Stay with the Ship // Pastor Sonja R. Dawson

[Music] [Music] good morning church family and friends as we prepare for morning worship please take note of our morning announcements join us tomorrow evening for church-wide prayer at 7 p.m in person and online if you are attending on-site please arrive early tomorrow's pearl service will feature our sunday school department and don't forget you can jump start your morning with prayer monday through friday at 7 14 on our daily prayer call church family we have multiple opportunities for you to study the bible throughout the week and assist you in growing in god's word grow discipleship institute is on tuesdays at 6 30 pm with two classes pastors bible study will continue the living with life's bible study series live on facebook and youtube and men on mission meets via conference call noon bible study is each wednesday via conference call pre-registration is no longer required to attend our on-site worship experiences seats are limited and face masks are still required for admittance we look forward to worshiping with you each week our early morning worship experience takes place on sundays at 7 30 a.m via conference hall the worship service is led by our ministerial staff deacons and deaconess our sunday school ministry is excitedly preparing for their annual retreat this saturday september 18th at 9 a.m this year's retreat will be held on zoom the theme is evangelizing above normal all teachers and sunday school workers are asked to attend for zoom information please contact the church office join us every sunday at 9 30 a.m as we study god's word together in sunday school via conference call and our youth and young adult classes meet via zoom we have also excitedly launched our sunday evening sunday school class it's every sunday at 6 pm on youtube and facebook we believe that sunday school still matters and we would love for you to come grow with us and so we gather in this place to worship you god we gather in this place to lift up holy hands we gather this place to stand on our feet and open our mouths and declare you to be the lord of every lord the king of every king the great i am the lily of the valley the rose of sharon the breath of life oh a redeemer our savior your everything that we need god and we bless you we honor you we praise you we glorify you hallelujah [Music] hallelujah come on sing we have come into this house [Music] come on sing we have come into this house [Music] oh i was glad when they said unto me let us go into the house of the lord [Music] to worship christ [Music] so let's lift up holy hands so [Music] come on lift your hands and say god i surrender to you have your way in this place have your way in my life all of my troubles all my burdens i'm bringing it to you god and i'm leaving it right in your hands [Music] as i magnify yourself [Music] is [Music] one more time we have come into this house we have [Music] to magnify the lord [Music] is oh [Music] [Applause] [Music] worship worship worship him right where you are praise god if you're happy to be back into the house of the lord continue to worship him come on you can do better than that on social media if you're ready to worship the lord praise him right where you are and please stand in the sanctuary as we all praise the lord together [Music] we'll be reading psalms 150 which reads praise ye the lord praise god in his sanctuary praise him in the firmament of his power praise him for his mighty acts praise him according to his excellent greatness hallelujah praise him with the sound of the trumpet praise him with the sultry and heart praise him with the timbrel and dance praise him with string instruments and organs praise the lord saints praise him upon the loud symbols yeah praise him upon the high sounding symbols in the name of jesus let everything everything let everyone let everything that has bread praise the lord praise ye the lord let us pray our father which art in heaven hallowed be thy name thy kingdom come thy will be done in earth as it is in heaven give us this day our daily bread and forgive us of our debts as we forgive our debtors and lead us not into temptation but deliver us from all evil for thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever and ever as we all say collectively amen amen amen you might as well stink stay on your feet and give god some praise come on clap your hands everybody like this come on come on come on come on the word of god says i will call upon the lord for he is worthy to be praised so shall i be saved from my enemies come on [Applause] i will call [Music] [Music] shall i be saved from my enemies [Music] calvary [Music] [Music] [Applause] i will [Music] for he is worthy [Music] salvation [Music] hey hello [Music] to prison did you come to prison oh say i don't know what you come to do i don't know what you've got to do i don't know what you come to do i don't know what you gonna do i don't know what you come to do i don't know what you're gonna do say i don't know what you've come to do i don't know what you've done i [Music] help [Music] [Music] that's the only one [Music] there's only one god lord over my future lord over my destiny lord over my healing lord over my life lord over my life lord over my life [Music] oh come on clap your hands if he's the lord over everything that you're going through [Music] it's a problem [Music] lord over my healing lord over my healing lord over my healing oh that's it i sound like y'all came to praise the lord today come on come on that's it let me hear you write the music let me hear you clap come on [Music] when i think of the goodness of jesus [Music] my soul cries out hallelujah [Music] oh that's it [Music] that's why i trust them that's why i praise them there's nobody that can do you like jesus there's nobody that can do you like today i jesus call upon the lord [Music] [Music] well might as well keep clapping come on you can keep keep clapping [Music] he's lowered over my life amen amen i don't know what you came to do but i came to praise the lord did you come to praise the lord this morning did you come to give god praise and even if you're at home or you're watching on the replay we have come for no other reason than to give god praise and i spilled the spirit in this place do you feel the spirit hallelujah hallelujah it's all right it's all right to give god praise listen you don't have to wait till the end of the service you can shout now if he's been good to you already you can shout right now we don't have anywhere to go we don't have anything to do that's more important than giving god his praise why because he is worthy is he worthy of it he is worthy he is worthy he is worthy he's been a good god he's been a kind guy he's been a loving god he's been a forgiving god he's been an able guy he's been a gracious guy he's been a merciful guy he's been a waymaker a miracle worker a promise keeper that's who our god is and so we have time we have nothing but time to give god praise amen hey amen amen bless the lord on my soul and all that's within me glory glory to your name god how we honor you how we bless you how we give you praise amen amen amen [Music] our music ministry's ready this morning i said our music ministry is he came to praise the lord this morning did you come to worship and praise god this morning and everybody doesn't demonstrate praise in the same way i get it everybody does not always is as demonstrative some folks they dance some folks stomp you know stomp their feet some folks like to clap some folks just sit there and shed a tear whatever it is as long as you let god know that you're grateful and that you love him and that you appreciate him amen amen amen you know the songwriter says thank you lord anybody know that song just says thank you lord i just want to thank you lord can we sing a little bit of that i'm going to do the announcements but i feel a spirit of gratitude amen there's some people in the house that have been through some things in the last 18 months and we came just to say thank you