Who's at the Wheel? | A Message From Dr. Conway Edwards

hey buddy all right come on let's give it up for 13 years of faithful ministry come on come on come on uh glad to see you in the house of the lord today thank you so much for coming thank you for those of you um at home for watching online and hanging out with us there uh it is an absolute absolute joy all right couple things i want to set up for you so you know what we're doing comprehensively as a church we're very intentional in everything that we do very intentional so i want you to grasp fully what we're trying to do then i'm going to pray that we're going to get to work all right number one when we when we came back from our time off we're trying to address multiple things in our teaching times at our church okay so the reason you have the book is because we realized that parenting how to disable your kids was a problem in our culture and we failed before the pandemic to equip you to pull that off that's why we spent the resources we did to give every household a free book and a free manual to daily disciple your kids with the whole counsel of god that's why we did it because we realized that one of the lessons we should have learned is that um we did not equip parents well then on sundays we're looking at threat level that's our series so it's called um and because we argue that most of america has subtly embraced this viewpoint of life and they're building their houses on fear and it's driven by fear and you're making decisions based on fear and that is a subtle deceptive ploy of the enemy for us to embrace a fear driven lifestyle instead of a love driven lifestyle and we're going to talk about that today that's what we're dealing with last week this week and next week we're going to conclude our series and then on wednesday nights do not miss this on wednesday night we've been through it twice already uh this is our third session the second and fourth wednesday in the next month now listen please well here's what we're doing on wednesday night man it's for men only on the second and third women are first and third uh man what we're doing is we're doing a series called intentional fathering and what we're doing is we're showing you what your kids when your kids are ready to leave the home we're going to show you what they should know who they should be and what experiences you need to give them to transition them into manhood this is very important there are five types of dads and we want to be intentional fathers and we're going to show you how to raise i've never ever ever ever in my life seen one of these ever and we're going to give you a 100 page booklet at the end of it that shows you details on how you should intentionally father your kids especially your boys and one of the things you're gonna do is you're gonna there's one uh segment in there where um ladies you're gonna have to write a letter to your sons and you're gonna have to tell them that i am i am going to now ask you to follow the lead of your dad and you're going to literally write a letter to your son asking him to pull that off for the glory of god so that he can walk away from childhood things and embrace manhood adolescence is prolonging too long until they're 35 and we're going to change that in homes in occ in the name of jesus now so every you don't i'm telling you man if you missed this you need to go watch the first two and you need to go listen to it and we have a whole handout that walks you through it and what are the things you need to be doing okay it's i'm telling you i've never heard anything like it which is why you need to get it and then lastly on wednesdays jada is dealing with um about the issue of the church and why the church matters this is so huge she's walking through the book of acts and showing you again why the church matters now you got to remember that there are two divine institutions that the lord jesus himself set up one is the christian home and two is the church the church is actually his bride and he says those are the two institutions that he wants to train and develop adults and kids in love which is the foundation of the other home that we're going to start building today and if you no wonder the enemy wants to disrupt our homes and our churches so that there are no learning institutions let me explain some to you everybody wants justice they want love they want peace and they want happiness the problem is but when you were growing up if you're a little older that that was the norm in their culture that it comes from jesus today they're saying you can get justice you can get peace you can get love you can get joy detached from jesus and we're serving it up to tell the world that that is a lie from the pit of hell and if you want real justice and real peace then you've got to go through the institution that god sets up anyways so that's that's comprehensively what we're trying to do and that's important for you to know so you don't think we're just throwing stuff out there because we never do it's always an intentional strategy to raise up a generation of believers that love god and walk in love in the times of joshua they're raised up they came a generation that did not know god and that will not be our generation because we believe in teaching the whole council that anyways so that's what we're trying to do can i get a witness somebody good good good good good good all right so now last week we started a series and it's called threat level and last week we teed up that the enemy's job is to it's to tee us up so that we live this way fear drives us we ask the question is it safe not is it right we ask