something we should be doing all of the times to ourselves how do we match up spiritually to what saith the lord with god's help tonight i'd like for us to look through and take a look at a spiritual checkup i i want to derail for a moment because that's what i do as a preacher in in 2007 in december of 2007 conference was held here at this church it was the first time that i had been asked to preach at this church do you remember this at all it was on a friday night the message was so powerful it stuck with you all these years no it was on a friday night and it was my first opportunity to preach here and so in support of that and i'm thankful i wish she was not bed bound like she is my mom has had a stroke i know some of you have met her in the past my mom was a character still is but i know charlie i know you met her and and she would have had had had she still had her full health about her i promise you every one of you would know her because she would travel from kissimmee where i'm from and she would come here and she would support because that's who my mom is was and is but i bring her up because that night then uh recently ordained uh just a few months earlier than that in 2007 i had an opportunity to preach here and i said mom this is the biggest church in our conference i said they're going to be here i said i would really appreciate your uh your support and and so she came and and dad came and steph and the kids were here there were others that came uh kevin knew i was preaching he came anyway and and uh so we were we were here and i got done and i'll never forget now in my mind i painted the picture that when i got done my mother would so what would a mother do oh son that was so moving i was so inspired by what you said i could hear the angels singing as you preach son and and so i this is why you would really have loved my mom i remember i walked off the stage and she was here and different ones hey great job brother really enjoyed it never happier when you were finished you know all those types of usual comments i get and and she said to me this is a true story she said you need to lose weight in 2008. wow that it's a wonder i kept preaching i'm just saying but that's the exact words that she said to me was it not because i turned and looked at my wife and you know what i proceeded to tell her i said how are you gonna enforce that i don't live at home anymore maybe you didn't notice in the first part of 2008 in an effort to get in better shape i joined a gym and started working out so even though i didn't live with mom mom still won i want you to plant that this particular proverb in in proverbs chapter 4 starts if you read the first verse with the call out from him to his children what what does he say he says hear you children the instruction of a father and so he's going to proceed to give them words that are written down for each and every one of us but as a father to his sons he held the words that he speaks here so sacred to them he he knew that these were things that they had to guide themselves not just physically but spiritually here is the road map sons that you need to follow and so as we look at these scriptures and we see these verses i promise you that god the father is telling me to be his voice tonight and to each and every one of us say hear now the words of a caring father i'd like to look this evening with god's help i believe there's five things that these verses cover and and i'd like to point those out first i believe god is saying to us he's taking a look over our ears look at verse 20 as as it says attend to my words that word attend means to give heed to literally listen up or or prick your ears i have two dogs at the house and and one of the dogs in particular if nothing's going on and we're watching tv whatever else you know we're not moving in other words that dog will begin to snore and he will snore so loud that you have to turn the tv up or you'll kick him i mean take an affectionate uh glance towards we'll kick him i'm sorry and and try and like get him to wake up because you can't hear the television for that dog snoring but let me adjust myself in the chair let me put my cup down in the cup holder let me make any noise whatsoever and he raises his head he's a schnauzer so he has the beard on him and his beard's all cock-eyed and his head from laying on the ground and he just cranes at me and he looks at me like what are you doing and i say that to say this that's what this means when he says attend unto the words he wants us to get our attention god is moving god's up to something and he wants us to hear what saith the lord attend give heed listen up literally to prick your ears is what that means inclined to my sayings we all need to have tonight a prompt ear god is ever talking are we always listening i read a interesting story about franklin roosevelt the president of the united states and uh how he was just certain that as he went through the receiving line can you imagine being president and how many times you shake so many people's hands that you had no idea who you were shaking the hands of but the story was told that he was convinced that none of these people that would come to hear him or meet him really listen to what he said and so as a as a trial he did this one time through a receiving line and he said he determined himself quietly to each one he would say i killed my grandmother this morning and so he did literally went down the line i killed my grandmother this morning i killed my grandmother this morning i killed my grandmother this morning and you know what people said back to him hey i love your job you're doing great job i'm praying for you keep on keeping on until you got all the way down to the end of the line this is a true story and an ambassador from bolivia was there the last person in line and he shook hands with this ambassador