there's some people at home that just came to say thank you as we prepare i want you to just take a moment and thank god for what he's already done [Music] thank you [Music] you've already made [Music] come on one more time sing it for me thank you lord [Music] that's your testimony it's all right to lift up holy hands in the sanctuary it's all right to tell them thank you [Music] [Applause] [Laughter] [Music] thank you thank you thank you lord make a personal eye [Music] [Applause] [Music] so you have to give him credit it wasn't the government it wasn't even your wonderful job but it was him and him alone [Music] so this morning i've come to say [Music] last one you brought me [Music] out if you know god brought you through some things you may even want to stand up and testify so you you can just let the world know you don't have to tell him everything that that he brought me out [Music] i just want to come on bless the lord right where you are thank you god thank you god thank you god with the fruit of our lips we thank you we bless you we praise you we honor you we know there's no one like our god and so this morning we say thank you it's easy to come and ask him to do a whole lot of things but it's good sometimes just to stop and say thank you amen amen well i'm pastor dawson and i want to welcome you to our morning service here at 11 o'clock we are online and on site we are one church in many locations many living rooms and wherever else we may be but we are still one church amen amen just a couple of reminders want to before i get to those thank you to reverend tompkins for her message of 7 30 a.m service as she discussed and helped to kick off our mission emphasis month thank you to deakin bobby williams and brother vernon williams for your leadership this morning at 7 30 on the early morning conference call line yesterday was the 20th year anniversary of 9 11. we will not forget we will not forget but we will remember the great sacrifices and all that has transpired since that time and all those who were impacted the families of the 9 11 victims but all of us were impacted in some way by the events of 9 11. remember that we are in a gubernatorial recall election if you have not voted please vote i do not use our worship services to politicize and to give you any suggestions as to how to vote however if you would like to hear what i have to say about it at seven o'clock tonight supervisor holly mitchell has invited me to be on her platform with some other pastors and we're going to be sharing that'll be on facebook and youtube and we'll share it on the church page starting tomorrow our worship services will be open with no registration so tomorrow night if you would like to come to prayer at seven o'clock you are welcome next sunday if you would like to come to church no registration you are welcome the only thing you we will do when we actually re started it back today is temperature checks amen we know the virus is still out there we're not going to be controlled by it but we are going to use wisdom so if you come we will check your temperature they started today and we will also sit we're sitting every other seat unless you are from the same household amen if we exceed our capacity which i believe we will the lord has blessed us with an overflow room we have plenty of places where we can worship we don't want anything to be a barrier for people to come to church anyone may want to come to church they may wake up that morning and feel like they want to hear a word they want to be in the building and we want you to be able to come in and to do that amen amen so i wanted to say that myself know that we are still going to keep you safe we're still going to have contact tracing we're going to know who's here but the bible says and it's true whosoever will let him come so we're going to uh starting even on tomorrow night at seven o'clock you are welcome all right finally happy birthday and happy anniversary do i have any september birthdays in the house or in the chat would you just stand real quick so we can wish you a happy birthday september babies oh it's a lot of you now if you're online would you put your name in the chat that you're it's your birthday happy birthday to all of those in september happy anniversary do i have any wedding anniversaries in the month of september would you please stand your wedding anniversary all right brother has it been a year brother all right happy anniversary to brother and sister erskine and there may be others are watching us online if you have a wedding anniversary please put that in the chat i have made a couple changes to today's order of service want to encourage our teams to check their phones because we're going to have a good time and then we're going to be moving down from this place amen amen offering time we're moving now to our offering time let me say first of all thank you for everything that you do every so seed that you sow thank you for all of your faithfulness in giving you can give in many ways as you are already well aware but if this is your first time with us um you can give in several different ways it's going to come on the screen in just a moment and if you're led to give we appreciate it we're working on several projects everybody knows that however we're also making sure that we're found faithful in giving to those who are less fortunate so this month in particular i've asked everyone who is able to give an offering only person only people i gave a number was the ministers but everybody else whatever amount you're led to give to our foreign mission and at the end of september i'll give you the report and we will turn over those funds to a reputable organization that's helping with relief efforts in haiti now i'm also led though that charity begins at home so as much as we want to be a blessing to haiti there are several things happening in our own country louisiana different places and we're going to hold a portion to make sure we can be a blessing at home is that all right so do know whatever you give this month through foreign mission which has a drop down on the um offering app on the app will go towards that effort this month in the month of september amen amen so we're going to prepare now to receive your offerings and then we're going to hear a selection by our praise team and we're gonna go straight into the word amen amen [Music] oh [Music] oh [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] me not available [Music] we serve a god that is faithful that is merciful that is full of love and grace and today we say thank you thank you [Music] great is your mercy towards me [Music] your loving kindness towards me your tender mercies [Music] i see day after day forever faithful towards me always providing for me great is your mercy towards me great is your grace [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] always provides [Music] is [Music] [Music] [Music] i see day after day [Music] [Applause] kindness [Music] every time i open my [Music] thank you thank you [Music] from the depths of my soul [Music] thank you you didn't have to make a way thank you [Music] [Music] oh you did it just for me jesus you love me [Music] you're always providing oh great [Music] your mercy your faithfulness your kindness you [Music] oh your love that lifted me from the depths of sin your blood that never loses its power [Music] you keep blessing me over and over and over and over and over and over and over oh great is yours [Music] great is your mercy towards me your loving kindness towards me your tinder i see day after day [Music] forever faithful towards me always providing for me [Music] great is your mercy towards me great is your grace great is yours grace [Music] [Music] your mercy cheese [Music] we serve a wonderful god amen amen well let's thank god for our music ministry come on appreciate you great is your faithfulness you serve a faithful god too amen i thank god for the opportunity to stand and to share with you i thank you for the last two sundays having a break thank you [Music] it