The Table of Encounter | Jeremiah Johnson | The Altar Global

[Music] so [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] uh [Music] um [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Applause] so [Music] [Music] this morning inviting you and i to go deeper in who god is to go deeper in our experience of him and so we're just going to pray and ask the holy spirit to help us and then we'll dive in holy spirit thank you for this morning thank you that no one is here by mistake or coincidence lord you drew us all in and god i'm asking that you would awaken us to the power of your word lord let it encourage let it correct let it rebuke lord i pray for a maturing in our faith in jesus name amen one of my favorite scriptures is found in john 14 15 very simply this jesus said if you love me you will obey my commands growing up a pastor's son i was around a lot of invitations to pray invitations to fast invitation to go on mission trip in fact if you've been around the church there's a lot of requests there's a lot of invitations made and sometimes we try to respond or sometimes we try to obey god out of what we know and so for me there are three forms of obedience if you want to take notes briefly number one there is fear-based obedience there's a lot of people in the church that obey god because they're afraid of going to hell i call this fire insurance a lot of people they just they've heard a message it's heaven or hell or that kind of that hell fire and brimstone and they're just they're trying to obey or they're afraid of consequences so like if i don't give in the offering today god's gonna curse me or if i don't do this and that so there's a fear that's driving it's the motivating factor behind obedience to jesus and then there is duty-based obedience which i believe especially most people in the south do the bible belt duty-based obedience rules over all and so it's this sense of i know that i need to do right so i just kind of try to religiously strive to get to the place where god loves me and so a lot of people the reason why they're in church is because their parents went to church or their grandma prayed for them and so we're just trying to religiously serve and obey god the best that we can but the third form of love i believe is the highest it's the most fruitful and it's the most productive obedience in the kingdom of god and it's called affection-based obedience in other words it is out of the experience and the encounter with the love of god i say it like this we will do for love what we would have never done for religious obligation so the place that the holy spirit wants to draw the church and i really hit on a lot of this last night there's going to be some incredible things that god is going to ask the church in the last days to do to sacrifice to give up to make time for but we will never say yes to that invitation if we're only trying to serve him out of fear of where we'll spend eternity or out of some kind of religious obligation just knowing it's the right thing to do isn't gonna keep you from sleeping with your boyfriend just being told bible stories and and singing songs on a screen if it's not real if there's not an encounter in a moment of crisis or a moment of temptation it's i call it some people get offended i call it a hot passionate love affair with jesus it's only song of solomon said your love is better than the wine of this world it's only when the love of god that invitation i believe it's a dare come and taste and see that god is good it's only as we're tasting and we're seeing it's only as we're encountering god's love that we gain effective and long-term victory over temptation and the plans of the devil right i want to be so in love with jesus i want to have those doves eyes eyes for one i want to take that covenant that job made with his eyes i've made a covenant with the lord there's a place of encounter with jesus that will deliver you from inferior appetites there is a realm of encountering jesus that will deliver you from pornography there is an encounter with the love of god that will deliver you from every besetting sin jesus said in john 14 15 if you love me you will obey my commands in other words it's those who love him who fall in love with him that will obey now i want to throw this out there i believe many people connect with this when we preach truth or when we preach obedience apart from intimacy with jesus we produce religious slaves so a lot of people in the church this is just a book of do's and don'ts this is when you hear people even evangelize we try to take this thing and beat i got a big one beat people over the head this is what the word of god says do not do this and do that when we just box people when we just preach this thing apart from a love relationship with jesus you're either going to scare them into obedience or we're going to drive them religiously to do the right thing for a season but they'll be caught in a religious cycle again and again and again how many of you are parents in this room i'm a father of four it's so important for our children i'm going to use an example close at home that instilling morals and biblical values in them we're trying to set them up to make right choices not because mom and dad are going to discipline you if you don't not because we're trying to scare them we want an active relationship with jesus we want out of them encountering him for them to make the right choices when that doesn't happen they hit 18 in peace out that's the pen that's another pandemic in america we religiously raise our kids in the church force them to obey god they never had a true encounter with jesus and when they hit 18 