and he said i killed my grandmother this morning and the unfazed in his response the ambassador said that's all right i'm sure she had it coming my point in saying that is this if we're to have a prompt ear make sure that our focus is to hear not just convey to god what's your issues what's your problem what's your troubles but listen to god's response to those things so many times that's all we want god to be for us for our ears sake is listen to me god let me dump on you everything that keeps me up at night now thankfully he's willing to hear all of those things but often times he has a response to you are you listening to what saith the lord not only should we have a uh a prompt ear i believe we need to have a persistent ear sometimes we hear what we want to hear only we say help lord that's what matters most to me but that helped me mean that we need to change sometimes in response to us as as we would call out to him his desire for us is stop doing what you're doing walk in a different direction sometimes god will absolutely tell us uh that that we need to give up something right we'll say lord i can't deal with this and he says well that that's because you need to stop doing this and start doing that you need to stop doing this and start praying more you need to stop doing this and start reading more but we don't hear the lord when the lord's talking to us because we're only concerned on getting our help instead of listening for the whole words of god the finest attractions that that can happen in this world the finest things that we can hear and that we can receive and and that we can be aware of will become deadly to us if we become overly attracted to them and less interested in hearing what saith the lord we cannot give up that see that's the danger of delaying and hearing god because sometimes god will say to us go right sometimes we pray our prayer we say lord i want out of here and he says to get out of here but sometimes he says be still and know that i am god hold on right where you are you ever had to endure or suffer through something sometimes we endure and suffer through things because we don't listen to what god is really saying to us he has a different message for us we just don't want to hear what he has to say or we don't take time to listen to him we should also besides a prompt and persistent ear we need to have a preserving ear determine that god's word should not be a temporary fix it's not about us feeling better it's about becoming a better christian take your medicine do what the doctor has instructed mark twain said the only way to keep your health is to eat what you don't want drink what you don't like and do what you'd rather not that should have been the biggest hallelujah that we that we've got but decide today to give your ear to the lord why it's healthy for us if we do number two god wants to examine our eyes looking it's it's really in two parts it's in verses 21 and 25 let them not depart from thine eyes but keep them in the midst of thine heart and then in 25 with on eyes look right on and let the eyelids look straight before thee so so as he calls these two out in 21 he's saying to keep them in the midst of your heart let them be contained and held in the very center of your affections when when god talks and i want to get too deep or derailed here because one of the checkups he's certainly going to do for us is our heart we'll get into that in just a moment but that that we love and need the most encased into god's words needs to have our eyes on them continually if it's something that god would have for us to go after then our attention should be on those things there's many things in life that we ignore i try to ignore that dog when it snores but it doesn't always work but our vision needs to be on those things in life that god would show and reveal to us that we'll put a spring in our step that'll give us vitality that'll give us the strength that we need to endure the things that we're through and not necessarily just meet our desires verse 25 says we need to have our eyes right on direct all of your energy all of your actions to a right end and keep our thoughts and minds fixed on that straight in that narrow way that leads to it determined to not look to the right or not look to the left are we keeping our eyes on his teachings so that he may guide our vision and even ourselves towards righteousness i read a uh interesting article about a man named matthew paris and and uh he was a writer for the new york times many many years ago he grew up in africa and and he would go then to not only his country of origin but those surrounding countries that were there and he would try to minister to them now the interesting thing about this man was he was a devout atheist and made no bones about it that as as he said it and as he wrote his article he made that clear because by the title of the app of the article it says why africa needs god is the article that he wrote and what was interesting was he said while all of these regions in africa were for the most part very poor and very run down he said the areas that were not only an encouragement to him but were an encouragement to others where those areas in africa that had been ministered to by missionaries that were there the difference that god made in the people that habitated those areas was something as an atheist that he could not ignore he looked at them and he saw them and he saw that their outlook on life and and what they had to face was completely different and his words that really made me think of how that fits so strongly into this was this he said whenever we entered an area worked by missionaries we had to acknowledge that something had changed in the faces of the people that we passed and we spoke to there was something different in their eyes wow you know but but then hoy i got to thinking