Welcome to Hub City Vineyard.
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Thank you and enjoy the message.
If you haven't been here, we are concluding our series, Won't You Be My Neighbor?
And if you're anything like me, this series has just impacted me.
I want you all to know that as I share and prepare all these talks, there is much for
me as they are for you.
They challenge me to get outside of my box to make a difference in our community.
And I know that 20 plus other churches around the Tri-State area are all doing this series
together as a means to really get involved in our community and make a difference for
Jesus.
So as I was praying about how to end this series, being that this is the last Sunday,
God led me to Matthew chapter 5.
And I want us all to read it together.
It should be up on the screen.
Do we have Matthew chapter 5?
Okay.
Matthew chapter 5.14 says this, you are the light of the world, like a city on a hilltop
that cannot be hidden.
You're the light of the world.
Okay, those are Jesus' words challenging people to be a difference maker.
Okay, to let the light shine out from within them.
He goes on to say no one lights a lamp and puts it under a basket.
And he challenges us to be outward focus.
Darkness, what is darkness?
If we were to shut off all the lights in this auditorium, it is simply the absence of light.
Now, within darkness, if we go after it and try to grab it and reach for it and put it
in a bag, it's not possible.
Like when we're walking in the dark, if you will, you can't see where you're going.
You're running into things.
You can't move it out of the way.
Only light is powerful enough to make darkness disappear.
Of course, Jesus says in the Sermon on the Mount, he made it clear, if you're in a relationship
with him, then let your light shine in the world.
We are called to shine.
But the light we share is not our own.
It's not our good works.
It's not the things we do.
And on Monday, as I was out on my run, Monday is my run day.
I go out for a pretty long run somewhere in the neighborhood of five to eight miles.
And as I'm listening to the Bible and listening to worship music, God led me to a very obscure
section of the Bible.
It's very difficult to find.
So if you brought a Bible or you have your phone, I want you to pull it up because I'm
going to read it to you right now.
It's Genesis chapter one, verse one.
Okay, so very obscure.
It's very hard to find Genesis chapter one, verse one.
So if you want to pull it up on your phone if you have your Bible, I'm going to read
Genesis one, verse one through verse three.
And it says, in the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.
And it would be excellent.
It would be great, in fact, if the Bible began with a positive tone or a positive setting.
But listen to what it says.
The earth was formless and empty and darkness covered the deep waters.
And when you hear that, I mean, doesn't that just sound like a hole or a pit or just complete
darkness?
And God begins the Bible, begins creation in a very difficult situation.
I mean, there was just complete and utter darkness.
And then it goes on to say, the Spirit of God was hovering over the surface of the waters.
Then God said, let there be light.
And there was light.
And see, from the very beginning of creation, God has been the source of light, both spiritually
and literally.
So imagine that.
Imagine a world full of darkness.
You can see nothing, a complete pit, if you will.
And then with four small words, light just blazes forth.
Light comes out of nowhere and just changes everything.
And if we really think about light, everything within our world relies on light for its existence.
Plants, animals, people, and the God who brought light into the world also brings light into
our lives.
Listen to 2 Corinthians 4, 6.
For God who said, let light shine out of darkness, made his light shine in our hearts.
Made his light shine in our hearts.
And see, the best part of all is that we don't have to be like the light bulb that said,
I have to find a way to shine.
I mean, imagine a light bulb and within that light bulb, he's thinking or she is thinking,
I have to find a way to shine.
And the light bulb literally went to a self help meaning to learn about the inner capacity
of light.
And the light bulb began to read books about how to get brighter.
And each morning, the light bulb would get up and recite positive affirmations.
I am the light bulb.
I believe in myself.
I will shine, but nothing happened.
What does a light bulb need in order for it to shine?
It needs the source.
Right?
And if we're really honest, many of us struggle and we get weary in trying to do good.
I mean, we wake up, we read the news, and we see the darkness, and we think about the
negativity and the evil and just all that is around us and we get overwhelmed.
In fact, we can get burned out.
And if that light bulb would just stop and think, wait a minute, if I'm placed in a fixture
and turned, suddenly the light shines forth.
The light bulb didn't need to think about it.
