Session Eleven | M.E.A.T. Houston 2021

[Music] uh [Music] uh praise god you may be seated what an awesome awesome awesome presence of god has been manifested in this place while the lord cannot come and go because he is feels all space he does reveal and or hide himself he does the scripture says that before i get started uh brother that's on the computer there if you will give me your email address i will send you right now the list of the scriptures i'll be using because there are many media sanctuary.org dot global woo we are in a global sanctuary today praise god now i realize that some of you have planes to catch and all that god bless you love you glad you've been here when you need to go you just have to go uh but i'm going to finish today what the lord has given me to do and i don't have anything where to be till 11 o'clock in the morning now you kind of ran out on me a little bit yesterday ran out of focus and energy but that's okay it was uh difficult to hear this is um i've spent three sessions with the holy ghost emptying out this session the holy ghost is putting in um the lord said to me the things i'm going to be covering today they are high points i cannot go into each one of these subjects except for enough to hopefully create the holy ghost to create some enough hunger and thirst that you will apply yourself to studying these things fact that scripture gave me these the lord gave me these scriptures john 5 39 search the scriptures for in them you think you have eternal life and they are they which testified me you don't ever accomplish that it's never finished i never get done searching the scriptures to see whether or not i have eternal life then matthew chapter 9 verses 12 and 13 says but when jesus heard that he said unto them they that behold need not a physician but they that are sick but go ye and learn what that meaneth i will have mercy and not sacrifice for i am not come to call the righteous but sinners to repentance we we preachers are used to making statements and hopefully we're making statements that the lord is saying through us but i have to be honest with you most of the time i despair of the hope that people are actually going to take what's said and go home and nurture it until it becomes their own now some people take notes while you're ministering and others don't and i have very mixed feelings on that frankly because sometimes people get so involved in trying to get all the notes taken that they don't they don't maintain the flow because it's two different things i'm listening and i'm writing and for me personally when i'm when god is talking to me personally in my prayer i hear so i get it that way and then when i'm writing it down and i'm having to process it to write it down and i'm meditating on it as i'm trying to to make notes on what he's saying so that i can go back and have a record of that and study it and whatever uh there is a benefit to that but the but when the spirit is moving if i'm making notes while the spirit is moving many times i miss it because it's like i'm not a surfer and don't intend to ever become a surfer but i have been in a few situations where i've been able to sin for a few minutes and watch and the timing necessary for that surfer to recognize that wave is coming and response respond to that wave so that they get the maximum ride with it is very very it's a very small window of response time and the spear of the lord rarely comes as a stream like a creek usually the spirit of the lord comes in waves and you have to be sensitive to that wave to be able to respond and catch it just right to be able to let it take you all the place that you're going to go and i've been places where i've watched uh watch people surf in two to three foot waves and it's not a long ride but that's all they had because to get graves you have to have greater disturbances to create those waves there has to be greater uh uh uh geological formations underneath the water that causes the increase of those waves and i have uh i have watched uh surfers where i was in places and it's very i love to take photographs i'd rather take pictures of them doing than doing it myself because i'm too old to learn that and i don't know if i want to learn but anyway so but i've watched in 10 12 15 foot waves and the the length of the ride's amazing and then you go on youtube and you can watch some people that were surfing 40 and 50 foot waves well when you you don't ever there's no experts on the holy ghost the moment somebody proposes themselves or present themselves as an expert on the things of the spirit run away i mean that very sincerely i don't trust as far as i can pick up and throw somebody who is an expert on the things of the spirit because if you're an expert on the things of the spirit you're proposing you're an expert on god and there aren't any i i'm not endorsing billy graham at all but there's one statement that i read that he made that i'm wholeheartedly in agreement with someone asked him one time what about the bible what about this and that is the bible true and how in in all this all this and he said billy graham said uh you're talking to the wrong person you're wanting to talk to an expert a theologian i'm not a theologian i'm just a student of the bible i don't try to pick it apart i take it at face value and believe it right here okay now i know some of the technical things about the bible and there are translations that i have more confidence in in others because i know that the the stories behind the the manuscripts that they were translated from and the cultural and purposes of that i mean one of the greatest greek scholar experts i don't read any of his writings because he was a nazi but most people don't know that so they take his writings at face value but you can go you can go on the source of all information wikipedia and read his story and he was a nazi a nazi sympathizer i don't know i just can't read his stuff but something about that it just i didn't i don't but anyway uh i know but but as i have already said to you i am not trying to have mature adult faith the goal is to have childlike faith when jesus talked about great faith great faith is childlike faith you said it i believe it in the story okay so we we have we've emptied out and the whole purpose of today even though some of these points many of you will have already heard from me and hopefully from others but but i wonder how many of you have ever gone home and really done your own study on these subjects and every single thing i'm going to hit as a high point today are major seasons of my life of revelation and impartation that i got on my own in study and prayer and i don't ever study without prayer i study by the spirit with the spirit through the spirit directed by the spirit i don't read the bible without the holy ghost present i don't read the bible and do not study intellectually i the lord directs me well i want to do a systematic study if he told you to do it great but while you're wasting your time doing that systematic study he very well may have something he's wanting to show you if you'll immerse yourself in study and this and that and the other and i read you verses yesterday where the scripture proves conclusively you and i will never intellectually understand god by human effort all understanding of god is imparted one of my favorite verses on this subject is in romans chapter one i think it's verse 20 21 somewhere along there that in the wisdom of god god has determined that by wisdom man can't find god god has set this whole thing up so that you cannot find him intellectually and yet you go to acts chapter 17 and it says that every one of us can find him if we feel after him because he's not very far from any one of us why so that even a little child can find him a little child we were in africa for a church building dedication was going to be the headquarters church and they were going to use it for bible school and my youngest son who's now 40 uh was two months shy of being five and i'm sitting on the platform he's sitting on the front row by himself and his mother sitting on the road right behind him they are singing songs ah i forget the name of the language but it was in malawi i don't remember which what language it was but they were singing the songs in their language i didn't know the names of the songs i didn't know the words of the songs but the spirit of the lord was so strong in that place that that four year 10 month old child on the front row started worshiping and had stammering lips all by himself and you know what dad wanted to do dad wanted to rush off the platform and put my hands on his head and the holy ghost said no and i looked at his mother in the eye and said no and the national assistant the the assistant general superintendent of malawi god sent him to that boy and prayed him through the holy ghost right there and all i was allowed to do was watch but the holy ghost did all of that there was no intellect involved it was spirit i need to have enough intelligence to shut up and listen i've said this before i do not figure stuff out in the bible i do not i don't sit around and try to put the jigsaw pieces of scripture verses together on the subject i pray and as i'm directed i study and i listen and i simply write down what i hear and he lays it all out and he is no respecter of persons i don't have a prayer time and i and then i have a separate study time it is just so interwoven as the holy ghost does that as i am spending that focused time with him where i'm doing nothing else and of course i want to stay connected and have that flow all through the day but that season of of just listening and if you're praying and dismissing the thoughts that come in your mind because they're interrupting your prayer you're missing it and i can't tell you the number of times i'm either praying about this or i'm praying in tongues and then these random thoughts just come through my mind they're just they don't have anything to do with whatever i'm praying or thinking about just random quote unquote stuff but i've learned there's nothing random and that's why i used to do it with one of those little small legal yellow notepads i'd write it down but you know i'm an apostolic apparently because uh i i am almost never out of reach of my phone or and or my ipad not because of why you think but because i always want something to write on immediately i always want the scripture hander handle handy all the time i want it i i i'm always listening i'm you know that's a lot of folks can't hear from god because they talk too much because they're not praying unless they're talking some of the greatest prayer meetings i ever had i've ever been a part of between the lord and i i almost didn't do any talking at all i just sat and listened wrote down what i was hearing and he's no respecter of persons so here's the uh subject today we must be before we can biblically do we must biblically be before we can biblically do that's another way of saying what i've already said you have to have a relationship with god that can support the ministry in the word and the spirit you want and the thing you produ you pursue the most is not ministry you pursue god you pursue relationship and the greater your relationship grows god brother libby preached this years ago it's a beautiful message and i've used it many times he preached god as a god of balance if you focus on seeking the gifts of the spirit god is going to focus on developing the fruit of the spirit in your life if you focus on having the fruit of the spirit in your life god is going to focus on producing the gifts of the spirit of your life because god is a god of balance those folks those preachers in the