about this have you ever and i hope you've done this if you've ever been working with someone that's lost and you've invited them to church and then thank god through the ministering of his grace and his mercy there's an invitation that's extended and so they make the choice at that time to come down to an altar and pray and and they pray and you know that you touch heaven how do you know that you feel the anointing of the holy spirit of god he comes down and he reigns down on a heart that's broken and some mending goes on right there at an altar of prayer now i want to ask you and i want to be honest with this typically in anyone who's lost there are a myriad or number of things that are wrong in their life in all reality what's changed at the altar if it was financial problems they still have them if it's a family problem they still have them if they were guilty of a charge and facing a trial of some sort illegal battle truthfully as they prayed through at the altar they still face it what changed they've turned their eyes off of themselves and started looking towards the answer hallelujah i'll sing it i'll sing he abides the chorus we will look differently we will look at things differently when we keep our eyes and our heart with those eyes the intention of our eyes and our vision upon he that can make a difference in our life and i'm thankful for that number three tonight the lord is checking up now on our heart look at verse 23 it says keep thy heart with all diligence for out of it are the issues of life so i would ask the question are we protecting our heart from evil think about this in god's word every time that heart is is mentioned it's really the most comprehensive term for the inward genuine authentic person the heart of each of us is our thoughts our will our affections truly it's the decision battleground if you will where our desire on things and deliberation on motivations or not to be motivated for things and the final point where we decide within ourselves is contained within our heart it's been described as the place of conscious and dis decisive spiritual activity it's here in the center of a person as to which god turns as a result the gates of our heart need to what be continually guarded if we allow the world in if we're careless with the entrance to our heart then what happens bad thoughts fearful thoughts harmful thoughts can sneak in now listen please understand this as i say this i am not downplaying or discrediting the impact of the virus that has resurged and faces faces us it is a very real and very tangible thing and if you don't take cautions that are physical cautions then absolutely uh there could be consequences for that having said all of that the moment that a christian allows a virus to rob them of the peace of god that he'll give you in your heart the moment that we allow fear over an unknown tomorrow to defeat us to continue to trust in god the moment that we let the doorway to our heart just fall apart and fall down and allow in things from in the world to within us is the day that we abandon our heart from god and we give in to our fears and i know that god does not desire that any one of us would have that kind of fear within our life mark chapter 7 verses 21 and 23 say for from for from within out of the heart of men perceive evil thoughts adulteries fornications murders he goes on and i intentionally skip this verse it says all these evil things will come from within and defile the man so we must as this verse says with all diligence or above or greater than all of these things watch over our hearts do you know that heart trouble or strokes is the number one killer in spite of all that we hear and uh see within the within the world nearly three-fourths of all deaths are come from a symptom or trial or trouble with a heart or a stroke what are the symptoms heaviness of the heart chest pain irregular beats palpitation pain sharp or dull within our chest within our shoulder within our arms within our neck within our jaw disorientation or dizziness nausea vomiting fever and there could be so many more that would affect us that are all attributes of a heart attack so i want to ask then what causes and please i'm not i'm not going to charge you a 35 copay what are the causes the issues that can cause heart trouble high blood pressure salt stress worry your job hypertension prolong long time stress or worry improper diet salt saturated fats high cholesterol smoking here's where i'm leaning what can cause spiritual heart problems your diet what we allow into us what we ingest into us good or bad can either help or harm the inward man what else our mind our attitude harmfulness if allowed in hurtfulness if allowed in will more hurt us than anything else spiritual disorders misaligned goals convoluted values defeatist attitudes unclear godly identity in our life and lost holy focus can cause our spiritual heart to deteriorate lack of exercise can hurt our spiritual heart this includes flabby faith poor praying habits laying out of church if you're here on sunday night the holiday weekend i'm talking to you we're glad you're here don't ever think it doesn't matter lack of proper rest or peace can hurt your spiritual heart non-surrender of those things that you're faith that you're facing lack of entrusting your all unto god these are the warning signs for you to fix your heart number four god wonders how is your tongue look at verse 24 it says put away from the froward mouth that means words of ill nature and perverse lips or quarreling lips put them far away from from you is your mouth clean and pure this is speech then that's turned from its true purpose and we need to beware of hastiness or speaking and anger saying things out of turn when we wouldn't reckless words said one to another colossians 3 8 says but now you also put off these things anger wrath malice