the question um how do we set up the best appearance we can have so that people believe that we're something we're not we then lead to because people have heard us in the past we then said well let me just let me just get as much money as i can and you know you do that because you care more about money than loving your neighbors because you don't ever pull your garage up and talk to your neighbors you just wanted a big fancy house and you and your kids be happy but you don't know nobody live around you when the reason god's put you there is so that you can build up his kingdom by reaching your neighbors for jesus but yet the materialism has driven us driven us and then now we want to control everybody because somebody trying to take your money either the government or somebody that don't like you so now you're going to control everybody around you to make sure they can't get what you got and you think it's cool to live your whole life by fear most of us didn't even know that we were doing it so today i want to show you where it all started whenever whenever you're looking for a concept in a word and you see you must go you must always ask where was it first mentioned first mentioned gives you the context of why we're in the predicament that we're in today so i needed to stand and let's do a little theology we're gonna do a little work today in the text so let's stand and let's go to genesis chapter three let's pick it up around about uh verse number five and let's see what he has to say to us today lord have mercy somebody go and get mad and walk out on today but it's okay you don't you don't bother me if you walk out you really don't because if i have the bible on my side i'm good in the name of jesus okay so let's see first mention here we go i need you to read with me everybody reading the word of god here we go real loud for god stop that's not everybody i need everybody say everybody that's it that's it that's it that means you here we go for god will be opened and you will become like god knowing good and evil what oh this is good what did the devil attempt eve with eve wanted knowledge she wanted education she wanted to know everything she wanted to control everything and so he says the enemy satan went to eve and said i want god is holding out on you because he don't want you to know something but i'm going to tell you he just don't want you to be like him please please no watch this between genesis chapter 1 and genesis chapter 2 chapter 1 and genesis is the overarching view of what happened chapter 2 is where he gives all the details somewhere between chapter 1 and chapter 2 there was a cosmic battle where the devil wanted to be like god and so since he wanted to be like god he said god i want to know as much as you know and if you don't let me know as much as you know it it's not going to get pretty so god says no worries you're gone ezekiel chapter 28 isaiah chapter 14 tell us the same thing listen fam listen man so guess what the enemy did the same thing he struggled with he now tease it up for eve and say eve you can be like god you don't need god he just want to hold out on you because you want something that he don't want to tell you and the only reason he don't let you eat the apple is because if you eat it you're going to be like him where you can control everything and you don't need god can i tell him can i tell you it's the same thing he struggles and he teased up in front of you which is why you say to yourself well i know better than god i'm leaning on my own understanding not on god's and i'm going to make decisions based on my own understanding and i'm not going to trust god the same thing he teed up for himself he teased up for eid and now he tease up for you and me and the same temptation get us every time do you hear me the same temptation is what's now creeping up into your house which is why it's driven by fear and it's not driven by love all because the devil said don't you want to know as much as god knows that's why most of you say to yourselves yeah god told me so because that is putting that is putting god on the knowledge that you want to prove to everybody that you know best say it verse six i know you're talking about why i'm standing so long stay standing a little longer here we go we read this after this i'm gonna make you sit down verse six we're going to verse 13 but you can't stand up that long so stop at verse six read with me read with me when the woman [Music] stop right there sister girl you had food in a hundred thousand other trees and you make the devil convince you that you can't enjoy the 100 000 trees you got to focus on the one that he told you you shouldn't have nothing to do with oh i know there's somebody in this section that god has allowed you to enjoy all of this and you're looking at god and telling him but this the one i want now god tell you if you if you take this one all hell finna break loose but you like that's the one i want that one right there that one right there that one right there that one right there you know you had no business marrying the fool that you done married some good guys showed up but you're like no he boring he boy give me some action give me some action i need some action i mean he got the he got the got the bling he got to be a thug he he need the action so you got the action where the action at now somebody in this section feel that a while ago this section right here look at my beliefs up front she'd be like forgive me lord anyway come on i gotta go i gotta go i gotta go all right all right um um jada's jada right now let me tell you how my wife thinks y'all she said right now you