“Loving God with All Our Heart” By
Brother Parrish Lee February
4th,
2018 Y'all may be seated. That is—you know what? We
come up here—and
any preacher, any deliverer, any messenger comes up here, and they
bring a sermon,
but that's the message. I will bless the Lord at all times, because His
praise
will continually to be in my mouth, in my mouth, in my mouth. Giving honor to God who is the head of our
lives, giving honor to
the Good One, the Great One, giving honor to the One who passes all
description, giving honor to the One who never stops giving, giving
honor to Him
who refreshed our souls, today. Giving honor to Him who has already
given more
to us than we ever, ever could repay. Giving honor to You, loving,
magnificent,
God, awesome, and wonderful, God. God of our souls and our lives.
Giving honor
to Him. And, giving honor to all those who have gone on before us in
ministry, from
our founding pastor, he and his family, our pastor, he and his family,
and all
those who have come and stood in the gap to make up the hedge, and,
giving
honor to every single one of them that have just accepted the mantle,
just
accepted the responsibility, accepted any responsibility for the call
to the
will of God to bring forth that precious Gospel. I have to say, Brother Hector, you was touching
me down there, and,
I was like, “Shoo!” Amen, amen. And, giving honor, Saints, giving honor
to all
of y'all, who braved the snow today, and, yeah, the snow and cold
weather, and
came out and said, “You know what? This is the day that the Lord has
made, we
will rejoice—snow or no snow—and be glad in it, and be glad in it.” We have taken—glad in it—we have taken the
month—we had a
wonderful time last month, you know what? I tried to speak for
everybody, you
can't really speak for everybody—but, I had a wonderful time last month
hearing
the messages about, “Come unto Me, all ye that labor and are heavy
laden, and I
will give you rest.” Isn't it beautiful when the Word of the Lord
comes, and
just fills your life? Isn't it beautiful when you can refer back to it,
and
find out it hasn't lost its power? That precious Word of God. That's
amazing! Amazing.
You can't stop loving it. But, this month, the month of February, we
have taken
a new theme. This month, for the month of February, we have taken a
theme from the
Book of Mark, and chapter twelve, and verse number thirty-three: Mark
12:33 and
to love him with all the heart, and with all the understanding, and
with all
the soul, and with all the strength, and to love his neighbour as
himself, is
more than all whole burnt offerings and sacrifices. That is the theme that we want to have for the
month. And, yeah, the
truth is, God gives us many themes throughout the month. He'll give you
a theme
throughout the day. He'll give you a theme when you wake up, He'll give
you a theme
when you get to work, He'll give you a theme at lunch time, He'll give
you a
theme—He'll give you plenty of themes, but the overall theme that we
want to
have for this month, we said, as a congregation, is from the Book of
Mark,
chapter twelve, and verse number thirty-three. And, today, we want to
have a
theme for the message. Our Scripture for the day, if I could ask
Brother Ed Kretzer,
if he would come, he is going to read from this same chapter, from the
Book of
Mark, chapter twelve, verses twenty-eight through thirty-four. Brother
Ed: Mark
12:28-34 And
one of the scribes came, and having heard them reasoning together, and
perceiving that he had answered them well, asked him, Which is the
first
commandment of all? And Jesus answered him, The first of all the
commandments
is, Hear, O Israel;
The Lord our God is one Lord: and thou shalt love
the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with
all thy
mind, and with all thy strength: this is the first commandment. And
the second is like, namely this, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as
thyself.
There is none other commandment greater than these. And the scribe said
unto
him, Well, Master, thou hast said the truth: for there is one God; and
there is
none other but he: and to love him with all the heart, and with all the
understanding, and with all the soul, and with all the strength, and to
love
his neighbour as himself, is more than all whole burnt offerings and
sacrifices. And when Jesus saw that he answered discreetly, he said
unto him, Thou
art not far from the kingdom of God. And no man after that
durst ask him any question. Thank you, Brother Ed. If we could bow our heads
for just a moment.
Almighty, Almighty God, wow! We get in Your presence, God, and You just
amaze
us every single time. You are sweeter than the honeycombs, stronger
than a lion,
the Lily of the Valley, our Bright and Morning Star, we praise none
other than You.