blasphemy filthy communication out of your mouth determined to speak words that uplift and glorify and edify only i read of a tombstone found in an old english countryside now this tombstone's been here for a number of years in fact it's told that if you want to see these words and read the epitaph if you were that that's on the outside of the stone you'll not only have to stoop down and take a look and make sure you have adequate light it's just been worn but these are the words on the stone beneath this stone a lump of clay lies bella young who on the 24th of may began finally forever to hold her tongue that's a joke folks i mean it really is on that but that's make the first time that you withhold your tongue be when they put you six feet in the ground a true example of not only wisdom but also listening to god is to know when battles that should be fought don't necessarily need to be fought by you i'll give you an example the church that i used to attend there was a man who's now home with the lord who came to me one time and i'm just revealing the facts of this and he said to me jeff you know what this church means to me and i said yes brother i do he had shared it with me he had been in many churches and finally really felt like he had found home and he said i mean you know god has led me here and i said yes brother i know that he has and he he said to me then you know you're going to find this hard to believe but i need to go somewhere else. and i said why do you do you ever hear this it's the most foolish thing in the world he just got done admitting that god led him exactly there and yet the first words out of his mouth are well i'm leaving and what was his cause of of alignment and again your own convictions are your own convictions please understand i'm not i'm not trying to stir up something or cause the message to derail in any way but for him the fact that two or three men were gathering outside of church after church was over and they were smoking on the edge of of the grounds was something that he didn't feel like was acceptable and felt like those men should realize that your body's a temple and you shouldn't be doing those things and i know we've all heard and seen people like this now i point that out because uh this particular man made me look tiny in other words he he probably carried 200 pounds more weight than should be on his body and and i and i said to him i said listen if this is an offense to you who says that you're the person that should confront that who says that god has charged you to open your mouth and go and confront them on the edge of the church and tell them that these things are wrong and you shouldn't be doing this and that i said what if they answer you and say hey buddy you may want to shove away from the buffet a few times i mean i'm i'm just being so don't ever come to me to counsel because that's a brutal honesty that you're going to get out of me i keep going to will keep going to hawaii but but i talked to him and i bring this up because i told him i said you don't always have to be the mouthpiece for god sometimes you may see something that's wrong or something that stirs your heart for you see what he did not know was two out of three of those men had talked to me already and they had said to me i feel so tied to smoking and i want you to help me pray that i would lose the desire to smoke again that's their that was their burden and they felt that burden and i said brother help me pray for them that god would take that away if that's a stumbling stone for you don't go and talk it up don't go and confront it god's not ushered you the holy two by four and said thou shalt go and buffet these men upside the head until they surrender this happen no sometimes the greatest talking we can do is to our heavenly father i feel like i'd be a bad preacher if i didn't tell you this within six months time all three of those men gave up smoking now why bring that up like i said two out of three of them said they didn't want to do it and by him not being confrontational but instead talking to the father it took away the problem sometimes the greatest thing we can do with our tongue is not only to hold it but bring it to the father lastly tonight i'd like for us to look at this i believe god calls us to examine our feet look at verse 26 it says ponder the path of thy feet and let all thy ways be established are we intentionally steadily unwaveringly walking towards god's truth without hesitation or do we as we go kind of way carefully all that we would head towards or do we act or react an emotional haste and then just repeat repent at leisure sometimes we i think we this feels right to me it feels good to me and we do that i uh i know i've mentioned this before but i believe it's a great example of this as as we had ministered in in a a serving capacity at the church that we were at before we came here for 25 years and what i mean by that was i led singing there stephanie played piano there she taught the six seven and eight-year-olds i taught the young adults i was a preacher there i mean there were many roles that we performed at that church it wasn't like we just got here and said lord we want to serve we served there and performed a role there but god made it abundantly clear that you were to go from there now i would like to tell you that kevin campaigned harder than even even ron senior did here from the stage to try and get for us to come here and kevin did oh we could use you there but i'm just being real when i say this how many people play piano in this church how many preachers did you have in the church now what i'm saying is add kevin back in add chris back in but the lord see we would like to have god tell us sometimes will you go here thou shalt go here and advance here and do thus but that isn't always the way that god works for us god told us just