Welcome To The NCC Bible Experience | Pastor Raymond Ramsey

can we tell god how mighty he is hallelujah come on jesus hallelujah come on and come to this place oh god we welcome you jesus come on and place those hands together [Music] we're ready for you to move we invite you to fill this room come take your rightful place we need you now and we're ready for you too [Music] we need you now [Music] come holy spirit [Music] [Applause] [Music] here we invite [Music] for your [Music] we need you now [Music] come holy spirit [Music] [Music] come by here my lord come by here come by here my lord come by here oh lord come by here you say come by hear me [Music] [Applause] oh lord come by [Music] somebody [Applause] [Music] nobody needs you [Music] [Music] come holy spirit come get your people free [Music] everybody [Music] is [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] everybody [Music] we're waiting there [Music] [Music] [Music] hello ncc family thank you so much for joining us here's what's happening at northview christian church ncc safe harbor and communion city if you wish to become a part of our ncce church online it's as simple as texting the word join to 334 539 pray or log on to the church website at nccfamily.org to find valuable information on how to join us as ncc family member we can't wait to connect with you ncc dothan did you know that our midweek virtual bible experience is now open to the public that's right we invite you to join us every wednesday night at 7 p.m for our midweek virtual bible experience if you're not in the dothan area you may join us via any of our social media platforms at the same time to experience the life-changing word of god please remember that for your safety we desire to observe the social distancing protocol while worshiping in the sanctuary therefore until further notice ncc safe harbor we ask that you please remember to register for all upcoming in-person services please help us to keep you safe are you watching on youtube do us a favor and hit that thumbs up and subscribe to this video if you're watching on facebook go ahead and hit that love like or share button or start a watch party hey ladies it's janita we're looking to update our woman refined database and we're looking to connect with you email us at therefonwomanncc gmail.com again that's the refinedwomanncc gmail.com and we'll keep you updated on all things woman refined and don't forget to like us on facebook under our woman refined facebook page we're looking forward to connecting with you thank you so much for joining us and please enjoy the rest of our service [Music] [Music] [Music] so [Music] so [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] all right am i live we live okay praise god thank you for joining us for our midweek bible experience i'm pastor ray i'm excited to be here with you man this has just been an incredible year has it not i mean what an adventure we can look at the lows but we can also look at the highs and we can understand that man if you take what many of us have been walking through you can find it right in the pages of scripture i mean talk about taking your place in history you know and so i know right now that as we talk tonight you're going through different challenges you're facing all sorts of difficulties and so i want to be sensitive to that tonight but tonight i want to talk to you about a topic that i don't think we can talk about enough especially with our theme you probably just saw it on the screen we talked about this is the year that we are one and and i you know the funny thing is when i was praying about a theme and my dad was talking about it he's like you know just share with me whatever you think god has put on your heart and the idea of oneness kept coming back to me and you know we said that we are one and that was a theme that we came with and i started noticing all around the country all these different churches were talking about different variations of being one and so apparently it's not just something on our heart and on our mind apparently it's something that's in the mind of god concerning his church first and then the rest of the world he wants us to know that he's called us not just to fly solo but to be one in fact in john chapter 17 jesus prayed about our oneness saying that when we become one the people around us will be able to look at our oneness at our unity which we'll talk about tonight and they'll be able to through the way we relate to one another know that there is a god and believe that he sent his son jesus to the earth i mean what an incredible responsibility that through the way we relate to one another people will believe there is a god or won't believe there's a god i mean that's an incredible way on us to say we've got to cooperate with the holy spirit and submit to the way he wants us to do relationship so tonight i want to share with you a quick word called relationship rules now what do i mean by relationship rules am i going to give you a bunch of rules concerning relationship absolutely not that's not what i'm talking about but what i want to talk about is that the importance of relationship in our life now if you turn on the television you look at reality tv shows you look at the you know different movies and stuff like that you'll find the topic of relationship is at the top of the list i mean everyone's thinking about who they're gonna be booed up with they're trying to figure out how to throw a divorce party they're trying to figure out you know relationships are all around us and from the time you're a child i mean you know you connect or don't connect with a parent or or a mentor or a teacher or a coach and you know with friends in school you're always trying to make uh friends in school and so relationship is a huge deal the problem is the more that we walk through life and we go through different hurts and pains we kind of start relating to people differently or not at all you know i think for some of us our goal is to figure out how to avoid relationship and still get you know the benefits of having relationship but i want you to know this might be bad news to you that you don't get to go through life and not know how to do relationship i mean you've got to master the art and science of relationship management you got to do it it's not just something that's on your heart and on your mind you weren't just wired for it it's something that's on god's heart and mind for you we were not created to be alone we were created to do community god himself lives in community father son and holy spirit god created man after creating everything else and saying it was good he looks at man and says it is not good that the man should be alone i'm going to create someone to help him fall i'm kidding anyway i'm going to create that's a joke i'm going to create okay it's too soon all right all right i'm going to give him a helper suitable to him you guys going to get me fired all right you guys made me do it i want to start by going to second second corinthians chapter 2 verses 5 through 10. i don't want to start with like a happy-go-lucky verse i want to kind of look at uh something that is was a problem to the corinthian church the apostle paul is writing in this second letter to the corinthians he says if anyone has caused grief he has not so much grieved me as he has grieved all of you to some extent not to put it too severely the punishment inflicted on him by the majority is sufficient now instead you ought to forgive and comfort him so that he will not be overwhelmed by excessive sorrow i urge you therefore to reaffirm your love for him another reason i wrote to you was to see if you would stand the test and be obedient in everything we'll read one more anyone you forgive i also forgive and what i have forgiven if there was anything to forgive i have forgiven in the sight of christ for your sake let's read another verse in order that satan might not outwit us for we are not unaware of his schemes i wanted to read that passage to you for a reason uh if you just do a little quick commentary on it you'll find where the apostle paul is writing to this corinthian church he apparently has a really interesting relationship with them they're very gifted in the things of the spirit uh they're very talented and so because of that the gifts that they were given to you know build the church up that was supposed to like strengthen each other it was tearing them apart and so we find in in first corinthians chapter 12 paul's talking about this whole thing he's trying to explain to them listen you can't like stand away from each other you're actually one body like you're you're put together to function together and so he has to say hey let's throw aside those like spiritual gifts for a second and let's just get down to the basics let's talk about love that's how you build each other up if you're gifted and you're you know ministering to one another and all this stuff but you don't have love you're nothing and he says i'm not going to leave it up to you to come up with your own definition of love we know there's so many different definitions of love he says let me just give you agape love the love of god and he begins to talk about the patience and kindness and not being self-seeking and all these things about what love actually is and he says you know when i was a child i spoke like a child i thought like a child i even reason like a child but when i became an adult a man i put away childish things he never leaves the subject of love but he begins to talk about how love is directly tied to our maturity as a person and our maturity as believers and even our maturity as a community as a church okay do you know families mature you know i mean the way my parents relate to me i'm 36 years old and i was raised like the youngest in the house and what's interesting about that is i mean they relate to me i see some some parents relating to their uh younger children a certain way they're still kind of frustrated frustrated and all this stuff but man my parents feel kind of like i could say you know hey man dad i pretty much blew my life he's like you know you'll be okay you know what they've learned patience and they've matured and they know even their wisdom for me is different than when i was younger right so you don't just even mature by yourself you mature in your love relationship your