The light bulb needed to be connected to the source.
The same thing goes for you and me.
The same thing goes for anyone.
People get tired and weary because they're not connected to the source.
As we go through this series and think about being a good neighbor and reaching out and
we talked about the good Samaritan and serving people, we can get exhausted.
We can get overwhelmed.
I mean, you can look at me like, Chris, enough is enough.
There's too many people with too many needs.
Friends, we're simply called to be connected to God who then uses us through the power
of his Holy Spirit.
And when we connect to the Holy Spirit, it's then his power that pours forth through us
and within us that changes our world.
It's not us.
It's him.
The ways we shine might not make news, but they make a greater difference than any news
article you could ever read.
I really feel like to close this series, God wants to change our world so that we can change
the world.
God wants to change our world, our hearts, our minds, so that we can then change the
world.
And let's stop and just invite him into our midst so that we can just connect to him now.
So Holy Spirit, we invite you to come.
God, I just silence any words of negativity or doubt.
I silence all phones and distractions.
And God, I just ask that your truth would just come forth.
That this would be a Sunday, God, like no other.
That we would encounter you, that we would be changed, that we'd be supernaturally ignited
with a fire and a passion like no other.
We love you God and we thank you for this time here.
In Jesus name, amen.
So going back to that verse in Genesis 1, it says, the earth was formless and empty
and darkness covered the deep waters.
So God, he begins with a very difficult situation.
And he wants all of us to identify with how things can happen in our lives.
I mean things can be difficult in our everyday lives.
It could be our jobs, it could be our finances, it could be our children.
And what I want you to do is I want you to connect with the way God took a very difficult
situation at the beginning in Genesis 1, 1.
And then at the end of the chapter, he simply said, it is good.
And I want us all to see and connect with the reality that God wants our lives to be
good, to be our outlook to be good and positive.
And it's simply following the steps.
That if God in Genesis 1 outlines the steps to change a very difficult situation, if we
simply follow those steps, guess what?
Our world will change.
Our world, our outlook, our heart will simply change, which leads us to the first step this
morning.
And that's simply this.
We have to connect to the Holy Spirit.
Genesis 1, 1 and 2 says, in the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.
The earth was formless and empty and darkness covered the deep waters.
There's the difficult situation that God was in that we can find ourselves in.
And the Spirit of God was hovering over the surface of the waters.
And see, isn't it awesome that God provides a bridge with every difficult situation?
It doesn't matter what you're going through, a relationship, a marriage, financial, it
doesn't matter.
God provides his Spirit to help us in those situations.
But see, here's the problem.
So many people believe that God's Spirit is kind of like an it, or it's kind of like gravity
or a force that's out there and kind of floats around and helps us.
And all those things that I just mentioned are just not true.
See, the Holy Spirit is actually a person.
And He is literally here at this very moment in this room.
When we were worshiping together, the Holy Spirit was here.
It's like Jesus was in this room.
As I am sharing with you now, He is in our midst.
He is here to deliver, to transform, to heal, to set free, to change our hearts.
But see, the problem is very often we don't connect to Him.
It's kind of like this building, right?
This microphone that I'm using is connected to these speakers.
These speakers are then plugged into an outlet and within those outlet runs what?
Power.
If those speakers are unplugged, there would be no power.
There would be no amplification of my voice.
But is that power still there?
Yes, it's in the walls.
It's all around.
We don't see it, but it's there and we recognize it when something is plugged into it.
See, quite often when we find ourselves in a difficult situation, we forget to simply
choose to connect to the Holy Spirit.
We just forget.
We get off track.
We get focused on things we shouldn't.
Genesis 1, 2 said the Holy Spirit was hovering over the surface of the waters.
In the Hebrew, the word hovering or moved was from a passive tense and it literally
meant that the Holy Spirit was moved on the inside.
Remember the Holy Spirit is a person who was moved on the inside and was moving over the
darkness.
He was concerned.
He was full of compassion.
He was like a mother watching over her child.
If the child goes through a difficult situation, the mother's heart goes out to that child
and wants to be there to comfort him or her with compassion and mercy.
But yet here's the reality.
If you're anything like me in the midst of a very difficult situation, the first thing
I think is, God, why are you a million miles away?