start walking and see i had a hard time with that because i'm i'm i'm mr cut and dry you tell me where i'm supposed to go but we visited no less than four different churches and went around to those churches and we weren't i don't want to make sound like we were campaigning or taking offers yeah well what he got for us no we were uncertain where god wanted us to go god told abraham what get up out of your father's house and go where go until i tell you to stop sometimes god guides our feet not with a specific purpose in mind but to simply be obedient because when god said here's home will it never felt any better to be obedient to god and to know here's where god would have us to go church he'll guide our feet for us and sometimes we want it to be decidedly in one direction but sometimes he's just going to let us wander for a while the israelites had to wander for what 40 years in the wilderness but when that time was up what happened he charged him into the promised land be obedient church listen to what saith the lord now i want to close with this and i'll be honest with you i i i enjoyed the way god used me in this message and and helped lead and direct me but i i struggled greatly with what do i close with until i listened to god see that was one of them right turn your ears to him in 2013 i uh i'm going to go back a little bit it's going to be a longer story but you should be used to that by me from me by now in 2013 i had gone to a football game on a saturday and i had uh uh it was not not a normal game i'm a seasoned ticket holder to a college football team and this was at a at another place and the seats that we had honestly were poor seats and what i mean by that was usually i can walk up a little bit and i sit in my seats where we've sat in the same seats for 15 years at the stadium this was an away game and i had the nosebleed seats that's okay so i start walking the spiral to head up to it and three or four times i'm stopping my family and i'm saying hold on i i just can't i can't make this they're looking at me like what what is the deal and i said i i just i don't have the strength in me to go and so we waited on dad and in about halfway through the game our team was losing but we were making a big comeback and you could see it and i turned to steph and i said steph i gotta leave i feel terrible and so we we left from that game uh came home what was my problem i had the worst pain in my jaw in in the side of the right part of my face it just hurt something terrible so bad that my mom susan who was a nurse and and a couple others i talked to him and they had told me and i was actually taking a low-grade antibiotic thinking i had an infected tooth and i'm just giving you full disclosure with this sunday comes and sunday night i preached at bartow church now sometimes when i preach i'm i'm more or less animated unless you're a preacher you really don't understand this you don't set out to be one way or another god uses you and sometimes he would really bring his spirit down and i preached my voice out i had no voice when i was done and just going and i felt terrible after it was done monday work came and the worst day that i've ever felt i went into the first aid kit at the office where i worked and i took ibuprofen i took tums it just hurt i just felt terrible and my jaw hurt it felt something fierce it got a little bit better after monday tuesday came and and it was a bad day but wednesday then i go to my home church and that wednesday night i preached again and again god called and used me in a very strong way that night and i came home and i was just exhausted and my tooth hurt or my jaw hurt is what it felt like and my son said dad can i fix you a bowl of ice cream sounded good to me let me just say any one of you wants to fix me a bowl of ice cream i'm pretty well in i ate the bowl of ice cream and the pain became so intense and i remember sitting there thinking to myself dummy you think something's wrong with your jaw and your teeth why would you take and eat a cold bowl of ice cream i didn't say it was the sharpest crayon in the box i laid in bed that night and i couldn't sleep and i ride and i kept rising up and lowering down and steph said to me will you please let me take you to the to the hospital will you let me bring you to the emergency room and i said man this is far more than the story i say if you're going to take me to lakeland regional i'd i'd rather just stay here and die i mean just we haven't had a really good experience with that i apologize to anybody that works at lakeland regional that's just my experience i've just lost half of the group that's fine she said to me where do you want to go i said i'll go to winter haven in winterhaven i had a friend that i i grew up with that she was a nurse there in winterhaven and i said now i know far more of you i would come irritate you guys instead but i i uh i said let me see if she's working and i messaged her and she said yeah i'm working right now. and steph said why don't we go and i said steph what do i tell them what i do i go into them and i tell them and i say my jaw hurts i said this is the dumbest thing i've ever joined my to my mouth hurts i mean who goes to the doctor for that and she sits there on her phone and she says signs of a heart attack pain in your jaw pain in your neck inability to struggle and you know and do this and i start recounting the last five days and everything she read on that list except for pain in in and around my heart every one of them was there and she said will you please let me take you to winterhaven hospital i said okay let's go to winter haven hospital so we went into winterhaven hospital and uh the nurse said what's going on i said i don't know she she thinks i'm having a heart attack i think i got a bad tooth i mean that that's literally where the the lines were drawn and uh