love connections and so you know the apostle paul had given had um kind of helped them solve some problems in the first letter to the corinthian church and one of them uh and i might want to get ahead of myself i'll jump back to second corinthians real quick um you have this scenario where paul is telling these people he's saying hey listen i want you to go ahead and forgive this guy who apparently has not offended me but has offended you right he's apparently done something so heinous that that you guys had to put him outside of the fellowship it was that bad you had to invite him to leave the church okay and he's saying now that guy's out there and he's kind of just in the wind he says it's been a little bit too long it's time to bring him back in and reaffirm your love for him now back to the whole commentary thing you know some scholars believe that what this guy has done is has spoken against paul's apostleship and paul had to correct him and therefore now he's saying you know he's overcome by the condemnation of the devil okay the reason why i don't believe that's the case is because paul is saying this is not a personal thing this is something you need to forgive which points us back to first corinthians where it's quite possible he's referring to a man who had slept with his father's wife who was like just walling out in the church and so and so what is he saying he's saying listen you got to put this guy out and so here it is paul has written this first church letter to the corinthian church he's written a second letter which we've lost to antiquity which he calls the scathing letter so apparently there's a second letter paul has written like a madman going off i don't know about you but i remember when i was younger and we didn't have cell phones to text each other we used to write letters right so if you were having like a relationship issue and you had to write a letter you could write a 10 page letter easily you put on some r b or whatever you listen to and you write that letter you crying write that letter so angry and next thing you know you don't run out you're writing on the walls so whatever paul is going through in this moment he's written this scathing letter like a madman you know and he sent it to them and for whatever reason the holy spirit decided that was not supposed to survive throughout the ages so now second corinthians is technically third corinthians as we know it but in this he's realized they've obeyed all these you know they've not obeyed many of his commands i mean he's told them go and do this they don't obey he says don't do that they go and you know they now that you're pointing out paul i think i'm gonna go do that they were disobedient in almost every matter except putting this guy out and now the guy's out there in the cold he's assumed a whole nother identity spiritually and paul's like i'm hearing this guy still out of the fellowship it's time for you to forgive him and to reaffirm your love for him you forgive him i forgive him why because how you relate to this person can affect and infect the rest of us because in the eyes of god your personal prosperity is not what rules the day in the eyes of god what rules the day is relationship that's why god didn't want to have a relationship through to us or with us through the rules we just didn't believe we were sinners in need of salvation so he said okay we'll follow these ten rules we couldn't follow the ten commandments in fact the harder we tried the harder we failed so what does it do it's meant to cause our guilt and our sinfulness to come to the surface so that we would become so desperate to say i can't do it on my own i need salvation and that's when he brings jesus into the scene okay that's why jesus could look at the pharisees and he didn't have to know what their private sins were to say they were hypocrites because he knew the fact that he was manifested meant it was time for god to save them from their sin there's no way they could look so squeaky clean and perfect there's no way you had to be lying right i see some people i'm like there's no way you could be that clean because nobody is right we all need jesus but what jesus does is he comes and he lives out the the law of god he lives out the perfection of god not as human beings understood it but as god intended and he fulfills the law on our behalf and he goes on the cross and he dies and he takes the punishment for our sin and he takes his sinless blood and he sheds it on the mercy seat for us in heaven and what does he do forever more we have forgiveness of sins not by our own works but by the blood of jesus i mean that's a beautiful that's a beautiful arrangement isn't it and and somehow through this arrangement god is saying i'm no longer relating to you through the rules i want to have a heart-to-heart personal relationship with you relationship rules in the eyes of god and and i want to talk to you about this because nothing determines your success or failure in life more than your relationships nothing at all i mean when god wants to take you up he sends a person into your life when the enemy wants to take you down let's be honest he sends a person into your life and vice versa man if the enemy wants to use you to take somebody down right or take someone up then that's what it'll do i want to talk about four different types of relationships that ought to be at the forefront of your mind because if we're honest most of us are having some kind of relationship challenge right now some kind of relationship struggle and so uh as my dad you say it behooves us to to kind of brush over this topic from time to time so the first type of relationship that you are engaged in right now whether you know it or not is called a spirit relationship let's go to jeremiah chapter one verse five in jeremiah jeremiah chapter one verse five is the calling of jeremiah the prophet but god speaks to me says before i formed you in the womb i knew you before you were born i set you apart i appointed you as a prophet to the nations now we could get all technical about what does the word no mean at the end of the day the word no means no what is he saying he's saying i had an interaction in a relationship with you i impressed myself on you there's so many different ways we could say that but but i don't want to get too deep in that the point is is that you have a spirit relationship with god in james chapter 4 verse 4 through 8 the apostle james he says this you adulterers people don't you know that friendship with the world means enmity against god therefore anyone who chooses to be a friend of the world becomes an enemy of god but i want to keep reading here he says or do you think that scripture says without reason that he jealously longs for the spirit he has cause to dwell in us but he gives more grace that is why scripture says god opposes the proud but shows favor to the humble submit yourselves then to god resist the devil and he will flee from you next verse come near to god and he will come near to you wash your hands you sinners and purify your hearts you double-minded now i read all of that extra stuff to say this you not only have a relationship with god you also have a relationship with the devil you are in an abusive toxic relationship with the devil and so what is god saying he's saying listen as it relates to me i want you to run to me even when you're struggling with adulterous tendencies even when you have a thirst for the world even when he's saying listen i want you to cast that aside i want you to run to me he said but as you're running to me i want you to resist the devil you got to submit to me you got to let me lead you you got to resist the devil so you have a relationship with god the scripture tells us that you even have a relationship with angels hebrews chapter 1 tells us that they are ministering spirits sent to minister to the heirs of salvation psalm 103 tells us that they they hearken to the voice of his word it's not just god speaking it's whoever speaks the words of god angels are sent into flight let me tell you something um angels aren't i hear people command angels we command the angels to come that's not what the scripture says but whenever you release the word of the lord angels go to war on behalf of that word so you have a relationship even as it relates to angels jesus said this he talked about children and their importance he said listen don't don't you know sleep on these kids man he said their angels are ever before my father's face so you have angels that are warring on your behalf but you also have a relationship or a connection as it relates to the devil he hates you he wants to destroy you he wants to rob you from everything that the lord would have for you to have right so you have and not just the devil himself but even demons demon spirits have a way of interacting with you that's why the scripture tells you don't believe every spirit but test the spirits so they eat so there are evil spirits that are sent out and not how do i know when i have a spirit that's come from god or spirit that's coming from the enemy even if it's not a spirit without a body it's a spirit you being used by a human agent so the same way god can use you the enemy can use you the same way god can use people in your life the enemy can use people in your life because spirits animate us the bible tells us in genesis chapter 2 it says that that when god made man he formed him of the dust of the earth now what is god god as a spirit the scripture's very clear jesus himself said god is spirit and they that worship him must worship him in spirit and truth but what does it tell us it says that when god formed men of the dust of the earth he is a spirit but he breathes into man's nostrils the breath of life and man becomes what a living soul man becomes a living soul what do we talk about a soul a soul is their mind will emotions imagination and intellect it's your it has to do with your personality your perception all those things everything that you know yourself to be is your soul right but your soul was birthed out of a spirit so what does that mean spirits have the ability to affect the soul a spirit can come can come on a person and cause them to feel anger without cause a spirit can come on a person and make them want to murder somebody that's why people will commit certain crimes and go i don't know