Precious Lamb of God, we thank You, we honor You, we extol You, God, we
exalt You,
God. We come before You, the One who spoke and created the Heavens and
the
Earth. We come before You, and we thank You for what You have done for
us, even
this day, Lord, even this day. We thank You for the opportunity to
raise our
voices, and praise Your name. We thank You, God, for what You've done
for us,
from Calvary’s hill, all the way up to this very second. And, we ask,
God, we
petition You, we come before You, God, and ask for a blessing on our
message
time, today. As we go over Your Word, that You would do, and honor,
exactly as
it said in the Scriptures, that Your Word would not return unto You
void, but,
surely, accomplish that to which You sent it. You are the faithful,
true, and
wise God, the beneficent one, the benevolent one. We thank You, praise
and honor,
and we claim all this, in Jesus name, and everyone said, amen. Amen. So from The Book of Mark, chapter twelve, verses
twenty-eight through
thirty-four, as Brother Ed just read, and, if we were to give a little,
brief
synopsis about the whole thing, we would see that, if we start at the
beginning
of the chapter, that this was a time of confrontation. This was a time
when
they sought to catch the Lord in His words. And, first up, was the
Pharisees,
and they figured they could catch Him, they had a crafty way of doing
things,
and, they said, “Oh, master, teacher, oh, Jesus, yeah, you know, if
you, you
know, we, you know, got this money, and, you know, is it lawful to pay
tribute
on the Caesar? Should we pay taxes? What do You think?” And they sought
to
catch the Lord in His words, and the Lord, of course, gave them an
answer. And, then, next up was the Sadducees, and they
had another hard question
that they wanted to present to the Lord: “Lord, Lord, Lord, Lord, Lord,
You
know, there was this woman, and she married this guy, and, You know,
that guy
died, then his brother took her, and, You know, that guy died, then the
next
brother took her to wife, and that guy died, and it was all seven
brothers that
took her, and finally, the woman died also. Oh, Lord, so, tell us,
Lord, whose
shall she be in the resurrection?” Hard questions. We have the benefit,
in
2018, of already knowing the response from the Lord Jesus, but had we
been
there at the time, we might have been caught, kind of, “Oooh, that's a
good
one. Who has an answer for that?” But, we have the benefit, now, of
seeing the
wisdom that Christ had put out, and are able to say, “Wow! Watch our
God go.” And
after He had answered both of them, and, the last one, I like the last
one, He said,
“You err, knowing it neither the power of God,” and He stretched it out
to
them, and I love the whole way that the Lord answered them, “or the
Scriptures.”
You don't know the Scriptures, nor the power of God in it. And, then,
that
would kind of make you shut up, when you're able to get that kind of
answer.
The Lord goes on, and the next up was a scribe. Now, the scribes are a
little
different from the Pharisees and the Sadducees. You see, the Pharisees,
if you
will, you would kind of say, nowadays, you would call them at the
domination.
They kind of have a certain belief. And the Sadducees, you would kind
of call
them, like, another denomination. They kind of had a certain belief.
You know, but,
the scribes, they were the studious ones, the lawyer ones, the teacher
ones,
and they stayed in the Torah, they stayed in, specifically, in only the
Word. They
didn’t develop outside of that too much. And, he was next up, and he
simply
asked that first question to the Lord, where it says, in verse number
twenty-eight: Mark
12:28 And
one of the scribes came, and having heard them [the Pharisees and Sadducees] reasoning
together, and perceiving that he
had answered them well, asked him, [after he saw their answers, he
asked
Him then] Which is the first commandment
of all? And this is a really important question, you
see, because, we are
familiar with the Ten Commandments, but the Jews, actually, had 613
Commandments. So, out of 613 Commandments, Lord, what is the first one?
What is
the one that comes before all of the other Commandments, what is it?
And, of
course, we see the Lord's response, in verse number twenty-nine, Mark
12:29 And
Jesus answered him, The
first of all the commandments
is, Hear, O Israel; The Lord our God is one Lord: That doesn't sound like much of a commandment,
“Hear, the Lord our
God is one Lord,” you better believe, that's a commandment. God is one.
Not a
community, not a collaboration, not a Unity thing, God is one Lord.