they're given so many options of the world and often times they're being offered more of a real encounter in the world than they ever got offered in the church so sad you know we travel the nation people are burned out on church or they say like you know i'm burned out i said yeah you're burned out on church but you've never tried jesus yet one of the greatest examples that i like to give is my relationship with my wife it's the closest thing that i can speak out of i remember being a really busy college bachelor i cleaned toilets to get through college i took 18 credit hours on my way to get a bible degree i'd wake up at four in the morning most days and go to work so busy didn't really have time for anything and i went and saw this girl named morgan dilley in a cafe and she showed interest in me and i was lucky enough to get her phone number through the weeks that followed what ended up happening it was just shocking is i went from a really busy bachelor to a super available guy i don't know what happened i went from needing to be in bed at a certain time so i could get enough sleep to work to like talking all night getting one hour of sleep somehow waking up excited getting through the day and couldn't wait to waste another night talking to her how did i go from religiously busy at work to all of a sudden available i began to encounter a realm of affection and relationship with her that delivered me from an inferior appetite in the same way that that happened in my life in the same human relationship i'm convinced we've got to get there with god have we gotten to the place of an affection based a love relationship with jesus that overrides what time it is and what's on my calendar have we experienced that realm of love relationship with jesus where we're willingly out of delight saying yes i'll give that up i mentioned in the last service imagine i told them my wife is sort of a health nut her idea of a good date is to run as fast as we can on a trail and then drink a smoothie i'd personally like rather go the movies and eat popcorn imagine showing up on a date and talking the whole time about what you sacrifice to get there talk about a turn off you show up to a date and you're like man i'm missing my favorite sitcom man i'm missing imagine how that person would feel if you're just throwing in their face 24 7 what you sacrificed to be there or imagine if you just looked at your watch and said how you doing they would probably think you don't care you're just asking religious questions but yet we sit in church and go come on i got somewhere to go don't you know i'm sacrificing the nfl football package to be here don't you know i'm sacrificing time with friends and family come on speed it up we do this kind of religious gymnastics with the lord inspect and expect to have some deep thing with him and i just want to tell you in love if it won't work in a human relationship it's not going to work with him why why we think that we can give god so little and expect so much more i don't know where that comes from because i'm pretty sure if i gave my wife my leftovers we would have a dry stale dead marriage because even when you're in love you still have to make sacrifices my wife and i four kids under nine we go on date night once a week or once every other week and yes it's gonna cost you money and yes you're gonna have to strategize and yes but listen what people care about they make time for it's like i'm busy well here's tickets to your favorite oh i'm open what what happened you have priorities so we we know some of the things that the bible said i mean saints jesus matthew 4 5 and 6 he says when you pray not if you pray he says when you fast not if you fast then he talks about money and we're just ready to close it up and in service there are things as christians that jesus clearly expects us to do as his followers if you love me the world will know when you fast when you give but jesus is not hoping that you and i will grit our teeth or get scared when the offering bucket go god they want my money again oh god 21 day who would wake up at 6 00 am 21 days in a row for prayer people that are in love with jesus you will do for love what you would never do for duty and obligation it's like we're so afraid to set people free from religious dry christianity and the truth is when we fall in love with him when we let him pour out his love upon us we will be some of the most dangerous courageous believers that are literally going to turn the world upside down we're going to fast we're going to pray we're going to where'd he alright here we go are you ready i don't believe in tithing you want to hear why so the old covenant in my own strength i was required to give 10 of my income to god now i'm under a new covenant and i no longer have to do it in my strength i can do it in his strength are you telling me that in a new covenant now in god's strength i get to give less what i'm going to tell you is under the new covenant in god's strength i actually believe 10 percent no longer becomes the maximum it's the minimum the reason why i don't believe in tithing is because i believe it gives god far less than what he's worthy of when the actual work of grace gets down in your heart when the love of god gets poured out into your spirit you you look at 10 like you pity people who either give ten percent or they just say well i've been freed from the law so i'll just give whatever which equals two percent of their income folks i'm talking about when the love of god gets down in your heart you literally can't give enough and you get crazy excited about it my life has been radically impacted by people whom the love of god has