1 00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:12,440 Welcome to the Potter's House Salmon Arm podcast. We are a Bible-Believing Church located 2 00:00:12,440 --> 00:00:16,680 in beautiful British Columbia, Canada. We are proudly part of the Christian Fellowship 3 00:00:16,680 --> 00:00:21,920 Ministries with 3,000 churches around the world. We are a church focused on world evangelism, 4 00:00:21,920 --> 00:00:27,300 discipleship and church planting. Here we will share recent sermons from P.H.S.A. Church 5 00:00:27,300 --> 00:00:31,880 and other sermons from throughout our fellowship. I am Pastor David Bigford and I will be your 6 00:00:31,880 --> 00:00:36,420 host for this podcast. I thank you for listening today and we hope these messages are a blessing 7 00:00:36,420 --> 00:00:42,240 to you and bring you closer to God. 8 00:00:42,240 --> 00:00:51,120 Hello, welcome back to the podcast. My name is David Bigford. I'm the pastor here in 9 00:00:51,120 --> 00:00:57,760 Salmon Arm and I just want to thank you again for coming back to another podcast episode. 10 00:00:57,760 --> 00:01:04,000 This is a message I put together called A Hunger for Holiness. I preached this way back 11 00:01:04,000 --> 00:01:10,120 in April and the subheading of this message is, Arise and Go Down to the Potter's House. 12 00:01:10,120 --> 00:01:14,240 So you can kind of guess where scripture is coming from today. If you're going to follow 13 00:01:14,240 --> 00:01:26,360 along our text is Jeremiah 7 verses 16-20 and Jeremiah 18-11. So in kind of highlighting 14 00:01:26,360 --> 00:01:31,240 the idea of this message, A Hunger for Holiness, I just also want to point out that this is 15 00:01:31,240 --> 00:01:36,300 something we desperately need in our time today. We really need to focus in on who you're 16 00:01:36,300 --> 00:01:41,080 going to be, who you want to be in the Lord or if you're not saved at this point you need 17 00:01:41,080 --> 00:01:47,720 it. Of course get saved but you need to think about what is your legacy going to look like? 18 00:01:47,720 --> 00:01:53,360 What are people going to think of you when your time is done here on earth? It's something 19 00:01:53,360 --> 00:01:58,640 that is of real validity in our day and age as things are going crazier and crazier and 20 00:01:58,640 --> 00:02:06,520 seem to be spinning out of control. What kind of person, what kind of being, what kind of 21 00:02:06,520 --> 00:02:14,520 man or woman are you going to decide to be? So let's look at this illustration I found 22 00:02:14,520 --> 00:02:22,280 called The Lasting Legacy of Simon Nisambi. East Africa's second generation Christians 23 00:02:22,280 --> 00:02:27,220 were facing the age-old spiritual problem of dullness of heart, something that we all 24 00:02:27,220 --> 00:02:33,120 battle with in our societies today. Simon, I'm going to just say Simon but it could be 25 00:02:33,120 --> 00:02:40,360 Simon Nisambi's message of victorious life sparked a revival that continues to this day. 26 00:02:40,360 --> 00:02:45,160 His dream was to study abroad so he applied for scholarships, finished filling out the 27 00:02:45,160 --> 00:02:49,040 form and placed the envelope carefully into the mail and with the posting of that letter 28 00:02:49,040 --> 00:02:54,060 in ways he could not imagine he was about to become the leading figure in the East African 29 00:02:54,060 --> 00:02:59,600 or East Africa revival, a 40-year awakening that changed the spiritual map of Eastern 30 00:02:59,600 --> 00:03:07,320 Africa. Simon Nisambi was born in Uganda in 1897 and while Simbe Kamonji, a chief of Uganda's 31 00:03:07,320 --> 00:03:12,200 most dominant tribe, the Buganda, had received his formal schooling at Mengo High School 32 00:03:12,200 --> 00:03:17,840 in King's College, Budo, during World War I he joined the African Native Medical Corps 33 00:03:17,840 --> 00:03:22,640 and was decorated for his distinguished service. After the war in 1920 he was made chief health 34 00:03:22,640 --> 00:03:28,120 officer in the Bugandans King's government. He excelled as an athlete in both football 35 00:03:28,120 --> 00:03:32,500 and wrestling and as a singer and an artist but it was his natural leadership abilities 36 00:03:32,500 --> 00:03:40,280 that would loom largest in his future. Nisambi became a Christian in 1922, three years before 37 00:03:40,280 --> 00:03:46,760 his marriage to Eva Bakaluba with