True or false?
In the midst of challenges and difficulty in life, we think God's a million miles away,
yet the person, the Holy Spirit is right here.
It's right around us and it's desiring that we what?
Connect to Him.
David in the midst of a very difficult place in his life wrote in Psalm 139, 7 through
8, I can never escape from your spirit.
I can never get away from your presence.
If I go up to heaven, you are there.
If I go down to the grave, you are there.
See the Holy Spirit doesn't leave us when we're in a difficult place.
We need to connect to Him and then allow Him to speak through us.
Let's listen to Romans 8, 26.
Now, the moment we get tired and the waiting, God's Spirit is right alongside helping us
along.
If we don't know how or what to pray, it doesn't matter.
He does our praying in and for us, making prayer out of our wordless sighs, our aching
groans.
I mean, quite often in a difficult place, we will pray ungodly prayers.
We'll curse God.
We'll curse people as we're driving down the road.
We'll tell people where to go, but when we allow the Holy Spirit to speak through us,
when we connect through Him, suddenly our prayers become godly.
We may not want to pray those words, but the Holy Spirit prays them for us.
Friends in the midst of a difficult situation in order to change our world, we need to connect
to the Spirit, which moves us to our next step.
And next, you've got to speak life.
You've got to speak life.
Look at Genesis 1, 3.
And God said, let there be light.
And there was light.
See, this is the first mention in the Bible of the word said.
The first words ever spoken were from God.
God spoke the first words.
Now God created you and me in His image, and we are the only beings on this planet that
can speak.
We are the only beings on this planet that can use words.
Now don't get me wrong.
There's now been scientists that have discovered that dolphins and whales, they can communicate
through their sound.
I mean, we all know if you have a dog, right, the dog understands us and actually talks
back to us when we ask him or her a question through his barks or her barks or whimpering
or whining.
We know the dogs speak, but do they use words?
No.
We are the only beings on the planet that can sing, that can talk, that can communicate,
that can write poetry.
You know what this tells me?
This tells me that our mouths and our tongue, that our words are going to have to get involved
in our miracle or our life change.
We need to speak it out.
We need to speak the promises of God.
We need to speak life into our difficult situation in darkness.
Listen to 1 John 1, 5.
This is the message we heard from Jesus and declare to you, God is light.
There's no darkness in him.
There's no darkness in God.
And God has shown me that many Jesus followers, including myself, we don't experience the
breakthroughs we want because we're not speaking out what we believe about God.
We hear these truths Sunday after Sunday, week after week in our growth groups as we
read the Bible, but rather than speaking them out, we speak what we see, feel, and experience
in our circumstances.
You say, well, what do you mean by that, Chris?
For example, many of you, we believe that by Jesus's stripes, we are healed.
Right?
That's a truth found.
It's a prophetic voice that Jesus was going to bring healing from our infirmities, from
our diseases.
He was going to set us free.
But quite often when we have symptoms of sickness, we say things like, man, this headache is
killing me.
I'm constantly getting these migraines.
I feel awful today.
I just knew I would get the flu from her.
Well, I'm depressed.
Right?
We speak death.
Or if you don't speak anything at all, you just kind of suffer in silence.
You don't say anything good or bad because you have accepted the negative situation.
Oh, it's just what God wants.
And then we throw it back in God's face.
God doesn't want you to suffer.
He doesn't want you to suffer in silence.
God desires for you and me to be healthy, to be prosperous, to be full of joy, to live
a life of peace and hope.
And that's why He gave you the power to change your circumstances, to change your negativity,
to change your outlook.
When we are faced with a huge problem such as sickness or finances, our natural tendency
is to talk about the problem or the mountain.
We talk about it.
Or we have friends and we say, can you believe this is happening to me?
It's here we go again.
It's in front of me.
It's constantly there.
Do we do that?
It's what we do.
We talk about it.
God doesn't want us to talk about the mountain.
What does He want us to do with the mountain?
He said, tell it to move.
They're not my words.
They're Jesus' words.
Jesus didn't say, hey, go have a conversation with your mountain and tell it how bad it
is.
Jesus said there's going to be mountains in your life.
Tell it to move and it will move.