pentecost over the years ago i'm a word preacher you're a reprobate i said that i didn't say that strong enough but that's as strong as i can get away with it why because every apostolic that rails on trinitarians for dividing god up into three people that then divides grace from truth or truth from grace that divides word from spirit or spirit from word is doing just as much harm and to the things of god and the work of god it's those that divide god up into father son and holy ghost people so i had a verse i didn't use i'm going to use it here um it's not in those things of course it wouldn't be right third john verse 2 says beloved i wish above all things that thou mayest prosper and be in health even as thy soul prospered there's the verse for what i'm talking about i need a balance in my life all this prosperity preaching all this health preaching well we're seeking prosperity we're seeking health if you get that out of proportion with the prosperity of your your soul you are unbalanced some of you are going to get on an airplane go home today you better thank god that there are experts that do on every flight what those passengers never even think about they balance weight in that plane both cargo and passengers have you ever been on a flight that wasn't full and they asked you to change seats do you know why they don't want to die they don't want you to die either because an unbalanced plane the laws of aeronautics do not work correctly in an unbalanced plane you ever seen a boat that was loaded all on one side the other and it's trying to go through the water like this it's not stable that which is not balanced is unstable and in calm it may survive but in storms that which is spiritually unbalanced will not survive and so if you're all word and no spirit or all spirit and no word you may be okay in normal life but you will not be okay in in in the in the life that jesus promised he said the things the the the uh these things have i spoken unto you that in me you might have peace in the world you shall have tribulation that's the life he prophesied we would have is no heaven on earth there's no plan of his to produce heaven on earth i've said this many times the hush era i don't always identify but he said to me as a young pastor he said brother right the lord will always leave a measure of crisis in your life every day of some kind the crisis may change from day to day but there will never be a day without some kind of crisis because god is never going to let you forget you need him every day balance so again if we want to biblically do we have got to first biblically be you know and i i started out in the ministry mission i'm a very mission focused person uh was in a marriage seminar in january of 1993 and uh brother keith joe strand was there and he was doing he had us all husbands and wife do the briggs meyers standardized personality test he said if you can understand what makes your mate tick and understand yourself you don't can understand how they interact you can do better and i'm and you know this all sounds like hocus pocus to me but anyway that day i got a revelation believe it or not so we did this test and uh and i don't know some of you know the letters or whatever i am an intp he's standing there and he's not naming names he's just naming combinations if you are this and he gives four letters my wife is an isfj which is exactly the opposite except for the eye but she tested out so extreme i introvert that my borderline introvert makes me look like an extrovert compared to her now i am an introvert without the flow i am an extrovert with the flow and so people hear me minister and they think i know i know i understand all of it you don't know anything about me quarantine has been no problem for me at all my wife says you'd be okay sitting in this seat and never leaving the house would you uh yeah absolutely yeah next what else you want to talk about that's settled she's this extreme introvert and but she's the ever-ready bunny she cannot stand to sit she got to be doing something her idea of taking a break is changing what she's doing i like just being but i so anyway so he names all these off and he says and now this is the rarest of all personality types and he says this personality type is the least people oriented of all personality types and i'm going uh oh he before even said it i knew he said if you're intp the word we would use to describe you is visionary but you are mission focused you're not people focused well for the first time i knew that i was weird because god made me weird because if humans could come up with a test to identify me and ever all of that was ever been it was true it was really true it was like hocus pocus it was scary right okay but it was true so i had the first at the first i always felt weird strange compared to everybody else and he said it's the rarest one you know and so i you don't need very many i don't meet very many intps i don't know about all this color stuff i don't know all i know about orange is i like to drink it so if you're one of those colors god bless you my daughter-in-laws in the colors god bless the color stuff i am i'm blue i don't know what that means personality type but i like blue i almost always have some color blue on some place i just like blue because it's god's favorite color you know that it's true the sky is blue and the water's blue you know why both of those are blue because it takes the sunlight to make the color so when the light shines through the water in the sky it produces a color blue now green that's all produced from the earth army green navy blue you got it unfortunately you think i'm just kidding with you no if you've been paying attention i have worn some color blue or in fact my wife is thinks i've gone crazy because i now have a blue watch and several different blue bands and i'm now now i have me a couple of different blue wedding bands she just shakes her hand i i don't know i just that's like blue but anyway so intp and i go up to brother joe strand after service and i said okay you've really helped me tonight i find out that if if if people that don't know me can describe me and it's accurate and my strengths and my weaknesses then i have to give some credence to that that means god actually made me this way for his purpose but i don't understand why would he make someone so not people focused and called them to preach and he said something to me it really helped me he said this is why god uses you so much because you know you can't do this you know that without god you can't do it and so every day i pray to not only receive the love of god to love him back with all of my heart soul mind and strength my whole being but also to receive his love so that i can be his conduit of his love through me to my neighbor so i love but i don't love with human love i don't have enough that to do it with but here's the secret even though that those that think they're full of it is only full of human love and that's not good enough for jesus so enough of that it is now 1201 you ready everybody set your watches i'm going to give you a progressive maturity chart of things that need to become mature in you so you can mature in the next thing you cannot randomly mature in these things i didn't even know god was doing this until he showed me after the fact on things and of course the problem is many of us struggle to grow in god because we're trying to grow out of sequence and we get some growth in these areas but we do it so randomly now i'm not even teaching from ii peter 1 where it says add to your virtue this and to that which is a sequence okay i'm not even referring directly to that but point i'm making to you in in personal growth and spiritual development god has god has things that he does in sequence and it's not that he never works on other areas but the maturity level each one is a foundation for the next one and the next one and the next one and the next one and again i've got the holy ghost and i've got the word of god and i can be i can grow in in all of those things to some degree at the same time i'm talking about coming to a place where it is absolutely a working concept that you can defend on or depend on a working concept or principle that you can depend on on your daily life that it's so much now a part of you you don't even have to think about doing it because your whole nature mentally emotionally spiritually physically is changed in this new direction and isn't that what we believe in transformation any church that does not preach for expect and settle for nothing less than change is not of god somebody said to me the other a few months ago and i never thought about it so i said brother you know what's so different about your ministry than a lot of people i said i don't have a clue which dogma this person said to me you never minister without bringing people to a place of having to make a decision about what you're talking about and i looked at this person who said that's unusual you mean isn't that the purpose of all ministry to bring people to a place where you present the change the need for change and the word repentance of course in the greek means change change of mind change of direction and so since i'm supposed to be living a changing life or or a a a growing life i'm supposed to be living a changing life and there's no growth without change and there's no change that doesn't produce some type of growth but grow you don't change for the sake of change but you in order to grow you must change because if there's no such thing as growing that's static we live we we enjoy that you know sometime this afternoon i'm going to eat some food what i'm eating didn't get i'm not eating it in the form that it first started out as the whole principle of life is there's no growth without change growth produces change and when does the lord say okay you've arrived that's enough you don't ever have to grow anymore it's not true it's not true so every day is a it's a searching a reaching submitting okay lord uh whatever you're doing today you know and and and we've all done this okay so if i take this step today it doesn't look like i've gone very far but i take another step tomorrow and i still have it and i take another step the next day and it just looks like i'm not accomplishing anything i just next day just take another step and every day i just take this step just however far the lord has taken me just each day and all of a sudden i kind of come to myself and go wow look how far i'm i've come but i don't know how far i've come to like he gives me glimpses back because right now all i'm seeing is i'm just taking a step if i'm living in the moment all i'm taking is a step i don't really understand how much change is accomplished till i look back from where i come from remember the pit from which you were digged what's the what's the old not old saying but the saying it's not original with me i am not i'm not what i want to be i'm not what i'm going to be but i'm also not what i used to be i put that another way always thankful but never satisfied always thankful but never satisfied that's biblical always thankful never satisfied you know the wilderness was not the greatest place in the world to be but most people didn't backslide in the wilderness but the whole nation backslid in the promised land why because they took over houses they didn't build they reaped harvest from fields they they didn't plow and sow they reap harvest from vineyards that they didn't tend and cultivate the process is as much a part of keeping as saved as the destination of the process is and when i resent the process i resent what the lord is doing in my life so here we go every one of these things when i mention