At the point that I thought something was up was going to be on our way home.
He was talking to Kate in our corner. I'm like, is Kate in our house?
But then I just thought, she's actually in our house.
Never you know.
Hey, hello.
I'm shocked that we all kept it a secret from her.
I know.
I'm super shocked.
Especially because Aaron and Arden moved furniture out there, I hung up one.
Arden did it without complaining.
Well, he took a lot of convincing to get him to help with the first place.
He did help with kind of like pricing for the first half of it.
That's huge help.
Chris said she gave it away at the point that they were arguing.
So I have Aaron and Arden move their dresser.
Whatever name that was.
She gave it away.
And they were arguing with me because I made them put carpet strips under the movements.
They scratched my brand new flooring.
I told them to take them out because they were huge.
I said, no, just take them out.
I'm like, I can be months.
Take them out.
And Chris said she was dying of fear.
Dad.
Just leave them there.
And I'm like, no, take them out.
So, what is it?
He's better than you.
I don't know.
He got that for Christmas.
I didn't know that.
I found this.
I'm the reputable owner of this floor.
Yeah, so I bet you bought it.
Yeah, I said I got the shirt for Christmas.
I bet he was trying to get her.
They could have found it except for something they cannot pick up their pillow.
They have to be on the floor or something.
I don't know.
I heard that he had his wet boots.
Where's the old?
I guess he said he had his wet boots.
I was a tiny little boy.
I picked up the pillow so he could have it.
I'm like, oh, shoot.
I had my son.
I'll do it.
I had your stuff.
I had Luke's stuff.
I would sell all kinds of stuff.
I remembered everything but that.
That's really good.
That's kind of sweet.
I was in the frame so I was doing one straight.
I was in the frame.
Here we are.
I'm going to get some cats.
I'm going to get a lot of food.
He's got a couple species on him.
I'm going to get some weird ones.
I'm going to get a bunch of them.
That's awesome.
And eventually we got the cats.
I was supposed to do it really hard, but the cats slipped out.
I was like, do you care if I mark up the door?
I got four of them.
I drove it into the side of the door.
I moved it like that and it went a quarter inch.
I did that 15 times.
What are you doing to your body?
I did not.
She was home between 13 and 18.
That is hilarious.
The two of you grabbed me up.
Going out of the office, I think is right.
It's trying to connect in my head.
Ready?
I got a black colorful one.
I was painting.
Get it!
Dad?
No.
I checked my son.
He's been out for a while.
Tell me.
No.
He doesn't even defy the law and check.
I do.
Good morning.
I want to talk to you.
Put the chair down.
I want to speak.
What?
You are?
I'm Sherry.
Nice to meet you, Hungry.
You have to learn how to pass.
I'm a senior.
I'm 13.
She comes up and she goes down.
She climbs back up with me.
I'm laying down like this.
I'm just in return.
I hope you weather.
I don't know why it's so difficult to see the sun.
Every day I see a light.
Make sure he gets it.
You guys like my adventures, right?
Yeah.
Hahaha.
There's a cat.
A door.
Here.
Yeah, where's he?
He didn't start.
No.
Hi.
I did.
When I stopped to get my teeth done.
I brought one of them over here.
One of them is mine.
It's yours.
Oh, okay, yeah. She only showed me the two.
So.
I told Dan Rose he could have one of them
as long as there couldn't be a use for it
at the live station at the E-Rights.
So I'll bleed it and take one home.
I don't know if he took one or not.
I got one of them.
When he rose up his sleeves
He had just put another rinse on
God is an awesome God
There is thunder in his footsteps
Lightning in his steps
I got him an awesome God
But the Lord wants him choking
When he keeps him out of me
It wasn't for the reason that he shed his blood
His return is very close
So you better believe that I got
This awesome God
I got
This awesome God
He raised
From heaven above
With grace
Of power and love
God is an awesome God
Where the sky was starless
In the void of the night
God is an awesome God
He spoke into the darkness
And created the light
God is an awesome God
Just around he pulled us up
Pricing grace he gave us at the cross
That hope it was worth it
God is an awesome God
He raised
From heaven above
With grace
Of power and love
God is an awesome God
He raised
From heaven above
With grace
Of power and love
God is an awesome God
From heaven above
With grace
Of power and love
With wisdom, power, and love, our God is an awesome God.
Our God is an awesome God.
He rears from heaven and earth with wisdom, power, and love.
Our God is an awesome God.
We believe it's been six years since we signed that piece of paper.
Is that nuts?
That's crazy.
Six years have flown by very rapidly since we signed the Constitution
and became a constituent of the New Heights College of Baptist Church of East Toledo.
That is our official name.
We had that big long name for a long time, and then even after the Constitution, we had kind of a big long name.
And now we have just New Heights College of Baptist Church of East Toledo, which is kind of long.
I'm just calling it New Heights College of. That's all I need to say to people.
I'll get it. A lot of people already know what it is when I tell them.
So that's pretty cool.
Anyway, so that's next week.
And that means after service, we will be doing our cookout and block party in the whole nine yards, as it were.
And having a good time.
We will be promoting it to the community.
We have missed out on some opportunities to do that, but we will make good on our opportunities this week
to the best we can to get the word out about that.
And the last time we did something like that, it was pretty well received.
It will be again Sunday.
And then what's going on with the pantry on Sunday afternoon?
We remember what we talked about that open at the end.
OK, so pantry will be open at the end.
So that'll be a blessing again.
It's good because it should be hard to do both those at the same time.
Anyway, so then don't miss it coming up.
The week immediately after that is our all family fellowship.
And we have the we have had for almost two months now, over two months now.
In fact, the shelter house by the tennis courts by the playground at Pearson Park Reserve for us to be there.
And so even if the weather is bad, God willing, it won't be.
No, it's the one on the other side of the tennis courts.
Oh, the other side of the tennis courts, yeah.
So the one right next to the playground is very small.
They make it bigger.
OK, anyway, so we'll be away from the just a little bit away, but really within striking distance.
OK, we got grass and we got fun.
We got time together and and we're we're church quote, unquote.
That's us anyway. So we are providing the meat.
So if you're willing to help cook some of the meat that's being provided on top of bringing the other things that you're bringing, let us know and we'll get that done.
But we're going to have meat there.
And then the church, y'all, me, all we all are bringing the stuff that we're going to eat along with it.
And if you're somebody who normally gets transported here on Sunday mornings, make your arrangements.
Make sure that you're able to go that because that's actually Sunday afternoon as well.
So the after church after pantry, I assume.
Right. So after the pantry, we'll be going out to the park for our all family fellowship.
What's the time? Five or five thirty.
OK, so if you're knowing someone normally gets transported, you would normally go home and then you would get picked up again.
That's not until five o'clock. OK, so if other arrangements are going to be made, then you need to talk to the people who transport you talk to people who allow you to come and all that and get that situated.
And everyone is asked to participate and bring a little something to share food wise.
So we'll have plenty of food. And that is not this coming Sunday.
This Sunday is a cookout block party. Next Sunday is this two weeks from today.
There we go. Is the event at Pierce Park.
Again, don't miss it because you didn't know this date until right now.
If you have exhortation, spiritual gift, I'm talking about that again.
I'll mention it. The spiritual gets a little bit at inspiration all the time because it's really hard to do that.
If you have exhortation, spiritual gift, June 1st, the evening of June 1st, the evening of June 1st, which is a Monday night.
I will be here because I that's one of my spiritual gifts. Praise the Lord. And if you don't know what your spiritual gift is, I will talk about that in a minute.
But if you have that, then June 1st, 6 p.m. in the cafeteria dinner provided.
It's a one hour event where we will share our successes and failures using that spiritual gift.
We'll talk about what it is. We'll eat together.
This is going to be a new thing for us. And then going forward, we'll have additional fellowships, additional fellowships based around.
Boy.
Thank you.
All right.
So we'll have additional fellowships based around each other spiritual gift as we go on.
We have a lot of these going forward. OK.
All right. And then don't miss VBS, the Freedom Celebration.
That's all coming. Human trafficking events, which is not us doing human trafficking.
I'm just talking about human trafficking. We have some very important guest speakers who will be with us that evening.
So it's just you block out time for that. You hear what they have to say.
It's pretty cool what we might be able to do as Christians to make a difference.
If you're not aware of it, Toledo is one of the top cities nationally.
You think New York, San Francisco, L.A., Miami, Chicago like that.
But per person, we are one of the top cities nationally.
Part of it is because we're so connected to snatch somebody off the streets here or a lot of them come through here because of all the expressways that go both ways, the airport, trucking, international ships.
They go in and out of the port thousands of them every year.
All that kind of thing is a terrible thing. What goes on with that?
And there'll be more details on that event.
And then we'll end that at eight o'clock. So the kids will be a team kid, an extra half an hour.
All the kids are excited about that. The youth will be with the adults in the human trafficking events.
That's the current plan. And so you got your bulletin.
They don't have their bulletin, but I encourage you to keep track of the events and be prepared to be involved in everything that's going on.
And we're going to do it together as a body and we're going to give God the glory.
So I want to thank you for those of you who sent me prayer requests Thursday, Friday.
I did have a great time with prayer and fasting with the Lord. I was very blessed by God's presence.
And a lot of things came out of that. You've been hearing about some of those things, not necessarily today,
but going forward because I'm excited about it and I know that I did pray for every request that was sent to me multiple times.
Some of them for as much as a half an hour each.
And so praise God that I was able to do that and you supported me to be able to do that.
And that's pretty cool. Say happy anniversary to RJ and Alicia. Today is their 12th anniversary.
They don't even seem old enough to be married for 12 years.
But when you look at their kids, you can believe it. Look at Jason. You can believe they've been married for 12 years.
But 12 years today, praise God. That's one year for every tribe of Israel.
I get told that all the time at work.
But you just married them?
Yeah. When I told the guys on the street how long I've been married, they went, no.
Blessing the Lord keeps us young. So we've got some folks in our congregation that have been married a lot longer than that. Praise God.
And it's kept them young too and doing a lot. So we're blessed.
All right. So we're going to pray at this time and jump into worship.
And I've asked and prearranged Caleb is going to have our opening prayer today.
It's the Jesus show. You ready? All right. Here we go.
Amen. Let's praise him.