And so what is that?
That's speaking life.
Proverbs 18, 21 says, words kill, words give life.
They're either poison or fruit you choose.
Many of you have memorized that.
I use it all the time.
When are we going to start to live it?
God is calling us, friends, to speak life because when we speak life, it changes our
world which moves us to our next step.
You got to separate from sin.
Continuing on in Genesis 1, remember there was a dark, formless void, empty.
But God brought life.
Genesis 1, 4 says, and God saw that the light was good.
Then He separated the light from the darkness.
The light was what, friends?
The light was good and He separated it.
I mean, we're talking about how to change our world.
If we want to change our world, we have to separate from darkness.
And what does that mean?
If there's any areas of our lives that we have allowed the enemy and his sin, his negativity,
his junk to invade our lives, we need to make a decision to what?
To change.
To separate.
To say no more.
To say I'm no longer going to dabble.
I'm no longer going to put my big toe in the warm water of sin.
And I'm not talking about murder, immorality, or death.
I'm talking about the little choices of sin, like your integrity.
Like truth.
Like just not telling a lie, no matter how small that lie is.
And you say, well, Chris, it's just a little white lie.
It's not going to hurt anybody.
What are you talking about?
The devil's a liar.
John 8 44 says, for you are the children of your father, the devil, and you love to do
the evil things he does.
He was a murderer from the beginning.
He always hated the truth because there was no truth in him.
When he lies, it is consistent with his character.
He's a liar and the father lies.
So if you lie, no matter if it's even a little lie, it's just slightly bending the truth.
Who are you connecting with?
The enemy.
It's okay to have crowd participation.
I mean, think about it.
When you go to the court of law now, if you're summoned and you have to speak before the
justice, you have to put your hand on the Bible and what do you say?
I agree to speak the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.
So help me God.
Now why is it that we have to say truth three times?
Because our society knows how to lie.
True or false?
I didn't make that up.
I mean, that's in the court of law.
They're trying to hold people accountable because they know they're going to lie.
And they want to bring about the truth.
Well, I'm going to speak the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.
Friends, we cannot allow those little things to penetrate our heart.
I mean, when it comes to moral issues, you can't straddle the fence.
You have to make a decision if you're in a relationship with Jesus to be in a relationship
or not.
It's just, it is what it is.
If your heart is invaded with unforgiveness and you're looking at a person with anger
and judgment, you're in sin.
You need to ask for forgiveness and go to that person and say, please forgive me.
If you're lusting after a computer screen that's sitting in front of you, you're in
sin.
I mean, that's just what God says.
It's not what Chris says.
It's your choice.
It's my choice to live in sin or to not live in sin.
I mean, we can't dabble on moral issues.
It's what the Bible says.
Oh, well, the Bible's old fashioned.
No, it's the truth.
Just because we live in 2019, it doesn't make it right that if you're not married, you live
with another person.
It's sin.
You either are in it or you're out of it.
And so often our world doesn't change because we choose to live in it and stay in it.
But God wants our world to change.
And that happens when we separate from sin.
First John 1 6, we are lying if we say we have fellowship with God, but go on living
in spiritual darkness.
We are not practicing the truth.
When we choose to allow darkness into little areas of our life, then our light doesn't
shine.
No one lights a lamp and puts it under a basket.
What's the point?
Think about this small example.
You're in your backyard.
You're cleaning up your yard and you discover this piece of wood, maybe a, I don't know,
something that you were a two by four or something that's been laying in the grass for several
months.
And you think, oh, that can't be there.
It's killing the grass.
I need to pick it up.
The second you lift up that board, what goes scurrying everywhere?
Bugs and nasty things.
True or false?
As soon as the light shines in upon those little creatures, they go everywhere.
Right?
Same happens with us.
See, when we let the light in, when we say, yes, come Holy Spirit, change me, when we
separate, those things scurry.
Because the enemy is a liar.
He's a deceiver.
He doesn't, he wants you to stay trapped in that sin.
He says as soon as you separate from it, it scurries.
But you have to recognize our next step, and it's the most important step of all.
You have to exercise authority.
Listen to Genesis 1 26.
This is when God makes it good.