don't take all that let the people sit down let the people say so sit down i just know what she's saying she said let the people sit down so they can enjoy here we go come on come on uh and read it with me and that it was a delight to the eyes let me talk to the fellas now this section said leave us come over here come to this they say they walk in the spirit now they say somebody in here this section right here somebody online somebody like it was a delight to your eyes a delight now you know what you should look at and you know what you shouldn't look at but because it was a delight to your eyes you kept on looking ain't nothing wrong with seeing it the first time but everything wrong with seeing it the one thousandth time can i get a weakness ladies can i get a weakness the same the same trick he's still using so watch it the text says the text says the woman saw that the tree was good for food and that it was the light to the eyes and that the tree was desirable to make one wise what is she after she want to know she want to be in the know and she want to know it more than everybody else so she says i want to know more than everybody else so i'm the smartest one around she took some of its food and ate and she also gave some to her husband with her the text should read something else after this the text and and she also gave some to to her husband with her and he counseled her and said sweetie you know that or god told us not to eat of this fruit so here's what we're gonna do i know i know what you did it's okay uh let's let let me hold your hand and let's go find god and let's confess our sins to god so that the whole human race is not jacked up that's what he should have done if if he could see further down the road he would have said baby you have no idea what you done did but let me lead you courageously i'm going i'm not going to be passive i'm going to reject passivity and me and you're going to walk back to jesus and we're going to say now jesus my wife done sin but you asked me and i wasn't there so the serpent was talking to my wife i shouldn't have had no serpent talking to my wife i should have stepped in and cut off his head but i didn't so so i'm sorry for my poor leadership but i didn't dig the hole deeper by eating what she gave me so i'm going to now on her behalf as her priest ask you to forgive her and me for not following you now that's what should have happened no that's not what happened but that's what should have happened by the way i wonder what's going on in your house today i wonder when your wife brings some stuff that's not in the word and ask you to dabble in it if you're dabbling i wonder if when your wife decides that it's not cool to follow jesus in this area of life i wonder if you're having the hard conversation and saying sweetie no not on our watch he did it to satan he's not going to do it in our house baby i know you're going to get mad because i know you really want to do this but this is not of god so we're not going to do that and we're going to stay focused because sweetie there is more freedom when you follow god than when you don't follow god so let's enjoy the freedom that he gives to us i wonder if there's a generation of men who ain't scared of their wives that will say baby i love you today but you outside of the council of god right now so i can't follow you there i wonder if there are any ladies in here when your husband asks you to do something stupid by the way when i say stupid i mean biblic biblical is stupid which means sin because i know somebody won't go home and say well the pastor said if i don't want to do what you want to do then you i just need to tell you baby don't be baby in unless it has to do with bible okay if she's violating the bible you're on good territory if you're not violating if you're not violating the bible just ask you to do something you don't want to do it don't be using jesus on that my god she took some of its fruit and ate and she also gave some to her husband with her and he ate next verse then both then the eyes of both of them were open but i tell you what if you just stay in the bible that's why you don't need to preach nothing by the bible the eyes of both of them were open that begs the question why that weren't their eyes open before then they see the fruit then she go pick it eyes were open so what the heck does the text mean when the text says the eyes of both of them were open well here's what it means it means that once you ate that fruit eve and adam all of a sudden now your conscience was opened up so now watch it watch it don't clap yet watch it so now you didn't know what evil was because god was protecting you from evil he loves you so much he trying to protect you from stuff but you so nosy that's what it is you so nosy you gotta go eat something that god tell you don't eat because you wanted to experience it is there anybody here who want to experience something that you know you shouldn't experience but you go dabbling in it and all of a sudden it don't hook you now and you can't leave him or you can't leave her or you can't leave the money because you're hooked on something that you have no business ever been hooked on jesus help us lord anyways let's get back to the text um the eyes of both of them were open and they knew that they were naked now hold up you got to laugh at some stuff the bible funny so first of all y'all were walking around butt naked and ain't nobody knew nothing y'all just thought it was so cute yeah oh yeah but you know what i mean you normally just go bam and you just be anyways um and and and then and it was fine but after you ate all of a sudden