you're going to go well yeah good well yeah so show me the studies you've done so you can dig deep into understanding each of these subjects then then i'll accept your will yeah god loves us well yeah what's next really i had that experience this year this last 12 months one day the lord began to talk to me about the love of god and i thought okay lord i yeah you love us i got that really i do he said i want you to do a series in the studio on the love of god okay well i i listened and i put down a few scriptures and i thought okay i probably could get two or three four lessons out of that hmm so i go before i get to the studios i walk in there adam breckenridge some of you know who that is uh he is my head media guy and we work closely together and so i walked in the studio and i'm setting up for the very first lesson and uh actually what i'd what the lord did he he's so slick he's i don't mean that derogatory he's he's just really good at getting you to do what he wants you to do without having to tell you what the plan is so he gave me this lesson on uh the love of god and i want you to do a a a a a live video a live lesson streaming on all the plants facebook everything on the love of god oh yeah that's often i love to do that so i'm sitting there in them and i you know and i already began to get a little inkling because god is love and he began to say to me okay so you think you know the love of god so that means you know me to the extent you need to know me because if you know my love the extent you need to know me know my love then you know me to the extent you need to know me so we don't have anything else to talk about you're ready to stop right here that's okay he said because i am love and you don't know anything more about me than you know about my love because i am love and you don't know any more about love than you know about me because i am love and the subject of my love is as exhaustive as the subject of me well all of a sudden i'm getting the idea and so i say to adam before i do that first video i i think this subject is bigger than i thought so i sat there and i went about two hours on that uh streamed video you know live stream and i'm in the middle of the lord says now i want you to take this and go come back and do lessons 30 minute lessons whatever they were on that so i said so so i came back and started and i thought i was going by this time it was about 12 13 lessons i'm four lessons in he said now take this part and make that into part two and add this and so part 1 became like 13 lessons and so now i've got part 2 and it's like 12 lessons and i'm halfway part 2 and he says now this is part 3. oh thank you for telling me while i'm actually talking in the studio recording that's where i get the direction there's part three and i'm in lesson one of part three and he said oh and that one lesson you got at the end that's not one lesson that's 13 more lessons that's part four so on on youtube right now there are 50 lessons on the love of god so you'll see right now why i'm saying i'm only trying to incite your own study and i'm going to tell you what what he is what he's done in my life is actually contrary to everything i've just said about the sequence i just didn't know that needing to fully understand to whatever degree he was willing to let me have it at this point was so critical to shoring up the main foundation why because the number one you ready the number one result in my life of truly knowing and believing the love of god is i will fear nothing and to the degree that i fear that's the degree to which i do not know and trust the love of god period in the story there's no yell buts there's none first john chapter 4 verse 16 and we have known and the greek word there means not only intellectual knowledge but experiential knowledge we have known or experienced and believed or to trust in completely trust and rely upon the love that god hath to us god is love god is love and he that love he that dwelleth in love dwelleth in god and god in him i had a an apostolic preacher say to me a couple of years ago love love love some churches are all about nothing but love and i'm thinking to myself and you just said you don't have a clue about the love of god because i want to know what it is what else it can it be about because everything that is not about the love of god is not about god because god is love now what he was talking about i understand and agree with he was talking about those that pervert the subject of love meaning that god loves us we can live any way we want to and he loves us so much he's still going to save us that's a lie from the pits of hell but everything is about love and the adversary is really really smart not he's not there's no comparison between him and god's mark but compared between us and him smart he's smarter than us he proved that in the garden and he proves it all the time he knows how critical it is that you and i believe the love of god so what does he do for us he doesn't care which ditch you get out of the road in as long as it's a ditch he doesn't care if you get in the ditch where you don't believe god loves you or where you believe some perverted love he doesn't care which one it is as long as it's not the true understanding of the true love of god he doesn't care and he's done that with everything he's done that with grace he's done that with the word he's done that with salvation he's done that with worship he's done it with ministry he he he has either though he either wants you to he prefers for you to believe none of it but if you're going to believe something he wants to pervert it so you're believing something that's not the word and that's why you have to be balanced so listen to this we have known to believe the love that god after us god is love and he that dwelleth in love dwelleth in god i mean if you have childlike faith you read that it means what it says says what it means you don't look for some way to explain that it doesn't say this verse 17 here is our love made perfect the word perfect doesn't mean flawless it means our love is brought to a place of maturity of completion and the greek word not only speaks of completion and maturity but fruitfulness so when my love is made perfect it produces in and through me things that glorify god but when my experience and my trust and the love of god is mature what does it say that for this cause the word that is for this cause for this purpose that we may have boldness in the greek word there is confidence in the day of judgment which is the greek word crisis which became an english word because as he is who are we in this world how can i as a child of god that have experienced the love of god and i my trust is in god because he is love therefore my trust is in the love of god how can i not have confidence in god in any crisis now i'm not saying that to find fault with you i'm saying to you that's one of your gauges that's an indicator i've been talking about that all week if i'm battling fear my problem isn't fear fear is the symptom the problem is i don't have it fully experienced and i don't fully trust the love of god so i can't fix my problem by trying to get rid of fear i can only fix my problem by by growing in the my knowledge and understanding and experience with the love of god because when i am absolutely confident god loves me i will fear nothing next verse there is no fear in love there is no fear in love the greek word there are several different greek words for to express the negative this one is not the conditional negative this is the absolute negative there is absolutely no fear in love fear and the love of god cannot rule in our lives or participate in our lives simultaneously it is one or the other when i am fearing i am not knowing and trusting the love of god when i am knowing and trusting the love of god i cannot fear now we all know that by experience we all have times where it's one or the other but it's rarely ever whatever but god is ready for his church to get to the place where we can be fearless why why because in the situation that we are entering into now you will you and i will not open our mouths to speak to a lost person because of the jeopardy it might put us or any or our loved ones or our church in so what are we going to do we're not going to have boldness or confidence in the day of crisis we're going to keep our mouth shut instead of letting the will of god be the will of god instead of doing what god wants us to do we are going to protect ourselves by keeping our mouth shut satan wins god loses and the only way you and i can be willing to do that is the love of god stephen do you think he absolutely had no idea of how bad that could turn out and let's just be let's just be blunt about it that day he's speaking and you're one of his brothers and friends and you don't you're not under that flow of anointing and so you're you're over on the side maybe you're kind of hidden away going stephen shut up man look at their faces can't you see stephen stop this isn't going to turn out well and he's just blazing away at that moment there wasn't a crowd standing up with him a brethren in support on the day of pentecost peter standing up with the eleven on that day the eleven stood with peter in front of a large crowd in the street going what is this all about but when stephen was preaching there's no indication anyone was standing with him oh my it went as bad as it could go they killed him and on that day that night while they were trying to deal with stephen's death and they're sitting around in small groups and and uh you know talking to one another i i didn't feel good about that while he was doing it no i i i tried to get this attention until him shut up but he just didn't listen boy we need to learn from that because that's dangerous business yo blah blah blah blah because we've got the benefit of hindsight and it's so normal to us we don't even see any trial or test in it there's no way stephen saw the outcome of that that his the testimony of his life and death and you know of course that the greek word translated testimony is literally the greek word that's almost letter for letter when the when the the english equivalent letters are substituted for the greek letters it's almost exactly the greek english word martyr because uh witness is not truly a witness who's not willing to put their life on the line for what they're saying the most powerful witness is the one who's willing to put their life on the line for what they're saying but you and i aren't going to do that if we're more afraid than moving to the love of god we're not going to do it well maybe it's not being killed that we're afraid of we're just afraid of being talked bad about maybe we're afraid of people being upset with us well the person that's afraid to speak the word of god the way he wants it said not only struggling with fear but it's fear of man not even fear of the devil it's the fear of man and i've said it before galatians chapter 1 if i seek to please men and not christ i cannot be the servant of god you hear me right now more than ever in the history of the church god is never going to allow people to be pleased with what pleases him for you to do and say i'm going to happen the only people that will be pleased with what you say are those that want god like you want god those that don't want god like you don't want god like you want god those that don't want god like you you want god they're never going to be pleased with what you say never and if you water down what god's trying to say the way he wants to say it it's not enough to say what god wants to say i've got to say it like he wants it said that means if he wants to speak softly and i yell it in