All right. It's about time again. So I need everyone on their feet if you are able.
And I need all the young type people towards the front of the room.
Yeah. Come on. They've got purses ready. You guys can come in front if you want.
So we're going to dance to the beat.
Come on.
All right. You can stay standing. This one doesn't have motions, but it is a call and response, which means one part is going to start and the other part is going to echo.
And we're going to do adults versus children.
Molly, I think if you're an honorary child. Yeah. So adults will go first. Children under the age of 18 will go second.
All right.
Good job.
All right. It's inspirational moment time.
And I have been inspired this week and I had a big long list of stuff I could have talked about.
But I have my duty and I thought I said, Lord, do I need to do that? And the Lord said, yes, we need to do that. So I was talking about that first.
Anything else? And that's spiritual gifts.
I had a brother say to me this week, he said, I kind of lost the joy of serving the Lord.
And I said, wow, I said, that's a tough spot to be in. I know that people have been there before.
And I've been there at times before. And I thought about it when I was talking about how has God helped me when I've been in that spot before where I sort of lost the joy of serving the Lord.
And I know there's a few things that God uses all the time.
And you could probably go beyond this.
But the first thing that this come out of my Sabbath rest that I just took in prayer time and fasting and the word and so on.
One of those is that Sabbath rest.
That rest, you are supposed to be intentional about marking time out, spending time with God.
And yes, we are with God now, but we are with God collectively.
Right. And there's part of you that is maybe bristled a little bit because the person next to you or the person that's next to you is not going to be able to do that.
Maybe the person next to you or the person that's talking, maybe you're annoyed a little bit by my voice or somebody else is goofing off and they're distracting you or your mind is somewhere else.
You got a problem.
Like, I don't know how I'm going to get my money in line to pay that bill or whatever, things like that.
And so there's always little things like that.
But when you get alone with the Lord and it's just you and God, there's really only two things that are going on.
And one is you're talking to God.
The other one is you're listening to God.
And that's it.
It's very, very simple at that time.
And when God talks to you or he says, get up and go do something, you find the strength to get up and go do it.
And the joy comes with the strength God provides and fills it as you go.
OK, now I know what I'm supposed to be doing.
And that so one is that time and rest alone with God.
That's the only way that God does it.
The second way that God does it, you just did it.
I hope you did it.
You didn't.
You really missed out on opportunity.
We have just a little bit more opportunity left today.
And that is worship.
Worship is one of the ways that God adds joy to our service.
And I want to talk a little bit about it during the sermon today.
So I want to get ahead of myself.
The bottom line is if you love God and you know who God is, you know what God has done, you know what God is doing, you know what God is going to do, then you've got a lot of reasons to praise God.
And when you praise God that way, God fills up his people as they're praising him.
When you recognize him and what he's done, if you're talking about what's going on in your life, that does not recognize God.
You're talking to people about your opinions.
That does not recognize God.
You're talking to God about the problems that you have.
That's not really recognizing God unless you're saying, okay, I understand only God can do it, then that's something.
But if you're just complaining to God, that may comfort you, but that's not really about God.
But when you praise in God, you're putting him first, you're recognizing who he is, what he's done, what he's doing, what he will do, and God fills us up with strength as we praise him.
I can't tell you.
More times than I have all my fingers and all my toes, and it's probably getting to the point where I have more times than all the bones in my body, which is a couple hundred, right?
And I'm thinking more times that I thought, well, I don't really want to go worship, and then I get there and I start worshiping and I sing, and just get fueled up from the inside.
It's not like when you're hungry, you go to McDonald's and they give you some money to give you a Big Mac meal and you feel not hungry anymore.
It's like you feel like, oh man, I don't have it.
I don't know if I can do it.
And then you start doing it and you say, praise God.
Hallelujah.
Praise the Lord.
You know, or you sing just that first few phrases and God just shows up and empowers it.
So worship is a big way, right?
There are lots of ways, as I said.
The third one is what I want to talk about.
That's just spiritual gifts.
Everybody, from the moment that you were saved, the Holy Spirit goes out to you a specific spiritual gift, and maybe more than one.
You might have one.
You might have ten.
Right?
It's typical that those who have a lot of them have each one that they have to a lesser degree.
That makes sense?
If you have ten of something, each one might be less of a driving force in your life.
But if you have one of them, it might be the thing.
You know what I'm saying?
It might be the only one that God's just made you just wired to do that.
That's what you do.
And the others, kind of like, very useful things, but it's not a gift from God.
It's not really what drives you.
And so when you exercise your spiritual gifts and you recognize that,
and so for me, for example, with preaching, when I preach and I know I'm saying what God wants me to say,
God empowers me from the inside.
It's like a pat on the back spiritually.
Like I'll go, man, I know I couldn't have said that.
I couldn't have done that.
I couldn't have figured that out.
I couldn't have seen that there if it wasn't for God.
And you get that lift from the inside.
And I'm trying to explain to you a spiritual thing in human words.
So I know it's hard if you've never felt God lifting you up from the inside.
You don't know what I'm talking about when I say that.
Right?
If you've never felt drained or like run out of spiritual strength,
I'm just, oh man, I still don't know if I can go on with what I'm trying to do for the Lord,
then you might not understand what I'm talking about.
And they're just words.
I'm just saying words right now.
I'm just going in one ear and out the other.
But the bottom line is the word teaches us that God gave us a spiritual gift
and that as each member of the body exercises their spiritual gifts,
they themselves are lifted up by God.
And then we collectively are lifted up by God.
We're linked together by God.
And we grow individually and corporately into the image of the living God,
of Jesus Christ, the Son of the living God, and God in the flesh.
We will never get to be like God.
Not initially.
We'll never be God.
But we get to be a little bit more like God.
And we can test and approve what His good will is
as we walk our life and are renewed in our minds and grow and have that blessing.
So know your spiritual gifts.
Use your spiritual gifts.
Now that's not, in a couple of cases, it's going to dictate the kind of ministry that you get into.
But in most cases, it doesn't.
For example, if you have a service and health spiritual gift,
which is one of the spiritual gifts that people have,
you could literally use that in any kind of ministry.
You're just going to wind up boosting it, building it up in the background.
You don't have to be in the limelight.
You can just be able to drive in there and make a difference,
fixing some problem, doing something that needs to be done,
being the strong person, physically, emotionally, spiritually, whatever.
You're going to be able to go in and do that.
If you happen to have exhortation,
which is more of an outward, outspoken encouragement,
drawing people out to do what they're supposed to do,
a lot of people with exhortation get into preaching.
But that is not the only way, by any means, that it is used.
And it isn't even only spoken.
Sometimes it's written.
Some people have a gift of exhortation built through writing.
And so you can figure out how to use your spiritual gift.
And then every time you use it, whatever ministry you use it in,
every time you use it, you get that little attaboy and the joy of the Lord.
How awesome is it when you realize you're doing something
that you could not do in your own strength, but God is doing it for you.
And that's that power of the spiritual gift.
So if you haven't done so, get yourself a spiritual gift analysis.
There are basically three ways that you can figure out what your spiritual gifts are.
And they all kind of work together.
The first one is take an analysis, take a second test.
It says, do you do this? Put it out.
Hey, number one through ten.
Do you do this? Do you do this? Do you do this?
And you just go down and listen to the questions and you number.
This never happens to me. This always happens to me.
And at the end you add them up, and it's going to tell you what, most likely,
what your primary spiritual gifts are.
Okay?
Second best way, or second way that kind of goes in conjunction with that,
but it's less so. I'll take them away if I hear them again.
You hear me? Thank you.
Alright. So the second best way is to ask people who know you.
Work with your family, your loved one, your spouse, your kids, your friends,
who you work with in ministry, and say,
hey, I think, you know, here's my analysis that says I might have these five,
or here's what I read in Scripture about these gifts, and I think I might have this.
What do you think? Do you think I have that spiritual gift?
Have you ever seen me do something weird with that that you couldn't quite explain?
Or can you give me an example?
And they'll help you digest it. They'll help you figure out, is it your spiritual gift?
If you get in there and you go like,
number two says I might have the gift of service,
service and helps.
And you go like, I don't think that's me.
Before you dismiss it, you better ask the people who know you,
because maybe you've been doing it and you don't even realize it.
Alright?
And then the third way is the word of prayer.
Just read what they are in the Bible and pray and ask God and compare it to your life
and let God point out to you.
God may give you a vision in your head of you doing that thing
and how you felt while you were doing it and how powerful that was in you.
So there's nothing required, no biblical thing about taking a spiritual gift analysis or a survey.
However, it's a very useful tool that you started.
Prayer and the Word, that's how they did it before surveys were ever developed,
was prayer and the Word and talking to others.
And so you can do it by that means or you can do it by that means.
But if you think you have the spiritual gift of exhortation,
then I would like to invite you to have dinner with me on June 1st.
It's not going to be anything fabulous, it's going to be basic dinner.
We're going to eat something.
But we're going to spend time talking about what is the gift,
what can one do with it,
and then at the end we're going to have anecdotally tell stories
of what happened when somebody used their gift like that.
And then you'll be able to, hopefully out of that you'll be able to determine,
do I have it? What can I do with it?
That's the goal.
We're not going to study a lot of Scripture or a Bible to get.
It's not a Bible study, you're not coming to a Bible study.
It's a fellowship, it's a spiritual gift fellowship.
So it's us working together, now that we think we've figured that out,
what does that look like?
So that's June 1st and I want to tell you how to explain it.
I felt really convicted, I needed to stand up and talk about spiritual gifts
because somebody here didn't have a clue.
And we all think everybody in the room totally understands that,
but somebody didn't know, and now you've got it, I hope.
At least you have an opportunity.
Thank you.
Alright, so how has the Lord been speaking to you this week?
As I said, I have a long list, like longer than my, what is this called, Qubit?
Arvin, you got something? Alright, let's hear it.
There's another song that I've been listening to a lot.
Okay.
A song that speaks to you.
It's by the same person I did last week,
but it's a really good song and I'll explain a little bit more later.
After the song.
One, two, three.
Somebody save me, me from myself.
I spent so long living in hell.
They say my lifestyle is bad for my health.
It's the only thing that seems to help.
All of this drinking and smoking is hopeless, but feel like it's all that I need.
Something inside of me is broken.