now what's that oh what was that you were fine just five minutes ago all of a sudden you got to cover stuff up that's what happens when you get nosy and want to know what god knows that's why sometimes you must say god i don't know everything here we go nor do i want to i just want to follow what you have asked me to do god i don't need to know step number eight nine and ten because if you told me step eight nine and ten i probably wouldn't go can you just show me can your word just be a lamp onto my feet i just want the next step i i don't wanna know everything i don't wanna know when i get to heaven you can tell me the rest right now i'm going to trust you with what you have shown me and you've just shown me the next step that's all i need god i'll need to know everything and they knew that they were naked it gets better and then they started sewing fig leaves together and made themselves waist coverage who told you you needed coverings but you don't open up your little brain you don't open up your little heart to stuff that you have no big that's why you got to protect your kids early and don't let them see stuff y'all be letting the tv decide for y'all's kids and then you don't know that disney and all of them got a game plan to to to feed into their brains a counter life that you are not asking them to live next verse verse verse 8. we go into 13 i think verse eight if we ever get there today i'm gonna get to this and the new one but i gotta sometimes you just need to hang out in theology because it's so good it really is so good and if you follow it it will guide your whole life okay now they heard the sound of the lord god walking in the garden in the cool of the day and the man and his wife hid themselves no now before the fall y'all were chilling oh god his presence was there and you enjoyed the presence of the living god you enjoyed connection with god community with god oneness with you enjoyed it all then you ate and all of a sudden you gotta hide you gotta huh what is that god oh lord he gonna find out that we that we didn't do what he told us to do i wonder if there's anybody here hiding from god tonight you don't i don't know where you were last night but you shouldn't have been there and now all of a sudden and it's covered times too so you know you shouldn't have been there because you don't know what was up in that place but all of a sudden you all up in there in the midst of coving and here's how foolish you are you asking god to protect you from covered while you're in a place god told you you shouldn't have been god will you please protect me from covet tonight back it up back it up janice and move on just say i haven't even looked i just there's a feeling coming over here that just said can you just move on please stay on the word stand the word don't get off saying the word don't look at jada don't look at you look at me okay where are we at and the man and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the lord god among the trees of the garden now they're hiding they had oneness with god no they're hiding next verse then the lord started asking three questions question number one then the lord called to the man please note who he called her the lord called to the man because god says i don't know what you all do and i don't know what y'all gonna do in america and later in the centuries but i'm here to tell you that i gave the man the responsibility and so since there's order in my kingdom i want the man to step up take responsibility because a relationship has been broken he went to he went to the man i gave you some instructions adam what's up where are you what where are you man i could just come and you'd run to me because there was connection you would run to me because there was no separation you just loved my presence all of a sudden now you can't you you're not so sure you can go to church no more all of a sudden you don't feel the holy ghost no more you just don't feel like you have the presence of god with you all because you ate an apple or you ate something else let's keep it move on whenever i get in trouble now move on move on move number quickly quickly this is now first here we go i heard i heard the sound of you in the garden and i was say this word right here first time it enters in the word of god now here's the word fear here's what's infected our communities here's what's infected or homes the same word fear all of a sudden and i was afraid enter satan and his counterfeit driver the driver is supposed to be love i've never been loved like this guy you created me didn't have to you didn't need me but you created me and you've given me everything i can enjoy because you want to have this connection with me that's driven by love but all of a sudden enter the evil one the one the roaring lion seeking to devour any relationship you have with god and now you start living your life based on fear he continues because i was naked so i hid myself next verse verse 11 and he said second question who told you that you were naked how did you know this because you're into knowledge by the way if you're in the burbs suburbs that is uh you into knowledge you're into edumacation you're into let me know as much as i can nothing wrong with it except when it becomes your driver of your life nothing wrong with with trying to trying to educate yourself trying to be the best you can be all of that's fine it can be in the car it just can't be in the driver's seat fear too can be in the car it just cannot be in the driver's seat and too many of us for too long have allowed it to be the main driver of our hearts the text continues have i have have