Then God said, let us make man in our image after our likeness and let them have dominion
over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock, over
all the earth and over every creepy thing that creeps on the earth.
The greatest gift God has given to mankind is dominion or authority.
I mean, God gave Adam the keys to the kingdom, the keys to the earth.
He said, you rule over it.
I've given you dominion.
However, when sin came into the world, the devil said, I'll take those keys.
Thank you.
I now have the keys to the kingdom and he now controls the world.
And he said, well, where does it say that in scripture?
Well, the devil said to Jesus when he was tempting him, he said, I'll give you the kingdoms
of the earth.
I'll give you everything that is mine if you bow down and worship me.
Jesus didn't contest that.
He refused to bow down and said, be gone.
However, when Jesus died on the cross and rose on the third day, he began the process
of bringing dominion, bringing authority back to you and me.
And see the understanding and concept of dominion and authority, it can change your life.
Can change my life.
It can change all of our lives.
How do I know that?
Well, Joshua 1, 9 says, this is my command.
Be strong and courageous.
Do not be afraid or discouraged for the Lord your God is with you wherever you go.
When you walk in dominion, you say, really?
Did I see that in Joshua's life?
Yeah, read it.
Read, read it.
In Joshua chapter 10, Joshua commanded the sun to stop and it stopped.
Tell me that's not the coolest thing.
I mean, if you were a surfer, right, you could tell that sun to stop right there and all
those waves would be coming in because it was the perfect place to stop.
Now the problem is that's never happened before or since.
Only Joshua did that.
But is that authority?
Yeah, that's authority.
And see then later in the chapter, we read Joshua 10, 24 to 25, when they brought them
out, Joshua told the commanders of his army, come and put your feet on the king's necks.
And they did as they were told.
And ever be afraid or discouraged, Joshua told his men, be strong and courageous for
the Lord is going to do this to all your enemies.
And see the word dominion comes from a word for the word foot.
And it means to tread.
And this is why Joshua, he spent seven days walking around the walls of Jericho.
He was what?
He was treading.
His foot was walking around the walls of his enemy.
Okay.
And this even says in Luke 10, 19, he says, look, I have given you authority over all
the power of the enemy.
Do you believe that?
I do.
How many toes do you have on your foot?
I said foot, not feet.
Five.
You have five toes on a foot.
If you don't, God bless you.
Just pretend like I didn't say that.
If you have six, that's awesome.
But I typically know that everyone has five.
So I'm going to focus on five.
See I believe that for many Jesus followers, there's five specific demonic powers that
negatively affect our lives and negatively affect our ability to follow God's call in
our life.
Five specific.
And you say, well, Chris, how do you know that?
Well, Ephesians six tells us that we're not fighting against flesh and blood, but against
evil rulers and authorities in the unci world, against mighty powers in this dark world,
against evil spirits in heavenly places.
That a lot of times our fight, our mountain, if you will, they're spiritual, but then we
try to justify them as earthly or physical.
And God is opening our eyes this morning to say, no, we need to take authority over the
spiritual forces, the negative spiritual forces that are coming against us.
And the five I want to highlight this morning is this.
Guilt.
For many of you, guilt's like your big toe that got stepped on.
Big big toe.
And what is guilt?
Guilt is like that voice in the back of your head that whispers to you, why are you going
to church?
You can't be forgiven for what you did yesterday or last month or last year or 10 years ago.
You can't be forgiven for that.
And it's that enemy whispering, it's that spiritual force whispering in your ear, you
got to look backwards.
Look at all that stuff you did back there.
You can't be forgiven of that.
You're no good.
You can't live up.
A few months ago, I was talking about the windshield.
Everyone remember the windshield?
The car when you drive, right?
You look out the windshield.
The windshield's what?
Big and wide.
So that you can see forward where you're going.
Your rear view mirror is.
And a lot of times you pull it right off.
Here's the reality.
We got to stop dealing with guilt.
Everyone's sinned.
The Bible says for all have sinned.
Yet God in His grace makes us right because of Jesus.
You got to stand on that authority.
So guilt.
Number two is sickness.
Doctors have now discovered that there's more than 12,000 diseases in the world.
Sickness is everywhere.