compelled them to make incredible sacrifices and they are jacked up excited about it one of my mentors in my life several years ago this brother is a businessman he takes extra deals he works extra days not for more houses not for more boats and not for more cars he lives his life to be a crazy blessing in the kingdom of god i would watch him write checks for five and ten and fifty thousand and he would get hit with the joy of the lord look at me and say isn't this fun and i'm like he's a nut he's lost it and he would say no i'm in love how many men in here love your wife and if you were right in your head you would do anything for her honey what what do you want if i had the resources if i had the what do you want and i i hope it wouldn't be this clause on a ch now i love you what an honor what a privilege what an opportunity to make you happy see it's that motivation that love sometimes in the church it's awkward because we're talking about intimacy with god and people don't know how to have intimacy with one another all right how we doing he loves you he loves you so much jesus died so that you and i could do more than 45 minutes on a sunday and a couple of bucks in an offering he really does want everything jesus hung naked on a tree shame before all men so that you and i could just live bare before him and yes we need to fast and yes we need to pray and yes we need to say no to the things of this world but we can truly do it out of the overflow god really wants to restore the joy of your salvation don't some of us remember we got saved and it was like we couldn't wait to get to the bible study we couldn't wait there was a fire that was on the inside of us that fire doesn't have to die you don't have to be an on-fire believer you get married and play house and the fire dies you can be an on-fire believer you get married in the fire doubles and then you have kids and you get introduced to the refiners fire hallelujah kids are a blessing and not a burden hallelujah all right how are we doing let's look at luke 14 verse 16. but he being jesus said to him a certain man was giving a big dinner and he invited many and at the dinner hour he sent his slave to say to those who had been invited come for everything is ready now want you to hear the holy spirit today saying to each and every one of us come everything is ready jesus has already died on the cross there's nothing more that he can do on his end he has provided everything in life and godliness for you and i there's a table of encounter that god is setting in every generation and then in verse 18 here's their response but they all alike began to make excuses can you turn to your neighbor and say excuse [Applause] the first one said to him i've bought a piece of land and i need to go out and look at it please consider me excused and another one said i've bought five yoke of oxen and i'm going to try them out please consider me excused and another one said i've married a wife and for that reason i cannot come and the slave came back and reported this to the master then the head of the household became angry and said to the slave go out at once into the streets and the lanes of the city bring in here the poor the crippled the blind and the lame verse 24 for i tell you none of those men who were invited shall taste of my dinner i told the last service this is jeremiah johnson's least favorite story in all the gospels this story has been one that i have wrestled with that i have got agitated with that i have slammed my bible down and said lord i'm gonna act like i just didn't read that and the reason or the source of my frustration with this story and really it's just because god is challenging me is that the excuses that e these individuals make about why they can't rsvp to the table of encounter is because they have a wife they have a pair of oxen they have a land a piece of land the big elephant in the room this morning is what's so evil about all of that i'm sort of hoping it would say well they wanted to go out and get drunk so they couldn't come well they wanted to go cheat on their spouse again so they couldn't come well they wanted to go do drugs so they couldn't come no all of the things that are listed here are not evil it's like asking yourself what was so evil about isaac that god asked abraham to sacrifice him maybe it wasn't that isaac was evil maybe he had become too good in the sight of abraham sometimes the things that you have to wait on the longest are the things that easily become gods sometimes the good gifts that god gives us are the things that we turn into gods welcome to 2021 where most of the gods that people have are called their kids good gifts that the father has given them that they have turned into gods and so now we have child centered homes which are not biblical and we should be raising children in parent-centered homes where you are not the center of the universe little johnny because if you believe that and you're taught that you'll never believe the real gospel where jesus is on the throne not you you could hear a rat pee on a cotton ball in here look at your neighbor and say chill out i can only tell that joke in the south [Music] northerners don't get it all right i want you to hear the holy spirit knocking on the door of your marriage some of you need date night would you get out of the message i need to prioritize my spouse more some of us it's i need to be spending more time with my kids some of us whatever hear the holies there's more prayer meeting fasting family the invitation to always go deeper in god it'll forever be there i love it i love that i get to serve of god who i can spend all of eternity getting to know and