whom he would have 12 children but education, the 38 00:03:46,760 --> 00:03:52,000 one thing necessary to cement his status as Uganda's elite, seemed to occupy this young 39 00:03:52,000 --> 00:03:58,280 rising star more than the gospel. Studying abroad in his mind was essential. The reply 40 00:03:58,280 --> 00:04:03,400 to his application finally came and he was turned down. His best hope for advancement 41 00:04:03,400 --> 00:04:08,680 had been dashed. Deeply frustrated Nisambi turned to God for answers and a vision came 42 00:04:08,680 --> 00:04:14,840 to him. God spoke to him and asked him a troubling question. What value did a scholarship to 43 00:04:14,840 --> 00:04:20,720 study abroad have compared with what he already had been given? The pearl of great price, 44 00:04:20,720 --> 00:04:27,520 the gospel of salvation, Nisambi was disturbed by his vision. Ashamed and repentant, Nisambi 45 00:04:27,520 --> 00:04:34,080 began to preach on a tree-studded Narembi hill overlooking the busy center of Kampala, 46 00:04:34,080 --> 00:04:39,920 Uganda's capital. On the street corner near the great Anglican Cathedral of St. Paul, 47 00:04:39,920 --> 00:04:45,520 the apostle, with its rounded dome he proclaimed the themes of brokenness and renewal. With 48 00:04:45,520 --> 00:04:51,600 those sermons in the streets, the first leaves of revival began to stir. 49 00:04:51,600 --> 00:04:58,400 Let's look at our text to Jeremiah 7, 16-20. As for you, do not pray for this people or 50 00:04:58,400 --> 00:05:05,040 lift up a cry or prayer for them, and do not intercede with me, for I will not hear you. 51 00:05:05,040 --> 00:05:09,160 Do you not see what they are doing in the cities of Judah and the streets of Jerusalem? 52 00:05:09,160 --> 00:05:15,360 The children gather wood in Father's kindle fire and woman-kneed dough to make cakes for 53 00:05:15,360 --> 00:05:20,400 the Queen of Heaven, and they pour out drink offerings to other gods and provoke me to anger. 54 00:05:21,200 --> 00:05:27,280 Is it I whom they provoke, declares the Lord? Is it not themselves to their own shame? Therefore 55 00:05:27,280 --> 00:05:32,160 thus says the Lord God, behold my anger and my wrath will be poured out on this place, 56 00:05:32,960 --> 00:05:37,040 upon man and beast, and upon the trees and the field and the fruit of the ground. It will be 57 00:05:37,040 --> 00:05:45,280 burned and not quenched. Let's jump over now to Jeremiah 18, 1-11. The word came to Jeremiah 58 00:05:45,280 --> 00:05:50,400 from the Lord, Arise and go down to the potter's house. And there I will let you hear my words. 59 00:05:50,400 --> 00:05:55,360 So I went down to the potter's house, and there he was working at his wheel. And the vessel he was 60 00:05:55,360 --> 00:06:00,480 making of clay was spoiled in the potter's hand, and he reworked it into another vessel, as it seemed 61 00:06:00,480 --> 00:06:05,520 good to the potter to do. Then the word of the Lord came to me, O house of Israel, can I not do 62 00:06:05,520 --> 00:06:10,880 with you as the potter has done, declares the Lord? Behold, like the clay in the potter's hand, so are 63 00:06:10,880 --> 00:06:16,240 you in my hand, O house of Israel. If at any time I declare concerning a nation or a kingdom, that 64 00:06:16,240 --> 00:06:23,360 I will pluck it up and break down and destroy it, and if that nation concerning which I have spoken 65 00:06:23,360 --> 00:06:29,520 turns away from its evil, I will relent of the disaster that I intended to do to it. And if at 66 00:06:29,520 --> 00:06:37,200 any time I declare concerning a nation or a kingdom, that I will build and plant it, and if it does 67 00:06:37,200 --> 00:06:43,120 evil in my sight, not listening to my voice, then I will relent of the good that I intended to do it. 68 00:06:43,760 --> 00:06:48,480 Now therefore say to the men of Judah and to the inhabitants of Jerusalem, thus says the Lord, 69 00:06:48,480 --> 00:06:55,200 behold I am shaping disaster against you, devising a plan against you. Return everyone from his evil 70 00:06:55,200 --> 00:07:04,080 way, and amend your ways and your deeds. Let's pray, dear Lord, I pray that you would open our 71 00:07:04,080 --> 00:07:10,640 ears to your word, open our hearts to your word, that we would understand that you call to us, 72 00:07:11,280 --> 00:07:17,520 that you desperately want to pull us out of the sin and the mire that we have created in our