Right?
Doctors can now confirm that if you have the right gene, you could die of cancer.
Or you have a family line that struggles with heart disease and heart attack.
Chances are you're going to have the...
It doesn't have to be that way.
Okay?
Now I'm not saying you don't be smart.
You don't live right, eat right, make healthy choices.
But what I'm saying is it doesn't mean that you have to die because it was in your family
line.
I mean, I believe that God can heal.
I've seen Him do it.
Now He doesn't heal everyone.
But just because He doesn't heal everyone, does that mean we don't pray?
Of course not.
I mean, the last time I checked, Jesus said that you will do even greater things than
I.
Jesus rose to dead.
So if Jesus rose to dead and we can do even greater things than He, then chances are we
can heal sickness.
But we have to take authority.
Guilt, sickness.
Number three is bondage.
See, bondage is what the devil wants for us.
Alcohol, drugs, prescription drugs, pornography, sports, entertainment.
I mean, Jesus said very truly, I tell you, everyone who sins is a slave to sin.
And the enemy, he wants us distracted and off mission.
He doesn't want us focused on what's important.
He doesn't want our lights to shine because when our lights shine, what?
People want the light.
People are attracted to the light.
So when we get off mission, then we're not focused on God's call in our life.
But I know the Bible says, whose son sets free is free.
Indeed.
Have you invited the Holy Spirit to set you free?
So we got guilt, sickness, bondage.
The fourth one is weakness.
What is weakness?
He said, well, what does weakness mean?
Weakness means you're, you feel like you have, you're inadequate.
You're lazy.
You're not motivated.
You go through the motions.
You're living a normal life.
You feel weak.
Like you're never going to make it.
Things will never change.
You're hopeless.
Saying things like these problems will never end.
My marriage will never be happy.
Did you know that social scientists have now determined that people can have a fear of
fear?
I was like, what in the world was a fear of fear?
Like what does that even mean?
That's weakness.
It's what the enemy wants for people.
Don't walk in your authority.
Be weak.
But the Bible says that because we are weak, he is strong.
The Bible also says that I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.
And the last one is poverty.
Poverty?
None of us live in poverty, Chris.
Poverty is those feelings that we never have enough.
We're living in a society that we are defined by what we wear, what we drive, what we look
like, where we live.
We feel like we can never have enough.
I always need something new.
I've got to look better.
I've got to impress.
That's what the enemy wants you to believe.
He wants you to believe that you don't have enough.
He wants you to say my car doesn't work.
I need another credit card.
He wants you to say things like that.
But it's just simply untrue.
We're rich.
We're the wealthiest people in the world.
God blesses those that give back to him.
God blesses those that serve.
He says you're rich, you're a son or a daughter in God.
So what I want to do this morning is this.
I want to do a little morning exercise together.
So it's going to involve you standing up.
Here's what we're going to do.
That's good.
Yeah, get a stretch in.
Move around.
Chances are here's the truth.
This is it.
I know this is happening because I was reading about public speaking.
And public speaking says this.
People are more engaged when they don't respond.
So when you don't yell out or laugh or say things to my questions, that means you're
more engaged.
Because that means the Holy Spirit is speaking to you and you're not quite sure what to do
with it.
So I know only two or three of you have responded to what I'm saying.
So I know you're all listening.
And see chances are when I was talking about those spiritual forces, those demonic forces
that battle against us that some of you related to that.
I know it.
Then when I was talking about guilt, you said, yeah, I deal with that.
When I was talking about you're sick, some of you here you're sick.
You got a headache.
You got a back pain.
You got knee aches.
You're just getting old.
I am.
I wake up every morning and feel that way.
Some of you are here and you're in bondage, man.
Let's tell you what it is.
You're trapped in some form of drug use or alcohol or I don't know.
You're just trapped in it.
Some of you here just weak.
You don't smile.
You're not positive.
Your outlook is just wrong.
Some of you here are just dealing with that poverty issue.
My car doesn't look right.
I need new tires.
Make it shiny.
Press everyone.
Gotta make my radio louder.
They're all just lies.
And I want you to hear that.
They're all just lies.
They're lies.
And if you're in a relationship with Jesus, here's the good news.