may not mean much to you because i know you know some people have been on break a long time but for those of us who haven't had quite as extensive a break these last couple of weeks was a blessing to me so thank you i know that as a church family you don't have to follow leadership i don't take for granted that i just say something and you do it but i felt led that if we did not stop and not just give myself a break but all of our servant teams we were going to exhaust ourselves and we got too far to go so i thank you on behalf not just myself but our media team our worship team and music teams and our church staff we got a break as well so thank you so very very much but i'm excited about the word this morning and i wanted to get up and be able to have enough time to say everything that god gave me to say not to be rushed is that all right the word is preeminent we say that every week that we ask god to hide his word in our heart and so i'm gonna just ask you to draw your minds in and i know there's a lot of things that can take our attention i see people with the phones out already here and i know at home you know you're to get a phone call or somebody's going to ask you to do something but just can you tell them for like all i need is about 30-ish minutes you know what an issue is a ish i need a ish i need 30-ish minutes of your attention because there may be something god wants to say just to you you know how a lot of times we think the message is for somebody else oh wait till i get i'm gonna tell so-and-so i'm gonna use this i'm gonna weaponize the message i'ma take this home and tell you all but maybe god is speaking to you today and so i want you to hear what thus saith the lord amen all right i solicit your prayers thank god for everybody who's already been on program i appreciate you for your support and all that you have done last couple of weeks i talked about mental health issues in the church not just in the church just mental health challenges in general focused on depression and anxiety and gave out some resources and if you still need to get that information you can always contact the church office because it's real it's real and i at some point i would like to even have more workshops because two weeks is really not enough time to get into all those issues that a lot of people are dealing with right now as a result of the pandemic and just as a result of life by just by itself and things happen and they impact us and it's okay if you don't feel like you're okay right now we just want to make sure that we help you to get better but today the holy spirit led me in a different direction because perhaps you know depression is not the issue for you anxiety may not be the issue for you but you just need a little more strength am i in on anybody's street [Music] and so i'm going to talk today about look about perseverance perseverance can tell somebody perseverance pastor's going to preach about perseverance hang on in there [Music] and every week i'm probably preaching to myself that's all right i can tell by your reaction here and maybe even online that this may be a word for you so turn with me to acts chapter 27 familiar chapter now you're going to have to read this chapter on your own i'm not going to stand here and try and read this entire chapter most of you are familiar with this account of paul apostle paul shipwreck when he was a prisoner on route to rome so most of you know the story but i actually don't want to preach it from paul's perspective today i want to try a different perspective i'm talking to you about these soldiers these centurions who were charged with keeping this man i want to talk to you about there from their perspective and see if we can hear something fresh that god wants to say to us now i'm going to begin my reading in verse 20. but again i want you to read all of it when you have time and i'm probably going to reference other portions of 27 but for your hearing i'm going to read verse 20 through 31 and i'm going to do it from the new american standard version i love the niv and what it says with this text but i didn't have an niv in my office that i could see [Music] you'll catch that on the way home i had one i just didn't have one i could see so it says here verse 20 since neither sun nor stars appeared for many days and no small storm was assailing us from then on all hope of our being saved was gradually abandoned [Music] when they had gone a long time without food everybody was on the ship then paul stood up in their midst and said men you ought to have followed my advice now earlier in chapter 27 paul tells them not to take this journey you can read that on your own he says men you ought to have followed my advice and not to have set sail from crete and incurred this damage and loss yet now i urge you to keep up your courage keep up your courage for there will be no loss of life among you but only of the ship for this very night an angel of the god to whom i belong and whom i serve stood before me saying do not be afraid paul you must stand before caesar and behold god has granted you all those who are sailing with you [Music] therefore keep up your courage i'm getting happy already keep up your courage men for i believe god i believe god that it will turn out exactly as i have been told but we must run aground on a certain island [Music] but when the 14th night came to my two weeks i only have two more verses as we were being driven about in the adriatic sea about midnight the sailors began to surmise that they were approaching some land they started strategizing and they took soundings and found it to be 20 fathoms and a little further on they took another sounding and found it to be 15 fathoms so what was happening is they first time they checked the water it was 120 feet deep the second time it was 90 feet deep which cued them that they were getting ready to run aground verse 29 fearing that we might run aground somewhere on the rocks they cast for anchors from the stern and wished for daybreak but as the sailors were trying to escape from the ship and had left the ship's boat into the sea on the pretense of intending to lay out anchors from the bow verse 31 last verse because paul knew what they were up to they were trying to jump ship y'all he says paul said to the centurion and to the soldiers unless these men remain in the ship you yourselves cannot be saved as you take your seat i'm going to preach about stay with the ship stay with the ship stay in the ship amen there is a benefit to perseverance there is a benefit when you stay with something you know a lot of times we celebrate people that start things if you start a new business everybody's excited you start a new ministry everybody's got your back if you start anything a new relationship a new family we we love people who start we'll we'll throw you a party just for starting we'll show up at your house when you get have a housewarming because you started we even celebrate people for finishing when i retired a couple of years ago all these people who i hadn't seen in forever which i'm grateful because some of them still they watch us online people i've worked with for over 30 years they made it a point to show up to celebrate that i was finishing and when you finish something when you finish college people celebrate when you finish whatever your goal or endeavor or your dream may be somebody is going to say what good job oh we're on facebook we're so proud of you because you finished but in the text today we're going to celebrate some people who did not just start but some people who stayed can i help my own self because we don't always celebrate people who stay but staying with anything is a mark of christian maturity it is easy to give up when things get rough it is easy to give up when you don't like leadership it is easy to give up when everything is not the way you want it to be it is easy to give up when all conditions are not perfect but i am here to celebrate those people that say and have said to themselves that if god before me he is