That's a
commandment that you know He is one Lord. Hear, o Israel, hear
everybody, you
people of God, I am One. There is none like Me, none beside Me, I am
it. The
first commandment is, “Our Lord is one Lord.” And, and, in conjunction
with
that, and in verse number thirty, Mark
12:30 and
thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy
soul, and
with all thy mind, and with all thy strength: this is the first
commandment. This, this is that first commandment: to know,
and acknowledge,
that God is one God, and we are to love Him with all our heart, soul,
mind, and
strength. That is our theme for the month. That is what we're going to
be
talking about this month. Today, I will be talking about loving the
Lord our
God with all our heart. Loving the Lord Our God with all our heart. Now, in the Old Testament, the heart was
considered to be the
center of the life of the body. And, it was also considered as the
center of
the spiritual life for the body. So, the heart was regarded as that
which all
life came from in your body. And, so, when the Lord says to love Him
with all
your heart, soul, mind, and strength, if we stop there and just focus
on ‘heart,’
for just a minute, we see that, if the heart is that which gives life
to all
the body, we are to love the Lord with every part that gets life from
our
heart. So, we are to love the Lord—my fingers get life from my heart:
with my
fingers, I am to love the Lord. I am love the Lord— my eyes get life
from the
heart. I am to love the Lord with my eyes. I am to love the Lord with
all that
my heart touches, and supplies, and brings life too. All my heart.
That's the
physical side of that. The spiritual side, the emotional side, is it
your heart
also cares, it's a caring center. It's the center of that which brings
love and
affection. So, everything, everything that my heart touches with its
love, and
its caring, and its affection, I am supposed to love God with that. I'm
supposed to love God with that. Now, this is the part that's not easy: because,
one of the things
that we, as humans, tend to do, is, we as humans want to have our own
way of
doing things. “I don't want to, you know, have Him tell me what to do.
You
know, if I want to love something, I want to love it. I don't want You
telling
me how to love it. I love it the way I want to love it. I want to care
about it
the way I want to care about it.” But, when I love God with this heart,
this
heart tells me how to love Him. So, when my flesh gets in the way, and
it says,
“I want to do it the way I want to do it.” I have to invite God in.
Now, this
changes everything. Because, as soon as God comes in, God tells you how
to love
it. God moves on you, how much, how thorough, how immense to love. And,
then, when
I bring God in, also, I have just brought in something that is greater
than
myself. I have brought something in that can do what I can't do. I have
brought
One in who knows the beginning from the end. When I love, when I bring
God into
my love I have just brought in that answer that I didn't have before I
brought Him
in. That is me loving God, with all my heart. So, there are rewards and challenges. The
challenge is against my
own flesh. The reward of course, the reward, of course, is
when I do bring God in, then he is able to
do that which I cannot do, that which I do not don't know how to do,
that which
I can't do. So, that's the rewards and the challenges. Thank God that
He is
able to do more than I am, because, I have seen how I can fail. Now, we've mentioned the challenge in the
reward, we also have to
mention the consequences. There are consequences when we don't bring
God in.
There are consequences when we don't love God with all of our heart.
“What
about, what about, what about,” people might say, “you know, Brother
Parish, I
can't really love God with all my heart; I got too many things in my
heart, Brother
Parish. I can love Him—you know how I can love Him? I can love God with
the
part of my heart that feels good when things are going right. I can
love God
when things are going just fine, and then I can really appreciate God.
And, Brother
Parish, when everything is going fine, I can really love the Lord.” Part
2: Affliction Part number two is affliction. Did you know that
sometimes we have
to receive affliction? Because, affliction provides us direction. Did
you know
that there is a message, a meaning in affliction? Did you know that
sometimes
we can receive answers, and direction through persecution, affliction.
We can
even receive it in depression. We can receive answers, and we can
receive
wisdom through affliction. You know that some of us actually have to
thank
people who are responsible for the affliction that is been brought on
us?
Nobody in the flesh likes, likes affliction. But affliction has a
purpose. From
the book of Psalms, chapter one nineteen, and verse number seventy-one,
David said: Psalm
119:71 It is
good for me that I have been afflicted; [Why? Why?] that I might
learn thy statutes. Now the definition of ‘affliction’ is: to be
made low, to oppress,
to be bowed down, even to be humbled. So, we see that affliction is
nothing
more than a vehicle for humility. When you get affliction you have to
know that
the end of this is going to be you learn how to be humble. So,
sometimes,
sometimes when we can't find humility, God has to provide it for us
through a
vehicle of affliction. “I don't want to be humble, no, I want to be me.