you eaten from the tree from which i commanded strong word you not to eat have you violated my word seriously is this how you're going to treat me after all that i've done for you you're just going to violate it as if i said nothing to you next verse and the man said [Music] the woman whom you gave to be with me she gave me some of the fruit of the tree and i ate well if there are any men today who you keep blaming your wife instead of taking responsibility you keep blaming her the woman you get if you get i promise you god if you give me another woman it would have been different if you didn't give me eve but you gave me sheila right you wouldn't have money problems anymore thank you holy ghost by the way let me that ain't no holy ghost it just wasn't it just wasn't correctly taped up there you know folk have been seen the holy ghost and everything that ain't the holy ghost that's just somebody didn't tape it right that's theological correction right there whoop-a-doo let's go next verse let's finish come on come on let's go now then the lord god said to the woman what is this that you have done and the woman said the serpent here's the key word of it all deceived me and i ate satan is still in the deceiving business ladies and gentlemen he really is he's going to make whatever decision you have to make he's going to give you 99.9 truth and the 0.01 will kill you that's what he does that's what he does so then then introduces in this concept is the word did not say the day you eat of it you will surely die so then that begs us to explain the theological concept called death the four types of that none of this is in your notes there are four types of death you have spiritual death you have relational death you have emotional death and you have physical death now whenever you see the word death in the first part of genesis really first chapter one two three really what it means is separation separation say the word separation what does it mean two more times what does it mean last time what does it mean good so when god says you you you're surely that means there will be a separation of me and you there's a separation that takes place when it comes to physical death there's a separation of the soul from the body there's a separation that takes place when it comes to listen when it comes to emotional now there is fear that floods your heart because you don't trust god so so emotional separation means god i don't know if i can trust you so i'm going to try and do it myself because i'm fearful that's where it enters the world now so now this issue called fear is a driver in our culture uh and when it comes to relational death that means you can't connect with your spouse you can't connect with your kids because there has been a separation that has taken place now with that as the foundation now i want you to see why the enemy is the master of fear enemy the devil is the one that creates an entire environment so you think you're missing out on something that god's trying to protect you from so now let's give you a review of what happens pastor man come on up here please and redo this one so now everything is driven by fear and the foundation of the house that you build is safety what does that mean that means you're asking the question first is it safe is it safe in the market is it safe for me i want to time the market so therefore so therefore if i don't think it's it then i'm going to pull it all out if i don't think it's safe then i'm going to talk to my to my finance guy and say okay if it go down how am i going to make sure i don't lose nothing if it go up how do i make sure i get all the gains and how do i make sure knowledge i'm always ahead of it all because it's now become my god that i think about which is why you watch the market every single day because you love your money so much you don't talk to god like that every day you don't read your bible like that every day you don't hang out in the word and meditate on it day and night so that you might do everything that's in it but you do watch the market every day and you do listen to them financial shows every day to make sure you're up on the latest knowledge because you don't just want to say hey man i'm just going to put in a little at a time and then whatever happens happens over time or when i switch a certain age i'm going to flip the asset allocation so it's the right one no no no no no no no no you want to beat it because you want to know more and you want to know the best it's driven by fear it's driven by fear all right so you know we're asking the question safety conversations with your spouse driven by fear no you don't want to have a conversation because you know if you have this conversation it's going to be painful and it's going to might take four weeks for it to be resolved so therefore let me just be silent and if i'm silent then okay we might get derailed a little but it's okay i just don't want to be in the doghouse because i raised a question that she didn't like or that he didn't like and you let fear drive your whole life you're at work and you don't want to have the hard conversation with an employee you don't want to have the heart coming down because you don't well they might leave and if they leave and we have anybody to do and you get on all the lists of why you can't lovingly confront somebody you have relationships with your kids but you're not so sure that their little heart can take it so you don't want to you don't want to tell them the truth about themselves so you keep telling yourself a lie so that you don't ever tell your kid a truth and then you're going to release them in the