own 73 00:07:17,520 --> 00:07:25,040 lives, that you desperately want us to turn to you for every good thing. But also Lord, let us 74 00:07:25,040 --> 00:07:31,840 understand that it is you who is the potter, and that you can take the clay being molded 75 00:07:31,840 --> 00:07:37,440 and rework it as you see fit. So Lord, let us allow ourselves to be pliable in your hands, 76 00:07:37,440 --> 00:07:43,840 to be created into what you desire for us to be, and help us to serve you in Jesus' mighty name. 77 00:07:43,840 --> 00:07:50,160 Amen. So as our society today, we have placed a lot of importance on the prestige of education, 78 00:07:50,160 --> 00:07:54,720 the talent of the rock star, the pop star, and the beauty of the model, or the charisma of the 79 00:07:54,720 --> 00:08:01,120 political leader. And do not misunderstand me, I don't begrudge education. You know, I've been, 80 00:08:01,120 --> 00:08:07,040 you know, I was able to use my GI Bill, my military funding to get both a bachelor's and 81 00:08:07,040 --> 00:08:14,480 a master's degree. So I'm not against the idea of education. But what you have to understand 82 00:08:15,200 --> 00:08:20,560 is just like in our story about Simon Nassambe, we see that in Africa, there was a belief that 83 00:08:20,560 --> 00:08:26,160 studying abroad was the next step of achieving prestige and success. And in our society today, 84 00:08:26,160 --> 00:08:31,200 there is a perception that if you are ever going to be successful, you have to do these things. 85 00:08:32,160 --> 00:08:37,920 The vision that he received was that it is God that can lift up the lowly and can cast down the 86 00:08:37,920 --> 00:08:44,000 proud. In our two texts, we see two different pictures. The first is a picture of what happens 87 00:08:44,000 --> 00:08:50,800 when the judicial hardness of a people can lead to a spiritual death that can leave no room for 88 00:08:50,800 --> 00:08:56,960 intercessory prayer. Jeremiah was told not to pray for such a rebellious nation that had turned 89 00:08:56,960 --> 00:09:03,040 their back on God and willfully worshiped other gods. This willful spiritual death can cause whole 90 00:09:03,040 --> 00:09:09,280 societies to look to earthly things to fill the void that is left when God is excluded. It is 91 00:09:09,280 --> 00:09:14,480 important to keep this in mind that Judah had just seen Israel destroyed, but they were still 92 00:09:14,480 --> 00:09:19,920 unwilling to turn back to their Lord God. We see this as the time I'm recording this, the 93 00:09:19,920 --> 00:09:25,520 Democratic National Convention is about to start tomorrow in Chicago in the United States. 94 00:09:26,560 --> 00:09:32,080 And one of the many things they're doing in celebration of the DNC, the Democratic National 95 00:09:32,080 --> 00:09:40,160 Convention, is that they're going to offer free vasectomies and abortions for the attendees who 96 00:09:40,160 --> 00:09:47,520 are coming to this event. They are clearly putting something above God in their worship of their 97 00:09:47,520 --> 00:09:54,160 humanistic ideals. So I don't want to get into the weeds in this, but you have to understand 98 00:09:54,160 --> 00:09:59,120 that there's almost a nature of sacrifice to what they're doing. They are quite literally 99 00:09:59,680 --> 00:10:07,760 sacrificing to the God of themselves by having that stationed as part of what they offer within 100 00:10:07,760 --> 00:10:14,640 their party. And what a large chunk of Americans have decided is the right way to live their life 101 00:10:14,640 --> 00:10:24,000 in service of self. It's a very stark contrast to what our God tells us to do and how our God 102 00:10:24,000 --> 00:10:29,520 tells us to live in service to others. The second picture is a picture of the Potter's House. We 103 00:10:29,520 --> 00:10:36,400 have taken this name as a church for a specific reason. This is the parable or story that comes 104 00:10:36,400 --> 00:10:41,280 straight from God through the prophet Jeremiah. It tells us that we can never assume to fully 105 00:10:41,280 --> 00:10:45,840 understand God's control in our lives and the lives of the nations of the earth, because we're 106 00:10:45,840 --> 00:10:50,880 all just clay in the hands of the Father. So when you come down to the Potter's House, 107 00:10:50,880 --> 00:10:56,880 one of our fellowship churches, you have to expect that God is going to challenge