anger i i that's just as bad as not saying what he wants to say if he wants to say it strongly with authoritative force and and i say it gently because i don't want to ruffle to anybody's feathers i've failed god i've failed god i failed god and finally well verse 18 again there is no fear in love there is no fear in love perfect love casts without fear because fear hath torment he that feareth has immature love he that feareth hasn't grown up in love they're not a grown-up in love they're still a child in love he that fears we live in a culture that's so against absolute statements absolute truths that we christians now approach the bible and nothing in the bible is absolute to us if we're not careful everything in the bible is a suggestion not an absolute truth but i read you the verse yesterday where jesus said that we're going to be judged by his words verse 19 we love him because he first loved us there are two things that the the love of god absolutely are the directly produces in my life the first one is mercy i have no hope of mercy without no without the love of god it is the love of god that offers me mercy and then on a day-to-day basis and from a salvation perspective the greatest gift of his love is righteousness let me demonstrate to you how even in the church we don't get it how many even in the apostolic church struggle with the fact that good people are just as lost as bad people or how about this one how many of us truly believe that self-righteousness is just as repulsive to god as unrighteousness yeah and all of that is because we don't understand the righteousness of god i've told the story i'm going to tell it again quickly my wife and i are are away for our 20th anniversary we're in a very beautiful place and and i've i've been struggling with me all week i've been struggling struggling with me it is november of 1988 and our 20th anniversary and i'm struggling i'm just struggling with me and uh it was the last full morning of the last full day there i'm up early and i i'm i'm in the restroom trying to pray because the only place i could pray without just disturbing her and i'm sitting there just praying just i was just in there praying and so i'm praying and and i just i was so fed up with me i finally just blurted out and said and up until this time all of my concept of understanding of righteousness was based on my cultural the cultural presentation of righteousness to me and that is all my life i was taught in the upci that you are right by doing right you become righteous by doing right that is a lie from the pits of hell there is absolutely no there not only is no biblical basis for being righteous by doing right it is exactly the opposite of what the scripture says i can only be righteous as a gift and all the righteousness that i do is because i've been made righteous so i don't do right to become righteous i become righteous to do right now i'm sitting there and i say to god just totally frustrated it's hopeless i wonder i didn't wake her up i don't mean she might have heard me it's hopeless i'm a sinner i've always been a sinner i'm always going to be a sinner because i'm trying to do what i was raised to believe i've got to be perfect i can't ever any sin is just so hopeless it's just hopeless and i don't want to be hopeless and so any shortcoming any failure it's just i'm hopeless i'm i'm supposed to be perfect i'm a pentecostal i'm saved i've got to be perfect here and i want to be righteous and in order to be righteous i got to do right and anytime i don't do right and part of doing right is not doing wrong see right and it was one of those prayers you pray where you you expect god to go no that's okay you're not really a sinner it's okay i got this no he didn't do that he said you're right just blew me away all my hope just left just when i'm done i'm finished god says i'm right i'm a sinner i've always been a sinner all going to be a sinner and he paused it was that pregnant pause and i'm in i'm i i am my proverbial heart dropped to the bottom of my stomach and i i i'm okay it's over i i got no hope and then finally he says but i'm in you and i'm good and you're good not because of who you are you're good because i'm good and i'm in you and he said and that's righteousness and so what did i do exactly what i am begging you to do with these subjects as the lord leads you you don't have to be a greek scholar or a bible scholar do you have a concordance do you have a way to copy and paste scriptures into a document all you have to do is copy and paste get in your concordance and sometimes there's a lot of scripture get in your concordance and copy and paste scriptures that has that word in it and then you'll find the related words because just justified justification is the process and and right righteous and righteousness they're all they're all part of that same thing and you put all those verses in there and then i begin to study because i can go into the greek now i found out that just or right uh just justified justification are all a part of the same family of the exact same family of greek words of right righteous and righteousness it's all it all works together and i came home and started with the very first message after i got home without having any intent to do so i was just studying and then the lord would pick something out of what i was studying and said talk about this tonight i went 33 straight services on righteousness with no intention to do so and you hear me right now i didn't come close to scratching the surface to this day i'm still learning about righteousness but it is a gift of his love romans 5 19 says righteousness is a gift among other places if it's a gift i can't earn it or deserve it by doing right i can't and so that you know the denominator world has it partially true because the most deceptive lies are those that are partially true we can't be saved by what we do well they mean good works i have to obey but my obedience according to luke 17 verse 11 or 10 uh when you've done all that you've been commanded to do say we are an unprofitable sir you're unprofitable servant because you've only done that which is your duty to do so jesus that's jesus's words he made it very clear that obedience is not works it's not good works obedience is the outward fruit of inward faith and mr whis w-u-e-s-t in his commentary on romans chapter 12 verse 2 makes the statement that the outward is the evidence of the n-word you can't see what's inside and in god's principle everything he's doing on the inside has a corresponding outward evidence that you have what's inside and the lack of the outward evidence means that you're lacking what you say is inside that's why james said it very succinctly faith without works is dead what works good works no the obedience but you go back to roman or ephesians chapter 2 verse 9 we're saved by grace and not by works lest any men should boast but of course they conveniently quit reading because the next verse says we are created in christ jesus unto good works we are his workmanship created in christ jesus under good works who produces the good works him he produces the good works so love will lead you to a revelation of mercy and righteousness here's the next one trust trust is what gets me through any circumstances you've heard it others have said it i've said it it wasn't original with me but faith is confidence in what god says trust his confidence in who god is that means even when i don't know what god's doing even when he hasn't told me what his plan is even when i don't have any understanding of what's going on i can trust him in the situation even though i have no idea how it's going to turn out naturally i don't know but i can know this he always has a plan and that plan always fulfills his will and his purpose and if i will trust him and stay on board you know it's like it's like being in a storm on a ship and that ship is being tossed around and you're going oh god we're in a storm in this ship and it's going to sink i'm going to jump overboard that's exactly how much sense it makes for a believer to bail out on god because you don't trust him in the middle of a storm i don't know what's going on i i've said this before brothers brother uh sheldon and i were talking about this the other day the greatest to me for me at this point in my life the greatest test that god can put me through is his silence going through something he's not saying a word i'm praying he's not saying a word nothing why because i've got trust but if he's talking now i can have faith too but when i because faith comes by hearing hearing by the word of god and people say that i said this the other day people that say they've got faith without a word they don't have faith what they may have is trust but they don't have faith but i believe the logos no faith doesn't come by reading logos because if that's the truth there are millions and millions of people that read logos every day and they don't have faith the only place in the bible i know of that says there's a blessing on reading the word is in re in revelation and it says there's a blessing on those who read the words of this prophecy jesus said study the scripture okay but faith comes by hearing hearing by the rhema of god the word of god so what is the logos logos is the lamp it points a direction logos is the the settled benchmark against which everything is tested you try the spirits by logos but i grow in my grace and my understanding of god because that builds trust the more i know him the how did paul put it oh i love it but put this on screen for me please it's not in your notes uh that i sent you romans 1 chapter 5 verse 1 excuse me i'm going to read these quickly if i could but this is therefore being justified by faith we have peace with god through our lord jesus christ by whom also we have access by faith into this grace wherein we stand and rejoice in the hope of the glory of god listen now not only so but we glory in tribulations trouble problems the greek word is ellipsis literally it means things that cause pressure tribulations also knowing that because we've knowing by experience we've learned that trouble works patience now no stay there please patience but not patience like we think patience because patience to us has become a very passive thing but the greek word here is not passive patience here is endurance it's endurance so going through trouble and experiencing god in my trouble and the gaining costly of experience that lets me know i can count on him produces endurance in your endurance possess you your souls the great king james says in your patience possess your souls but if i what it means by possess my soul doesn't mean i possess it but my soul possesses salvation because i don't give up how many times the bible talk about quitting the opposite of quitting is endurance oh and the two root words for endurance is to stay under so what does that mean i don't pray myself out of or out from under things that god is allowed to be in my life until he is through with them that's what i learned that when i go into a valley of the shadow of death he has a plan to get me out of that valley of the shadow of a death somehow at some point in time but i am called to trust him and go through the not around not over but through ekaha the valley of the shadow of death even if my way out of the valley is to die i it's temporary oh i forgot this part he's reminding me in this context you read you read hebrews 2 it is just amazing but he talks about one of the main reasons that christ was manifested is to set us free from the fear of death it is not the will of god for his people to fear death christ not only hung on the cross to save you from your sins he hung on