You've been given authority to overcome those issues.
And see, just like in Joshua, you know, he drug those kings out.
Those kings are like your demonic forces.
And what did he tell his men to do?
He said, put your foot on their throats.
That's kind of cool, isn't it?
So this morning we're going to do that.
We're going to do a little exercise.
And we're going to lift our legs up.
Not yet.
Some of you won't be able to hold it that long.
Not yet.
We're going to lift our legs up.
And whatever it is that you're struggling with, if it was guilt, when you put that foot down,
you're going to say, I'm forgiven.
If it's sickness, you're going to say, I am healed.
If it was bondage, you're going to say, I am free.
If it was weakness, you're going to say, I am strong.
And if it was poverty, you're going to say, I am rich.
And I firmly believe that some of you are going to experience a miracle this morning.
That by simple actions and speaking it out, God can supernaturally heal you.
Do you believe that?
Do you believe it?
All right, you ready?
Has everyone got their, their, their, what, has everyone got their foot?
Man, they're, they're, now get ready because there's going to be demonic force just going
everywhere.
It's going to be like Ghostbusters.
Here we go.
Let's go.
Let's lift them up.
Lift them up.
Ready?
Go!
I am free.
Didn't that feel good?
You want to do it again?
Let's do it one more time.
One more time because some of you are struggling with many.
Here we go.
You ready?
Pick it up.
I am rich.
Man, that feels good.
Okay, you can sit down.
Now here's what I want you to learn.
Right?
You don't have to do that on a Sunday morning.
You can do it tomorrow morning when you wake up.
Say you had a bad dream, right?
You had a bad dream and you're living in fear.
You know, I don't live in fear.
I'm strong.
Heck with that.
In Jesus' name.
Right?
You need to speak out the truths that we read about in the Bible.
Because that's the only way your light is going to shine.
If you allow the enemy to control who you are and what you do and what you say in your
outlook on life, you're not going to shine anywhere.
People aren't going to be attracted to you.
Right?
You're going to be like that board.
Just a board that gets thrown away.
No man, we've got to get rid of that board and let those creatures scatter so that our
light can then shine to others.
So to close our series, four simple steps that now that we're free, we can shine to
others.
Right?
What does it look like?
The first is just be counter-cultural.
The one who is the true light who gives light to everyone who's coming into the world.
I mean, Jesus is the light of the world.
You're the light of the world like a city on a hilltop that can be not hidden.
You know, I looked up CNN and Fox News.
I looked them both up for Republicans and Democrats.
Don't worry.
I looked them both up this morning.
And the headline, okay, was bickering, arguing, finger pointing at negativity.
No good news.
There was no good news at either site.
Neither one.
The world is full of darkness, full of lies, hate, negativity, and confusion.
And the Bible tells us in Romans 13, the night is almost gone.
The day of salvation will soon be here.
Remove your dark deeds like dirty clothes and put on the shining armor of right living.
That means be counter-cultural.
Follow Jesus.
When Jesus walked and moved and lived, his light shined.
People were healed, set free, and wanted to be with him.
Don't participate in the darkness.
Instead, clothe yourself in the presence of the Lord Jesus Christ and don't let yourself
think about ways to indulge your evil desires.
I don't care how old you are, where you work, where you go to school.
Swim upstream.
Be like this.
Is it hard?
Is it difficult?
Is it challenging?
Absolutely.
But the rewards are worth it.
Jesus tells us we're going to live and live abundantly if we are counter-cultural.
Number two, think of others.
You are the light of the world like a city on the hilltop that cannot be hidden.
No one lights a lamp and puts it under a basket.
Luke 6, do to others as you would like them to do to you.
Consider other people's needs and help meet them.
Encourage instead of criticize.
Be patient.
Give others the benefit of the doubt.
Consider God if you hear gossip, run.
Just run.
Because gossip is lies.
That's all gossip is.
When you encounter a difficult person, remember this.
This is cool.
If you encounter a difficult person this week, think about it.
God gave you a dominion and authority over creeps.
Read it.
Go back and read Genesis 1, 26.
He gave you dominion over all the creepy, creepy little things and creeps in the world.