you. 108 00:10:56,880 --> 00:11:02,400 God is going to put his hands on you and he is going to want to mold you. And you're going to 109 00:11:02,400 --> 00:11:08,080 have to decide if that's something you're going to allow to do, or if you're going to go off into the 110 00:11:08,080 --> 00:11:16,400 rest of the world and basically you have snubbed God's desire to work with you and on you to go 111 00:11:16,400 --> 00:11:22,480 and do your own thing. So this brings me to my first point, which is the higher life. For African 112 00:11:22,480 --> 00:11:27,600 Christians like Nisambi, however, the greatest challenge to faith did not come from the 113 00:11:27,600 --> 00:11:32,560 missionary imperialism, witchcraft, or ancestral spirits. So we're jumping back into this story. 114 00:11:32,560 --> 00:11:36,960 For a growing number of the second generation African converts in the 1930s and 40s, the main 115 00:11:36,960 --> 00:11:42,720 issue was spiritual dullness. They confessed a Lord who rose from the dead, yet many felt 116 00:11:43,520 --> 00:11:48,560 rigor mortis rather than resurrection power was the normative experience in their churches and 117 00:11:48,560 --> 00:11:53,600 their souls. This is something we feel in our society today oftentimes. We'll pray with someone, 118 00:11:53,600 --> 00:11:59,360 we'll see them get saved, but it doesn't last, it doesn't stick before they just kind of go 119 00:11:59,360 --> 00:12:06,160 off back into their own lives, no longer wanting to pursue or push into the things of God. 120 00:12:07,360 --> 00:12:12,480 It is a battle that we deal with as a church and as a culture, as a people, because so much of our 121 00:12:12,480 --> 00:12:19,040 society is about self that it's so easy for people even as they come in and get saved, 122 00:12:19,040 --> 00:12:24,080 but then they'll walk away and walk away from their salvation altogether sometimes. 123 00:12:24,080 --> 00:12:28,720 So after his scholarship crisis and God's call to preach, Nisambi still struggled with an inner 124 00:12:28,720 --> 00:12:34,960 emptiness of a soul. He longed to know the power of the divine will and full experience of divine 125 00:12:34,960 --> 00:12:41,520 grace, and help came in the form of a white stranger. J.E. Church, Joe, to his friends, was a 126 00:12:41,520 --> 00:12:47,040 new medical missionary with the Rwandan Mission, an offshoot of the Church Missionary Society 127 00:12:47,040 --> 00:12:54,400 working in Gahani, or Henni, Gahani Hospital in Rwanda. Like many who had worked with the Rwanda 128 00:12:54,400 --> 00:13:01,760 Mission, Church was an Anglican deeply affected by the higher life teaching of British Keswick 129 00:13:01,760 --> 00:13:06,720 revival, the openly critical of the spiritual state of the church in Uganda and Rwanda. 130 00:13:07,360 --> 00:13:12,880 Keswick's teaching had its root in the 1875 Dwight L. Moody revival in England. It taught the 131 00:13:12,880 --> 00:13:19,840 power of indwelling, the indwelling sin in a believer can be broken by a strong faith 132 00:13:19,840 --> 00:13:26,640 experience in which the believer both internalizes the death of Christ and surrenders to the control 133 00:13:26,640 --> 00:13:32,560 of the Holy Spirit. This faith experience it taught took place after conversion. After this 134 00:13:32,560 --> 00:13:38,160 experience, the believer enjoyed victorious Christian living. Without it, the believer lived 135 00:13:38,160 --> 00:13:44,720 in defeat as a carnal Christian. To tie our first text, Jeremiah 7, 16-20, together with this idea 136 00:13:44,720 --> 00:13:50,480 of a higher life, I think it's important to understand and look at 1 John 5, 16-18. 137 00:13:51,280 --> 00:13:57,040 If anyone sees his brother committing a sin, not only does he commit a sin, but he also 138 00:13:57,040 --> 00:14:01,840 commits a sin against the Church, and he is a Christian. He is a Christian, and he is a 139 00:14:01,840 --> 00:14:09,760 Christian. If anyone sees his brother committing a sin, not leading to death, he shall ask, 140 00:14:09,760 --> 00:14:15,920 and God will give him life. To those who commit sins that do not lead to death, there is a sin 141 00:14:15,920 --> 00:14:21,360 that leads to death. I do not say that one should pray for that. All wrongdoing is sin, but there is 142 00:14:21,360 --> 00:14:26,000 sin that does not lead to death. We know that everyone who has been born of God