world where they're going to tell them the truth and they can't handle it because you didn't have the courage to tell your kid the truth you still fighting with teachers about what they should be and why they not it instead of telling your kids the truth about themselves can i get a weakness from a teacher up in here up in here it's all because of fear and most of the time for parents and kids it's your fear not theirs all because they're trying to play it safe all because we're trying to play it safe you got to do that you're dating but you're not so sure that if you ask him the question if he might leave you and he might be the last one that might be attracted to you for a year you don't want to be single for a year so you you deal with nonsense because you don't want to have the right conversation because you don't want to say hey man look at here i follow jesus who do you follow and because you don't want to have it and because you're fear and you want to be safe and you don't want to look up you don't want to appear as if nobody don't like you and you're tired of your in exactly everybody else saying where your man at where your girl is so now you don't want to look gay so now all of a sudden you got to say here you go the person i'm dating come on man what's wrong with us driven by fear and then as if that's not enough it go matt did this fall down again oh lord i re i rebuke you materialism in the name of jesus okay man just leave it off leave it out please we're good somebody in here stuck in material oh i can stay right there for i can stay right there for a minute somebody in here still has the money god so we're driven by safety and then you have appearance and a parent says i want you to think better of me than i really am i don't want you to know who i really am so i'm going to project something that's not true because i don't feel safe that you're going to love me if you know the real me if you know who i really am will you really love me if you really know talking to your co-workers how jacked i am would you still love me and because you won't and because most of us have created environments where if you really know me you're not gonna love me then you have to project something that you're not and so now since you do it your kids has caught it from you so now your kids want to make sure that they look good on the outside even though your god tells us in first samuel chapter 16 hey man i don't care so much about the outside i care about the inside but you teach your kids the opposite of what the bible teaches so you want them to look good on the outside and overlook the drama they create on the inside and so from appearance then we go off the money and then after money we go off to control and so we live our lives that way but what's god asking us to do pastor testament take them all down now and then put up the second mother i'm only going to get through half of it we'll finish it next week but here's what he says now he says no i don't i want you to be driven by love i don't want you to be driven by fear at all let's go to first first john chapter four let's speak it up there what is first john chapter four says vernon about verse 18 here's what it says there is no fear in love but perfect love drives out fair what's going to be the driver what's going to be the staring wheel of your life that's the question what's going to drive everything that you do the challenge that we have is who is steering your life what is steering you're like who's in the driver's seat because for most of us it's still fair and in this whole series i've been praying that god will allow us to be driven by love and not by fear because perfect love drives out all fear all i want you to do is just ask yourself this week as you go through life is that decision made by by fear or is it driven by love which one is driving this decision you'll see how many times in my own life you'll see many times it's driven by fear well i don't know what would happen if this time what happened and you're driven every decision you make it's safety that's coming from the culture that don't want to know jesus and god would say not so with you you should be the man and you should be the woman and you should be the teenager that's driven by love because i love you that much okay to understand this principle i've got a video to show you today um no no before you go to the video go go next ephesians chapter five the diffusion chapter five verse one and two watch what the text says therefore say this word with me everybody be imitators of no no say it again real loud be imitators of last time who should you be following not the devil not his fear-driven worldview you and i ought to be imitators of as beloved children in light of that here's what he says next verse he says and walk in love just as jesus just as christ also loved you and gave himself up for us he wants us to walk in love three times everybody together walk in love two more times walk in love last time walk in what should drive us it's the word love that's what you drive us what kind of love let's take a look at it so um here's an experience when that's jada right here by the way she was outside of the will of god doing this i knew nothing about it and she was outside of the will of god in one of her rebellious states because i wasn't sure if the insurance policy was paid up i wasn't sure you know if she was gonna be a lot she was gonna leave me with two kids and i didn't know what to do with them two kids and so you know as as praying and worrying over all of that as she did her little uh experience okay so here she is trying to be a trapeze trying