more than the world against me and if he put me here i'm gonna stay right here if you stay with a job eventually you'll get promoted if you're doing your work you know if you whatever you stay with if you stay with a diet i'm sorry tomorrow is monday [Music] if you stay with a workout program am i right about it if you stay with it it'll pay off well here in the text we find paul the scripture tells us that the apostle paul was in serious trouble so much trouble that it placed his life in the lives of others around him in mortal danger if we are told that they were on a small ship caught up in the midst of a storm now this was not paul's only trouble and many of you who i know are familiar with this text are aware that he had trouble way before he encountered this storm you see he had already been arrested and he was on his way to rome to stand trial and now he is on this ship caught up in the midst of a turbulent and life-threatening storm which was more trouble trouble on top of trouble on top of trouble but isn't that just like life that sometimes before we can put one problem to rest you find yourself in another problematic situation i got a couple amens in the house i can tell you from my own experience and many of you can as well that the problems of life can come upon us and before we can get one thing worked out here comes another storm see christians often talk about storms metaphorically not just the storms that we see you know we're all hearing about in the news and we've lived through they're they're talking about it we're talking about it metaphorically we're saying that it's a trial or a challenge some type of obstacle or opposition that we have to deal with and no one can better testify to that fact than our old testament personality by the name of job job as you may recall faced a series of problems if you've read the book of job it seemed like that brother couldn't get a break as soon as he got through one thing somebody else was coming in here coming in there telling them and now your kids are gone as soon as he got through that and now your property's gone as soon as he got through that and now your house is gone so much so that we know his wife ultimately said just let this whole thing go curse god and die that's why you got to be careful listening to people even when they're close to you because they don't always know what god has for you they may love you but they may still be wrong that's a word for somebody they don't know they don't know they love you they don't want to see you hurting they don't want to see you going through but they may not have the word that god has given you and so job job was someone who was familiar with trouble in fact he says in job 14 3 man that is born of a woman is of a few days and those are full of trouble and as it was with job so it is here in this text we find that paul is in major trouble and if i can put a pen here quickly and tell you just because you're a child of god does not mean that you're not going to have trouble can i say that again for the people in the back just because you love god and gave him your life and you're trying to live right does not mean that you're not gonna have trouble in fact a lot of times it accelerates the trouble in your life i know i'm not supposed to tell that but it's just the truth a lot of times because the enemy is threatened by the anointing and the call that's on your life by the gifts that he has given you he will place you in a situation where there will be trouble after trouble after trouble but i am so glad that just like job had a hedge of protection around him god puts a hedge of protection around those that love him so that we can withstand the trouble so the question this morning is not are you in a storm or will you have a storm the question is simply how are you going to respond now here in the text we see several different people who responded different ways i shared with you at the beginning that i don't really want to focus on paul's response i know we love paul and we talk about paul and paul this and paul dad and i have no disrespect i have not written 27 books i have not uh started 14 churches i have not traveled thousands of miles by foot i haven't been shipwrecked i haven't been beat i haven't been bitten by they haven't done any of that so much respect much respect however that's not where my mind is this morning because there were some other folks with him there were several soldiers who were entrusted with getting him to that trial in rome and i want to look at their response because in in my mind paul is a man of faith the angel appeared to him if the angel came to me of course i'm going to stand up and say everything's going to be all right but what about the people who had to get it from somebody else i hope somebody knows where i'm going today the people who had to listen to the man or the woman of god and still believe god enough that they would stay in the ship ah and so let's talk about these folks what can we learn from them because when we meet them in verse 20 seven i think it is a 28 one of those they are plotting and planning to get off that ship come on can you be honest with me for a moment have any of us ever been there we making our own plan i don't know what your may be i i don't know what your may be you you can fill in the blank could it be a relationship could it be a job could it be whatever your church whatever but you you got your own plan in mind uh you're not gonna say anything to anybody you're gonna keep it quiet you're just gonna execute you're not gonna tell anybody you're going to keep your own counsel but but you've been strategizing it's just like when you go to magic mountain or or what what i think it's magic mountain where they have the i don't want to call it that exit right now that's not going to come out right god i don't want to get in trouble but you know that exit where right before you get on the roller coaster if you're a little scared uh you know what i'm talking about i don't i don't make i don't want to get any emails so i'm just going to call it what y'all call it the exit that you can get out and there are some people because of all that they've gone through in this pandemic and all that they've gone through in life they are right there getting ready to go through that exit they want to jump ship i know what i'm talking about i read the reports i'm in the meetings about the number of people that are leaving christianity that are saying that god is not real because how would he allow all of this to happen i could be talking to somebody right now or on the replay and you are ready to jump ship on this whole religion thing it didn't work it was still here my mama got sick my kid died this hap we're still here it didn't work you're ready to jump ship and we have here these these soldiers who are tasked with getting paul to rome but yet they're coming up with another plan on their own [Music] god didn't orchestrate or organize and they decide they're going to get off of this ship i don't know who i'm talking to this morning but god is going to speak to you he's going to speak to me he's going to speak to us if you keep praying because it's not time and he wants you to stay in the ship so what are some of the lessons we've learned from from these these gentlemen who were who were thinking about moving on coming up with a new plan doing their own thing first thing we learned from them the first problem that they had the first issue the first thing and it's the same thing that can mess us up when we are in a storm they did not listen somebody say they did not listen they did not listen paul told them before they even got in the ship before they got in trouble before anything happened he said don't go he says don't go because i know this uh water at this time of year it's going to be too much uh choppiness it's gonna be a problem we're not gonna be able to make it but they didn't listen to him because he was the prisoner you know god will put his word in somebody's mouth that you don't expect sometimes