the cross to save you from the bondage the scripture calls it to our fear of death and perfect love casts out fear so for god so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son whosoever believeth in him should not perish but everlasting life so the love of god provided the sacrifice that overcame death that conquered death hell and the grave so that if i abide in the love of god i abide in that which conquered death hell and the grave so by that abiding in his love i am no longer fearing death so i don't i you know you know people that that risk death are called daredevils that's a lie there's no such thing they're not daring devils the devil doesn't have the right to take life he doesn't have the he has the ability to take life but only with permission because death and hell are going to be cast alive in the lake of fire so death itself is not from god the adversary is the one that takes life but he can't take like without permission therefore christ died to deliver us from the fear of death because the only way i can die is by permission and so paul goes so far with it and most of us read it and we kind of shake our heads and ignore it go on he goes so far with it in his confidence in god and god's love and says for me to live is christ and dies again and we go okay glad for you paul that's just for me to live is gain and to is hopefully salvation but i'm not ready to test that yet right that the way it is so not only so but we glory and tribulations also knowing that tribulation worketh and the greek word therefore work is is activates energizes causes to be operative endurance so my experiences in trouble produce god uses those experiences of trouble to produce in me and activated endurance next verse and endurance produces what experience and experience results in hope and hope is greater than faith not our current cultural understanding of hope which is nothing more than wishing but biblical hope is an absolute certainty that what you're expecting is going to happen that's why hope is greater than faith faith is substance think hope for the evidence thing's not seen but hope is greater than faith because it goes to a level of absolute certainty next verse and hope make it not a shame and how does all this work because the love of god is shed abroad in our hearts by the holy ghost which is given unto us and you don't understand any more about the love of god than you understand about the spirit of god and you don't fellowship with the love of god more than you fellowship with the spirit of god and you don't fellowship with the spirit of god more than you fellowship with the love of god and you don't have any more of a flow of the spirit of god in your life then you have a flow of the love of god you can't separate the two when i separate them i just made both love and spirit impotent in my life i gotta move along so the word trust the word trust the definition of trust is firm belief in the reliability truth ability or strength of someone or something proverbs 3 verse 1 says i'm read quickly my son forget forget not my law but let thine heart be let thine heart keep my commandments for the length of days and long life and peace shall they add to thee let not mercy and truth forsake thee bind them about thy neck and write them upon the table of thine heart so shall thou find favor and good understanding in the sight of god and man trust in the lord with all thine heart and lean not unto thine own understanding and all thy ways acknowledge him and he shall direct thy past i want to be led of god i really want god to lead me but i'm so afraid huh what verse 5 again trust in the lord with all thine heart and do what ah and lean not unto thine own understanding because the degree to which you're trying to figure it all out in your mind is the degree to which you are not trusting next verse if i trust in the lord and don't lean on my understanding if in all my ways acknowledge him that's not saying hiya lord acknowledging him in all my ways is exactly how jesus taught us to start all prayer when i say our father which heart in heaven what i'm saying is and i usually pray the details of this lord my god in the person of the lord jesus christ you're sitting on the throne of the universe you're ruling over everything in this world right now according to your word you're ruling over all principality power might demanding every name that is named in this world the greek word there is not cosmos but eon age you're ruling over everything in this age right now you are in authority over everything right now and i acknowledge you not only in this whole universe i acknowledge that you are lord you are my lord that means you're my supreme ruler over everything in my life that's acknowledging him in all my ways that's just a brief glimpse of acknowledging him in all my ways and if i do that what does the scripture say he shall direct thy paths we try so hard when really what we have to do is give up quit but we have to decide are we going to give up on god or give up on our ability to do it the most spiritual day of your life is the day that you give up except that on that day you're going to decide whether you give up on god or give up on your ability to do this rather than letting him do it through you most spiritual day of your life and what will he use to get us to that place tribulations endurance experience brings me to the place where i finally can have hope because i give up on it all me everything i give up all of that to have him period one more place here before i go to the next place the next thing oh come on now all right isaiah this is shortman isaiah 26 1 you know these verses and that's they shall this shall this song be sung in the land of judah we have a strong city salvation will god appoint for walls and bulwarks open ye the gates that the righteous nation which keepeth the truth may enter in thou wilt keep guard preserve him in perfect peace whose mind is stayed on thee why because he trusteth in thee the result of trusting him is my mind isn't all over the place spreading about this and that what's going to happen what what's biden going to do what's going to hap what laws are they going to pass what's the economy going to do how how expensive gas is going to be you think god is any more challenged to pay for five dollar a gallon gas than he is two dollar a gallon yes you think god is any more challenged when your grocery bill is five hundred dollars a trip instead of a hundred dollars a trip really no the freak out is us not god he is not wringing his hands uh i got all these people to take care of i don't know what i'm gonna do my right my you know the bank account's getting a little low and the warehouse is really really beginning to be depleted and they're all counting on me who do they think i am god right now i'm not trying to be funny but the problem is i've dealt with so many people that that's exactly the approach they have with god all right it gets better now that we've talked about love and mercy righteousness trust now we're going to talk about rest hebrews chapter 4 verse 1. let us therefore fear the word fear there is not terror but one of great focus and concern let us therefore fear lest a promise being left us of entering into his rest any of you should seem to come short of it let me mention something here there is the plan to do questions and answers this afternoon but i don't think that's going to happen so here's what's going to happen okay i'm assuming all of you got an email from brother shelton announcing this so whatever your questions are you can write him an email and we're going to have some zoom call question and answer sessions to cover all of your questions okay i'll be he'll be sending out an email on that okay but what that will do is i will answer the questions that are sent in not those that are asked during the zoom session so you've got an email if you don't know it you're able to contact brother shelton and get his email or however somebody else has it but the point is you can contact them and through that email he'll let you know how you can access these videos okay so folks you've got airplanes to catch and i got another wave of the spirit to catch hang on when you're finished you can go amen when you need to god bless you so i'm reading again hebrews chapter four verse one let us therefore fear unless the promise being left us entering into his rest any of you should seem to come short of it now i want to give some of you some hope somewhere within a probably about a 20-minute drive up here 25 minutes at the most there is an order of the combo of crawfish etouffee and fried crawfish tails waiting on me and i'm hungry so i promise you my flesh is not going to go one second longer than the spirit requires my feet hurt my back hurts and i'm hungry i'm not asking you to feel sorry for me i'm telling you those things to assure you that i don't have enough ego to stand here on these hurting feet just to prolong the time and to live up to some kind of reputation okay so that being said praise god i'll read it again let us therefore fear lest the promised being left us of entering into his rest any of you should seem come short of it for unto us was the gospel priest as well as unto them but the word preached did not profit them not being mixed with faith in them that heard it way too much preaching being done that people aren't mixing faith with i was sitting on the platform at apostolic conference about 10 years ago it was in the old building dylan's old building but the stone king is preaching and i'm going to tell you what everybody knows this if you have brother stone king you're going to have a crowd because there are those that go wherever he goes they want to hear him that's wonderful but here was the problem i'm sitting on the platform minding my own business and he's being his normal apostolic self and it was awesome and i i tried not to do it every once in a while i'd look out over the crowd and just do that sweep with my spiritual antenna and i'm saying what what's wrong here tonight what's this oh they were responding emotionally and verbally to what he was saying but i'm going and then the lord said to me what's your feeling is this most of this crowd has come to hear lee stone king but they're not listening to what i'm saying i'm talking but they're not listening to me they've come to hear least on king they're not mixing any faith with the word that i'm speaking through my servant verse two i'm reading again for unjust it was the gospel the god was the gospel preached as well as unto them but the word priests did not profit them not being mixed with faith in them that heard it for we which have believed to enter into rest as he said if we believe we're enter into rest if i'm not seeking for and trying by the grace of god to yield to that rest i'm not believing for we which live we which have believed do enter into his rest as he said as i was sworn in my wrath if they shall enter into my rest although the works were finished from the foundation of the world for he spake in a certain place after uh in a certain place of the seventh day on this wise and god did rest the seventh day from all his works and in this place again if they shall enter into my rest seeing therefore therefore it remains that some must enter therein and they that they to whom it was first preached and are not in because of unbelief again he limited a certain day saying to david today after so long a time as it is said today if you will hear his voice harden out your hearts see the voice of god's involved here now for if jesus is actually joshua had given them rest when they entered the promised land no more rest from their wandering then would he not