does not keep 143 00:14:26,000 --> 00:14:32,160 on sinning, but he who is born of God protects him, and the evil one does not touch him. The 144 00:14:32,160 --> 00:14:36,960 idea here is that there are times when we can pray for our brothers and sisters with intercessory 145 00:14:36,960 --> 00:14:42,320 prayer, because there is a chance for them to turn from their sin that doesn't lead to death. These 146 00:14:42,320 --> 00:14:46,320 will be the times when we are praying for repentance, sanctification, wisdom, understanding, 147 00:14:46,320 --> 00:14:52,240 or spiritual revival. Other sins lead to death, like apostasy, or when someone is blaspheming the 148 00:14:52,240 --> 00:14:57,680 Holy Spirit. These sins often lead to the hardness of heart that we see with the people of Judah 149 00:14:57,680 --> 00:15:03,440 during the time of Jeremiah. In these situations, we often will lament for those people and nations, 150 00:15:03,440 --> 00:15:09,280 but we know that they are often too hardened to hear God's word and turn from their folly. They 151 00:15:09,280 --> 00:15:14,800 become deaf to their own conviction, to the spirit of conviction that would work on them. 152 00:15:15,520 --> 00:15:20,720 It's an important thing for us to remember as a church as we seek to preach a gospel of repentance, 153 00:15:20,720 --> 00:15:27,040 salvation, and restoration. We must not allow this fallen world and the politics in this world to 154 00:15:27,040 --> 00:15:32,800 distract us from living a higher life in Christ. This brings me to my next point, revival fires, 155 00:15:32,800 --> 00:15:37,920 and as we jump back into the story, I just want to make sure that I impress upon you that we are 156 00:15:37,920 --> 00:15:43,920 also living in a time and an age where decisions have to be made. Are you going to willfully walk 157 00:15:43,920 --> 00:15:50,480 down the road of self-satisfaction and hope that as you go through those dark alleys, 158 00:15:51,120 --> 00:15:57,120 seeking out the things that are going to make you happy for a moment, are they going to lead you to 159 00:15:57,120 --> 00:16:03,360 a paradise, or are they going to lead you to a bondage in sin, bondage in drug use, bondage in 160 00:16:03,600 --> 00:16:11,200 all sorts of wickedness, or are you going to purpose yourself to walk a narrow path? These are 161 00:16:11,200 --> 00:16:16,240 all decisions we have to make and we often have to make them daily. We daily have to pick up our 162 00:16:16,240 --> 00:16:22,640 cross, the Bible tells us, because it's not something that's easily done. And I preached on 163 00:16:22,640 --> 00:16:27,760 this earlier today when I was doing today's sermon because it's a Sunday, but I was reading a book 164 00:16:27,760 --> 00:16:34,240 called Do Hard Things and I just interject with that. We're meant to do hard things in our 165 00:16:34,240 --> 00:16:42,400 Christian walk. We don't get to get away from doing just the easy things because the easy things 166 00:16:42,400 --> 00:16:49,920 will oftentimes leave you idle enough to just fall into more self-pleasure. And that leads you to the 167 00:16:49,920 --> 00:16:57,040 pride of self and to be able to fall because of your own pride. So in 1929, finding himself in a 168 00:16:57,040 --> 00:17:03,360 state of acute spiritual dryness, church took some time off in Kampala and that's where he 169 00:17:03,360 --> 00:17:12,080 encountered Nisambi. Church wrote in his diary of the meeting with Nisambi that would change his 170 00:17:12,080 --> 00:17:19,840 missionary career. Yesterday, a rich Muganda in government service rushed up to me at Nurembi and 171 00:17:19,840 --> 00:17:26,480 said that he had heard me speaking about surrendering all and coming out for Jesus. He said he had done 172 00:17:26,480 --> 00:17:32,000 so and had great joy in the Lord and he had wanted to see me ever since. And then he said in his own 173 00:17:32,000 --> 00:17:38,400 words that he knew something was missing in the Ugandan church and in himself. What was it? Then I 174 00:17:38,400 --> 00:17:43,440 had the great joy of telling him about the filling of the spirit and the victorious life. Following 175 00:17:43,440 --> 00:17:48,800 this conversion, Nisambi met with the church again to go over the Schofield notes on filling of the 176 00:17:48,800 --> 00:17:54,640 spirit and prayed to quit all sin and faith. After several days of prayer and Bible study