to fly through the air and do flips okay not sanctioned by her husband or god sanctioned by her own inner childhood dreams of flipping [Music] after faster than parade for years i can now talk about it okay all right so here's why she went see this ladder right here this ladder so long she walked up the whole ladder be like oh lord how did you get all over this she got it there then she's now standing right here and she's about to swing she had never done this in all her life she's about to sing and then try and do a flip in the name of jesus on no in the name of somebody else it wasn't jesus unsanctioned by god and by me okay uh and so here's why she did it though she did it because she had this safety net right here so that even if she fell the safety net would catch it then she has a harness on so so it's controlled the entire way and so as she does this she is doing it but she also knows that she is safe because there's a harness and there is a net that will catch her so now here's what she's going to do she's going to go and she's going to do it but only because of the safetynet and the harness can i tell you what love is the love of god is the love of god is your safety net because he says i love you so much that i care so much i will never let anything happen to you so before it happens it has to pass through my hands i have to sanction it i have to put my stamp of approval on it before anything can happen to you so the reason you could do is because she knew generally she was 100 saved because of the love of the net and the love of the harness so let's see what she gonna do now let's let's see press play here we go here we go pray for her y'all pray for her pray for her in the name of jesus whoa oh lord now she gonna do a flip right now let's see here we go here go to flip hey you so excited she is after she launched me like yes i did it all of that was possible because of the safety net that was under it your god says if if i've asked you to do it don't you think that i would have prepared everything around you to keep you safe if it's in my word and i've asked you to do it don't you think that i have been careful enough to make sure that you said don't you think i care about your safety more than you care about your safety am i not the god who is omniscient and know everything am i not the god who's omnipotent and can oversee and change anything i want to change so why do you think your quest for knowledge is going to do more than my omniscience and my omnipotence god says i love so if i tell you to go then your job is to go and as you go i will show you all the things i have in store for you all you got to do is trust it okay you're not you're still not believing let me get an old school story about your church that most of you don't know see i got mad at god one time we're in a hotel trying to get over to a building we didn't have no building we're doing about 1200 people in six services in a hotel it was no four services excuse me in a hotel it was driving us nuts we were tired couldn't handle it all that right packed like sardines in a hotel ballroom and then i got mad at god god i need this deal come on now god you got to do this i need a house or she gonna look like an idiot god so this is not about my name this is about your name you better find these people at house cause we going a little crazy i looked everywhere i looked i looked i looked i prayed i prayed a prayer to face it i marched around jericho i did everything to get a facility for god's people and could not find it and god says hey hey hey just listen to me i had a building i knew which building we should get i said god this is it this is perfect i know you got let's go and it was and god said no and he kept saying no and he's made the city tell me no you're not getting that building i don't care if you the holy ghost and the father come you ain't getting that building right there all of a sudden i'm mad at god because he won't give me here we go now what i can see he won't give me based on what i know and my little p brain don't know a whole lot because i'm trying to get a building that only have a hundred parking spaces and can't work okay a hundred possibly can't work but i don't know i just think the building is cool give me that building in the name of jesus i cry it down i rebuke the devil i tell him he a liar and he must go to the pit of hell i i preached up a storm and god says knucklehead ask not what i have for you but i'm in the pain of doing four services and i said god then okay give me some because these people gonna think you're crazy give me some so then i'm driving down this road 121 not even a full road yet and all of a sudden i saw the building the little house on the prayer behind here not this one the other one and this is such that the story is not that we got a building that ain't the story because i'm driving down you know the story those who have been here for a while i'm driving down i gotta i got a sense that we should ask them for no for sale sign no no it's up and they said uh oh my gosh we're praying about who we should give this bill and tell who we should sell to all of a sudden they sold it to us and we got it in two months later we're in that building right there that's not stop don't clap yet that is not it that is not the blessing that is a blessing but that's not the blessing [Music] the blessing is that when god loves you he's trying to take care of you in ways you don't even know i'm just telling you so he couldn't he could not answer my prayer because i didn't know what i was praying for i was praying for a building that's the office but i look really