I won't do anything that sets me free.
I'm a lost cause.
Baby, don't waste your time on me.
I'm so damaged beyond repair.
Life has shattered my hopes and my dreams.
I'm a lost cause.
Baby, don't waste your time on me.
I'm so damaged beyond repair.
Life has shattered my hopes and my dreams.
What if the night sky was missing the moon?
There were no shooting stars to use wishing on you.
And all of my sorrows, I just want to slow down.
It's the only peace I've ever found.
All of this drinking and smoking is hopeless, but feel like it's all that I need.
Something inside of me is broken.
I won't do anything that sets me free.
I'm a lost cause.
Baby, don't waste your time on me.
I'm so damaged beyond repair.
Life has shattered my hopes and my dreams.
I'm a lost cause.
Baby, don't waste your time on me.
I'm so damaged beyond repair.
Life has shattered my hopes and my dreams.
So like, part of the reason why I like this song so much is because to me it reminds me of who I used to be.
So before I got saved I always felt like I was a lost cause.
I always felt broken.
Nothing ever seemed like it was good enough.
No matter how hard I tried, nothing ever seemed like I was doing enough.
And even now today I still struggle with that sometimes because there's multiple times in my life
where I'll just sit back and wonder, am I ever doing enough?
Am I doing a good enough job with my dad?
Am I doing a good enough job with my husband?
A provider?
So it's like you always have those thoughts.
Especially, I mean this is mostly for the guys, but especially as men we're meant to provide.
We're meant to protect.
And I don't know if it's, well like I said, I'm not sure if it's a guy thing for sure,
but to me it seems like a guy thing that we always have that feeling like it's not good enough.
Like nothing we do is ever good enough.
And then we start getting into a spot where we hold onto things that aren't really good for us.
Because it makes us comfortable, it makes us feel safe.
And in the song that's one of the things it says is he says all of the drinking and smoking feels hopeless,
but it feels like it's all that he needs.
So you know there's a problem, you know there's something that's wrong,
but it's the only thing that you think makes you feel at peace.
And like I said, for me that's how it was before I got saved.
I mean it's hard to go look back and realize where I was and realize where I am now,
because I've always wanted something to save me from it.
I've never wanted to live a life like that.
And I finally did and it's changed my life dramatically,
but this song is a reminder that you may feel like it's hopeless,
you may feel like it's a waste of time,
and you may feel like you're a lost cause, but with God you're not.
You're not a lost cause, you're not a waste of time, you're not a waste of space.
In God you are someone amazing.
And I think there's plenty of people in this room even that can testify to that,
because you look back who you used to be before you got saved,
and look where you're at now and look at how much God has done in your life.
Even the little things in your life become huge things now,
because you realize that it's God doing it.
Like something as simple as being able to raise children or just pay a bill
or have the extra money to go, hey I can help you do that if someone needs it.
Just simple things in life become huge things because you know that now it's God doing it
and not you striving to find something else.
Good word, I thought you were going to preach the opening of my sermon there for a second.
I'm not getting ripped fast.
Come on, dance, get your dance on.
The plan was, the two of us, next thing you know the two of us are floating, drifting somewhere new.
And we've hit a shortcut, I'm trying to be a good sport, but I don't see how we make it through.
Remember the size of the world before, it was you and I, just you and I.
And now the horizon holds so much more, it's do or die, yeah it's do or die.
All I can do when the road bends is lead into the curb.
And all I can do when the tanks run dry is see what's in reserve.
And all I can do when the plants break down is stay on my feet.
And all I can do at the end of the day is play on, play on, or we'll keep the beat.
Hey, Bebo, are you scared?
You know, my daddy used to sing to me when I was scared.
So did Andres.
Hey, we can sing with the songs.
That was Cherisa.
I am here, just on another song, always in your corner, watching you soar.
Drumming is in my blood.
I can teach you if you want.
You're going to teach me how to play drums?
Here, Bebo, check this out.
Try a simple beat.
That thing you're doing is noise.
Observe.
Wow, you learn quick.
I must be a really good teacher.
Oh, my good.
Whoa, this sounds good.
Yeah, I see potential.
Raw talent.
Come on, Bebo.
Let loose, Grandpa.
Grandpa?
Did a grandpa do this?
Oh, yeah, Bebo.
Woo.
And now you've got a size of the world before.
Now it's you and I, yes, you and I.
And now the horizon is so much more.
And it's you or I, yes, you or I.
All I can do in the road bend.
We've got to make it, if I can go.
All I can do when the tanks run dry.
We've got to go be a better man.
All I can do when the plans pretty done.
I'm in a world full of pain.
All I can do at the end of the day is play on, play on.
Let's keep the beat.
Come on, you can't stop now.
Let's keep the beat going, partner.
Not the beat.
Not my partner.
Okay, pause it, turn the lights on.
So, that's Bebo.
That's an awesome movie.
Sit down with your kids, man.
Every time I watch it, I'm like, God's in this, God's in this, God's in this, God's in this, God's in this.
You just can't stop.
I mean, it's so inspirational.
It's such a great movie.
Probably number one movie of the year.
I only got like top five movies.
It's on Netflix.
But anyways, so just real quick, it's so cool.
As I like to talk about the youth of God, God is not, he's a billion, trillion years young.
He's not old.
He's eternal.
He's always young.
And you can see this girl pushing her youth and her compassion and mercy to this older monkey.
And I've seen the movie.
No one can understand him except us, the audience.
He goes, chirp, chirp, chirp, chirp.
So, nobody knows his sarcasm when he's singing.
So, like, you know, she just thinks that she's teaching him how to play the drums.
And he's like, yeah, good job.
And he's just, and then it's the wisdom of God, the older monkey, that God is wisdom and always been around.
And he's out there just being patient, knowing that we're trying to grow, knowing that we're trying to learn.
It's just so awesome.
And also, I just want to say, if you want to check it out, I'm going to do maybe a half an hour session on the whole video.
But that's Righteous Foundation or Holy Ground.
And Father, the Watchman, anybody on the podcast, if you hear this, 419-902-4899, reach out.
We're looking for those that are desperately hungry for encouragement.
We find people that don't get encouraged at all by anybody.
And so, if you need that real truth, real love and encouragement, reach out to New Heights and we'll reach out to you.
And that'll be me.
I'll be reaching out to you anyway I can.
Here's what I love about these verses.
Remember the size of the world before was you and I, just you and I.
So, just remember the size of the world.
It was just you and I.
It was me and God.
You know, it was just you and I.
We were good.
But then the horizon became so much more.
It got really big.
It got really hard.
It got really crazy.
And I don't mean to offend anyone, but I'm broken and busted.
So, people have been broken but not busted.
Taking advantage of, not truly discipled.
Whatever it was, I'm not talking about churches or nothing.
But God brought me back and discipled me.
And God uses that.
I'll say this real quick.
If you were in a football field and you were a football player, even you could play baseball.
You're not going on the baseball field right away.
You were trained for football.
That's what God does.
He takes someone who's broken and busted, reach out to people who are really broken and busted.
Patiently working with them.
Some people can't even understand it because they've never been through it.
I've been through it.
Ten years of just the hardest days of my life.
So, I can understand and relate to a lot of people.
So, the horizon is so much more.
Now it's do or die.
We can't just give up.
It's either we do it or we die.
We can't quit.
And then He says, all I can do.
And that's the best part.
And even at the end when the girl's singing that song, He's like, I'm still not going to listen to that.
All I can do, all we can do, Church, is when the road bends, is lean into the curve.
Amen.
We lean to the cross.
We lean to who God is.
We don't quit.
There's no other way to do it.
They're going to lean some other way to just keep going, but they're really not going.
Because we have to lean to our God that is absolutely sufficient in all of our needs.
And all I can do when the tanks run dry, because we're going to have tanks that are going to run dry.
We've got to see what's in reserve.
God is absolutely sufficient in everything that we have.
We're not running dry.
We have everything in reserve by God.
And then He says this, all I can do when the plans break down is stay on my feet.
The plans will break down, but we keep on the feet.
The gospel of peace, we keep walking in the peace of God.
They can't take away what we're doing.
They can't take away what we can do.
They can't take away what we could do.
They can't take it away because we stay on our feet with God.
We walk that path that the Lord has.
We ain't perfect, but it's not our path.
In Hebrews chapter 12 says, a race marked out for us.
Amen.
We didn't mark it out.
He marked it out.
It's all marked out for Him, us.
He's got the obstacles, the snares, and when you do get us trapped, He's got a way out.
He's got a refreshment station.
Every little thing is marked out for us, the church, everybody, not just you.
Even though it's a podcast, He's got a race marked out for you.
Finally, all I could do at the end of the day, because the day ends.
The day doesn't end for God.
The glorious Lord spoke every day in existence the very day He spoke it.
He knows when the day ends.
There is no end to the day, to us, because we need a day over.
We need to play on and play on and keep the beat.
So what it really means to me is, at the end of the day, follow the drum.
Follow the guitar.
Follow whatever it is that you keep listening to every day that God does.
Stay with that beat.
Don't give up the beat.
Don't try to change the beat.
Don't try to make the beat different.
Stay with the rhythm of what the Lord is doing in your life, what the Lord wants to do,
what the Lord is doing, because it's not your rhythm.
It's His.
All right.
Anybody else?
I'm going to add a little bit about what he was saying just for a minute about how you lean into it.
You have to lean into God.
So first thing that popped into my head was it's a lot like riding a motorcycle.
If you don't lean into the turn, you fall.
You go off road.
And that's how we are with God.
If we don't lean towards God, we fall.
And then we go off the road.
And then it makes it so much harder to give back.
How about you pray for us as we transition?
Dear Father, we thank you for this time together.
Thank you for everyone that's here.
God, thank you that we're able to do this because there's many places where we wouldn't be able to.
Thank you that you blessed us enough to be here.
Thank you for every household represented here, every person represented here, God.
And I pray that we're all here to learn more about you and to grow and to see your power work.
God, I just pray you bless everyone here, bless every family, and keep everyone safe.
In Jesus' name, amen.
Thank you.
Amen.
How long, how wide is the love of Christ?
How deep, how high is the love of Christ?
How long, how wide is the love of Christ?
How deep, how high is the love of Christ?