So it doesn't mean you're rude to them, it just means you smile extra hard.
Because Luke 10, 27 says love your neighbor as yourself.
Write this whole series about loving your neighbor as yourself.
Think of others often and put them first, friends.
That's loving your neighbors.
Number three, be active.
Don't sit on your hands and live a normal life.
Matthew 5, instead a lamp is placed on a stand where it gives light to everyone in the house.
In the same way let your good deeds shine out for all to see.
Remember it's not what you do.
It's the Holy Spirit using you and connecting through you.
Jesus said in Luke 10, 28, do this and you will live.
What does it mean to be active?
It means that you are involved in people's lives.
You're looking for opportunities to give, to serve, to pray for.
Next week we'll have 3,000 glow necklaces here to give to you.
We'll give you packs of 50 that you can give out at the Mummer's Day Pray.
You can give out a trick or treating or trunk or treat or wherever it is you go.
Because we want to give you opportunities to be active in people's lives.
You can come and you can donate your shoes, you can donate candy, you can serve other
people by simply giving and it makes a difference in people's lives.
True or false?
It's true.
Luke 10, going over to him the Samaritan soothed his wounds with olive oil and wine and bandaged
them.
Then he put the man on his own donkey and took him to an inn where he took care of him.
The next day he handed the innkeeper two silver coins telling him take care of this man.
If this bill runs higher than this I'll pay you the next time I'm here.
That friends is being active.
We need to follow that example and be active every single day.
We need to take the feeling and connections that we are having here this morning, wake
up tomorrow morning and say yes I want to have that outlook today.
Monday morning can no longer be dreaded.
It has to have an outlook of I'm going to change the world because my life has changed.
When our world has changed and we want to change other people's worlds it's simply
a choice.
And then finally when given the opportunity number four just point back.
It's not about you.
Following Jesus, being about the kingdom is pointing back to God.
In the same way let your good Dean shine out for all to see so that everyone will praise
your heavenly Father not you.
John 1, John himself was not the light.
He was simply a witness to tell about the light.
Think about John the Baptist.
He prepared the way.
Our goal should never be to bring recognition to ourselves because when we want to be recognized
then guess what the enemy has us.
It's all about pointing people back to Jesus.
And there's a fine line between being light and trying to get attention.
And you know what that fine line is?
It's a matter of the heart.
When Jesus says take up your cross and follow me that means that you lay it all down.
It's not about you and me anymore.
It's about Jesus in us.
His Holy Spirit using us and moving through us so that we can then give that light away.
Let's stand together.
God I just thank you.
Come Holy Spirit.
I just thank you.
Thank you God for this opportunity to just share, to stomp on the enemy's head.
I thank you God for new life.
I thank you God for a group of people that want to sing out, that want to praise you.
God I pray that these praises, this connection with you, this authority that we've been given
just reigns throughout this week, throughout this month and for the rest of this year God.
That we begin to exercise what God has given us through Jesus' actions on the cross, through
his redemption, through his being raised from the dead God.
That we begin to exercise that authority.
That God we see people set free.
We see healings come God.
That we become a church known for pointing people to Jesus.
It's just not about us.
It's about Him and about Him using us.
So I just simply, God took me back to one spot.
Okay it's cool that we can put our foot down.
It's cool that we can say things but God said look there's going to be people here this
morning that just simply need forgiveness.
That's just it.
That's what he highlighted in my heart.
There's going to be people here and you need to pray for them.
So if you need any form of forgiveness for a choice that you made, something you did,
something you said, will you just put your hand up.
I want to pray for you right now because I believe that there's mercy in this place this
morning.
There's mercy.
So just pray it out.
God in your immense love, I am forgiven.
Thank you God for your grace, your love and your mercy.
I speak against the lies of the enemy and I walk in your truth.
In Jesus name.
Amen.
Now whatever you were forgiven for, don't go back to it.
I mean that's what Jesus told the woman.
Go and sin no more.
So if you experienced some form of forgiveness this morning, some sort of healing, some form
of don't go back to it.
Walk in that freedom today and for the rest of your life.
God bless you guys.
It's been an incredible series.
Have an incredible week.
There's no way I believe that you are working now.
Oh boy.