what came over me right a spirit has the ability to affect the soul so you have a relationship with the spirit realm whether you know it or not god says to the children of israel in ezekiel chapter 36 he said i'll put my spirit on you and cause you spirits can cause you your second type of relationship that you engage in is a soul relationship or people-to-people relationships in john chapter 13 verse 34 let's go there real quick john 13 34 jesus says a new commandment i give you love one another as i have loved you so you must what love one another matthew chapter 5 verse 44. let's go there real quickly matthew chapter 5 verse 44 it says but i tell you love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you i've stopped there for a reason here's why here's why because your relationship with people is not limited to your relationship with the people you want to relate to you don't just have to learn how to manage relationships with your friends that are in your corner cheering you on you've got to learn how to manage your relationship with your ex who wants you dead you've got to learn how to manage your relationship with an overbearing parent or a wayward child you've got to learn how to manage yourself with against co-workers who are trying to cause you to lose your position you've got to learn not just how to relate to people that you care for but people who don't care for you and jesus goes on to tell him you'll be like your father in heaven who is perfect he reigns on the just and the unjust the goal is to be conformed to the image of his son and what is the image of of his son who is the son of god jesus the bible says he happens to be the express image of god himself of the father so we want to be conformed to the image of his son and by doing so we will also look like our heavenly father which means the same way jesus could not escape people i mean think about it there were times jesus was frustrated he's like how long will i tolerate you guys he didn't say idiot but he was like oh my goodness at one point he goes into the temple no doubt to pray and he sees people selling stuff in the temple and just there was no prayer anywhere there was no worship there was no and he just walks out i'm sorry guys give me a moment you ever had to give me a moment yeah just i'll be right back give me a second he goes out and braids a whip with what i don't know whatever material he had he found it and he knew how to braid a whip but he went in and he kicked over tables and he whipped people and the scripture says that it would be fulfilled zeal for your house has eaten me up jesus had to relate to people and and the funny thing is there were times when jesus was thinking he was forward thinking but his disciples were so far behind they were slowing him down and frustrating him you ever have people around you they never get it and every time you go to make a move those people frustrate the process they slow things down and yet no matter how hard you pray god won't let you discharge your duty of taking care of them no matter how hard you try you know what i mean i mean mom you're out there trying to get you know get your love life on on you know on course but you always got these kids man you gotta you can't even go on a date you gotta go you know your kids trying to burn down the house i didn't sign up for this babysitter number 27 it's like i'm out you know what i mean they meet the family everything's great to meet the kids you're like man i'm sorry i i can't do this right what am i saying we've got to learn how to relate to people and we've got to learn how to do the bible says he that wins souls is wise it's not just wise to win over people but it takes wisdom to win over people you know long gone are the days of saying to people you know repent or else you know especially when you have people that the enemy has planted into the church to spread false doctrines that there is no hell so you have a great number of people who don't even believe there's a health so you can't tell people you know if you don't repent you're going to hell they won't even care so we've got to be wise like jesus said follow me i'll make you to become fishers of men i've got to teach you how the mind works i've got to teach you how to operate as it relates to the realm of the emotions that's why i like gods like td jakes you know i mean he came in such a time where people were kind of pretty much ignoring the soul especially the souls of women and he just started speaking to that a man speaking to the souls of women and what did god do he started to repair certain things and he started telling the church hey maybe you ought to start thinking more about like what's happening in the soul and then by understanding the soul then you'll be able to understand the spirit that's why the scripture says that that the word of god one of the things it does is it separates what soul and what spirit because if we're honest we can't tell the difference without god's help so you got to have a relationship with people the third type of relationship you've got to pay attention to is the relationship that you have with yourself mark chapter 12 verse 29 can we go there real quick i'll read to verse 31 if you will allow me to the most important one after jesus was asked what are the what's the greatest commandment he said the most important one is this hear o israel the lord our god the lord is what he's one love the lord your god with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength the second is this love your neighbor what as yourself there's no commandment greater than these i love this because jesus gives the greatest commandment which is to love god and i'm going to tell you something it's very difficult to love god just because you're told to do so you've got to have a revelation to love god you've got so many people who are zealous about the things of god but have no knowledge of god himself they have no connection to him no prayer life no type of worship someone has to literally get up and coach you to worship god after he's kept you alive during a pandemic after he's you know kept you from losing your house after he's you know brought you back from the grave over and over again after he's kept you from um you know going to jail for things you should have done and someone still has to get up and get you to get your hands out of your pocket and tell you how to worship him it means that you don't have a revelation and it's not to bring condemnation it's just saying hey something's not connecting here but here jesus is saying you know you're commanded to love the lord your god with everything you have but but in loving the lord your god he's saying listen don't forget people too love your neighbor but you got to love your neighbor as you love yourself what happens if you don't love yourself you're going to love other people the way that you love you you're gonna see other people the way you see you right because we see the world not as it is but as we are we see what we are prepared to see okay so so here's what i mean if you don't believe that you are worthy of honor you will dishonor other people it's true well think about it like this let's say that you worked really hard for something i mean really hard and you let's say you were even hazed into some organization right and the rules change you become like you work your way up and now to let other recruits in they don't let you haze anymore are you gonna feel like they deserve to be there no i mean you're going to look for little ways i'm not allowed to hate you but you know they're walking through the door you trip them why because you feel like they gotta they gotta hurt the way i hurt to get this thing right why because you see the world if if i got here through pain you got to get here through pain too and that's why god's got to really help our community because especially if you were raised in this nation and you are the descendants of slaves that were slaves in this nation the struggle is that we've so identified with pain that we have pain in every if we're not hurting we feel like something's wrong we will find ways to make pain happen in our relationship make pain happen and you know god help us when you know thank god for like the civil rights movement and different things like that and different movements that have happened but i've noticed this if we find ourselves in situations where there's not some kind of tumultuous thing happening then we might create that here's what we need to do we need to find a way to get healthy with ourselves and i'm going to tell you something let me for those of you who are freaking out right now here's the flip side to that one of the ways you know what you shouldn't tolerate is by seeing yourself in a healthy way when you see yourself in a healthy way you'll be like nehemiah when they told them to go into the temple and hide because the enemies were coming he said would a man like me run into the temple and hide please and that's how you know when you won't you no longer tolerate abuse from either governments or relationships or whatever when you start getting healthy a healthy relationship with yourself then you'll say wait a minute would a person like me put up with that no would a person like me be in a job that's not paying me what i would what a prayer no why because you start to value yourself ephesians 5 verse 25 can we go there real quick ephesians 5 if you were to go to verse 18 uh we're not going there but if you go verse 18 he says you know don't be drunk with wine you know whereas it is excess or whatever but be filled with the spirit okay once you hear that everything from that point on is about the spirit because we a lot of times we stop ver we read verse by verse it wasn't written verse by verse you don't write to somebody and then say verse two okay that was just so we could find it okay you understand what i'm saying right okay so so here's what he's saying he's saying when you're filming the spirit you'll uh you'll sing you'll speak to one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs you'll make melody of your heart to the lord he goes on to talk about relationship right and he eventually he gets to a more specific form of relationship which is marriage which means the hardest type of relationship and what is he saying he talks to the wife about submitting to her husband