with 177 00:17:54,640 --> 00:18:01,360 Nisambi, church returned to Gahani Hospital and the power of Pentecost. The change in Nisambi 178 00:18:01,360 --> 00:18:07,200 was visible and permanent. He quit his job as a public health worker and devoted himself full time 179 00:18:07,200 --> 00:18:12,720 to preaching and renewal. When church returned to Kampala several months later, he was confronted 180 00:18:12,720 --> 00:18:18,720 by an irate missionary who demanded, what have you done to Nisambi? Church inquired what the 181 00:18:18,720 --> 00:18:23,680 problem was and she replied, oh, he's gone mad and is going around everywhere asking people if they 182 00:18:23,680 --> 00:18:30,160 are saved. He just left my gardener. She insisted Africans are not ready for this new teaching about 183 00:18:30,160 --> 00:18:37,600 sanctification and the Holy Spirit. So revival comes when we turn to God and acknowledge our need 184 00:18:37,600 --> 00:18:42,800 for him in our life. In the second text of the morning, we recount the potter and the clay from 185 00:18:42,800 --> 00:18:48,080 Jeremiah 18 and in this piece of scripture, we're shown an eternal truth. God, our creator, has the 186 00:18:48,080 --> 00:18:53,920 right to reform us if we are marred. This can only happen if we allow ourselves to be molded by the 187 00:18:53,920 --> 00:19:00,480 father. Christianity is all about growth and rebirth and this continuous process that enables 188 00:19:00,480 --> 00:19:07,920 the church to grow and start afresh. So Nisambi was radically set on fire for God with an 189 00:19:07,920 --> 00:19:13,440 infilling of the Holy Spirit. And this is something that often happens is when people see this, even 190 00:19:13,440 --> 00:19:19,440 when they're culturally Christian, they see someone really on fire for God, they recoil because 191 00:19:19,440 --> 00:19:26,800 I believe that it brings a spirit of conviction on their own lives. But the reality is that he had 192 00:19:26,800 --> 00:19:34,080 stepped into the challenge to do more for God and instead of recoiling saying that's not and I'm not 193 00:19:34,080 --> 00:19:43,280 ready for that, he said I'm all in. I'm all in. And this tremendous infilling comes into his life. 194 00:19:43,280 --> 00:19:48,560 So we can think of this stuff in another way. When tending a fire, you have to turn the logs over to 195 00:19:48,560 --> 00:19:55,520 allow for more air to come in and stoke the fire. The embers are still hot but left unattended, the 196 00:19:55,520 --> 00:20:01,680 fire begins to cool. When the log in the fire, when the logs in the fire are now just embers, 197 00:20:01,680 --> 00:20:06,880 you have to add more fuel to that fire. This is a picture of growth of the church. We need not only 198 00:20:06,880 --> 00:20:13,760 to stoke the fire that is in us but also rekindle the fire in those around us and throw more logs 199 00:20:13,760 --> 00:20:20,880 onto the fire. This is how revival can start and be sustained. So God as a soul sovereign has the 200 00:20:20,880 --> 00:20:26,480 absolute right to deal with nations according to their conduct towards him, illustrated in a tangible 201 00:20:26,480 --> 00:20:34,560 form by that molding of the potter and the vessels from clay. So when we think of going down to the 202 00:20:34,560 --> 00:20:40,640 potter's house, the idea of that is you're leaving from your high places where the temple would have 203 00:20:40,640 --> 00:20:48,400 stood, maybe you're high and mighty in your spirit and you're coming down to where God is 204 00:20:48,400 --> 00:20:56,320 and where God is going to work on you in the potter's house or where Jeremiah exercised his 205 00:20:56,320 --> 00:21:03,600 prophetic office low to the ground where some well-known potter had his workshop. 206 00:21:03,600 --> 00:21:08,880 The idea of God as the potter is continued into Romans, in Romans 9, 2021, 207 00:21:10,400 --> 00:21:16,480 it says, but who are you, O man, to answer back to God? What does molded say to its molder? Why 208 00:21:16,480 --> 00:21:21,920 have you made me like this? Has the potter no right over the clay to make out the same lump, 209 00:21:21,920 --> 00:21:27,760 one vessel for honorable use and another for dishonorable use? And this is something that's 210 00:21:27,760 --> 00:21:34,880 important to our day and age where in our desire to control everything and in our desire to please 211 00:21:34,880 --> 00:21:41,280 ourselves, we can say, I was made wrong, so I'm just making myself into my own new image. 