we can't hear the message because we're caught up on the messenger we can't hear what god is saying because it's not the person maybe it's somebody that's younger than you i gave myself time man maybe they're younger than you and so you think they don't really know what they're talking about i've been here you know all these years and i know but just maybe somebody younger than you has the answer maybe it's a woman i got time maybe it's somebody's the what i like to call not the usual suspect so they did not listen because paul was a prisoner to them and they did not have to listen to prisoners they in the hierarchy they were over him maybe it's your subordinate at work that has a better way of how you can run operations but your pride says i'm the boss and so we this ship gonna go down cause i'm not gonna listen they did not listen and i know that they were prisoners and i know that paul was a prisoner but they would not listen to him and paul was trying to tell him i perceive that it would be life-threatening if you set sail right now but the captain disregarded what he said so many times in life we ignore the things that people say to us because that it doesn't come in the package that we prefer there there are those who even come to church on sunday or monday or tuesday or whatever day and they're not listening to what is being said you remember the oj's had a song your body is here but your mind i know my crowd today is way on the other side of town but that's how it is sometimes with church we're here but we're not here and i'm not just talking about the people in the pew because you may be online there's no thing is making it so convenient and you're fixing breakfast braiding hair washing clothes cleaning the house this is my stuff i don't know about you [Applause] we're multitasking [Applause] texting [Music] watching two sermons at once i'm gonna stay online over here so pastor sees my name i know how it goes i know i know i know i know how it goes every now and then i'm gonna put an emoji in the chat cause you know she read the chat she don't have a life she read the chat every sunday night so i'm gonna put an emoji in the chat but at the same time i'm attending the pilot's house or the preacher down the street because i don't want to miss either word when we do these things there is a danger in missing the message so often my brothers and sisters my sisters and my brothers are warning is given but we miss the message we're not listening in our storms and i can go on and on but i don't need to because i think that you understand what we're trying to say and even from not from a spiritual perspective this is my last illustration on this but some of us missed the message because we didn't listen to our parents can i talk to the youth and the young adults and anybody else that might be watching we're missing the message because you think that they don't have anything to tell you you're missing the message because you say well they don't haven't gone through what we're going through they didn't live in our time but in whatever time we've all had to deal with opposition we all understand that if you lie down with dogs can i get some help that you i don't care what generation you're in we we understand that if you mind your manners and you keep good company it will help you in life and so so the first thing the first problem these guys ran into and we often run into when we're facing storms of life is we don't listen somebody said they didn't listen they didn't listen they didn't listen and that's what messed them up let me give you the second point that we see in the text i'm talking about these guys who who were charged with taking paul across uh to to to his final destination which was wrong the second thing we find out is they they moved too soon i'm gonna help myself they moved too soon somebody say too soon they moved too soon see i i can't really criticize the captain here because i was totally honest there have been times in my life when i moved too soon can anybody will help me and not let me be out here about by myself tell them that you you had that have where where you heard what god told you to do but you moved at the wrong time that that and the funny thing about that is when you do that a lot of times you don't know that it's the wrong time but god will give you counsel around you that will tell you that the timing is not right that is not a good thing it's the wrong time so let me see if i can break this down as simply as possible because when you're launching out too soon you can get ahead of god and you can do something before god says to do it you jump into something without god's blessing without god's direction based and born in sin and if god didn't tell you to do it doing it anyway is not being an overachiever it's walking in disobedience well i know it's gonna get silent don't turn away don't click don't scroll over give me just another minute i have to let us know because the problem is that they were told not to go they did it anyway they moved too soon and in fact sometimes what we want to do doesn't have it doesn't mean that it's the right time to do it it may not even be god's will for our lives and then sometimes when it is god's will it's just he's not saying no he's saying wait he's not saying no he's saying not right now he's not saying no he says wait because he knows us better than we know ourselves is anybody praying with me he knows our spiritual level he knows that we're mature enough to handle it right now he knows that if we're not ready to handle it we're going to wreck it just like this ship he knows if we have a maturity in christ that we're not ready to launch out right now therefore it may be true that what god has for you is for you and i know we like to say that and i've said it i can jump and i can dance it is true what god has for you is for you but he may not give it to you right now i'm trying to help somebody you're mad with god and he's saying not now you're upset about different things that are happening and god said it's not time he's saying i don't want you to move too soon because you haven't grown up to that yet you can't submit to leadership god's saying it's not now you can't you can't do the things you've been asked to do god's saying you're not ready it's not now ah you can't clap your hands or say a man or put an emoji in the chat unless it's your favorite preacher that's preaching god says you're not ready [Music] i'm all right i got plenty of people to walk me to my car god said you're not ready god is saying wait you're not ready can i tell you something based on my own experience cause i'm not putting this thing at you i had to learn this stuff myself you can be gifted you can be anointed you can be smart you can have every degree in the book and you can still not be ready i got a lot i got some help in it here d i got some people in here that have lived long enough to know that you can have what they used to call that educated food all the bells and whistles alphabet soup after your name you might be prepared but you're not ready it can be your time i want you to hear this part cause i wrote this and went back and wrote it again i said lord you sure it can be your time for something but it's not your turn you can be ready but it's not your turn it's somebody else's turn and it's not your job to jockey to move them so you can make it your turn this is not for everybody but it's for somebody see the sign of humility and what i look for in leadership let you in on something it's when i have people who are ready but they are humble enough to not just wait their time but to wake their turn and when you just exhibit that you can wait your turn and you can help other people even if you think that you are smarter than them or you have more to offer or you're a better singer or you're a better preacher but you are humble enough that you can wait your turn that is when i've seen god do it that's when he'll bless you that's when he'll bless you if you can carry somebody else's vision that's when god will