that's the s word right and he says you submit to your husband as unto the lord as though your husband is you know as christ okay but then he doesn't leave husbands out he says in verse 25 says husbands listen he says love your wives just as christ loved the church and gave himself up for her now we could keep reading all of that and he talks about what that looks like to make her holy cleansing or by the washing water by the word but i want to i want to skip down here if we could to verse 28. in the same way husbands ought to love their wives as their what own bodies he who loves his wife loves himself again let's flip that what if you don't love yourself i mean it's just simple you won't love the people around you if you don't love yourself you won't love your kids if you don't love yourselves you won't love your church if you don't love yourselves you won't love your friends if you don't value yourself how do you know if you love yourself how do you treat yourself i mean let's be honest do we give ourselves adequate rest are we feeding ourselves the right food right are we um are we allowing ourselves to um just to engage in things that stress us out what are we doing because again oftentimes you shouldn't just have um situations in your life where people are choosing you you ought to be choosing people for your life it can't just be that someone else saw value in you and you said well that's not really the ideal thing to do but because someone saw value in me and i don't see value of myself i'm just gonna i'm just gonna take this opportunity no you've got to see yourself properly when adam saw eve he looked at her he said i call you what woman he said for you are bone of my bone and flesh of my flesh and he said i call you eve because you're a mother of all living well if she's the mother of all living who was the father of all living you got it he was he was naming animals and doing all this stuff he was setting up the garden doing so when god gave him a helper he said i'm gonna give him a helper suitable to him not just suitable to the garden not suitable to his assignment but suitable for him in his assignment y'all catching that yeah because we're always looking for a reason to not have to relate to a person because relating to a person means we'll have to be humble but in order to relate to people properly man we've got to relate to ourselves well the fourth type of relationship i like to call the situational how do you relate to your environment how do you relate to your circumstances and situations in philippians chapter four go to verse 11 we'll read to verse 13. are you guys getting something out of this so far i hope so he said paul says this he says i'm not saying this because i am in need for i have learned to be content whatever the circumstances i know what it is to be in need and i know what it is to have plenty i have to learn the secret of being content in any and every situation whether well fed or hungry whether living in plenty or in one which flies in the face of the people who believe that if you're following god he will never lead you into a wilderness if you're following god you will always have more than that is not true okay now he says here's the secret i can do all this through him who gives me strength now you you've probably been quoting that over everything else you know you go with your friends to run a 5k i can do all things through christ who strengthens me you know what i mean you're going to climb them out and i can do all things why am i naming all dangerous stuff all right i can do all things through christ who strengthens me but he's talking about your situation and circumstance he's like look man i've learned how to be content wherever i find myself because sometimes we're in situations we didn't choose for ourselves sometimes we're in circumstances that maybe we did choose it and now we're living out a consequence but do you think god leaves you alone just because you mess up and you end up in a circumstance no god's with you and in that situation you say hey listen i've learned how to not act out i've learned how to be okay i've learned how to be cool i've learned how to be content i'm not reaching for more i'm not trying to i'm not being angry and bitter and frustrated what am i doing i've learned to be content with the timetable of god i've learned to be content with the provision of god i've learned to be content when i don't when things don't line up i've learned how to be okay in my situation in jeremiah chapter 29 if we were to read verses four through seven he talks a little bit about this you guys know jeremiah 29 11 was my favorite childhood verse and probably yours too he said i know the thoughts that i think towards you thoughts of peace not of evil some translations say i know the plans that i have for you plans for peace and not of of evil to give you hope and bring you to an expected in or a hope and a future right here's the deal most people do not read context i do not know why this is the case but he's telling them listen jeremiah's telling you're going to go into captivity and you're going to be gone a very long time a whole life span that did not sound like good news so in verse 4 he says this is what the lord almighty the god of israel says to all those i carried i carried into exile from jerusalem to babylon he says build houses and settle down plant gardens and eat what they produce marry and have sons and daughters find wives for your sons and and give your daughters in marriage so that they too may have sons and daughters increase in number there do not decrease and the next verse is also seek the peace and prosperity of the city to which i have carried you into exile pray to the lord for it because if it prospers you too will prosper you have a relationship with the city with the family with the enviro the workplace that god has led you into and you're so busy cursing that environment thinking that you can curse the environment and you not be cursed but here god is telling them hey i'm leading you to a place you didn't choose for yourself but but i don't want you to be distracted by that i actually want you to have a good relationship with the circumstances and situations you're in i want you to go on life as usual i don't want you to decrease i want you to increase even though you're in a place that you didn't want to be and he says and by the way the city i carried you into i want you to pray for its prosperity because if it prospers you will too so you got to have a good relationship with the situation that you find yourselves in let me ask you this question are you complaining about where god has you now you prayed and asked god to send you into this situation you got to the situation things aren't the way you wanted to be are you complaining are you bitter about the circumstances and situation you're in and now when god goes to draw sweet uh water from you he finds there's bitterness there are you angry right now and hard to get along with well listen you've got to get a better relationship with your situation because you listen god isn't calling you to be comfortable but he will have the comfort of the holy spirit to go with you everywhere you are because in order for god to develop your faith he has to constantly put you into situations of uncertainty because faith is spelled what risk now all of these relationships are related to one another think about it you have a relationship with god but the scripture tells us that you can't say you love god whom you've not seen who's a spirit but you don't love your brother who you have seen so even god says before you come to me talking about how much you love me i want you to go and make peace with your brother in fact jesus actually said this leave your gift at the altar you've come to show god how how much you love him and you want to honor he said well wait a minute you have unforgiveness over there i want you to go and resolve that first then come back and let's celebrate together god's always looking to make sure that there's some kind of peace happening in your life he wants you to have peace in matthew 18. you know the disciples are asking a question hey how many times do we forgive our brother if he sins against us in a day seven times don't you love when people try to suggest to you what the answer is seven times i mean that sounds like a lot to me if someone does you wrong seven times in a day imagine that imagine you catch someone you know it's one thing to walk in the parking lot you see a car you think it's your car you go to it does it ever happen to you you go and you try to unlock it it's not working you're like oh the battery must be dead you're pulling on this car and you look in there and you go wait that doesn't look like i don't remember having a car seat you know some people will still pull on the handle like i don't know that doesn't look like my stuff and then what do you do you look around and make sure no one sees you someone with a gun from a long distance like you know what i mean you're like how's there another car my car's junkie how's there another car just like it all right but but here's the here's the deal what if that's the case but now someone sees your car and i think man this car's better than mine i think i'm going to break into this car so they start breaking in the car and you catch them and they're like man my bad i am so sorry please don't call the cops you go you know what i forgive you i'ma go back into this store real quick you turn around you look and they're back out there with something shimmying to get into your car you go what are you doing and they're like my bad i'm sorry i thought this was my car again so so sorry how many times would you let that happen seven times before you hurt them so so they're asking jesus seven times i mean we've added this up this sounds about right he says no 70 times seven he's not trying to give them an exact number what's he trying to tell them he's saying as much as it takes because the forgiveness is not about the person the forgiveness is about keeping your heart clean and so they're saying that thing is like man how's this possible and jesus begins to tell them a story about a steward who was caught we've talked about this story before someone go too deep into it but this guy who was stewarding money for this king he was caught and he was facing some charges