learning how to love him better i love that but our list of excuses of why we can't rsvp it'll always be this long and i'm gonna tell you why so long as two things number one we don't really have a revelation of who god is that list of why i can't do this and why i can't do that if we don't really know god that list will be long and secondly we don't know what he's prepared at the table for us when we get a revelation of who god really is when we understand the beauty the delight the savior of the world when we really fall in love with him just like i began to fall in love with my wife i began to get delivered from inferior pleasures secondly when we really understand at the table of the lord he will withhold no good thing from those who seek his face when we recognize the invitation when we say yes to sit at the table of the lord he's going to serve you not what you want lollipops and candy and ice cream and brownies he's going to serve us exactly what we need a big fat juicy steak or if you're a vegan broccoli i want to teach you something that god taught me and it could throw some of you for a loop or you might even think it's semantics but it's not your level of surrender is not determining your level of encounter that's religious your level of surrender is not determining your level of encounter are you ready it's your level of encounter that's determining your realm of surrender tell all these if i just give up or it's like we don't want to fat like it's like fasting is our nuclear option for breakthrough they got demons you know we or somebody has cancer i mean i'm gonna stop eating i'm gonna sacrifice it all for the breakthrough and what we ended up doing is we got spiritually dead dry and so now we're fasting out of the place of lack hoping that god would encounter us where when we get delivered from religion we understand it's out of the encounter and the overflow it's out of loving the lord and allowing him to love us in return that then we surrender to him being motivated by love and not duty folks i've i i was around a man named lou engel maybe some of you know him he had a ministry called the call he filled stadiums called people to fast 40 days 21 days i did a lot of them he he's a he's the guy that rocks if you don't know he's like the most polarizing figure he's passionate he's on fire for the lord and he he'd get around people and again he would have such an impact on them they would start fasting and praying and they'd last five days they'd last 10 days they'd last 15 days then they'd go back into the world then they'd hear lou again and get fired up again and then they would some of us were in this religious cycle where we're just well all right our marriage is good we're going to get involved in the church or all right good month encounter weekend we're going to sacrifice and then you miss the next six it's we're trying to just offload all of our junk and then say god encounter us the invitation this morning is live from the place of daily encountering the love of god it's out of that place of encountering him that we obey him trying to set religious captives free today trying to encourage you that some of those excuses that we have of why we can't the root of the issue see pastor matt i got convicted because i used to preach about the fruit of disobedience without ever touching the roots they're not doing this and they're not doing that and why aren't you doing this and why aren't you giving and why aren't you and really the root not the fruit the root is we need a fresh encounter with the love of god the root is we really don't believe that god has prepared a table for us as his sons and daughters when we believe the lord when we fall in love with him everything changes bill johnson says many christians repent enough to get to heaven but few people repent enough to experience heaven on earth so here's the thing about these excuses what we're finding out as we go deeper in god is he's just not after our sin stuff he wants our good stuff the reason why this scripture drives me crazy and challenges me so deeply is because let's say i preached a message of repentance this morning repent for the kingdom of god is at hand get right with god most christians sit there and say he's not talking to me why i don't have drugs in my life i've already been delivered of immorality i'm not that guy anymore but as we go deeper in the holy spirit the message of repent isn't even talking about your sin stuff it's talking about your good stuff told a story of a family i was preaching out in colorado on the love of god on encounter they were there on the friday night visibly being rocked by the love of god six months later the pastor calls me and says hey do you remember this family i said yeah i definitely remember them he said what you didn't know is they were they never came to encounter services they were on the ball fields of america five nights a week they had games on sunday and they just happened to show up when you were there he said the love of god has so radically impacted them that the kids went to the parents and said we're no longer going to play sports the kids went to the parents and said we've encountered the love of god to such a degree we're not going to waste five nights a week on a ball field anymore see the american thing in us feels sorry for them oh they're gonna miss out on their childhood and it's that same mentality that we see these kids running away from god at 20 and 30 years old because we wanted to sell them short on the kingdom of god stuff them with the world and then get mad at god about it it's like we want our kids to have an encounter with god that we're unwilling to have