afterward have spoken of another day he said there remaineth therefore a rest to the people of god for he that is entered into his god's rest has ceased from his own works as god did from his let us labor therefore to enter into that rest boy does that sound like an oxymoron right but the word there means strive focus upon give give our attention to entering into his rest let us there let us labor therefore to enter into that rest lest any man fall after the same example of unbelief now here's the key here's his rest verse 10 he that has entered into his rest has also ceased from his own works everything i'm trying to do for god is not rest everything everything i was raised it's pentecost it's so it's so iconic pentecostal terminology we live for god we work for god it's not in the book we have a problem houston the bible it's not in the book he not only i love double negatives on it he not only doesn't want me to work for him and live for him he wants me to do the opposite he wants me to be crucified with him so he can live through me paul said for i am crucified with christ nevertheless i live yet not i but christ liveth in me so all the living i'm doing for god is preventing christ from doing the living in and through me and it's not just living in me but christ not only wants to live in me he wants to be the one doing the work through me i am crucified with christ nevertheless i live yet not i but christ liveth in me and the life that i now live in the flesh i live by the faith of the son of god who love and gave himself for me so first christ is doing the living and then christ is doing the flowing his faith is what's flowing through me so the works that are done are his faith through me as his conduit i'm not living for god i'm not working for god but god is not going to get in a wrestling wax match with me to to live through me and to work through me i've got to willingly by the grace of god surrender that's why jesus himself said matthew chapter it's not in your notes matthew chapter 11 i think it starts with verse 28 come unto me all ye that labor and are heavy laden matthew uh yeah matthew 11 30 i think or 28 or 30 one or the other my mind is blank there you go i want them to see this i messed you up then you had all this in there there it is it is 28. come unto me all you delivery labor and are heavy laden and i will give you rest that word rest in the greek there means cessation from all of your labor all of your labor to cease from all your labor now the next verse take my yoke it's a decision i have to make take my yoke not my i'm not getting an egg yolk he he didn't say get in your yoke and even if he said okay i'm giving you a yoke now you get it no no no he said get in my yoke i'm in this yoke i'm inviting you in this yoke with me you're not doing the work you're joining with me in the work it's my yoke take my yoke upon you and learn of me because it's in this kind of environment you really get to know god when you've stopped trying to do it for god to earn things from god and press god and you're just fellowshipping with god you learn about him what do you learn the things he points out we can learn are not the things we expect first of all you learn that he is gentle you ever going to a doctor that says does this hurt damn does this hurt i've never done it but i felt like it a few times what do you think i'm in here for do you think this is phantom pain yeah that hurts huh jesus is gentle he will take he will he if you let him he will deal with all of your insecurities and hurts and all of that in the most gentle fashion as he gently lovingly leads you to a place where you let him make you whole in trying to let him be the man of god through me instead of me doing it for him i've learned this if i sit down with somebody they determine how i approach them if their attitude in spirit lets me be gentle i'm going to be i'm going to handle them with kid gloves i'm going to handle them so gently because that's his choice but if their attitude in spirit is different than that the gloves come off and they're going to get upset with that but it's on them that's not the way god or i want to deal with it and i'll say this to you the lord will be to who to you whom so ever you let him be to the guys who had the five talents and their two talents they they never questioned god's faithfulness and whatever they just went and did there but to the guy who said who had the least to protect and was the most fearful of losing it he said i knew you were a hard man and your expectations were unreasonable i'm paraphrasing and so i went and hid this and the lord said you knew i was a hard man you should have at least given my money to the the lenders oh what's the what's the deal here the lord didn't say i'm a hard man i'm responding to you the way you have approached me [Laughter] you want to get god to yell at you i've done it a few times yell at him rest is true biblical rest is absolutely it's impossible to say how critical it is because rest then opens the door for the next two things and i it the list is winding down believe it or not not that i want it to until you're willing to come to the end of all your efforts you can't have rest take my yoke upon you and learn of me for i'm meek and lowly in heart i'm not only gentle i'm humble thank god god is humble what does it mean here i didn't say humble i said humble if i'm going to be wrong i'm just going to enjoy being wrong humble what does it mean god is a humble it means he is so secure in who he is he does not feel the need to vindicate himself against everybody that defies him he can put up with being abused by man in order to work his plan no matter what man does so we learn that in this yoke meek and lowly in heart you find rest for your souls for my yoke is easy and my burden is light and that word rest in verse 29 is not the same greek word for rest in verse 28. the greek word for the word rest in 28 is cessation from all labor the word rest greek word for rest in verse 29 is rest in your labor and the only way you can have rest in your labor is to cease from your labors and let him work his labor through you as a conduit and what does that lead to peace you cannot have god's peace while you're laboring to control circumstances impossible john 14 27 says peace i leave with you my pete my peace i give unto you not as the world giveth give unto you let not your heart be troubled neither let it be afraid this is not semantics and it's not even these two are not even remotely close the world's peace and his peace are so diametrically opposite they're shockingly different his the world's peace the world only has peace when there's nothing going on troubling them god's peace is able to keep you in peace in the very worst of times i have a friend that within the last three years his wife of decades passed away suddenly when that happened his daughter and son-in-law who were his main help in the church she commits adultery the son-in-law who is a licensed minister he is he gets bitter he backslides he marries out of the church and leaves moves then his mom and dad who were elderly the mother the wife had alzheimer's the dad is elderly and infirm he decides he can't take anymore he shoots her and to put her out of his ministry her misery before he then turns the gun on himself he commits suicide the problem is he died without knowing he didn't kill her she lays up in the hospital with alzheimer's not knowing who anybody is for months and months and months on end before she finally passes he finds an apostolic lady online she is a widow she's called to preach he marries her and now she is currently gone in the second period of time that she has left him in the first year of their marriage what do you say to a person in that oh and he's had a bunch of people leave church is almost down to nothing and he says to me brother i i don't know how in the world i can go on i don't know how to go on peace john 16 33 these things have i spoken unto you that in me you might have peace in the world you should have tribulation be of good sure i've overcome the world how can i have that you've heard me teach it before i'm teaching it again here for a moment but i'm begging you i am begging you study this stuff if you don't do anything more sophisticated and study this is i this has been my main approach in study for since 1965 february of 1965 when i got my first study bible i did what was called topicals i didn't even know what it was called the lord led me to do topical studies i collected all the verses on a subject so i could compare what what all the scriptures said on the subject and i would just read those verses and pray about them and and the lord would direct me and then he'd begin to explain how they all fit together and what it meant i didn't figure it out so first peter chapter 5 verse 5 likewise you're younger submit yourselves unto the elder yea all of you be subject one to another and be clothed with humility in this case what is humility humility brother pugh said many many decades ago i was in a in a service where he said it he said being humble is not thinking bad things about yourself that's not what being humble is thinking bad about yourself saying bad things to yourself about yourself is not humility he said humility is just not thinking of yourself at all and the most proud people there are are the ones that are most down on themselves because it's all about them every look is about them every whisper is about them every negative thing is about them the most egocentric people there are are the people who are down on themselves it's all about them biblical humility is i give up me it's not about me it's about god he says clothed with humility why for god resisteth the proud and giveth grace to the humble what proud you mean the world the world no let's read let the bible explain itself you know the easiest way to understand the bible is let the bible explain itself so i read the next verse verse 6 humble yourselves therefore unto the mighty hand of god and he will exalt you in due time how do i do that i'm glad you asked casting all your cares upon him for he careth for you you know the way my the only way my friend can survive all that grief every time it tries to overwhelm me she's got to give it to god again give it to god well i gave it to god and it comes back really oh man this is all supposed to be like pushing a button and you push a button and then it works and if if you push the button and it's not permanently done it does it's not true and it doesn't work because i don't know anything about god that's why i think everything is instant whatever you know i remember i remember when i first went from dial up internet to what was the next one oh i know it what's that next one come on some of you tell me what dsl thank you i went from i went from dial-up to dsl i thought i died going to heaven what took me 30 minutes to download on now only takes five and then then i got the next one and now it downloaded a minute and i'm thinking wow this is lightning speed and now if what i touch the screen to do doesn't happen instantaneously i want to shake the thing what's wrong with you i'm pushing that button come on now what's next if they come on the screen when i think about it ooh that's scary isn't it and it's already happening isn't it oh they're not listening into us my son was telling me the other day they have a lexa in their house and that you know they have eye equipment phones ipads whatever they weren't using any of them he and her were having a conversation in the house they were talking about a particular thing they wanted to get for one of their children and they talked about that specific thing and the color they would get