he asked for forgiveness was given the forgiveness went out found someone who owed him money had that person thrown into jail gave them the same consequences he was supposed to get someone saw it went and told the king the king brought him back in it's like are you for real and he said no man now he gives him the consequences and what's interesting is the scripture says this he was delivered into the hands of the tormentors until he was able to pay the debt okay now so here's the deal you put him in a place like let's just be literal and say jail right because he owes money so how can he in jail pay back that money and this if we put this in in normal terms i mean people that have gone to jail for let's say child support or some kind of debt or whatever it's like you're in jail how can you make the money to pay off the debt to get out of jail it's an impossible situation and that's what jesus is trying to communicate here he said this will my father do to anyone who refuses to forgive their brother or sister from the heart it's another thing have you ever forgiven someone from the mouth i forgive you but your heart is still holding on you forgave them but you're still waiting on them to say they're sorry you forgave them but you're still waiting on them to make you whole that's why the word give is in the word forgive it's saying you took something from me that created a deficit in me and now i can't i'm not waiting on you to give me back something to make me whole i'm gonna give me what is owed to me to make me whole on my own i'm gonna i'm gonna work to make that better on my own which means forgiveness may hurt because they took something from you you might have a few trust issues but god's willing to work with you to give you grace in order to forgive but there is no grace for unforgiveness are you with me man i don't know if i'm still in the same house someone threw their phone on the ground stopped it please pick your phone back up all right lord heal their phone so he's saying listen it's a paramount importance that you learn to relate to people well because because god's judging your relationship with him based on how you relate to people are you with me and then again as we just learned i relate to people based on how i relate to myself now god is always working to draw us together i mean think about it in the scriptures you hear them talk about we've been given the ministry of what reconciliation god's always talking restoration drawing us to himself i'll draw you to myself right that's what the blood of jesus does it makes us it's a connective tissue blood is it's drawing us to god it's connecting us to god god's always trying to restore relationship and the same way he's always trying to connect us and draw us closer to him the enemy is working overtime to pull us apart think of the strife think of the stress the problems you're having right now in your connections with people it's the enemy that's trying to pull you apart why because he doesn't want you to achieve or maintain what's called unity because he understands that there is a power in unity which we'll talk about in a second what is the definition of unity unity is the state of being unified or united or joined as one jesus praying in john 17 was what that we would be one as he and the father were one and so what is god's desire for us his desire for us as a church his desire for us as as brothers and sisters and and and cousins and and you know as coworkers his desire is for us to not function as a bunch of you know disjointed people trying to outshine one another he wants us to learn to function as one you know i remember a long time ago the san antonio spurs were you know i didn't understand it because it's not like they have the most talented players ever they had the twin towers right right here's the idea though they had a few good players but they're they were so seamless on the court i mean you always see this you see those teams that are like like those movies that are star-studded with a star-studded cast but the movie's still bombed you have teams like that where everyone's like a star and then what happens when they get the ball when they're in crunch time everyone's playing hero ball everyone's trying to get give me the ball no give me the ball don't give me the ball you know i got to uphold these endorsements i got endorsements i got endorsements i got a shoe deal i got a shoe dude i got a shoe deal and they're fighting each other right everyone's a hero on the team the avengers everyone's fighting each other okay but then you have those teams where you can't even really tell who the franchise player is you can't tell no one has a shoe deal but they're killing it why because they've learned how to play their game as one and that's what jesus is trying to get us to understand he tried to get the disciples to understand you know they were like yeah yeah i get all this wonder stuff but hey who's the greatest of us and he would be like are you kidding me right now one one time uh two of them their mother came to jesus and said hey you know you're doing such a great job here i just you know parents love to do it i just love what you're doing with my boys so when you come into your kingdom can one side on your left another on your right of your throne he's like are you for real right now but we laugh at that but if we're honest we're doing that think about most of what you're pursuing isn't it to outshine other people isn't it to stand out and to stand head and shoulders above other people you want to be the person that's above everyone else you want to be the person that's in the lights it's something that's in us the pride of life and it's something that god often times is going after because it becomes an enemy of our unity right but unity means to be joined as one it comes from a latin word that literally means one but what the enemy understands that you and i have to come into understanding of is that there is a power even a supernatural power in unity what does you need to do unity attracts the miraculous it attracts the miraculous unity makes things that should be impossible possible in the book of genesis we hear of this story in genesis i think it's chapter 11. you hear the story of the the tower of babel and these people are they decide they're probably bored but they decide to build this tower up to heaven they're trying to get to god and they say we're going to build this tower right and what do they do they start building this tower all the way up building and building a building and god ends up saying this god says hey listen he says i've got to go down and i've got to confuse their language in their speech why he says because if they are if they remain in this place of unity i see they jump to verse six for me it says nothing they plan to do will be impossible for them if they stay communicating well if they stay when one person says something the other person gets what they're saying i mean there's nothing worse than having community excuse me um lacking unity in your communication that's why you see the word unity in the word community and it's also related to the word communication or communicate why because that's what binds us together we have the same language we have the same speech we think the same have you ever like watched an old movie and you just it's a black and white movie or something and you listen to how they communicate it's so weird sounding to us hi my boy come on over here old chap what we don't talk like that what's an old chap hey my boy hey what who's your boy right but that's how they talked back then right they had certain things that made sense to them but we're in a different time you see what i mean i did a message recently called you know keep that same energy you know what i mean like to someone 10 years ago they'd be like what are you talking about that doesn't make any sense in america we have all these different ways to say the same thing right a sub sandwich is actually a submarine sandwich it's really what it is that's why it's like a submarine but if someone came from overseas and didn't know that they'd be like you know we had a submarine sandwich what is a sandwich on a submarine like you understand it's it's when once a person says something the other person understands what they mean or at least they're close enough to say well wait let me try to figure out what does that mean that's how we keep that relationship flowing that's how we have that unity and satan fights that because wherever there's unity there's the miraculous in acts chapter 1 the bible tells us that i believe in verse 14 that they were in one place and one mind one heart i mean they were all going after the same thing waiting on the power from god so that they could live the life of jesus in the earth and and after they as they're sitting there they're realizing okay wait a minute what's missing this hasn't happened yet and then they start saying well maybe we need to set another apostle because there were 12 disciples and then one of them went rogue so let's get another one in they cast lots and then what happens they go back to this place of oneness wholeness unity and then in chapter two spirit of god comes in there's power on your unity paul and silas are in one are in the jail together they're singing to god they're they have one focus and what happens the power of god shakes the place the ju the um cell doors are open over and over again you see them in the same place at the same time and and there's a power a miraculous power that happens when you're in unity i mean the scripture talks about that if we don't even have honor for our spouse i think it's a husband toward a wife what does it say it says your prayers can be hindered i wonder sometimes if if there's miraculous results that are still on the uh not downloaded yet simply because we're lacking unity i wonder if there's miracles and healing and things that god wants to do that the only reason they haven't happened is because we're still in unforgiveness and we still have resentment toward one another and we're still holding on a conflict that could easily be resolved with a conversation but we don't want to have a conversation because because and being vulnerable makes me unsafe i'm unsafe if i come to you and i open the lines of communication and you're not ready what if we come to a topic that