With the saints and bounties high and wide, with our great hand, our love is open, with the earth, with our soul, and
How long, how wide is the love of Christ? How deep, how high is the love of Christ?
More than any one can ever hold, is love the tail, the ocean, till we overcome?
How long, how wide is the love of Christ? How deep, how high is the love of Christ?
Higher than the mountains, deeper than the ocean, farther than the reach of the sky.
How long, how wide is the love of Christ? How deep, how high is the love of Christ?
The spender of the key, the world in majesty, that all the earth rejoices, all the earth rejoices,
He reps himself in light, and what the sky is to hide, the temples at his voice, the temples at his voice.
How great is our God, sing with me, how great is our God, oh sing, how great, how great is our God.
How great is our God, sing with me, how great is our God, oh sing, how great is our God.
God is bringing love, Father, Spirit, Son, Father in the land, Father in the land.
How great is our God, sing with me, how great is our God, oh sing, how great, how great is our God.
There is a candle in every soul, some brightly burning, some dark and cold.
There is a Spirit who brings the fire, ignites a candle and makes us whole.
Carry your candle from the darkness, seek out the wilderness, to use it more.
Take your candle, take your candle, and go light your world.
Take your candle, and go light your world.
Brush any water, see how it's dried you, light with a candle, so melt away.
See now your sister, she's been cropped and lied to, so hold the candle without a flame.
Go into the darkness, seek out the lonely, tired and poor.
We're all to see it, take your candle, and go light your world.
We are a family, our souls are crazy, so let's raise our candles out of the sky.
With our Air passionate,quency through fire, it moves from ahead of ours,
I can't go, I'm too the darkness Seek out the wilderness, to see them fall
I can't go, I'm too see them Take in your drizzle, you're like the moon
I can't go, I'm too the darkness Seek out the wilderness, to see them fall
I can't go, I'm too see them Take in your drizzle, you're like the moon
It has occurred to me a number of times during my Christian walk as RJ began to touch on and I warned he was touching on the illustration of the sermon that I have wanted to do something more for God.
Has that ever happened to you? Has there ever been a moment in time where you say I want to do something more for God?
Like maybe somebody is hurting and you're talking with them and suddenly you get this kind of internal urging that you really desperately need to say the right thing?
Or you're working in the church and the church is talking about a mission trip or giving or serving in some certain way and you go I really feel like I want to do something more for God.
There is a grave danger in wanting to do something more for God in a good way and a bad way.
There is a grave danger in wanting to do something more for God because you can want to do something more for God and start to do something that isn't for God or about God or doesn't really fit the bill so to speak.
And that's the story today that we're going to hit on. It comes to us in a unique way and in a moment after we go to the text and you're with me there I'll give you the history and the background of the text.
Alright so grab your Bibles if you would and go with me to 2 Samuel chapter 6.
Amen praise God. This is all about God's words. I'm here on in and whatever it is that God would have us to say.
Alright 2 Samuel chapter 6. Now as I said I'm going to give you a little bit of brief background. I'm not going to go back and read the text. If I read everything that we needed to understand everything that was going on in this very historic text we would be here way too long.
So I'm going to give you the summary. The bottom line is the Ark of the Covenant is not in Jerusalem. David has taken control of Jerusalem and his seat is there and he's doing well.
He has many houses and that kind of thing. He's prospering in Jerusalem but the house of the Lord is not in Jerusalem.
And it gets in David's mind to move the Ark back. The reason the Ark is not in Jerusalem is because you may recall there were two sons of Eli who were unfaithful to the Lord.
They were not serving God the way they were supposed to. Eli in his youth had been a high priest and had been serving the Lord faithfully but then as he raised his sons he didn't do a good job and his sons moved away from God.
They took the best of the offering for themselves and things like that. That's how Samuel kind of comes on the scene.
Samuel is a young boy and that household is raised by Eli and dedicated to God.
There's a certain day at which the Israelites go out against the Philistines in war and they take the Ark of the Covenant with them.
They already had fought for a couple of days and they were losing badly and they thought we're going to take the Ark of the Covenant.
We can't lose if we take the Ark of the Covenant with us. They took it out there and they lost it into the hands of the Philistines.
The Philistines are an ungodly people who had nothing to do with God. They were not Israelites. No blood in them. No semi-blood in them at all.
In fact, they were a seafaring people and nobody historically really knows where they came from and settled exactly.
But the bottom line is they captured the Ark of the Covenant, God's seat or his footstool on the earth.
At that same moment when the messenger came and told them that Phineas and I just lost his other name. It will come to me in a second.
Gosh, the two sons names. I had them memorized and I forgot them. I'll get them in a minute. They'll come back to me.
Anyway, the two sons of Eli were slain in the battle and the Ark was captured.
At that same time, Eli, when he got the news, he fell over backwards off his chair, broke his neck and died.
That was the end of that priestly line, if you will. The Ark went into the control of the Philistines.
After that happened, the Philistines had moved it from city to city and everywhere they moved it, plagues struck them and horrible things were happening to them.
They said, we've got to get rid of this. So they put it on a new cart on two oxen who would be separated from their families and might turn the other way.
They put them on a road aimed back toward Israel and the cart was marching along back toward Israel.
But as it got near to Israel, they were afraid to accept it. They were afraid. What's that?
Haphni and Phineas. Thank you. Couldn't get that other name.
But anyway, they were afraid to accept the cart back in Israel.
The Philistines stopped at the border and they contacted a nearby town and they said, you take the cart, you take the Ark of the Covenant.
They were Israelites. They said, okay, we'll do it.
They took it into their town and they had it. Then they began to be blessed. They were being incredibly blessed.
God's people, Ark of the Covenant, they were being incredibly blessed.
They said, we're going to move the Ark up to Jerusalem, first try. This is during Saul's day.
While they were moving it up, there was a man named Uzzah who was walking along behind it.
He had helped to care for the Ark of the Covenant and the house where it had been stored for a while.
He's walking along behind and the oxen stumbles. As the oxen stumbles, he reaches out to steady the Ark of the Covenant.
God strikes out and kills him just like that.
They're like, oh gosh, how can we bring this Ark, that holiness of God, how can we bring the Ark up?
They named that place the place where God struck out and killed Uzzah. They moved it aside into the house of an Israelite who would take care of it.
You're not getting all the details here. The bottom line is, and then of course his house begins to get blessed.
Now we're in David's day and that's where we pick up the story.
David is thinking about bringing the Ark of the Covenant up.
This is what he hears in verse 12, 2 Samuel 6, verse 12. It says this.
It was reported to King David that the Lord had blessed Obed-Edom's family and all that belongs to him because of the Ark of God.
That's the house where they had gone aside and put the Ark in there and they're taking care of it and keeping it safe and whatever.
So David went and had the Ark of God brought up from Obed-Edom's house to the city of David with rejoicing.
When those carrying the Ark of the Lord advanced six steps, he sacrificed an ox and a fattened calf.
David was dancing with all his might before the Lord, wearing a linen ephod.
Now if you go over and read the other account of this, just to be clear for one second,
if you go over and read the other account of this over in Chronicles,
you'll see that this time they have actual Coathites who are holding the poles and carrying the Ark the way it's supposed to.
The first time when they moved it up, when Uzzah was killed, they just put it on a new cart like the Philistines had done.
But now they've gone back and they've looked at exactly how you're supposed to carry it and so they're doing it right.
Now with that they sacrificed at the first six steps, but David is now dancing with all his might before the Lord,
wearing a linen ephod, which is basically a loose-fitting soft garment.
To us it would look like he was wearing almost like pajamas or bath clothing, but it's over wraps.
He and the whole house of Israel were bringing up the Ark of the Lord with shouts and the sounds of the ram's horn.
As the Ark of the Lord was entering the city of David, Saul's daughter, Michal, looked down from the window
and saw King David leaping and dancing before the Lord, and she despised him in her heart.
So there he is in what is almost kind of like a little bit of, you know, almost like an underwear type situation going on,
in very loose-fitting clothing, probably showing more of what he than he should.
He's being very flamboyant because he's dancing and whatever, but he's focusing on God.
And she sees him dancing in front of all these people and whatever moves her, she begins to despise him in her heart.
Now there is a story and a background you may know or you may not know, and again I'm going to summarize it,
we're not going to read the text, but you need this background to understand her position.
So Michal has probably been wronged by David, in fact she's probably been wronged by just about everybody.
She loved David in the beginning.
See David was promised the older daughter of King Saul in the early days, and then King Saul tricked him.
And instead of giving him his older daughter, which would have put him in line for the throne, he gave him his younger daughter.
But it says in that text that she loved David.
So Michal loved David and became his loving and supporting wife.
Then later, and the same story, five verses later, Saul demands a payment for the betrothal,
and David has to go and kill a bunch of Philistines and brings back 100 Philistine foreskins for her betrothal.
That's his dowry, which he does do that.
And then you know how things erupted between him and Saul, and Saul tried to kill him a couple of times,
and then he's chased out in the country with some guys who are pretty much like the dregs of society, but they're very strong.
And while that happens, Saul gives Michal to another man.
Now they've never literally been married, they've never slept together, but he gives his daughter Michal to another man.
So then fast forward, David, three incidents, could have killed Saul, didn't, whatever, all that happened.
Saul and Jonathan are eventually killed. David comes back and becomes the king.
Then he asks, well, where's my wife that I was promised?
Now by the time that happens, David has already married Abigail.
Now you remember her, she's in the countryside, David's out there with his men, they're hungry,
and he goes to this man and he says, give me some food and water for my men.
And the guy's like, I don't know you from Adam, I'm going to help you, could be treason, whatever.
And then he goes out and the men start talking and they decide they're going to go back and punish him and take what?
Because David is the rightful king, ordained by Samuel, right?
But they say, well, they're going to go back and punish him.
And Abigail comes out and meets him and says, my husband spoke wrongly, he didn't understand, forgive him, whatever.
And so he winds up killing her husband and taking her as wife and Abigail becomes his first wife.
Then he later goes and he's staying away still and he takes another wife.
So he's got two wives already and then he goes back and he says, I want Michal, the first wife that I was promised, that loved me and I loved her and I want her.
So he takes her away from her current husband.
Now as her husband, as she is forced to walk up to Jerusalem to be David's wife, her husband walks behind her miles, like over ten miles, walks behind her all this distance, weeping the whole time.