just with each other that evening an ad came up on some site there or it was either uh google or whatever it was they were searching an ad came up for that exact thing in the exact color they were talking about and he goes oh god he showed that to his wife yeah so the next thing is artificial intelligence does it sinking for you the thinking for you because it's superior to you so you just shut up stupid i'll do your thinking for you you want peace you're gonna have rest that means you quit trying to do it and after you give up on what you're trying to do and let him do it through you now you give up control of everything that's what it means to cast all your care you give up control so when you begin to cast all your care it means you give up telling him what to do how to do when to do it where to do it whatever and with whom to do it you you give him the care and don't tell him how to fix it you're not casting the care if you're still asking him to do x y z you haven't cast your care and i'll tell you there are some things i can speak and cast one time and it doesn't come back i've let it go there are other things there are days that thing wants to keep coming up in my mind and i catch myself thinking about it no i'm not going to think about this i i'm not god i can't fix this i give it back to you and i may have to do that numerous times during the day but i'm not going to be tempted to eat the apple i'm not taking back control of it why i want peace i want that perfect peace i want that peace that passes all understanding thou will keep him in perfect peace whose mind has stayed on thee because he trusted him in thee i want it and then that produces this ready contentment that's when our wills and our flesh are not involved in our lives philippians 4 11 not that i speak in respect of want for i have learned in whatsoever state i am whatever condition i'm in whatever my circumstances are therewith to be content here is the key to this and it is you can't do this i can't do this without god it's not possible but to reach the place that you so want the will of god because that's what i'm doing in casting my cares i'm giving up my will seeking his will that's just another way of saying casting who cares i've given up all my will and i'm releasing control of everything to god and i'm saying i'm trusting you whatever you want to do i'll either stay uninvolved and watch you work or i will do and say whatever it is you want me to say and i pray this regularly i don't belong to me i belong to you literally i pray this regularly i don't belong to me i belong to you wherever you're going i'm going whatever you're doing i'm doing whatever you're saying i'm saying and by your grace i'm not adding to or taken away from any of that by your grace i'm a part of your kingdom i'm a part of your plans your purpose i'm a part of your life by your grace i'm a part of you i seek your will only your will nothing but your will i was sharing that with our elders a couple of months ago and one of the younger ones said well what you're really saying is we're supposed to be dead to everything and i looked at him and said that's exactly what i'm saying because that's exactly what the bible's saying and hear me this is about the time this whole meeting is about the time and why is that critical it's about the time because these are the things we must pursue so we can be in tune with god in this most critical culminating of all of his promises in regards to man oh no the rapture and the millennial reign of christ is going to be the ultimate no it's not now oh that's going to do is finalize the evidence because in the millennium he's going to take away every excuse man has ever used for not believing in him following him the ruler of the world is going to be the only god there is there's not going to be sickness there's not going to be pain nobody's going to die under 100 years old the preacher will be your governor your mayor and they'll be in a glorified body so they'll only have pure motives they won't have any flaws or failures the governing will be perfect the ministry to you will be perfect and the devil will be bound a thousand years so therefore what that means is this every excuse man has ever used will be eliminated and even with that at the end of the thousand years satan's going to be loosed and in a short amount of time he's going to turn the nations against god and they're going to come against jerusalem and fight the battle of gog and magog so i'm telling you the millennial reign of christ is not going to be the ultimate that god has done in the earth this culminating period of the church age it's the greatest time in god's dealing with man during what's called time and he trusted you and i to be a part of this [Music] he trusted you and i to be a part of this and we have to get in tune with him by his grace so that we can be who he wants us to be he can be in us who he wants to be he can be through us who and what he wants to be so that he can move us places and we don't feel used we're privileged to be a part what kind of honor is god offering us to be a fellow laborer with him in his yoke in his kingdom there is no greater honor god can offer mortal man than that in the millennium the scripture says the sinner being a hundred years old will perish there will be sinners in the millennium that don't get saved but nobody's going to die less than 100 years old here we are if you're stephen you're called to be stephen or you're called to be james who got killed in the beginning of this thing or you end up being john who has to live the longest but you're banished to a desert island that doesn't mean there weren't any people there read the history of it it wasn't exactly a penal colony but it was close all the other apostles died about to death every single one of them we want to be apostolic not god picked you god picked you personally he picked every one of you personally to be alive in this day to be his instruments in this day to be his fellow laborers in this day to be his laborers in his field to represent him to have lost a nine world he's trusted you with that and to whom much is given much is required and i'm going to say this to you the people in the church age were given the most and expected the most of anybody all other human beings in this world god has never dwelt in man before or after like he dwelt in his church we are going to be unique all through eternity if that's the case and peter pointed to the last day on the first day as great as those 12 apostles were they were only at the beginning of the thing you and i have been trusted to be at the end of it will we value that or squander that trust you see it's not about me it's not about how good i am or what i'm able to do or what people think of me has nothing to do about that this is what god thinks of me this is what god thinks of you he picks you to be here now that's what god thinks of you it's not what you think of you it's not what the world thinks of you it's what you think of you based on what god thinks of you he picked you to be here what are you going to do with it just have good church services and enjoy social media and netflix and vacations because you're tired you need some rest you don't know tired everybo every family's ever brought home a newborn baby from the hospital that's in proportion to what we're used to even our greatest moves of god you read the stories about those that actually had sex tuplets that survived and brought home six of them you ever seen those pictures your life changes bringing one home your life really changes bringing home too three six you don't have a life they have a life you're their servants period and we want revival and harvest but we want to fit that into our calendar our schedule no we don't that's what god's trying to find out who wants this enough that whatever he asks they say yes i've said this many times we want god to fill out the check put who it's paid to put the date on it and the amount before we sign it but god is waiting for you and i to sign the check with nothing in the date nothing into payee nothing in the amount those are the people he's going to use mightily in these last days those are the ones he's going to use mightily those are the ones and finally here we are all these are i i i started to say one of my favorite subjects the bible's my favorite subject so here we go i'm going to read these quickly as quick as i can i don't lie it all comes down to grace here's the definition god has given me of grace i haven't read it anyplace this is where he gave me grace is what we call the love of god by the agency of the spirit of god that abides within me activating and operating in me both the desire and the resolve to do what he wants me to do and then empowers me to do it because i can't do it that's biblical grace it is the love of god at work in me by the agency of the spirit of god that dwells in me activating and causing to be operative in me to be and do those things in and through me that i cannot do myself to prove the importance of this there's an apostolic impartation at the beginning of every epistle paul wrote except hebrews and yet the book of hebrews is filled with these three things even peter and john jude use the same ones they are not a greeting they are apostolic impartations so important that paul led off every epistle he wrote with them but we read right over them ignore them grace mercy and peace be unto you those are words of impartation from god our father the king james says from god our father and the lord jesus christ the word and there again is sharp's rule of syntax the literal translation according to that rule should be from god our father even our lord jesus christ because they're one and the same foreign foreign speak up so i can listen all the time to you father it's a full dependence it's beautiful it's gorgeous already brother cole taught me this that's not a message in tongues interpretation that is an inspired utterance but the lord had him share his own personal prayer with us and then gave him the interpretation to himself for us to share in the interpretation of that prayer billy cole taught me that okay it's beautiful it is beautiful john 5 verse 19 says then answered jesus and said unto him unto them verily verily i say unto you the son can do nothing of himself but what he seeth the father do for what things soever he doeth these things do with all the doeth the son also for the father loveth his son and showeth him all things that he himself that himself doeth and he will show him greater works than these that ye may marvel are there any sons of god in the house does this fit you it does if you're no longer doing it yourself verse 19 again that's why behold what manner of love the father bestowed upon us that we should be called the sons of god and it does not yet appear what we shall be we know when he shall appear we should be like him if we can't be like him then if we're not like him now that's why paul said in romans chapter 8 that the that god is working in us to transform us into the image of his son that's what's happening that's what this meeting is about the son can do nothing of himself that's the first step here rest i stop doing my labors peace i give up control contentment i only want what god wants in my prayer lord if you're not giving it i don't want it or you can ask anything i don't want to ask anything if you're not giving it i don't want it if you want it initiate it i'll believe for it just tell me what you want and i will pray the words you tell me to pray speak the things you tell me to speak and i will receive what you're giving but i don't want anything you're not giving that's contentment and when you're