that we're not ready to deal with and and what happens we we keep god's power out there are benefits to to being in unity right what does unity bring it it brings strength and it brings safety ecclesiastes chapter 4 verse 9. let's read that i'll read a few verses i hope this is helping you it says two are better than one because they have a good return for their labor if either of them falls down one can help the other but pity anyone who falls and has no one to help them up also if two lie down together they will keep warm but how can one keep warm alone though one may be overpowered two can defend themselves a cord of three strands is what not easily or not quickly broken i love this because it says it doesn't say chords of three strands a chord all right one accord right we're all we're three but we're tied together and this is the point the point is is that there is strength in unity one ox can can pull so much weight but you put two together under one yoke man they can pull exponential the amount of weight god's trying to connect us with people for there's some things you want in life that you can't get to by yourself but the problem is every time god puts you with people who can help you because you don't have a good relationship with yourself you can't have a good relationship with another soul you see and so now you keep on superimposing offenses onto that person from the last person or the way you see about yourself so now people that are there to construct you you think that it's it's not constructive criticism it's them trying to break you down they're trying to tell you where you're missing it so they can tell you what you need to do to correct it but you want the no no no don't tell me where i'm missing it just tell me how to do it right well you need to be broke we got to kill what you got first to give life to something else but you want the both of them to exist together you want to be wrong and right and it doesn't work that way god tell me the right answer well i got to first tell you the answer you have is wrong no no no no this could be right too it's my truth okay you do that you hold on to that buddy there's strength of their safety in unity how about this many of you are already thinking this there's blessing and divine favor and unity psalm 133 let's read that and uh and i'll be getting you guys out of here pretty soon psalm 133 let's go there if you get a chance a song of a sense of david how good and pleasant it is when god's people live together what in unity next verse it says here it is like precious oil poured on the head running down on the beard running down on aaron's beard down on the collar of his robe it is as if the dew of herman which is the mountain of god were falling on mount zion for there the lord what bestows his blessing even life forevermore man when we're in unity things just flow when we're in unity god looks at that thing he kisses it god anoints that thing that's the oil god anoints it and again oil also has to do with ease or with grace oil flows things just work when there's when there's unity there and he's saying that this is not just gonna not only does god bestow a blessing it's just even life evermore things just live on but man think about your favorite band right think about your favorite band from back in the day and you know great band i mean they're getting hits and all of a sudden there begins to be some infighting in the band and so now one person says shoot i'm the one selling these records you know what i'm gonna do i'm going solo so they start brokering a side deal you know maybe they go solo they do well for a second but in the end you lose the whole band now this person goes solo the other person who used to play the cowbell now they go solo the person used to carry the chords across the stage they went solo and in the end unless there are michael jackson or beyonce or some other people that you might like they fizzle out eventually but man that band could have had life ever more and what i hate is that sometimes it takes 20 years for a group to reunite by the time they reunite they can't even do all the dance moves they used to do they're just across the stage like you know why it took that much time to get the unity back don't be your favorite band how about this not only is there blessing and favor but there's growth there's maturity in acts chapter 2 verse 46 and 47 it talks about when this unity that goes beyond just prayer and begins to be a lifestyle every day they continue to meet together in the temple course they broke bread in their homes and ate together with glad and sincere hearts it says praising god and enjoying the favor of all the people and the lord added to their community daily those who were being saved i mean churches grow when there's unity communities grow when there's unity your business will grow when there's unity amongst the staff amongst the ideas that are flowing amongst your vision and your mission and your values when there's unity things just happen to grow and prosper but when there's not unity i mean moms and dads separate brothers and sisters don't talk to each other anymore when there's a lack of unity the enemy is able to work in that lack of unity ephesians chapter 4 it talks about two different types of unity in the beginning of ephesians 4 paul talks to the church at ephesus about the unity of the spirit he says you've got to endeavor to keep that unity listen in verse three make every effort to keep the unity of the spirit through the what bond of peace peace is a glue that keeps us together but not only that it helps us to keep or maintain or protect the unity of the spirit through the bond of peace now watch this what i want you to realize is this there is a unity that god gives naturally to believers you go to the store you meet somebody you guys have a conversation and you go to yourself are you a christian or you go to church why there's just a natural kind of whatever you go to a church you feel a connection there and you know you're supposed to be connected some people are so funny to me they'll go to a church they're like i don't know i don't think god's in that church no that's not what god wants you but god's in that church he's just trying to guide you with his peace you don't have peace there you go don't stay stay and cause problems don't stay and try to be you know the harriet tubman of that she wouldn't have done that everybody get out i'm going to take you across this you know across the tracks to this other church where god really is it's all about preferences okay god's moving there first corinthians 12 talks about that differences administrations and operations same god but paul's saying here listen i understand you're all individuals you have different graces he says around verse six or seven i understand that and those graces on your life are what make you stand out and be different however before you talk about each person being given a different type of grace i want you to get this down this unity down go back to the verse we were on that unity you got to get it down why he's saying god gave it to you you don't have to create it he's saying just don't mess it up and go to verse 4. he says listen there's one body and one spirit just as you were called to one hope when you were called one lord one faith one baptism one god and father of all who is over all and through all and in all look at that so he's simply saying man you are literally any egos of course but to each one of us grace has been given as christ apportioned it so before we get to the differences and all that stuff he said i want you to understand that we're one go to verse one of that i want to read verses one and two of that as a prisoner for the lord then i urge you to live a life worthy of the calling you have received verse two be completely humble and gentle be patient bearing with one another in love i love how he says completely because it answers the question of how humble do i have to be before i can rise up in rebellion how gentle do i have to be before i lay these hands that's it i love that he said how patient do i have to be before i quit how much do i have to bear with one or how do i bear with one another with griping and complaining no he says do it in love he's saying be completely humble be completely gentle be patient bear with one another in love and he tells them why in verse three why so that you cannot mess up the unity that jesus gave you by the holy spirit but if you were to skip to verse 11 let's skip to verse 11. so christ himself gave the apostles the prophets the evangelists the pastors and teachers to what equip his people to sit in pews and listen to messages as long as they share it with their friends and they give their tithe an offering wait is that what that says oh to equip it this is a different version greg to equip his people this version says for works of service for them to do the work so that the body of christ may what be built up next verse he says until we all reach what unity in the faith so we talked about unity of the spirit he says you don't create that just don't mess it up but now he says till we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the son of god and become mature attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of christ i want to read the next verse just because i like it then we will no longer be infants tossed back and forth by the waves and blown here and there by every wind of teaching and by the cunning and craftiness of people in their deceitful scheming listen that's one way you can know you're still a child in christ or an infant every new doctrine that comes out did you read the gospel of judas did you hear about this new teaching of this and that okay and you're applying it and wondering why you're not getting results you're not getting closer to god you're not becoming more mature in christ you're actually looking like something completely different why because you're still a child you need to be under authority and under spiritual leadership and be um at work with what's being imparted to you not just hearing but obeying and using the impartation that was given to you and as you're using it to serve you not only build the body of christ but you as a member of the body of christ begin to become mature and what does maturity look like it looks like learning to think speak act and love