bless you and he'll give you your own i've seen him do it have you seen him do it i've seen him do it humble yourself that was the word from last week and that god exalts you in his own time so the first thing we had we had that they what was number one y'all helped me out they didn't listen they didn't listen number two they got out in front of god they moved too soon i want to encourage somebody this morning wait on the lord be of good courage and he shall strengthen thine heart you know i've told you before in the law the word shell means this is mandatory it means the judge can't even do anything about it if it says you shall go to jail you shall it's you shall there is it's not it's no condition that's that's in the law but god's law is even higher than man's law and so if he says that if you wait on me that he shall strengthen your heart so that was number two but here's number three the storm lasted too long now this wasn't this brother's this wasn't they thought this was this one this point this was not their fault they strategized they had come up with a way to get out of there they were in their little secret extra meetings they parking lot meetings whatever they had decided what they were going to do but here's the problem they could not control the length of that storm i could run out of here all by myself we have been out for 18 months nobody knows when this thing is going to pass i'm talking about this pandemic we can strategize any and everything we want to do but ultimately we're going to have to wait on god seeing these soldiers that it went on too long the storm didn't just last a few days in fact the bible says it was two long weeks 14 days and not just a regular storm some little nuisance rain that messes you up on the freeway it wasn't like that it was what they uh one of the verses i think is verse 31 would give the storm had a name it starts with an e you can look it up in the king james i'm not going to say it right now because i'm get too tongue-tied but that storm had a name just like ida katrina all these other things when a storm is big enough they give it a name and you may have a storm in your life right now can i preach it like i feel it that is so big you've given that joke a name [Laughter] it's not some little something you're trying to get through this thing was so big they actually referred to it as a tie phone and it kept going and going and going and it would not relent no matter what they tried it kept storming no matter who they called it kept storming no matter what they came up with it kept storming and it may be somebody i'm talking to today that no matter what you are trying to fix it is still storming in your life ah it lasted too long i've been sick too long pastor everybody else they're they're walking around talking about how the lord healed them and i'm still going to the doctrine and still trying to figure it out that somebody's testimony is it's lasting too long my marriage we went to the retreat pastor we met with the counselors like you told us to but things are not getting better it's lasting too long my finances i can't seem to piece it together from month to month i'm bringing in this money but seems like it's going right out the way it's coming in it's lasting too long and you hope by now like these these soldiers that the storm would pass but it's still raging uh in some of our lives rather than the storm getting better in spite of all of our prayers in spite of all that we've done the storms keep on raging the storms get in your home and they keep on raging they cause turbulence in your family storms get in the church they keep on raging they cause churches to split and fall apart storms get in your health starts with one bad report and then it's one thing after the other and they keep on raging it just seems like it lasts too long have you ever been there where it seems like god answers everybody else's prayer but he doesn't answer yours and those on board this ship along with paul were in an awesome storm that kept on raging so they started throwing stuff off of the ship i'm reading the text because as we learned last week on anxiety sometimes you got to let things go but even though they threw things off and they made it lighter it kept on raging the bible says that it was dark out and they could not see and when you don't see any light at the end of your storm it can make you want to give up but paul decided that he would step in at this point and remind them that they should have listened to them for he had warned them before they left crete not to set sail paul said man you should have listened to me and not set sail and incurred this injury and lost but i had a visitor last night ah because see god will come to you sometimes when you're praying in the midnight hour and an angel of the lord came to me and told me don't worry because everything is going to be all right so my brothers and sisters in spite of the storm in spite of the thunder and in spite of the lightning in your life in spite of the waves in spite of the ship that may be destroyed hold on to the word that says that everything is going to be all right how did paul know that it was going to be all right he knew it was gonna be all right because there was something he still had to do for god he still had to go before caesar he still had to complete his assignment and my brothers and my sisters i came to tell you that everything is going to be all right you may lose some friends in this season you may lose your health in this season you may lose some money in this season you may lose some relationships in this season but everything is gonna be all right you've got to stay in the ship god wants somebody to know that the storms are still raging gubernatorial recalls poverty around the land hunger and food desert the storms are still raging wars and rumors of wars skyrocketing inflation politization of a vaccine the storm is still raging hatred of the oppressed and marginalized the storm is still raging but i need somebody to know and to help me preach this that even though the storms may be raging in your life god has a way of keeping you in the storm i need somebody that may even be going through a storm that say that i have faith enough to know that even though it's rough and even though it's hard i've come too far to give up now you can't make me doubt him i know i know i know too much about it maybe you don't understand but they used to say that when i was growing up that you got to know that you know that you know that god can keep you what do you know about him you know too much about god the father you know he's a keeper a creator a sustainer a provider he's a protector and his is your provision you know too much about god the son jesus christ radical revolutionary patient redeemer waymaker miracle worker promise keeper advocate intercessor who now sits at the right hand of the father you know too much about god the holy spirit he's a comforter he'll hold you in the midnight hour he's a counselor he convicts you of sin he is a paraclete he is a helper he's an empowerer and he's an enlightenment and he's an encouragement so stay in the ship stay in the ship i know it's easy it's tempting i'm just gonna jump into a new ship i'm just gonna go into a new marriage i'm just gonna go into a new situation but i came to tell you stay in the ship don't mess up don't make the mistakes don't listen they didn't listen what else did they do they moved too soon what else did they do they decided that it was lasting too long but i want somebody to know like dr gina stewart said just the other day then the enemy comes in like a flood god will lift up a standard he'll make sure that the storm does not take you out of trouble don't last always you got to do is wait on him trust him tell him lord i need your help i'm trying to make it but it's hard i'm trying to do it but i don't understand i'm trying to stay faithful but it's getting to me but all you got to do is say i'm waiting i'm waiting i'm waiting i'm going to sit right here i'm waiting i'm not