as parents well if johnny will just get touched at youth group no sir or ma'am when are you going to play some worship and have a family bible study and let let them see let them see mom and dad don't play religious games on sunday see we're we're really we're shaking the gates of religion again brother just leave us alone just let us alone in our religious complacency here here's what i i really believe most of these folks here are going to heaven i believe that there are millions of christians in america they go to church they tithe they love the lord they're going to heaven but will they ever inherit revival no you will never inherit true revival until you allow god to come for your good stuff many people are getting into the kingdom of god because they gave up their bad stuff their sin stuff amen but if we're going to take the invitation to taste and see that he is good if we're going to go deeper in god we're going to have to understand the deeper we go in god the less we can take with us but i'm just telling you there really is a place in the lord where you're giving of your finances you're giving of your time you're responding to the altars and it does not have to be this miserable dry worthless christianity that's bearing forth no fruit in your life your family and your marriage we really can go for joy-driven excited enthusiastic christianity for the joy set before him he endured the cross we really have to believe that the holy spirit is stirring parents he's stirring families in this hour we've got to begin to believe that god is raising up arks of his presence in a turbulent culture now is not the time to check out now is the time to check in now is not the time to run and hide now is the time to arise and shine we have such an opportunity in america right now with so much fear with so much hopelessness people are the suicide rates people are scared out of their mind about the pandemic or about their finances you and i have not been given the spirit of the world we have been given the spirit of god and the spirit of god allows me to have a sound mind it allows me to have power it allows me to operate and love so the ball is in your court this morning i'm getting on a plane see ya will you wrestle with me will we just stop highlighting scriptures that we like and ignoring the passages that make us wrestle god's not looking for more gifted individuals he's looking for available vessels just looking for people out of a purity and honesty god doesn't need any more loud pharisee prayers he doesn't need any more shouting and yelling or mumbling through i like leonard ravenel he said christians don't tell lies they just sing them every sunday we can move beyond the fake that's why no one's getting saved these days they see right through the hypocrisy i want to ask you to bow your heads with me i believe the holy spirit is here this morning to help us get to the next level whether that's just a baby step or some of you are ready to jump off the cliff and sink into the deep oceans of god's grace maybe you've been given a buck in the offering and you can be give a buck 25. i don't know where you're at with the lord holy spirit we ask right now that you begin to minister to us all over this room if you feel in your heart just to pray a short prayer it's just simply this take me deeper god take me deeper god you have a prayer language begin to pray in the holy spirit if you don't pray in english but we need the help of the holy spirit to take us deeper god those areas in our lives where we're saying i don't think so but i have a burden for marriages and families this morning god i ask that you would set marriages on fire i pray for holy romance i pray for individuals to fall in love again lord i pray for fresh encounter for our kids thank you for setting the table father for inviting us this morning to come and partake to come and eat and drink give us grace to rsvp in jesus name hey it's jeremiah johnson i want to thank you so much for joining us at the altar global a growing movement of christians who have a burden a desire for the return of jesus christ and the preparation of the bride for that glorious day i want to pray for you today i know that you have needs desires things in your life that you're hoping believing that god would answer but before we do that i want to just extend an opportunity to you to partner with the altar global in your prayers your financial support god is gathering a remnant of folks who just have a desire to partner with us on a monthly basis or maybe you're even watching today and you just want to sow a one-time seed i want to let you know as the founder of this movement we're going to take the money the prayers that you sow today and sow them right back into the kingdom of god we're seeing souls save the church come alive like never before missionaries church planters being revived because of what god is doing you're going to see a number pop on your screen you can text to give you can even click on the link in the comment section and there'll be an opportunity for you to give there so let's pray today father thank you for those watching today lord thank you for the ministry of the holy spirit that is participating even with the bride saying come lord jesus but i ask that you would meet every need today lord i pray for breakthrough i pray for salvation for lost loved ones god we believe that we are living in the greatest days that we have ever known in the name of jesus amen thank you so much for joining us today stay tuned for another episode bye-bye [Music] you

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Length: 47min 50sec (2870 seconds)

Published: Thu Sep 23 2021