like jesus so the devil is working extremely hard to break down our relationship think about that that unity in the early part of the verse that's how the spirit of god moves amongst us the connection to that leadership is how we're coming to the unity of the faith we're hearing the word of god we're growing in our faith we're taking risks we're falling and being restored we're having all these things happen and that's how we're growing in the image of christ i want you to keep this in your mind god wants you to live a victorious life and the way that god causes us to conquer us he does this number one god defines and conquers that's how he works he always is working through definition of identity the first thing he says to jesus before sending him out into ministry is you're my son all right so so if you're my son and i love you and i already approve of you that sends you out the door i remember when i was a kid my parents would send me out with a lunch box you know you have a lunch box as a kid and a big book bag you could barely carry right so you go out the door and you look at each other's lunchbox i don't know if kids do that anymore they probably cash out you know tap their phone on something and lunch comes out i don't know but the idea is this you don't leave out the door hungry you don't leave out the door not prepared so what does god pack in your lunch when he sends you into the world to to succeed he gives you identity you're my child right so so whatever whatever you see me doing you can do because you're my child you have a a genetic predisposition to be like me that's it so however you view god will determine what you try to go out and be and do right he says you're my son whom i love i love you which means i'll keep you safe so you should have security you don't have to find security in a relationship with people you don't have to find security in a gang or security and why because i got you your security's not your job it's in me okay and he says you know i approve of you which means you don't have to go out and make a fool of yourself trying to get approval of people approval asks the question am i good enough you don't have to wonder if you're good enough you are good enough your kids shouldn't have to be out in the world asking if they're good enough you should make sure that they know they're good enough but they're still going to ask because the enemy is same way you're trying to attach them to their destiny the enemy's trying to pull them apart god's his strategy is define and conquer for man our strategy is decide and conquer when you make a decision it literally means you cut away every option beyond besides the thing that you're choosing that's a decision literally here's the idea i used to say design design and conquer because we always want to plan things out and map things out and do and then we go off and take over the world but in reality it doesn't matter if you design something if you don't decide to do it until every other option is dead you have not made a decision but once a human being makes a decision and locks in success is inevitable and if you take a few steps in your process and you look back and i don't know you haven't decided so victory is not inevitable for you but defeat is a possibility but for the devil it's divide and conquer he always tries to get between you and other people why so he can distort the way you see god's word so he can distort the way you see people who care for you so you can he can distort even the words you say to yourself you ever think thoughts and go man that doesn't make sense but maybe you're so sad and you just kind of start entertaining these do you ever have thoughts that are maybe suicidal thoughts or thoughts that are just like self-harm or sabotaging thoughts or thoughts that nobody loves me no one cares about me you know they don't make sense but you're in such a low place those words almost feel comforting you ever been in a place like that maybe it's just me you just it's just like you know i'm nobody and you just kind of let it just kind of rocks you sleep i'm nobody you know you know who was me pity party but you don't realize that words are connected to spirit jesus said my words are spirit and they are life which means the enemy's words are spirit and they are death and if you invite those words in unchecked then you can be inviting death into your future that's why the scripture tells us that we're to take a hold of those thoughts we're to take those thoughts captive make them prisoners and he thought that it wouldn't make him obedient to christ because we know what god's word says is true the word devil is the word diabolos in the greek and what it simply means is accuser or slanderer the word dia means a cross and balos means to throw it's literally throwing something through the middle to separate how does the devil do it he does it by being satan what is satan the accuser of the brethren satan right now is accusing other people to you he's accusing them of not having your best interests at heart so it will make you move differently and sabotage your destiny right now satan is speaking to someone else about you someone that god told to bless you he is telling them that you have a bad attitude and he's telling you that they are overly critical why because once you guys come together what was meant to be a blessing through your unity now you come in seeing each other differently and he has effectively deviled you he has effectively divided you so even though you're in the same room you're not together are you guys with me so let's let's take the next few minutes to see what do we do about this this is actually a whole series we can do a whole series on this so what do we need to do we need to protect our unity speak starting with the unity of the spirit right we've got but in order to do that i want to i want to end here with three different types of of disunity or disharmony that you need to be able to identify and need to know how to deal with okay so number one there is division division there's all these words in scripture that start with this right this means taking away um you know there's discord there's dissension there's all this stuff but i just want to use the word division because the word division has to do with vision it means that we see things differently that's the first way that we um have disharmony or disunity in our relationships our connections we see the matter differently and there's at the surface level there's nothing necessarily wrong with division if we can kind of cure our double vision by having a meeting of the minds because as god asked um how can two walk together unless they agree i think that's in amos chapter three how can we walk together unless we agree on the direction the new living says and so division means we see things differently but if we're not careful and we don't come to a meeting of the minds that division can turn into a disagreement can turn into dissension where where now everything about me disagrees with everything about and now we we have discord and we're fighting and we've got to identify is this something that and i'll be honest with you sometimes there are natural disagreements it's just kind of the product of i just don't see things the same way here's the thing sometimes you'll see things the same way that actually might mean you do need to separate sometimes you do actually need to separate from some people right things just aren't jelly right paul i find it interesting that saul who became paul and barnabas i mean barnabas when saul got saved no one would touch him with a 10-foot shepherd stab no no anything to do with him trying to think of what they had back then no one wanted anything to do with him because all they knew was he was the guy having their family members put to death right and so so when they hear he got saved that's not good news man who cares we wanted him to burn in hell okay so he gets saved and no one will deal with him but barnabas takes him under his wing and and you know mentors him and kind of matures him a bit and now he he goes from being a believer a minister to being in a room with prophets and teachers they're ministering to the lord the lord says to one of the prophets separate unto me saul and barnabas for the work where unto i've called them that was apostolic ministry they fasted and they prayed they laid hands on them and they sent them out together listen god said separate them to be saul and barnabas it's clear saul and barnabas but man they get into this argument over this guy john mark you know i mean timothy had done it one time i think he had kind of not shown up for one of their assignments but in this case for whatever reason john mark is on a missionary journey with them and he's like i can't take this i'm out and he turns back so when it comes time i guess he had a change of heart it comes time for him to like go with them on their next journey and these aren't easy journeys sometimes they're in prison sometimes they're shipwrecked there's demon spirits coming after them you know all sorts of foolishness and so you got to rely on everyone that's around you and all of a sudden here comes john mark hey you guys ready to go uh paul's like no barnabas is like all right man come on come on son he's like no he's not going with us and and paul is like uh and barnabas is like yes he is you know i imagine barnabas is the soft kind of pastorly type you know he's going with us god has a great destiny for him paul's like yes that destiny is away from us and they begin to fight the bible says they had such sharp contention that what they parted ways they parted ways but in the end of paul's ministry he's saying sin john marks me because he's profitable to me for ministry here's the idea he is of a benefit to me in the ministry but paul could not make him profitable because of the way he saw john mark in his season of development are you with me but now here he is able to be unified because of the work that's been done in his life so there was a season though imagine if bart imagine if john mark had gone with him though let's just imagine that paul has suppressed his feelings he's gone alongside them every time john mark so much just thinks something wrong paul's gonna be calling him out he would have never become who he was supposed to become so there's some division that's natural