gonna move i'm waiting i'm not gonna quit i'm waiting i'm gonna be the last man standing up when the smoke clears i i'm gonna be here right where you told me to be stay stay stay stay stay [Music] i know you're frustrated stay here stay in the ship yes yes yes yes here's i say encourage yourself in the lord nobody around just you and jesus encourage yourself tell yourself put yourself on your own back hang in there keep on going you can make it stay in stay in the ship don't let nothing turn you around don't let nothing take your joy don't let nothing take from you what god has given to you oh god i hear the lord say it there's joy in the ship there's a love in the ship there's healing in the ship there's deliverance in the ship you gonna move and you're gonna miss your blessing you're gonna move and you're gonna miss your opportunity you're gonna move and you're gonna mess yourself up stay in the ship stay there don't move stay there don't waver stay there tell the devil get thee behind me say that i rebuke you stay there i'm not moving i'm not leaving i don't have anywhere else to be but right here in the yeah whoa [Music] my mama [Laughter] [Music] don't you let go don't you let go don't you dare give up now you don't know when this storm is going to end you don't know it might be tonight it might be tomorrow it might be next week so you gotta hang in there [Music] yes i'm happy listen i was trying to tell you what dr stewart said i got too happy the doctors gina stewart one of my mentors that i watch and i follow she said something to bless me this week about storms she said that storms not all storms are you gonna win listen the way this story ends that ship broke up it crashed you're not coming out of every storm as a winner sometimes we preach in our effort to encourage you and make it seem like you're never going to lose anything along the way that's for somebody some storms you win but then there are other storms you know how you win them cause you outlast them [Music] you out lash them you you're still there when it's all over you win that storm because you outlasted it i don't know who i'm talking to this morning i'm through you've been waiting for god to move your mountain and he's not going to move it he's waiting on you to outlast it there are some witnesses in the house he he used to sing a song lord move that mountain don't move that mountain but give me the strength to climb lord don't move that stumbling block believe me anybody remember lead me all around see he wants you to outlast your opposition he wants you to outlast your haters he wants you to outlast the naysayers and the critics he wants you to stand long enough to outlast the threats to your marriage and your family he wants you to outlast the financial struggles that you're facing he wants you to be still standing and even though the ship might break up along the way he's gonna say i'm leaving you enough to get to the other side see see when they held on to that ship because the bible talks about how some came in in all these different ways some came in online somebody hear me in the spirit some some came in on site some came in you know i'm talking about my thing they may come in different ways but they all ended up back in the ship [Music] because they held on and they didn't give up see this reminds me of jesus can i can i preach jesus for just two seconds see he had opposition from the day he was born he he was hated he was criticized he did so many things that he had to outlast he could have fought with everybody now he did fight with some of them folks and let them have it but a lot of times he just kept his face like flint he just kept his face towards calvary because he knew that he could outlast his opposition he endured the cross despising the shame he hung he bled and he died for the sins of this world he died until you and i were made right with god he died until we were justified he died until we had an opportunity to become believers on the lord jesus christ but not only did he die he rose again with all power in his hand and one of those things he can give you is stay in power stay in the ship so this morning there's a song it says it right here like a ship that's tossed and driven battered by an angry sea when the storms of life are raging and its fury falls on me and i wonder have you been there what i have done to make my race so hard to run but i say to my soul [Music] say to your soul take courage because the lord will make a way somehow [Music] the lord will make a way somehow when beneath the cross [Music] he will take away he'll [Music] now [Music] is shown upon my there's a sweet relief [Music] [Music] just the chorus the lord the lord somehow [Music] [Music] he will take away [Music] right now and well [Music] that the weight is showing up [Music] [Music] anybody need a relief this morning take it to the lord and leave it there's a sweet relief [Music] [Music] there's a sweet relief [Music] somehow amen amen that song was in my heart come on give it up to our music team they worked so hard on these songs they just come out of my mind but some of you guys go back and you know that song amen amen amen we're going to prepare now to extend the privilege of the church whatever song you have prepared for that is fine i want to just take a moment to encourage somebody and to say um that this message is for you even if you're not a christian let me tell you why because right now in some ways we're all in the same we're listening to the same news reports we're hearing the same different things you know that's being said about all kinds of things but what makes my ship different from your ship is that i have a captain that that captain is the captain of the sea but he's also the same captain who's willing to lift you from your current situation and make you a part of him and we do that by faith by asking him into our heart asking him to forgive us for our sins to become lord of our lives i love to use john 3 16 and 17 when i do invitations because it really kind of speaks to me it talks about the love of god that god so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son that whosoever believeth in him should not perish if you believe in god believe in jesus actually that you don't have to live a life and go to hell you don't have to live a life that's not the abundant life but you can receive him as your lord and savior it says for god so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son that whosoever believes in him shall not perish but shall have everlasting life and that everlasting life actually starts now not just when you pass away the bible says you move from uh from this life into the eternal life right at that moment that you may still suffer a physical death but you've been reborn in your spirit and you now have spiritual life but i love verse 17 because it says that god did not send his son into the world to condemn the world now oftentimes especially if you're not a christian all you ever hear about are the narrow-mindedness of christians how we're always talking about everybody else is so bad and so terrible but god did not come to condemn this world this world was already messed up he came so that those who wanted to receive him could accept him and so that that's you today i'm going to invite you to do that even at home you're going to put the number one in the chat our ministers are there and they're watching online and they'll make sure they reach out to you but if you're in the room here with us and you know for sure that you've never asked jesus to become your lord and savior i'm just going to ask you to stand because you're already seated so i'm just going to ask you to stand or you can raise your hand if you want to do that the second call is for someone who says i'm already a christian lord i'm already a christian pastor but i need a church home you may have been coming here you may have been watching for a while this is it this is it we're not going to bring in anything else no special anything this is it this is where god's leading