212 00:21:42,480 --> 00:21:47,040 And it's very similar to this verse of scripture where it's basically saying, 213 00:21:47,920 --> 00:21:51,920 I have the right to change myself, but God does not have the right to change me 214 00:21:51,920 --> 00:21:58,160 when he's the potter, when he's the one that made you to begin with. 215 00:22:00,160 --> 00:22:02,880 Springs me to my final point, which is enduring legacies. 216 00:22:05,040 --> 00:22:09,680 Nisambi's preaching at the revival meetings emphasized two themes. The first theme was 217 00:22:09,680 --> 00:22:17,520 echoed in the often repeated phrase, akibi kibi neo, sin is sin. The ugliness and 218 00:22:17,520 --> 00:22:23,840 destructiveness of sin was so clear to him, but of equal emphasis was the softly spoken akisa, 219 00:22:24,640 --> 00:22:31,200 lugandan for mercy. We must always stand against the sin of the world, but it is always with the 220 00:22:31,200 --> 00:22:37,120 intent to see mercy to be done. We cry out for all people to turn from their sins and accept Christ 221 00:22:37,120 --> 00:22:43,200 through repentance. We cannot lose sight of the grace that holds us all together. So during the 222 00:22:43,200 --> 00:22:49,040 1950s, the revival reached its peak. The Nagenda and church traveled to India, 223 00:22:52,320 --> 00:22:57,200 America, Europe, Brazil, and all over Africa with the message of brokenness before the cross. 224 00:22:57,920 --> 00:23:04,480 Tanzania, Rwanda, Uganda, Kenya remained the epicenters of the renewal. Church writes that 225 00:23:04,480 --> 00:23:11,040 the leaders of the Christian work and visitors to Kampala would not leave without a visit to Nisambi. 226 00:23:11,040 --> 00:23:17,360 They would also return home with a new challenge and blessing. It's funny how challenges and 227 00:23:17,360 --> 00:23:23,440 blessings seem to come hand in hand within the scripture. Upon his death in 1978, Nisambi was 228 00:23:23,440 --> 00:23:30,000 the patriarch of a movement that had altered East Africa Christianity. Millions of Christians had 229 00:23:30,000 --> 00:23:36,960 been touched by the revival representing a new vital Christianity shaped by African leadership. 230 00:23:36,960 --> 00:23:42,240 Still, there were many issues left in the African churches. Disagreements and doctrine led many 231 00:23:42,240 --> 00:23:46,640 splits within the church and this should be expected because God is constantly molding and 232 00:23:46,640 --> 00:23:54,480 remolding us. Even within the church, there is sin and it has to be dealt with from time to time. 233 00:23:56,480 --> 00:24:00,080 It is dealt with by the breaking down and the starting over and that does not mean that this 234 00:24:00,080 --> 00:24:06,320 process is not intentional or necessary. It is a process that is not intended to be done 235 00:24:06,320 --> 00:24:11,840 or necessary. God is at work in the church just as he was at work in our lives and each of our 236 00:24:11,840 --> 00:24:21,680 lives individually. Though many traditional denominations represented these new structures 237 00:24:21,680 --> 00:24:27,760 of renewal, they prepared Tanzania for the wave of Western Pentecostal missions that came in the 238 00:24:27,760 --> 00:24:34,080 1970s and 80s. The Pentecostal preachers began new church revivals to the older churches and once 239 00:24:34,080 --> 00:24:40,640 again the struggle between the faith of the older generation and of the saints in the new winds of 240 00:24:40,640 --> 00:24:47,280 the spirit dominated the landscape of the Christian East Africa. Simon de Sambi would have felt right 241 00:24:47,280 --> 00:24:53,520 at home. The decades-long tale of Simon de Sambi is a story of preparation, birth, death, renewal, 242 00:24:53,520 --> 00:24:59,440 and preparation again. God's work is never done and that is the primary message of this morning. 243 00:24:59,440 --> 00:25:08,080 Bless challenge and blessing. God will give us a challenge that he wants to bless us through. 