there's something we've got to fight against there's some that's man-made right in proverbs 6 it talks about people who are sowing discord among the brethren the scripture talks about tale-bearers who go and run and tell that hey i heard so and so said this about you be careful of those people be careful those i heard they don't like you hey did you know this hey did you hey did you hurt people like that first of all do you have a job be careful of those people because it's meant to do what gets you to see something differently but there's another type of division or just there's another type of disunity that's actually god inspired divine disunity that's when god's trying to separate somebody from you or separate you from someone or separate you from some people i was talking with somebody recently about this because we were trying to make something work and we're realizing hey it doesn't mean we're not brothers or sisters or whatever but maybe god's trying to bring a separation here because nothing's working and we begin to think about when saul first got saved paul first got saved he started preaching and the people were like ah get him out of here when he left the bible says didn't have the churches in jerusalem rest when jonah was on the ship he was going the opposite direction of his destiny and what happens of his assignment the bible says he actually ran from the presence of god how do you run from god's presence his presence is everywhere that's not what they're saying god is with him but he was with him in nineveh he's saying i'm going opposite way so he had to pay his own way that's a whole other lesson he gets in the ship he hides out and a storm comes and these expert sales people are sales people he's accident oh god they're selling you something though these x-men ex x-men good god can you help me out greg expert sailors can i get that right all right good i need some sleep here's the idea he's expert sailors i want to say salesman again what is the devil he's like satan's inspiring he's like say something all right all right here's the idea someone said that's all right i love it in church you can say anything you know it's all right baby you ain't anywhere near in the key that's all right baby someone said that's not all right i'm looking for that church but here's the idea though he's like hey they're wanting to know this storm is not natural like how can we get out of this storm who's offended the gods and and they cast lots and it falls to jonah he's like all right y'all for real like i'm the reason why you got to throw me overboard but they've thrown the merchandise they're trying to throw merchandise over they're trying to keep this guy alive and then eventually they say hey listen we don't want your god to be like offended with us we're gonna be cool right if we throw you over and have you dead right jonah didn't think he was gonna stay alive he was hoping to die he'd rather die than go to and see the ninevites save he knew if he could preach to them they returned to god but they were very evil people very wicked sacrificing children all that he's like no i want them to burn in hell so what did god say no i want you to preach to them of course in the end you know god prepared a fish for him spits him up on the shores of nineveh he preaches everybody turns to god and he's mad so but there's a divine disunity sometimes where god causes you to break out of unity with people you shouldn't be unified with but ultimately the one we need to be guarding against is demonic unity james chapter 3 verse 13 through 16 i'm in here james chapter 3 i hope this helps you a little bit who is wise and understanding among you let them show it by their good life by deeds done in the humility that comes with wisdom but if you harbor bitter envy and selfish ambition in your hearts do not boast about it or deny the truth you ever ask somebody if they're envious it doesn't work such wisdom does not come from come down from heaven but it's earthly unspiritual and what demonic next verse if there is another verse but where you have envy and selfish ambition there you find disorder in every evil practice here's the idea the idea is this whatever you harbor in your heart in this case envy um selfish ambition i'm trying to get ahead i'm trying to step on other people's necks we're climbing the ladder i'm trying to climb over them to get to kick them on their forehead to push them down wherever you have all that kind of stuff going on there's gonna be disorder there's going to be confusion there's going to be every evil work and you know it's funny he's saying listen that's coming from a wisdom what is he talking about wisdom for a lot of times we need wisdom to know how to get ahead we need wisdom to know how to get from where we are to where we need to go and he's simply saying be careful what kind of wisdom you tap into because there's a wisdom that says go and spread a rumor about that person to try to take them out of the competition but that wisdom is not the wisdom that comes from above that's earthly it's sensual and it's demonically inspired can we read the next verse because he kind of gives us a different kind he says but the wisdom that comes from heaven is first of all pure then it's peace loving it's considerate there's the s word it's submissive it's full of mercy and good fruit impartial and it's sincere man look at that it's real when it comes from god it has nothing to hide when it comes from god it loves peace when it comes from god relationship rules what's happening in your relationships right now are they rocky you need to know whether or not you need to fight for those relationships is this a separation god's causing or is this something natural that just needs to be defused and needs to you need to patiently and gently work through to untie this issue or is this something that's demonic that's come up and you've got to go to a spiritual place to fight that whatever it is you're fighting don't don't say to yourself well this relationship doesn't matter it absolutely does matter even if it's a situation where it's a person you're not in fellowship with that relationship situation is still weighing on your life spiritually if you have not forgiven that it's still hurting you in some way there's so many of you watching tonight who may be a prisoner a captive of god himself i have been because you refuse to forgive someone i want to encourage you what does he say i'll deliver you into the hands of the tormentors whenever there's torment in your soul all sorts of things happening in some of us mentally emotionally could it be because we've not forgiven the scripture says that with fear there is torment most of the time we are we won't operate in love because we're operating in fear what if i go there and try to reconcile things and i'm rejected what if i go there and try to reconcile and repair things and they throw my my sins in my face what if i go there and i admit that i was wrong and then now i look bad i look stupid what if i but what god's looking for is he wants to give you grace he can't give you that grace without humility and at some point we don't have to just bury the hatchet we've got to burn the hatchet at some point we've got to completely remove every alternative to unity why because in the place of unity is where god has has commanded blessing he's commanded favor he's commanded power miracles he's committed there's so much god wants to get to us but we've got to see relationship the way he wants us to see it we've got to understand that anything god wants to do in our life he's going to do it through the power of relationship so i hope you receive that word tonight i want to pray for you real quick and then we'll move on father thank you so much for those who are watching tonight thank you for pouring out revelation uh from your word i pray god that they would take the things they heard tonight add it to what they've already heard what they already knew um and then even speak more to them maybe they're gonna go and watch something else tonight or or hear a word from a friend but lord it's not about me or whoever else is preaching we're the ones we're we're sowing and another person waters but you're the one who gives the increase so i'm asking you god to speak to them and impart peace to them in their relationships tonight so that there would be no turmoil and confusion because you're not the author of confusion but the god of peace as in all your churches where saints can be found so i thank you for that tonight give them peace and reconciliation in jesus name amen amen for those of you who thank you again for your time for those who want to partner with this ministry financially again we're not playing money games with you what you do is between you and god but the scripture tells us especially as new testament believers that we're not to give in response to pressure or any form of manipulation or obligation but we give as we purposed in our heart so i want you to take a moment and i want you to ask the holy spirit lord would you have me to give something tonight and if so what would you have me to give and then attach your faith to that because god honors your faith but if you want to give there five ways to do so number one you can go to our website nccfamily.org click on the giving tab you can give to the ncc family app you can give by texting ncc family to 77977 i think that number is going to change soon and we'll get you that information you can give at one of our campuses at safe harbor 500 eastdale loop in montgomery alabama or you can give in doth then i'll give the address in a second by you can also mail to this address in dothan it's 200 dome lane dothan alabama 36303 once again thank you so much for your time god bless you i pray that you not just hear these words but you mix them with faith and you make them come alive by acting on what you've heard until then listen god bless you and your family i hope if you uh have the faith forward to be in someone's church this weekend you're welcome to worship with us but if not hey worship with your church go somewhere and be around other believers god bless you and until next time we'll see you soon [Applause] you

Channel: Pastor Hart Ramsey

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Id: XFOQEtXjyjY

Length: 95min 29sec (5729 seconds)

Published: Wed Sep 22 2021