content the devil has no open door to tempt you with because it is coveness covetousness that is idolatry and contentment is the opposite of covetousness and when you've surrendered it all to god and you're at peace with god and then you've given up all want well then what are you an automaton no no no whatever he puts in me to desire whatsoever things you desire when you pray believe that you receive that you shall have them what things do i desire i've surrendered my will to god and if i give my will to god if he puts a desire in here i'm trusting he's putting me his desire blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness the hunger and thirst is desire from god for us for god and the flesh goes i can't do all this right right it's hopeless i can't do all this right it's hopeless you can't do all this if your hope is in your ability it's hopeless you can't do all this and he's not gonna force you to let him do it for you to you through you i'm gonna do it you're gonna have to seek and yield to it verse 5 chapter 5 verse 30 the son says i can of mine own self do nothing as i hear i judge and my judgment is just because i seek not mine own will but the will of the father which has sent me i'm crucified with christ nevertheless i live yet not i but christ liveth in me the life that i now live in the flesh i live by the faith of the son of god the son of god's faith what's the son of god's faith john 5 19 and 20 what i see the father do i do john 5 30 what i hear the father say i say that's the son of god's faith if god's not showing me what to do i don't do anything i just trust him and i follow my peace i just live each day following my peace if he wants me to do something i do what he shows me to do if he wants me to say something i don't say what i think needs to be said i say what i hear him say now how did jesus do that when we can't john 1 14 and the word was made flesh and dwelt among us and we beheld his glory the glories of only as of the only begotten of the father full of grace and truth john bear witness of him and cried saying this was he of whom i spake he that cometh after me is preferred before me for he was before me and of his fullness have we all received grace for grace you know from faith to faith it's grace to grace that's why peter said grace and peace be multiplied unto you said it twice first peter ii peter grace and peace be multiplied there's no static amount of grace that proves that it you know people say well grace is unmerited favor that means it's god unmerited favor no no it's not grace is what god does it's not static i can i can move from grace to grace i can trust god at this level of grace and this level of faith and he can take me to the next level of faith and the next level of grace and the next level of faith and the next level of grace and the next level of and there's no end to it that's why the last words of the apostle peter is grow in grace and in the knowledge of the lord and savior jesus christ why john chapter 15 verse 4 abide in me and i and you as ye as the branch cannot bear fruit of itself cannot cannot cannot cannot we have no ability to do it ourselves except it abide in the vine no more can ye except you abide in me i am the vine year of the branches he that abideth in me and he abideth in me and i in him the same bringeth forth much fruit for without me you can do nothing much fruit he's doing it no fruit i'm doing it little fruit i'm doing it he's doing it i keep switching back and forth with him depending on how i feel the parallel verse to much verse much fruit john 12 24 yeah i'm waiting he's gonna put on the screen john 12 24. i want you i want you to see this with your eyes not just here with yours you all know it but we're going to read it okay verily verily i say unto you except a man except excuse me except a man human a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die it abides alone but if it dies it brings forth what much free i am the vine john 15 5 year the branches he that abideth in me i and i in him the same bringeth forth much fruit so me abiding in him and he abiding in my in me is synonymous with me falling in the ground and dying which is synonymous with me being crucified with christ and how was christ crucified the greatest part of the crucifixion of christ was when he prayed in the garden three times and completely surrendered all of his human will to god that's being crucified in christ i give up all of my will all of my wants all of my likes all of my dislikes all of my preferences i give up my will in any form or format i give it all up to god by the grace of god that's why paul said in romans chapter 8 verse 13 if ye through the spirit do mortify the deeds of the body you shall live you and i can't do that i can't crucify myself only by the spirit of god enabling me can i do that so then we read philippians and i'm going to read quickly here philippians chapter 2 verse 5. uh the good news for you i've only got three or four passages to go to read so i'll read five fast listen to this now i'm going to read the context of a verse i've quoted to you so many times philippians 2 and 5 let this mind be in you which was also in christ jesus have this mode of thinking have this attitude and approach and outlook on everything this is the your mindset this is your mindset that defines your lifestyle let this mind be in you which was also in christ jesus who being in the form of god thought it not robert to be equal with god but made himself of no reputation took upon him the form of a servant and was made in the likeness of men and being found in fashion as a man he humbled himself and became obedient unto death even the death of the cross wherefore god also has highly exalted him giving him a name which is above every name that in the name of jesus every knee shall bow and every of things in heaven things on earth and things under the earth and that every tongue should confess that jesus christ is lord of the glory of god the father wherefore my beloved is she is all as ye have always obeyed not as as in my presence only but now much more than my absence work out your own salvation with fear and trembling for it is god which worketh in you both the will and to do of his good pleasure the word grace is not in verse 13 but that is the purest definition of grace in it to be found in the bible now let this mind be in you verse 5 which was also in christ jesus because you are a son of god it is not robbery for you to realize that you're equal to the son of god but this is the mindset you're to have you don't make yourself of any reputation you are a servant even though you're my son i've made you in the likeness of men to reach men and because i've i've made you in the fashion of man i'm expecting you to completely humble yourself and not try to do your own works in me or for me but let me be who i want you to be and the way you do that is you humble yourself to be obedient unto being crucified with me and when you do that i give you a name son of god bride of christ body of christ by the name of jesus which is above every name and that as you as i use you everything is going to bow before you and everything will have to yield to that my authority will work through you and i do that by working in you to cause you to both will and walk in me so that i can work in and through you which is all pleasing to me right i'm reading it again romans 5 1 and 2 therefore being justified bay by faith we have peace with god through our lord jesus christ by whom also we have access by faith into this grace wherein we stand and rejoice in hope of the glory of god see the progression there let's talk about the ministry of grace acts chapter 4 verse 31 and when they had prayed after they'd been threatened they'd been scourged the disciples have been beaten and and they've been threatened and they go to uh they they leave rejoicing that they were found worthy to suffer for his name that's not a mindset we most of us have yet and when they had prayed the place was shaken where they were assembled together let's see this is how god responded to a group of people who were rejoicing that they were accounted worthy to suffer for his name through whatever means he chooses for them to suffer we want this without the cross we want this without the suffering and when they had praised pla pray the place was shaken where they were assembled together and they were all filled with the holy ghost and they spoke the word of god with boldness and the multitude of them that believed were of one heart with one soul neither uh said any of them that that all of the things which he possessed was his own but they had all things common that means wherever there was a need what is that they were able to meet the need they met the need they didn't mean there was a common pot and with great power gave the apostles witness of the resurrection of the lord jesus christ and great grace was upon them all and without great grace what we're believing for is not going to happen first corinthians chapter 3 verse 9 for we are laborers together with god your god's husbandry year god's building according to the grace it's all according to the grace of god which is given unto me as a wise master builder i have laid the foundation and another builder there on but and another bill at their own but let every man take heed how he built it their own and he clarifies that completely in first corinthians 15 verses 9 and 10 for i am the least of the apostles that am not meat to be called an apostle because i persecuted the church but by the grace of god i am what i am and his grace which was bestowed upon me was not in vain but i labored more abundantly than they all there's no period there there's a colon which means what's about to be stated explains how he did that yet not i i labored more than all of them but it wasn't me but the grace of god which was with me he's the one that did it and then finally my last scripture i think of this houston meat is i've already quoted it three or four times but i'm reading it to you second peter chapter 3 verses 17 and 18. so i'm going to read the preceding verse before this verse the last words of the apostle peter recorded in the bible ye therefore beloved seeing ye know these things before read the chapter the chapter's all about the end time second peter chapter 3 i'm not reading all of it for your sake in consideration of you of your humanity okay but you've got to get this in your mind therefore ye therefore beloved seeing ye know these things before all that he said was going to happen we know them before beware lest ye also being led away with the error of the wicked fall from your own steadfastness even though you know what i said was going to happen and even though you begin to see that it's going to happen that it's happening you still have to be careful that you don't fall fall away and he tells us how to not fall away but grow in grace and in the knowledge of our lord and savior jesus christ to whom be glory both now and forever amen and that's how i close many many of my prayer sessions as the lord leads lord by your grace search my heart search my motives let everything i do and say be done for your kingdom and your kingdom only by your power and only by your power and for your glory and only for your glory in jesus name god bless you i love you

Channel: Apostolic Iron

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Keywords: Apostolic, Apostolic Iron, Jesus, Prayer, Pray, Praying, C.M. Wright, Bishop Wright, Pentecost, Pentecostal, UPCI, Call To War, God, Lord, Preaching, Apostolic Preaching

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Length: 143min 34sec (8614 seconds)

Published: Thu Feb 11 2021