When they get to Jerusalem, David takes Michal into his house, was supposed to be his first wife, but was never technically his wife.
And then he marries her and then he sends her husband away, back home.
So she's been wronged in every possible way.
She's had it really bad, so people think that David did this to her, or that Saul did this to her, and I think that's pretty accurate.
I think Saul did this to her, because he first gave her without her permission to David and then took her and gave her to another man and she was just trying to legally be obligated to her husband.
And then David comes in and by his own right, he had the right to do so, took her back.
So I think Saul is the one who kind of did it to her, but whether Saul did it or David did it, I want you to see God did it.
God allowed it. I'm not saying God was punishing her for anything, I don't know that.
I just know some bad things happened in her life and God allowed those bad things to happen.
That's where she is the day she looks out and she sees David leaping and dancing before the Lord.
And she despised him in her heart, that's the full circle.
She loved him when she was first betrothed to him, now she despises him.
Then it says in 17, they brought the ark of the Lord and set it in its place inside the tent David had pitched for it.
Then David offered burnt offerings and fellowship offerings in the Lord's presence.
When David had finished offering the burnt offering and the fellowship offerings, he blessed the people in the name of the Lord of armies.
That's our God, the God.
Then he distributed a loaf of bread, a date cake, and a raisin cake to each one in the entire Israelite community, both men and women.
Then all the people went home.
Verse 20, when David returned home to bless his household, Saul's daughter, Michal, came out to meet him.
How the king of Israel honored himself today, she says.
You can hear the snarkiness, this sarcasm in her voice.
How the king of Israel honored himself today.
So she accuses David of honoring himself.
She said, he exposed himself today in the sight of the slave girls of his subjects like a vulgar person would expose himself.
In other words, you danced barely clad in front of all these people.
All these people saw you dancing.
And she accuses him of exposing himself and honoring himself, but not God.
21 says, David replied to Michal, it was before the Lord who chose me over your father and his whole family to appoint me ruler over the Lord's people Israel.
So in other words, I danced not for myself, but before God.
I humbled myself before God and let everybody see that I was humbling myself before God is what he says.
Then he says, however, by the slave girls you spoke about, I will be honored.
In other words, they will recognize she didn't, but they would recognize that he was dancing and making a fool of himself, if you want to say that, before the Lord.
He was humbling himself before the Lord and honoring God.
And the slave girls would recognize that, but Michal was not recognizing that.
You follow?
And then it says this, and this is a terrible proclamation for her, and it says, and Saul's daughter, Michal, had no child to the day of her death.
So at that point in time, as far as we've gotten, that is the end of the house of Saul, essentially.
At least the ruling house of Saul. It's done.
There will be no more male heirs to take the throne, with one small exception who would never be able to take the throne.
So her line is dead.
She did not recognize what David was doing when he danced in a linen ephod before the Lord and honored God and then blessed all the people.
She didn't recognize what he was doing, and her line is dead.
Her house is dead.
Now chapter 7.
When the king had settled into his palace and the Lord had given him rest on every side from all his enemies, so everything is going perfectly,
the king said to the prophet Nathan, Look, I am living in a cedar house while the ark of God sits inside tent curtains.
So Nathan told the king, Go and do all that is on your mind, for the Lord is with you.
So Nathan was the prophet and he told the king, Go and do everything that you plan to do.
It's all going to be honoring to God.
Verse 4.
But that night the word of the Lord came to Nathan.
Go to my servant David and say, This is what the Lord says.
Are you to build me a house to dwell in?
Hear that?
It's an accusation, if you will.
He says, Are you to build me a house to dwell in?
From the time I brought the Israelites out of Egypt until today, I have not dwelt in a house.
Instead I have been moving around with a tent as my dwelling.
In all my journeys with all the Israelites have I ever spoken a word to one of the tribes of Israel whom I commanded to shepherd my people Israel,
asking, Why haven't you built me a house of cedar?
In other words, is this a thing I've ever asked you to do?
To build me a house?
So now this is what you are to say to my servant David.
This is what the Lord of Armies says.
I took you from the pasture, from tending the flock, to be a ruler over my people Israel.
This is basically what he says.
You were nothing, the lowest of the low, and I have made you everything.
I have made you king under me over my people.
I have been with you wherever you have gone, and I have destroyed all your enemies from before you.
I will make a name for you like that of the greatest on the earth.
I will designate a place for my people Israel, and I will plant them so that they may live there and not be disturbed again.
The evil doers will not continue to oppress them as they have done ever since the day I ordered judges to be over my people Israel.
I will give you rest from all your enemies.
So in other words, God says, Have I ever asked you to do that?
Listen, let me tell you what I'm going to do.
And God just turned it around, didn't he?
Instead of making it about what David needed to do for God, God said, Now let me tell you what I'm going to do for you.
The Lord declares to you, the Lord himself will make a house for you.
When your time comes and you rest with your fathers, I will raise you up.
I'm sorry, I will raise up after you your descendant who will come from your body and I will establish his kingdom.
He is the one who will build a house for my name.
So he's talking about Solomon and I will establish the throne of his kingdom forever.
So in other words, not only will there be Solomon after you will build the house, but on top of that, there's going to be somebody on the Davidic throne forever.
Almost done.
I will be his father and he will be my son.
When he does wrong, I will discipline him with a rod of men and blows from mortals.
But my faithful love will never leave him as it did when I removed it from Saul, whom I removed before you from before you.
Your house and kingdom will endure before me forever and your throne will be established forever.
Nathan reported all these words and this entire vision to David.
So David got it just exactly as that.
All right.
So a few things I want you to see in here and some of it's a little tough.
The first thing I want you to see is that David wanted to do something more for God.
He wanted to bless God.
Out of his humble heart, dancing in front of the coming Ark of the Covenant in an ephod, kind of shamefully, if you will.
I mean, he's king or he could have been in a crown.
He could have had a rod.
He could have had a golden cloak on.
You know what I'm saying?
He could have really been decked out and he could have shown all the people how awesome God is because of how much God had blessed David.
Right.
But instead, he put on the simplest of garments, maybe exposing a little bit too much of himself and danced joyfully and humbly and honored God before the Ark of the Covenant.
We know he had a heart.
He wanted to bless God.
So then out of that heart that he wanted to bless God, you can see Nathan do that too.
Right.
Because Nathan said, just do whatever is in your mind to do for God.
It's going to be great.
That was Nathan's initial reply.
But then God said, all these years I have lived in a tabernacle.
All these years I've lived in a tent that went here and there and everywhere.
Have I ever told anyone, any Israelite, anytime ever to build me a house made of cedar?
Have I ever done that?
And David's like, well, it would have to say in response to Nathan the prophet who comes and says, well, no, you never did tell me to do that.
Right.
I've never done that.
God said, I've never done that.
David had a heart that wanted to bless God and that led him to want to build God a house.
I want to do something magnanimous, something huge.
Remember we talked about last week about how we were into grand gestures.
And the week before we were talking about grand gestures.
We've got this idea that I want to do something that only I can do for God.
Every time you say, I want to do something that only I can do for God, you forget that God can do everything for himself.
God does not actually need you to do anything at all for him.
Our actions and things that we do for God, they are not to honor God.
We make it out to be like, oh, I'm going to go one step further.
I'm giving tempers.
I'm going to give 11.
I'm going to give 19.
I'm going to show up an extra five hours and work harder.
I'm going to push harder.
I'm going to go until I'm sore and tired and got nothing left.
And we make it out like we're somehow providing something for God.
We want to bless God in some way.
David knew that God is good.
And you should as well.
Out of what God has already done in your life, you should realize that God is good.
But also realize that when people see you and see you do something amazing for God, we have this conversation.
Alicia said it beautifully in the team meeting.
She said, when people come and they see all that we do for God, they get a little intimidated.
They're like, I can't imagine how you do all that, and they get fearful of doing that to living like that.
And we do a lot.
And our church, being as small as it is, has the biggest footprint of literally any church that I am aware of anywhere.
I know there are mega churches that will say they've planted 40 churches and so on.
But no church of this size has ever done what we have done.
But we haven't done it.
God did it.
So people look at us and they go, look at you, what you've done.
I can't be like that.
That's too much.
You're asking me too much.
People see you, and when they see you, they don't see God.
They don't.
Do you expect people to look at you and see God because of the mighty works that you are doing?
Even if they see you, it's like, wow, he's incredible.
How can you do that?
He can do what nobody can do.
There are magicians that can do what nobody can do.
And they don't go, oh, there's a magician over there that made the Statue of Liberty disappear on TV.
Man, I've got to go praise God about that.
Unless they already have a heart to praise God, they're not looking at them and going, well, that's incredible.
The people who wrote series and became like J.K. Rowling, everybody knows that name in all the world.
Everybody knows J.K. Rowling because they wrote Harry Potter.
And you're like, well, I didn't know that.
But most people in this room probably did.
But people don't look at Harry Potter or J.K. Rowling and go, oh, man, God.
Yeah, I can see definitely God did that.
Because there have been other people who have written, right?
God will see you.
They will see you.
They will not see God through you.
Not inherently.
Not because you do something mighty.
Not no matter what you decide to do for God.
It will not happen.
So the question is, how will you lift him up and yet get out of the way so that he can be seen?
If there is a line, it's God.
And I'm not, somebody out there is going to go, this is a radical, man.
He's going to be all kinds of trouble.
It's God.
And then it's us.
And then it's the lost people of the world.
Now, it's not actually like that, right?
We're actually in all amongst them and all kinds of things.
But if there was a line like that tracking spiritual growth, spiritual positioning, whatever,
it would be God, Christians, lost people.
That would be the line.
If there was a line.
There isn't.
But if there was, that would be the line.
And if you're there and you're holding up God, yes, God, yes, God, and they're looking at the bottom of your feet,
they can't see God.
They just see the bottom of your feet.
They see your butt end going, yeah, God's awesome.
Right?
I went to a concert some years ago with the guys in our family.
Went to an NF concert.
It was really cool.
I watched 80% of the concert on the cell phones of the people in front of me.
Literally.
I'm not joking.
Because everybody has their cell phone up like this, video in the concert, right?
And because I couldn't see past the heads of the people in front of me very well,
and I certainly couldn't see past their upraised cell phone arms,
and I could see lights and action and stuff.