I got
sick. I'm laid up. I wish I was feeling better. I wish I was stronger.
Oh, man,
I ain't got enough money. People is all attacking at me. They're all
mad with
me.” Affliction is a vehicle for humility, because, when we get
humbled, then we
begin to ask God, “Why? What is going on, Lord?” Yes, it is a vehicle
for
instruction. A vehicle for instruction. So, we can't get mad at it. We
can't
get mad when it happens. If we get mad, then we have taken God
completely out
of the picture. If we have God in the picture, we have to ask the
question, “God,
why?” and then we can say, “Turn around,” like David, said, “Well, it
was good
for me, that I was afflicted, you know? Because, then I learned some
more ways
of God.” And, there are other people, still talking about consequences,
there
are other people who say I can't love God with all my heart, at least,
not
right now.” And, what has happened—the Scripture we’re going to go to
in the
Book of Psalms, one thirty-seven—they say, “I can't go to Him right
now,” and
they found out that they had found a bunch of willow trees. If Brother
Greg
would come, from the Book of Psalms, chapter one thirty-seven, we're
going to
start at verse one, and we're going to read down through I think it's
verse
seven—six: Psalm
137:1-6 By the
rivers of Babylon, there we sat down, yea, we wept, when we remembered
Zion. We
hanged our harps upon the willows in the midst thereof. For there they
that
carried us away captive required of us a song; and they that wasted us
required
of us mirth, saying, Sing us one of the songs of Zion. How shall we
sing the
Lord’s song in a strange land? If I forget thee, O Jerusalem, let my
right hand
forget her cunning. If I do not remember thee, let my tongue cleave to
the roof
of my mouth; if I prefer not Jerusalem above my chief joy. Thank you, Brother Greg. By the Rivers of
Babylon, we sat down, we
wept, yea, when we remembered Zion. We hanged our harps upon the willow
trees.
Now, a harp is a musical instrument that is used for melodic sounds.
It's a
soothing way, just to usher forth a praise. But, this group of people,
from the
children of Israel, they said that, “We have to hang our harps on the
willow
trees.” And, they said, “How can we sing a song in a Strange Land
because,
because there were people who carried them away captive, they were
captive to
something. “How can we praise God when something has me tied all up?
How can I
worship God when I’m behind? I can I worship God when things are
oppressing me?
How can I praise God when I'm going through something? They that led us
away
captive required of us a song.” I've got a quick sidebar, I've got to say about
this one: this
verse, verse three: For they that carried us away captive required of
us a
song. They that wasted us required of us mirth. “Sing to us one of
those songs
of Zion. Sing us one of those songs that you would sing that would
bless God.
But, you're not going to get out of captivity, we just want to you to
sing it for
entertainment. We want that feeling, we don't want your God. We just
want that
feeling.” This last Christmas, there was a commercial on.
And this
commercial, it had—I didn't even realize, I didn't realize what it was
at
first, it was a Google Chromebook, one of those computers—but the
background
music was a Gospel song, but they muddled the words. They muddled the
words,
because they wanted, they just wanted to pull out the enthusiasm, and
the
excitement of God's people, without God. They muddled the words; you
couldn't
hear the word Jesus, the song, actually, was, “Jesus Can Work It Out If
You Let
Him.” And they muddled, they muddled the words. And it, if you listen,
if you
watch the commercial, it’s all about—the computer itself is doing a
little jig.