you we love you to be a part of what god's doing here at new my calvary [Music] we want your love for you to join all you have to do is put the number one in the chat if you're present all you have to do is just stand and say i want to become a part of this church i want this to be my church family we would love to receive you now this last call is specifically to those folks who are members of the mountains maybe you found yourself in this text in a lot of different ways but i want to talk about church membership because if you are a member here i'm encouraging you to stay in the [Music] unless the lord is leading you to do something else focus on what god is doing here and then figure out how you can help there's still plenty of work to be done and these 20 people can't carry it by ourselves if you sign the dotted line you said this is your church and you tell everybody in town this is your church i need you to stay in the ship i need you to recommit i need you to tell me pastor i'm still here i i don't know i was sharing that we had a meeting yesterday we had a luncheon with our inland empire bible study it was socially distant all the folks that live out in the inner empire almost 20 people showed up we had a wonderful time but we did that because i told them i can't see you i don't even know if you're still connected to me [Music] you're connected to this church and the enemy will come in and tell you oh no go over here and go over there and they do this and they do that but god assigned you here stay in the ship it doesn't look like it used to live past you we're in the fellowship hall stay in the ship when we get to the sanctuary whenever that is it's gonna be different stay in the ship those soldiers they got to the other side because they all held on to the there's no record of anybody that survived they all survived because they held onto the ship pastor what do you want us to do show up speak up type up let me know i'm in the ship i'm here i'm here and whatever the lord gives you to do i'm gonna be here because this is where my blessings are i'm gonna be here because when i when something happened in my family you showed up i'm going to be here because when i needed to get married you did my wedding i'm going to be here i'm just going to tell you when you when i was sick when you were sick you were the one that came to the hospital not these people on tv are 3 000 miles away you were there and so i'm going to stay in the ship i'm going to talk some more tonight when i get to holly mitchell about how i feel about that other situation but i will say this california's still here we better stay in the [Music] father thank you for the word [Music] today we pray now that we've only done what you wanted us to do only said what you wanted us to say [Music] we thank you the hearts were encouraged and inspired we will listen we will not move too soon and no matter how long it lasts we're gonna stay in the ship in jesus name amen [Music] [Music] [Music] hallelujah you blessed by the word today let's give the lord a hand praise for what he's doing in this house and for our pastor for that awesome pastoral message and i know that as we prepare to pray out pray out of this thing that we all got something to meditate on to pray on and they get better in jesus name amen i'll be praying this out heavenly father in the name of jesus we thank you so much for the word that has gone forth we thank you so much for the opportunity to to to listen to our leader about how we can serve you better by serving here in this body of believers that we call new mount calvary missionary baptist church in los angeles california thank you lord and lord god i pray that we all focus on you that we give you all of the glory all the praise and as we prepare to sing out we say amen lord make us one [Music] because we want to finish the work that we have begun [Music] oh lord make us one [Music] and we will keep going because we are growing as one [Music] we are growing together as one [Music] we are growing together through god's holy [Music] [Applause] word oh yes we are growing growing as one [Applause] gracious god we thank you so much for what our eyes have seen what our ears have heard what our hearts have felt lord god lord god as we have already prayed and we will say again to you we thank you for the message we thank you that you are still communicating with us that you are still giving us an opportunity to serve you god almighty and may i'm sorry and lord god by the grace of our lord and savior jesus christ the sweet communion of his holy spirit may it rest root abide with us both henceforth now and forevermore and god's children say all together amen and amen [Music] be blessed church a few weeks ago a massive earthquake hit the country of haiti registering 7.2 on the richter scale it struck the southwestern part of haiti near porto prince the nation's capital since the july earthquake over 1400 people have died as a result and many haitians are still recovering from a previous earthquake in 2010 that left the country devastated there are 11 million people living in haiti they are not only suffering with the after effects of the recent earthquake but they are also suffering from gang violence political corruption a pandemic threats of a tropical storm and the recent assassination of their president the haitian people need our help this world is filled with pain need isolation and despair we at new mount calvary are blessed to be in a position to help others through the work of our missions department the missions department is the ministry of the church that focuses on helping others through acts of mercy and compassion right now we are in the process under the leadership of our pastor we are raising funds to help our brothers and sisters in haiti our swift and immediate action is needed during the month of september we are asking you the faithful and loving members of new mount calvary and our ministry friends to help us by giving a special offering for foreign mission haiti relief will you stand with us in this effort even if you cannot give anything we can all pray thank you in advance for your support join us tomorrow evening for church-wide prayer at 7 pm in person and online if you are attending on-site please arrive early tomorrow's pearl service will feature our sunday school department and don't forget you can jump start your morning with prayer monday through friday at 7 14 on our daily prayer call church family we have multiple opportunities for you to study the bible throughout the week and assist you in growing in god's word grow discipleship institute is on tuesdays at 6 30 pm with two classes pastors bible study will continue the living with life's bible study series live on facebook and youtube and mental mission meets via conference call noon bible study is each wednesday via conference call pre-registration is no longer required to attend our on-site worship experiences seats are limited and face masks are still required for admittance we look forward to worshiping with you each week our early morning worship experience takes place on sundays at 7 30 a.m via conference hall the worship service is led by our ministerial staff deacons and deacon nests our sunday school ministry is excitedly preparing for their this saturday september 18th at 9 am this year's retreat will be held on zoom the theme is evangelizing above normal all teachers and sunday school workers are asked to attend for zoom information please contact the church office join us every sunday at 9 30 a.m as we study god's word together in sunday school via conference call and our youth and young adult classes meet via zoom we have also excitedly launched our sunday evening sunday school class it's every sunday at 6 00 pm on youtube and facebook we believe that sunday school still matters and we would love for you to come grow with us [Music] you

Channel: New Mt. Calvary Baptist Church

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Length: 112min 23sec (6743 seconds)

Published: Sun Sep 12 2021