But man, I could see it on the cell phones real good.
So I'm watching the people in front of me, there's like 10 cell phones,
and I could see the scene and the smoke and the lights and the artists and everything.
I could see it beautifully.
That's what it is.
But what's happening is you're focused on God, and people are looking at you,
and there's nothing.
There's no screen.
There's no projection.
There's no way for them to watch what you're watching.
You're not a scrying device into another realm.
So how are you going to serve the Lord and honor Him and lift Him up
and still get out of the way for people to be able to see?
Well, David got it.
This part of his example is awesome.
He totally figured it out.
If you want people to see God and see what God has done,
you have to humble yourself before God.
Before we're through, I'll give you one practical step of that,
but I want to read from the speakings of another man who figured the same thing out,
and it's John the Baptist.
If you would go with me to John 3, verse 30, if you're following along.
John chapter 3.
So John chapter 3 is a great chapter, by the way, obviously,
because Nicodemus is in here before we're through.
There's some really good stuff.
But I just want you to dial in on one little set of comments,
and I'll go back to verse 27.
So John, that's John the Baptist, responded.
So this is chapter 3 in verse 27.
John the Baptist responded.
No one can receive anything unless it has been given to him from heaven.
You yourselves can testify that I said I am not the Messiah,
but I have been sent ahead of him.
He who has the bride is the groom.
But the groom's friend, who stands by and listens for him,
rejoices greatly at the groom's voice.
In other words, the party, the groom's men around the groom,
are super happy because they hear the voice of the groom and what's happening.
And he says, so this joy of mine is complete.
And verse 30, he must increase, but I must decrease.
The one who comes from above is above all.
The one who is from the earth is earthly and speaks in earthly terms.
That's the rest of us.
The one who comes from heaven is above all.
He testifies to what he has seen and heard, and yet no one accepts his testimony.
The one who has accepted his testimony has affirmed that God is true,
for the one whom God sent speaks God's words, since he gives the Spirit without measure.
The Father loves the Son and has given all things into his hands.
The one who believes in the Son has eternal life,
but the one who rejects the Son will not see life.
Instead, the wrath of God, that means the violent opposition of God,
instead the wrath of God remains on him.
The before and the after break down to this.
He must increase, but I must decrease.
So now I'm going to give you just one single solo,
worth looking away from your phone if you're not following along in the Bible,
worth not being distracted right now, this one will give you one single action plan.
I want you to look at yourself.
I want you to look at your personality.
I want to look at your experiences, your passion, whatever.
We talk about shape, your heart, your attitude, your personality,
and your experiences will lead you to what you can do for God,
put your spiritual gift in there, boom, you live in your shape,
and you can live that way for Jesus forever.
And now I want you to look at yourself,
I want you to look at your passions, the things you've done in the past, your experiences.
I want you to look at the things that are there and the things that are not.
Someone in this room is going to say, well, for example, I am not a public speaker.
I know for a fact that I don't get up in front of people and talk,
that's something I have never done, I never will do, God would never use me to do that.
Or somebody else will say, I am not a person who reaches out to people who are hurting.
I see they are hurting and I can stand by and I can be strong,
but I don't have a word of encouragement, I don't have a thing.
I can't say, hey, can I help you in some way?
Hey, can I pray for you?
Hey, can I ask you what's going to happen?
Because I am afraid they are actually going to tell me, or whatever.
Whatever it is, whatever it is about you that you say,
that's not what I do, that's not who I am, you want to honor God?
Do that for God.
Now, not if it's sin, I am not talking about sin.
Nothing that's sinful, but by putting the thing that you can do for God,
fully in your wheelhouse, this is what I do, this is what I am good at, this is who I am.
This is the strength that I already know that I have.
By doing that, you are not honoring God.
People are always going to look at you and say, he is strong, he is doing strongy things.
He is smart, he is doing smarty things.
She is wealthy, she is doing wealthy things.
She knows how to dress and look nice, so she is dressing and looking nice.
People are always going to do that.
And listen to me, all those things I just listed,
all of those people have already existed a thousand times, a million times, a billion times under the sun.
It's already been done.
You cannot do anything that anyone else does and do it for God and somehow bring him glory.
It's not going to work.
What you have to do is the one thing that you would not do.
That's what you have to do.
You have to say, people have to look at you and go like, there is a man,
there is a man who I wouldn't expect him to be doing that.
I know him.
I can't imagine that he would extend himself in that way to do this thing.
Wow, he is really taking a risk.
He is putting himself out there.
He is really, she is really doing something that I don't think they are capable of doing on their own strength.
That's when God gets the glory.
Less of you, more of him.
David wanted to bless God and David could build and he could collect resources and he could command men.
He could put it all together.
I honestly think that if David had built the temple, he would have built God a bigger, better temple than Solomon did.
Not that it wasn't big and great and awesome,
but he probably would have gone even more because David had enough in him to know that the grandiose displays,
if they are going to mean anything, they have to be truly grand.
He would have probably marked out a temple size that was a hundred times as big as Solomon and said,
I won't get this built in my lifetime, but I am going to get started on it.
We are going to build this out over the next five generations and it is going to be half the size of the city.
So that no one with a hundred miles can look into the sky and not see the temple of God.
This is the kind of heart that David had for God.
But he realized that that grandiose display, at the point at which he was walking in front of the Ark of the Covenant anyway,
was not available to him.
So he put on a linen ephod and he danced like a madman to God's honor and glory.
And I am wondering when people who have become Christians,
who have realized that God has saved their soul by grace, you can't earn it,
by grace your works of righteousness will always be as frailty rags,
will get to doing the things that God wants them to do that they don't think God wants them to do,
or they don't think God would use them for, or they don't think that would fit their personality.
I am not about to call for an underwear dance,
but spiritually and emotionally you are going to have to decide to do the things that God would have you to do that are outside you.
And that is when you will be honoring the Lord the way David wanted to.
And there will be someone who will look at you and say,
oh you are getting an awful lot of attention by doing that.
And you will give the glory to God.
But there will be someone who knows the Lord, who knows what God wanted you to do,
who will look at you and will say, yeah, I see what you are actually doing.
You are humbling yourself before God.
You are honoring God outside your own capabilities, outside your own strength to do what it is that God would have you do.
You are glorifying God by humbling you.
Second thing in the text I want you to see in there is that Michal was the end of Saul's line.
She was the end of the story for Saul really.
Some say she was wrong by David or trapped in a horrible relationship,
or she was unloved or she was ripped away from the man who truly loved her.
That she was just from the wrong family and had it bad the whole time.
She is the one who lowered David in a basket out the wall to escape Saul.
But later when David gave credit for escaping Saul, you know who he gave it to?
Jonathan.
Not Michal at all. She was not mentioned.
But you know that was their society.
Women did not really have a lot of rights and they did not get mentioned a lot.
But that is not Christian or godly society.
Of course David was not a Christian but he was a follower of the Lord.
The bottom line is her house ends here.
It ends at the moment that she does not recognize that David is humbling himself before God.
When she accuses those who are serving God in humbling themselves before God of actually looking for attention themselves.
You know how many times, I mean you know me, I am not really outspoken about me or anything like that.
I do use some examples from my life and I try to be very transparent.
I have repented a number of times in the pulpit and things like that.
But so often I am treated or talked to like I am an enemy.
Like my opinions about what scripture says are flawed when I am literally just taking it the way it is written.
I am attacked for my political views.
All I have to do is say one thing that I do not agree with something or I agree with something.
And I will be attacked from all kinds of people that I did not even know existed.
There are a lot of people who just do not get it.
But now in this church there are people who recognize I am just trying to do my best serving the Lord.
And they will stand up for me and they will stand with me and they will try to do what it is that God would have them to do.
And that is what we are called to be.
The reality is that God can take away all of your positive outcomes.
All of your hopes and dreams or what you think or the next generation or where you want to be one year from now.
Five years from now, ten, twenty.
God can take all of that away and you say but that is not nice.
No it is not nice.
It is rap.
It is violent opposition.
Uzzah reached out to steady the Ark of the Covenant because there was a little shake and he thought it might fall off the brand new cart when the ox stumbled and God killed him instantly.
And like it says in the text that David got mad when he heard that Uzzah had been killed.
He was angry with God.
But David did not know Uzzah's heart and he submitted that to God.
He named that place the place at which God destroyed Uzzah and then he sent the Ark off into Obed's house and did not bring it up to Jerusalem.
He said how can I bring that up to me?
God is holy.
Listen to me.
If you dance in a linen ephod before the Lord in a prideful way, he is likely to destroy you or your house or your family or your finances.
This is no joke.
The God of heaven can eliminate your positive outcomes.
And in many cases already had we were once objects of wrath.
And if we are now followers Lord Jesus Christ, but working in our own strength, unwilling to work in God's strength, unwilling to submit to the Lord, unwilling to follow the Lord the way he said, then we are probably facing that wrath despite the fact.
What did he say?
He said I'll love him.
I'll never stop loving him, but I'll beat him with the rods of men when he is disobedient.
God's not going to walk away from us.
He's going to hang with us to the very end.
But he is going to chastise or discipline us because he loves us.
He's not going to let us keep going our own way.
You've got to go God's way.
You have to.
The two sons of Eli were destroyed.
Eli himself fell off a chair and broke his neck when the Ark of the Covenant was lost to the Philistines.
He goes back.
Look at every time the judge fell away, the people went into wickedness.
And then God sent the nearby nation to come and attack God's people.
And men died.
And women died.
And children were killed because the people were not honoring God with their choices.
They were worshiping false gods.
God chose Jacob over Esau.
Jacob I loved.
Esau I hated.
It's the God of heaven.
Doesn't mean he didn't love him as a human being, but he despised him in comparison to the people of promise.
God's people would eventually foster and begin the church which started us.
We all got saved because of Jacob.
Not because of Esau.
Esau founded a nation called Edom.
You can go there now.
In the mountains they carved huge stone fortresses.
Look it up online.
Some awesome pictures of huge stone fortresses carved in the mountains.
And you know where the people are?
Nobody else knows either.
God said eventually I will wipe that nation from the face of the earth and no one will remember what happened to it.
And guess what happened to Edom?
All the people disappeared and nobody knows what happened.