cute contemporary all that but he said knucklehead that ain't going to work i didn't know that at the time so then we got into this building your god is so good when you trust them and when i got in the building guess what i found out there was a school in the building a private school guess what i found out when we got the building that they paid to be here so now all of a sudden we're getting 30 000 extra dollars per month so now i'm an owner we are an owner of a facility that's getting paid let me explain how ridiculous that was our total expenses for the money was about 22 000 so the way god set us up is that he said not only i'm on gear building stop don't clap yet i'm gonna get a bill then i'm gonna make sure that the they pay for the building and the note and all the employees that you got so that you saving 800 8 000 without one person paying a tithe the way i work is so good that what you want to do is shut the heck up and wait for me to move so that i can show you how much i love you only god can do that only god don't worry about your understanding worry about what he knows because he knows way more than you do in the name of jesus will you trust him in the name of jesus will you be driven by love when the name of jesus will you realize that when he opens the door and you don't kick them down because we love kicking down doors instead of letting god open it up and when he opens it lord have mercy it will be a blessing that you cannot contain will you dear family will you dare not to be driven by fear will you dear occ not to be driven by fear but to be driven by the love of a god who went to calvary to die for you will you be driven by his love we'll finish it next week as we go into the rest of the house and what it looks like but the the challenge this week is will you be driven by fear it's okay for it to be in the car just not in the driver's seat will you be driven by love the love he has for you and the love you have for others the foundation is trust will you trust him and not lean on your own understanding heavenly father will you lead occ fam away from the influence of this culture driven by fear seeking safety in every opportunity hiding who we really are and appearing to be somebody else creating walls of materialism that has now become a god and control and power that now becomes the other wall that protects us and keeps us safe as if we can fully protect ourselves help us to abandon that and embrace love driven by trusting in you in all years of our lives we pray this in the matchless name of jesus and everybody said will you stand with me please everybody right where you are stand i want you to take 30 seconds and i want you to pray this prayer i simply want you to ask god god will you will you help me tear down the house of fear and bill start building the house you and god alone now you and your spot you and god alone i just want you to pray that if you're a teenager in your campus if you're a college student wherever you are i want you to pray that very prayer god will you help me tear down the house of fear and build up the house of love make that your prayer 30 seconds come on everybody right where you are if you're online i want you to pray the prayer too god help me please help us please to tear down the house of fear and build a house driven by love love relationally love spiritually love physically love with reference to what we do for work professionally parentally will you help us to be driven by love physically will you help us to be driven by love recreationally will he help us to be driven by love and not by fear in terms of our resources and finances god will you help us everybody under the sound of my voice be driven by it we pray this in jesus name and we recommit this week show us god and as you show us we will walk in obedience as you show us we realize freedom is ours when we trust you so help us to trust help us to reject the apples of this week and trust that you know what's best for us we don't have to see and taste everything what you give us is enough because you're abba father in jesus name we pray everybody's celebrating god and said come on come on the god that loves you the god that has the safety net the guy that's giving you a harness his harness let's praise him all right we're going to dismiss you in a moment stay standing we're in this space in a moment and we're going to dismiss you in sections the reason we do it's not because we're driven by fear we're driven but we're doing it because we want to be wise yet simultaneously we want to be god honoring and so we want to make sure that some people are very comfortable some people aren't and we're trying to balance both of them as we lead a group of people toward christ like this okay so they're going to let you out in sex if you want somebody to pray for you as you're going just don't leave just come on down we'll pray for you if you want somebody to hang out with you and just say hey man i want to connect with some people i want to serve somebody don't don't don't don't don't just be i'll do it next week no you're not going to so make the decision today if you want to talk about jesus this is the time to do it if you want to talk about how to become a member of our church then let's have a conversation with men and women pastor matthew and i'll be here the whole time thanks for being here go represent your god well and show the world what it looks like to be driven by love

Channel: One Community Church

Views: 58,911

Rating: 5 out of 5

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Id: iw6pAYg5Ra0

Length: 53min 9sec (3189 seconds)

Published: Sun Sep 26 2021