she said to me the nurse i'll never forget it she said we're gonna run an ekg and if your wife is right i'm going to introduce you to 50 of your new best friends and if you're right we'll figure out what's wrong with your tooth we'll get you on a better antibiotic whatever it is we got done and we walked out and her parents had come they lived close to winterhaven and so as we came out and uh and i barely sat down the door to the er busted open and out came a wheelchair and that same lady and she said mr white i have 50 of your new best friends i'd like to introduce you to and i told my wife i said here we go and sure enough on monday what i thought was tooth pain indigestion i had had a heart attack and all of the symptoms that led up to that was that i promise you i'm going somewhere with this i'm almost done the very next day they did a heart cath on me one of the most nerve-wracking things i'm going to guess there's several of you that have been through it in my case they did it through my wrist and so it was the strangest thing to have your arm stuck out like this see two doctors standing there because literally they want you awake for at least part of it and two doctors standing there at the extent of my long arm and they're working on my heart and they're like how you doing jeff and i'm like i don't know what how you doing you know what are you doing in there and i will never forget this because we came out and the cardiologist met steph and i and he said to me mr white you're very very fortunate man he said while you're overweight and you need to lose weight he said i can tell that you've been working out i said how can you tell that how can you tell that he said your heart has learned to map pathways around the blockage in your heart from the working out that you and it saved your life so in 2008 when my mother said you need to lose weight in 2008 it saved my life true story i say all of that to say this that as solomon says my son give ear to what saith the lord pay attention he's talking to you church today those things that we'll set into work those things that we'll allow god to do in our lives those times when we temper our tongue when we want to say something those times when we listen when it's not what we want to hear those times when we safeguard our heart and we protect it we say lord i know i don't have the answers but fear harm is not going to reside here because you're guarding my heart lord and i believe it those times when we would walk and we would confront or we get upset in church and say we're going to leave or whatever that is we're just gonna walk out we can't deal with this and god says just stick around for a little bit be still and know that i'm god those actions that we do have a ripple effect in our life we all one day want to enter into heaven and hear him say what well done thou good and faithful servant enter into the joys of the lord the only way we're going to hear that is if we safeguard ourselves and we realize it's worth listening to god will you come and get a song we get a song of invitation you're here this evening you have a need in your life you want to be remembered in prayer would you just slip up your hand tonight by that saying would you pray for me i have a need god knows what it is but i want to be remembered in prayer bless those hands tonight how many have loved ones who need jesus in their life i want to remember them amen god we love you we thank you for the message thank you for for jeff god i pray lord that we would heed these words these wise words from this proverb the god that will protect our eyes and our feet and our heart and what we do what we say where we go god i pray that you'll continue watching over us for those who raise their hand tonight god you know the need in their life and others who raise their hand for loved ones who need jesus god you know the the people the names the places god i pray that you can pick them of their need of you have your way in every heart and life this evening we ask all these things in your precious day amen as we stand together as we sing the invitation song you need to come and pray would you step out and come [Music] [Music] is [Music] and when he speaks my heart [Music] complications [Music] when is speaks [Music] enjoy that message tonight let's get brother jeff a hand wonderful job excellent job i asked jeff to make his way back to the vestibule if he would do have a few announcements to remind you this wednesday all young people will be inside the sanctuary uh brother heath ferguson from texas will be here to speak to preach for us and so be praying for that and then next sunday we will have our sca day of course we're also continuing inviting people we have our cards here uh to invite people this september especially so if you need some cards pick those up hand those to your neighbors friends family members but this uh this sunday will be sca day we're going to have food we're going to have bouncies we'll even have a separate location for the kids to eat pizza and the bouncies in the gymnasium hopefully so you can drop them off in there and then enjoy lunch uh youth competition is doing their luncheon in the cafeteria so that's this coming next sunday coming up hope you'll come back for that any other announcements before we are dismissed yes revival brother joe tolbert will be at shadybrook uh this week till friday i believe so uh let's remember that that meeting going on all right all right come back wednesday night and uh we'll pray for another good time of the lord brother archie would you dismiss us in prayer this evening

Channel: First Free Will Baptist Church

Views: 182

Rating: 5 out of 5

Keywords: Jeff White, Tampafreewill, FIrst Free Will Baptist, Church, Tampa, Florida, Seffner, Jesus, Jesus Christ

Id: C3qCOsVd87w

Length: 59min 16sec (3556 seconds)

Published: Mon Sep 06 2021