They figure a nation came in and literally carried them all into captivity or whatever and it was never recorded in history.
But God said he would wipe them out and he did.
God can eliminate your positive outcomes.
You can literally cease to exist in the kingdom of God unless you figure out that there is a way to honor God.
And it has to do with you getting outside your personal preferences.
Outside what you think is right.
Outside your judgment of God and God's people.
And living there.
Okay God, I get it.
You're big, you're strong, you saved me, you cleansed my soul, you inhabited me.
Because of that I have an attorney to have with you.
Now I'm done.
I'm not living for me anymore.
I'm living for the one who died for me.
2 Corinthians 5.
Michal was the end of Saul's line.
So we got the end of a house.
But then look at what David was promised.
The thought of what God had promised to David easily overcomes David's desires to build God a house.
David said I'm going to build you a house.
God said have I ever asked anybody to build me a house?
David said I'm going to build you a house.
God said have I ever asked anybody to build me a house?
Listen to what I've done for you.
Listen to what I'm doing for you.
Listen to what I'm going to do for you.
And from that moment on, David lets it go.
He doesn't say I'm going to build a house anyway even though God doesn't want me to do that.
He doesn't say I'm going to keep being the kind of guy who can work with the military and work with the soldiers and work with the temple and work with the money and all that.
That's how I'm going to honor God.
No, he poured out his heart before God.
And we see that all throughout the Psalms.
David decided that the proper response to what God had done is doing and will do is praise.
David's desires to do one more thing for God were easily overcome by God's replacement plan for him which was to praise him.
To live humbly before the Lord and put God first.
And he danced and he lived in the ephod and he wrote Psalm after Psalm after Psalm.
And he was in the temple and they praised God.
And that's what you and I are called to do.
The next time God does something good for you, this is going to happen.
You're going to get a check in the mail.
Oh man, I wasn't expecting this money.
This is awesome.
I'm going to give God some of that.
I'm going to thank God for that money by giving him some.
The moment in time you make that decision is already too late.
Your heart is in the wrong place.
You've got it all wrong.
Yes, God may have sent you that check.
Yes, God is blessing you.
He's blessing you because of his character.
It's not a question about what are you now going to do with those blessings.
We say that all the time, don't we?
God has blessed me.
Now what am I going to do with those blessings?
God has literally already gave you the kingdom.
You are air and joint air with Christ.
It means every blade of grass on that lawn outside eventually is owned by us.
Every star in the sky whose names we cannot name eventually owned by us.
Free access to the throne room of God to spend time with our Father.
Free access to come and go from the new heaven and the new earth.
To ride a horse in one moment and shoot across the stars in the next.
Free access.
And we are going to thank God for a check in the mail.
We are going to give him a little more money because he gave us a check in the mail.
We should be living a heart of gratitude every day all the time.
And there should be no question if God sends us a blessing that he's going to get back much of it.
Because we are already giving back much of everything.
When you get in view what God will do, how God has changed you past, present, and future.
What God is building for you.
Your priorities will change from building something for God to praising the Lord with your every breath, action, and step.
You won't be able to spew venom because your mouth will be too busy spewing praise.
You won't be able to do something more for God because your schedule will be so busy with the things that you are doing to give him praise and glory.
That there will be no time left over to go, oh I better give him something more.
Like the little boy who had no money to put in the offering plate.
And walked up to the front of the sanctuary and eventually all the money went into one plate and the other plate went on the ground.
And he stepped and stood in the plate and said, I got no money but I give him me.
That will be you.
You'll stop looking at the balance of your checking account thinking I have enough money to pay my bills or I don't have enough money to pay my bills.
You have a God that will pay your bills if you will put the kingdom of God first.
He said seek ye first the kingdom of God and all these things will be added unto you.
So you will get out of bed in the morning and you will say, okay Lord how do I praise you actively with this day?
What would make this day the most about me getting out of the way and lifting you up so everybody can see?
What would make this day about that?
But that's not what people are doing.
Not only people out in the world, lost people that don't know Jesus, but people in the church too.
When we get a view of what God will do, you can't buy your ticket to heaven.
Your retirement is not going to buy one tiny little stone on your driveway in heaven.
It's not going to do it.
Winning a million people to Jesus would not give you the right to walk into the throne room of God when you die.
Nothing would do that.
Nothing you can do will ever entreat God to do it.
Now I understand it says give and whatever measure by which you give will be given back to you.
But why do you think that is?
Because when you give, your heart is already in the right place.
You're already doing this to praise God and do it because I love God.
God has already done so much more for me than I could ever do for him.
So I'm going to stop trying to do for him to pay back what he's done for me and start paying it forward
and giving it all to God all the time as much as I possibly can.
When you get in view that which God will do, it will change your priorities from a priority of building something for God
to a priority of praising God with your voice, with your actions, with your strength, with your breath.
For a priority of praising God.
Obedience is praise when you think about it correctly.
I'm going to follow the Ten Commandments. I'm going to stop lying.
I was listening to a woman who did a little devotional and she said she used to have a real problem with speeding.
And she would drive 10-15 mile over speed limit everywhere she went.
So then she heard the pastor preach on it sometime and he said if you just govern your foot and think of it as praise,
think of it as you're praising God when you set the speed at or below the speed limit or within four miles or wherever you set it.
Set the speed there and you don't drive that 15 mile over.
And you think of every moment that you're choosing not to drive 15 mile over speed limit,
you think of every moment that you're doing that as praising God.
And she said from that moment on she never sped. She didn't have a problem.
Because she just would put her foot on the pedal and she got up to about 65.
She'd say, praise Jesus, I'm going 65.
And from that moment on she was able to do it. And it's you too.
It's about getting out of bed in the morning. It's about going to bed at night.
It's about working out. It's about eating right. It's about encouraging others.
It's about stepping up and serving.
All the things, if you would think of everything you're doing as praising God,
you will soon find some things that you are doing that cannot be thought of as praising God.
Too many calories, too much caffeine, a little bit of alcohol, a little bit of pornography on the side,
or just some soft pornography, girls in bikinis, you know, whatever.
Guys, muscle guys in string bikinis or whatever the work, whatever your thing is.
All of that, none of that can be done as praising God.
And if your heart is in the right place like David, then it's less me, more God.
And when you do that, you'll be like, hey, I can't do this praising God.
So then you start to cut it out naturally because you're going to replace it with that which will praise God.
But maybe you don't realize what God has done for you, or what God is doing for you,
or what God is eventually going to do for you.
Maybe that's why your actions are not praising Him.
I submit to you that if that's true, you need to repent and turn to the Lord today and make your actions praise Him.
The next time you say can't, I want you to think of this.
And our family, Alicia was growing up, we just started to have to do this with Ariana a little bit.
She would say can't all the time. I can't buckle my seatbelt, I can't get my door shut, I can't do this, I can't get my socks on.
Can't, can't, can't. And we used to say what?
There is no can't.
God tells you to do something, there is no can't.
You say, but if I go out there, I may wind up dead. Okay, fine.
There is no can't.
When you know what it is that the Lord would have you do, there is no can't.
You say, but I'm addicted to caffeine, I have to drink all that caffeine, which I know is too much, right?
There is an amount of caffeine that is reasonable, there is an amount that is not.
I have to do that.
Or I'm addicted to watching TV, I have to stream and see I asked 40,000 episodes, right?
Of the three to ten different variety.
I have to sit in front of the TV every night for two to three hours.
I have to do that. I'm addicted to it. It's who I am. It's who God made me to be.
Get outside, who God made you to be, and make a choice to honor the Lord in that moment.
And turn the TV off and read your Bible and pray.
Sing praise songs until you fall asleep.
The next time you feel like you have to do something that does not honor God,
read your Bible and pray and sing praise songs until you fall asleep.
And then get up the next day and ask yourself, today, how am I going to live?
Or maybe you don't understand what it is that God has already done,
what He's doing and what He's going to do for you.
The point now is to be a people of praise, obedience, and gratitude.
Jesus said to the woman at the well, or to the disciples there and all that were gathered,
that God is looking for worshipers in spirit and in truth.
And when you're watching things you're not supposed to be watching,
when you're doing things you're not supposed to be doing,
when you're eating things you're not supposed to be eating,
when you're failing to take care of yourself in the way that will allow you to be God's servant
for another 50 to 80 to 100 years on the earth,
when you're failing to do those things, it's because you don't have an understanding
of your relationship with God, which is supposed to be.
This is my action of praise.
Talking with a brother, I say, I need to get this done. He says, I can't do that.
I call a sister on the phone, I said, I need to get this done. She said, I'll make it happen.
Another day I call a sister on the phone, she says, I can't do that, I'm busy doing this.
This will work for God. I know, but I'm busy.
Call another one, yep, I'll do it right now.
I was supposed to do this, this, and this, I have all these things I've got to do,
but I see that's for God, I'm going to do that right now.
Are you willing to do that?
You want to bless God, if you know these things, you want to bless God.
How will you lift him up and humbly get out of the way?
As I said before, one way that works, do that thing you never would do.
Not something that's sin, but it's different.
Something that in your personality you would not give up.
You say, I can't. I can't do it.
When God told me I was not allowed to have pop after 40 days of not having pop, I'm like, but God,
but come on, I want the pop.
And I'm not saying you have to give up pop, by the way.
You find your way of doing something for God that you would not normally do.
You're like, I can't do this unless God does it through me,
and then do that, and then tell everybody about it because God did it.
Tell them what you've seen and what you've heard.
Matthew 5.14, the same concept.
We are very near the end, we've got one reference left.
Matthew 5.14, you probably already, that rings a bell,
it's about something I know, but I want the verses before it and after it,
so I'm going to flip there.
Toward the beginning of the Sermon on the Mount,
Jesus says this, beginning of verse 13,
You are the salt of the earth, but if the salt should lose its taste,
how can it be made salty?
I want to ask you as a Christian, what do you taste like?
And that's being overly simple.
When people encounter you, do they encounter somebody who is actively at that moment praising God?
Like when you go out to eat, do you bow your head and pray when you go out to eat?
And if you do, do you do it silently?
Or do you do it loudly?
Not rudely, but loud enough that somebody at least a couple tables away would hear?
Do you offer to pray with your server if you go out to eat?
Somebody was like, I don't ever go out to eat.