244 00:25:08,880 --> 00:25:15,680 Move closer to God, live a life that draws near the Lord, express that faith to love those within 245 00:25:15,680 --> 00:25:21,600 your sphere of influence, and allow God to mold you and change you, to grow in the gifts of the 246 00:25:21,600 --> 00:25:27,920 spirit and to see what God can and will do in your life. In Galatians 5 22 through 23, 247 00:25:27,920 --> 00:25:32,880 but the fruit of the spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, 248 00:25:33,360 --> 00:25:40,160 and gentleness, and self-control. You might just end up with an enduring legacy like Simon 249 00:25:40,640 --> 00:25:46,400 or even of our founder, Pastor Wayman Mitchell. So if I could have every head bowed, every eye 250 00:25:46,400 --> 00:25:55,680 closed real quick as I finish this sermon off. Challenge and blessing. Do hard things. These are 251 00:25:55,680 --> 00:26:03,600 ideas that I feel God is pressing on me lately because I've always been one to want to, 252 00:26:03,600 --> 00:26:09,040 that was willing to allow myself to be challenged. And I'm not saying I don't get lazy like everybody. 253 00:26:09,040 --> 00:26:13,600 I'm not saying that I don't like the easy things or the comfortable things. 254 00:26:14,480 --> 00:26:22,720 I like to relax sometimes, don't get me wrong. Challenge and blessing. Do the hard things. 255 00:26:22,720 --> 00:26:30,000 Do the hard things. These ideas all to me because I think that we live in a time that's going to be 256 00:26:30,000 --> 00:26:36,800 necessary for us to challenge what we are doing so that we can see God's blessing. And that's going 257 00:26:36,800 --> 00:26:46,640 to require us doing very hard things because our societies are moving away from God. And so maybe 258 00:26:46,640 --> 00:26:50,800 as you're listening to this message today wherever you are, maybe you're not right with God. 259 00:26:50,800 --> 00:26:56,560 And maybe this message is like really honing in on you with the sense that you need to get your 260 00:26:56,560 --> 00:27:01,680 heart right and you need to be filled with the Holy Spirit. If that's you right now, if you know 261 00:27:01,680 --> 00:27:06,400 that you're not right with God but you want to be, I want you to signify that with an uplifted hand 262 00:27:06,400 --> 00:27:12,160 wherever you are. I can't see you but God sees you. And I'm telling you right now that if you 263 00:27:12,160 --> 00:27:17,120 feel conviction, if you feel that almost like guilt or whatever that's in your heart saying, 264 00:27:17,120 --> 00:27:24,240 I need to get right with my Maker, then raise your hand. God sees that hand wherever you are, 265 00:27:24,240 --> 00:27:31,280 whenever you're listening to this because I might not be omnipresent but God is. So if you're 266 00:27:31,280 --> 00:27:37,680 listening to this today or tomorrow or five years from now, God will know your heart. So if you 267 00:27:37,680 --> 00:27:42,080 rose your hand, I want you to repeat after me, Dear Lord God, I know that I'm a sinner but I know 268 00:27:42,080 --> 00:27:48,000 that you sent your Son Jesus Christ and that He died for my sins, that He rose from the grave 269 00:27:48,480 --> 00:27:55,600 and I repent of my sins and accept Him as my Lord and Savior and I accept salvation through grace 270 00:27:55,600 --> 00:28:03,840 in Jesus' name. Amen. And that simple prayer is you recognizing that sin is sin and you need to 271 00:28:03,840 --> 00:28:09,200 cast that out. So really quick as a closing to today's message, I also just want to give a quick 272 00:28:09,200 --> 00:28:15,840 prayer saying, Lord God, I pray you are a mighty and powerful God. I pray that those who prayed 273 00:28:15,840 --> 00:28:21,200 that prayer or those that are listening and need an infilling of the Holy Ghost that you would fill 274 00:28:21,200 --> 00:28:28,000 them right now, wherever they are, wherever they be, whatever time it is that the Holy Spirit would 275 00:28:28,000 --> 00:28:37,120 come and fill them with power and might so that they would see the challenge and be blessed. They 276 00:28:37,120 --> 00:28:43,200 would leave from listening to this message and go and do hard things in your Holy Mighty name. In 277 00:28:43,200 --> 00:28:49,040 Jesus' name I pray. Amen. So I want to thank you for listening to these messages. Again, if you 278 00:28:49,040 --> 00:28:54,000 have, if you like what you're hearing, please like, share, subscribe, all that kind of stuff so that 279 00:28:54,000 --> 00:28:59,520 we can get this message out to many, many more people. And I just want to thank you for listening 280 00:28:59,520 --> 00:29:07,440 again and I can't wait for you to come back next time. God bless. 281 00:29:29,520 --> 00:29:31,440 Amen.