But when you have somebody over to your house, so you go over to their house,
and you go, I don't have anybody over to their house.
So why don't you have anybody?
Well, that's just not what I do, okay?
Well, there's one thing you can put on your list.
You could go out to eat to praise God.
You could call somebody over to your house to praise God.
You could go to somebody's house to praise God.
You could do those things to praise God.
And then when people encounter you, they will encounter somebody praising God.
Instead of talking about sports or whatever, they will encounter somebody praising God.
You are the salt of the earth, but if the salt should lose its taste, how can it be made salty?
It's no longer good for anything but to be thrown out and trampled under people's foot.
You are the light of the world.
A city situated on a hill cannot be hidden.
No one lights a lamp and puts it under a basket, but rather on a lamp stand it gives light for all who are in the house.
In the same way, let your light shine before others so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father in heaven.
You are the light of the world. You know why?
Because you know what God has done for you.
You know what God is doing for you.
And you know what God will eventually do for you.
And you are the light of the world to show that, to teach that, to praise God for that, to dance in a linen e-file.
Listen, if you can't call people on the phone, text people, show up at their house, you can't send gifts, give more, serve more, do more, mark more hours out in your day,
then get your stinking underwear and get down front and start dancing.
Because somebody somewhere better be able to figure out that you're shutting you down and turning God on in your life or otherwise you're not a follower of the Lord Jesus Christ.
If nobody can see a light in you, no one can see the...
So you're serving, you're like, I'm serving, but I don't ever tell anybody about Jesus, I'm serving.
I'm strong, I'm doing strong things. I'm smart, I'm doing smart things. I'm wealthy, I'm doing wealthy things.
I'm tricky, I'm doing tricky things. I not address myself, I'm dressing.
How on earth does that show anybody that you're a follower of Jesus?
And the answer is, it doesn't.
If you just be who you are, who God made you to be, that will not show anybody something different.
But if you've been born again, made new, got a spiritual gift, got something you couldn't do before, you do that,
you start showing up when nobody expects you to show up, or in ways that nobody expects you to show up,
then they'll go, what is going on with that person?
We are not of this world.
People should be looking at us going, what is going on with that person?
Why is it every single time I run into him, he's singing a praise hymn?
Or, why does he always say that line about James chapter 1?
Or why does he always offer to pray for me every time I see him?
People should be wondering, because you're the light of the world.
You know what God did for you, is doing for you, and will do for you.
Paul wrote to the church in Ephesus, essentially, that this is the people that we're supposed to be.
Last reference of the day, Ephesians.
I'm going to use a verse from chapter 1 and then verses from chapter 4, once I find it.
Ephesians is a great book about the church.
In fact, it's largely about the church.
Ephesians 1, 18 and 19 says this,
I pray that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened,
so that you may know what is the hope of his calling,
what is the wealth of his glorious inheritance in the saints,
and what is the immeasurable greatness of his power toward us who believe according to the mighty working of his strength.
That was written to the church.
Look at what he prayed for them.
I pray that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened, that you can wake up and see what's going on,
so that you can know what is the hope of his calling.
How big, how mighty, how powerful, how effective is the hope of his calling?
What is the wealth of his glorious inheritance in the saints?
God's going to give you more than you could earn in your lifetime,
and he's going to give it to you for an eternity without end.
And what is the immeasurable greatness of his power?
The power of God, for crying out loud,
we need to see that towards us who believe according to the mighty working of his strength.
We can figure this out.
It's pretty obvious.
That which you experience when you got saved, you've got to be saying something about it.
You've got to let it affect who you are.
Then in 4.17 through 24,
Therefore I say this and testify in the Lord,
You should no longer live as the Gentiles live in the futility of their thoughts.
Hang on.
We shouldn't live like the world lives.
Translating it to modern vernacular, we shouldn't live like the world lives in the futility.
We shouldn't be thinking like they think.
They are darkened in their understanding and excluded from the life of God
because of the ignorance that is in them and because of the hardness of their hearts.
They became callous and gave themselves over to promiscuity.
That means various sexual things for the practice of every kind of impurity
with a desire for more and more.
But that is not how you came to know Christ.
Assuming you heard about Him and were taught by Him as the truth is in Jesus,
to take off your former way of life, the old self that is corrupted by deceitful desires,
to be renewed in the spirit of your minds,
and to put on the new self, the one created according to God's likeness and righteousness and purity of truth.
And then he gets into, and I won't read it, he says,
Therefore, put away lying, speak the truth,
and a variety of other things that we should do that are good works,
that we tell people they should do out of obedience to the Lord.
Recognize what God has already done and what He has promised to do for you, and respond accordingly.
Turn your attention to praising Him every moment of every day.
He has now chosen us as His temple, not a house made of cedar or a tent made of tarps or carpets.
We have become His light, and in time our crazy actions, our self-sacrifice and self-denial,
will become obvious to all as His work in us.
What He is calling you to give up, what He is calling you to put in, what He is calling you to be, that's easy.
He's calling you to be His, to walk in Him.
He's got to be in your life at every moment of the day that you're awake and have any control over it,
and probably then it will be in your dreams too.
He's calling you to be His, to walk in Him, and to make this same relationship available to a lost and dying world.
When it's like that, you'll be able to stop reading your Bibles going, it says, thou shalt not lie.
Well, I better stop lying.
Because instead you'll be, I'm praising God through speaking the truth.
You won't have to read that where it says, thou shalt have no other gods before me, no idols.
Don't worship anyone or anything else and declare its value or their value because you'll be busy declaring God's value.
You'll be looking every day at every moment, how do I praise the Lord with this, what I'm going through?
Mikal got the raw end of the deal.
But I submit to you, her story would have ended completely differently if she had just recognized how much honor God deserves
and how much a great man, the greater the man, the more he should humble himself before God.
If she had just figured that out, this story would have ended differently.
I'm asking you, I want to for me, I want to figure it out.
I want to live my life every moment of every day in praise to the living God who has done so much already,
who is doing so much in me and who is doing way more in the future than I can ever understand.
By the time you have to be corrected and somebody admonish you, you already missed a boat, you already forgot,
already failed to understand.
I pray that our hearts will be enlightened and we will realize how much God has done,
how much he is doing and the eternal house that he is promising us.
That son of David that would be on the throne forever, that's our Jesus.
And we are heirs and joint heirs with him, if we can figure this out and live accordingly.
I'm going to say a brief prayer for us today and then we'll be having the praise team come and we'll praise our way out.
And we forget sometimes, we've got a hymn of decision that that's praise, but it is praise.
If you don't have a reason to repent today, if you don't have a reason to say,
hey I have not been praising God with my life every moment of every day and I want to turn my life over to him
and let him do that through me.
I've been allowing my weaknesses or my experiences to hold me back to do things that God would have me to do.
I've been feeling like I need to do more for God because I'm so grateful for what he does,
but instead of me doing more building something on this earth, feeling like I'm doing something more for God,
I need to realize all my actions need to be out of praise, all my steps need to be in his ways.
And if you need to make that decision, make it.
If you don't need to make that decision, then it's a praise song.
That God led you to a place already where you already know and you already are all day long,
every day trying to live according to praising him.
Jesus is not Lord 23 hours out of the day.
He's Lord 24 hours out of every day.
So if you're taking breaks here and there, you have no Lord at all.
No breaks.
Just Jesus all the time.
That's pretty good.
Father in heaven we thank you and praise you.
We see our weaknesses.
We also see our strengths.
Sometimes the enemy comes at us and makes us want to ignore our strengths
and we don't want to use our strengths and we don't want to work on our weaknesses
because we realize that we fail and we wouldn't do well.
But in our greatest weaknesses, you are made strong.
We see what you did on the cross at Calvary.
When I think about how it's been six years since we signed our Constitution,
I think it's about how it's been almost 2,000 years since Jesus died on the cross.
Both of those seem impossible to me.
Time has moved so quickly.
It's been 2,000 years almost since Jesus died on the cross.
It's hard to fathom.
For me it was that day when I was 25 years old
and I encountered you for the first time.
You forgave me of my sins.
You set me on a new course.
And then it was this morning, and it was just moments ago,
when I said the things that are hard for me to say, hard for me to grapple with,
but I can trust them because they are your things.
Father, help us deny ourselves and take off our cross daily and follow after you
and help us stop thinking that means we can do it our way.
I don't understand why we ever thought, deny ourselves,
do it our way, that those two things go together.
It doesn't make sense.
They are almost opposites.
I do know that people find their groove,
they find a rhythm serving you, following you, praising you every moment of every day,
and they cut things out of their lives, perfectly good things,
and people are like, why did you have to cut that out?
It's a perfectly good thing. It's not even sin, right?
And they cut them out, and let them go, dismiss them.
And they are better off for it.
I guess I'd much rather be praising you every moment of every day,
every second that I can control,
and I'm asking your help for that.
You never asked me to build you a house.
You never asked me to become a house.
You did it all for me.
And for every person that's in this room, I will accept Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior.
And every person that's listening,
and that ever hears this message,
and that any person in this room takes this message,
and will unlike it out to the world,
the gospel is simple, that Jesus lived, He died, He rose again.
And believing in Him, they're saved, forgiven, have a Lord, have eternal life.
Father, help us praise you every moment of every day.
So we won't have to find ourselves going, oh, I want to do more for God.
But rather find ourselves saying, I can't believe what I've been able to do for God.
It's amazing. God is so good.
And there will be no underwear dancing, Lord.
But we know there will be embarrassing moments,
hard moments,
challenging times to overcome,
times in which we will feel like the victim,
we'll feel like things didn't go the way we thought they should have gone.
And those times, Lord, we pray that with your help we will be found
praising you for all that you've done, all that you're doing,
and all that you will do.
I pray all these things in Jesus' name, Amen.
Ask Christy to come forward at this time and lead us in our closing hymn.
And if you're not making some kind of decision in your heart today,
then you praise God right where you are.
And if you are making some kind of decision,
then you should take that information public.
And let yourself be held accountable,
let yourself be prayed for and encouraged
as we commit ourselves to praise and praise.
Would you stand and sing with us?
All to Jesus I surrender,
All to Him I believe in,
I will ever love and trust Him in His presence any day.
I surrender all,
All to me, my Lord, the Savior, I surrender all.
I surrender all,