It's folding to show all its features. We don't want your Jesus, we
just want
that enthusiasm and excitement. Get people all riled up so they'll
spend their
money, and buy the product. And, they ain't the only ones. They ain't
the only
ones, there's been—there was a Super Bowl a couple years ago, I don't
know if
anybody remembers this one, but it had CeeLo Green and Madonna on it. I
don't
even remember who was playing, all I remember is it was the halftime
show, Cee
Lo Green and Madonna, I don't even know CeeLo Green is, but, their
thought was,
they brought in a Gospel choir, in robes and everything, and I thought,
“Are
they going to turn this into a praise and worship?” No! They wanted
that
excitement of God's people, but, leave that God alone. We want you to
be our
backup singers for our crazy songs. And, they ain't the only ones. You
look at—Michael
Jackson has done it, Foreigner’s done it, there has been many other
groups that
have done it. They just want to just suck the sinu, and the energy, and
the
spirit—even at Christmas time. I know, don't get me started. But, even
at
Christmas time, they don't talk about the glory of God, they talk about
the
Christmas spirit. Don't that just kind of get up under your grill? Make
you want
to fire off an E-mail? They don't care. They want to talk about, they
want your
spirit. And they ain't the only ones. Did you know, there's big
churches, they
pop up, tens and thousands of people in some of these big
congregations, and they
call it a humanistic church. A humanistic church. And, what happens in
a
humanistic church, is, they have a congregation of people, and they
have songs,
and they'll have somebody get up there and say some words, and they
want to
have a happy feeling. But they don't want to have anything to do with
God at
all. And, they say, “Why should those religious people, those Christian
people,
why should they have all the good stuff?” it's true. I was shocked when
I saw
it. You should be—if you're not there for worship, why even get
together? Have
a game, do whatever you want to do, why I have a cathedral, like tens
of
thousands of people, and they were all hugging, and slapping hands?
And, I
don’t know, who would you pray to, if you don't worship God? I don't
know. But,
they just want to suck, they want to hold Christ captive, they want to
hold the
great things of God captive. But, yeah, go ahead and make us feel good,
just
take Christ out of this message. We have to be aware—that was just a sidebar—we
have to be aware.
But, going back to what they said: we had to hang our harps up on the
willow
trees. Some of us have had to go through things— and we know this to be
true—and
we have found ourselves—and some of us more than once—hanging our harps
on the
willow trees. “I, I would be in a praise mood, but I'm mad! I would be
in a
praise mood, but I'm disappointed; I didn't get what I wanted. I would
worship
God, but, God, things didn't turn out like I asked You to give me. I
would, but
I had to hang my harp up on the willow tree. How can I use, how can I
use my
gifts of God, in this church? In my house? On my job? In my car? How
can I sing
praises to Him, How can I carry that song in my heart, around my life?
It's
about to make it go away.” We've hung our Harps, some of us, have hung
our
harps up on our willow trees, and we've allowed the fowls of the air to
come
and grab the seeds that God would have in our lives, and allow some to
fall by
the wayside, and some on the stony ground where thorns would come and
try to
choke it out. Yeah, there is a message, today. I hope the sermon goes
well, but
the message is what we have to hear, today. And the message is, get
your harps
down off those willow trees. The message is, get violent for the Lord.
The
Bible says in the Book of Matthew, chapter eleven, and verse number
twelve: Matthew
11:12 And from the days of John
the Baptist until now the kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the
violent
take it by force. It doesn't mean that you grab a baseball bat or
a knife, and you
go around and get ready to make some bloody thing, but this means that
you push
yourself into it, that you make yourself available, that you make sure
that it just
doesn't pass you on by. You do something, when something is going to be
taken
away from you. You know who God is looking for? The Bible says
that God is a
spirit, and they that worship Him must worship Him in spirit and in
truth (John
4:24). God ain’t looking for people to lay down; God is looking for
people who
say, “Lord, I'm wanting to, I'm willing to. You help me, and we will,
I'll go.
You send me, and I'll go forth in Your name. God, You are God, I am
Your
servant, You are the Potter, I am the clay, I will go where You tell me
to go.”
That's who God's looking for. The true worshippers. Because, if you
worship Him
in truth, the Bible says He inhabits our praises, the praises of
Israel. Part
4: The
Jonah's So, we talked about the people that, that—we
talked about
challenges. We talked about the people who—we talked about the people
who would
give, if things was all right, and the people who would love the Lord
with all
their heart, if everything was crystal clear, and the people who would,
if they
weren't, you know, in captivity. You know they're holding us captive.
And then
there's This last group of people we're going to talk about: the
Jonah’s, and
they are the people who are running from God., running from God. And,
you know
what? I'll tell you, I see them everywhere. I see them at work. I see
them at
the store. I see them in my family. And, I see them in church. And,
truth be
told, we've all got a little Jonah in us. Truth be told, we've all got
some
Jonah in us. If we were to just literally tell the truth, and, this is
why, this
is why we have to be violent. Running from our blessings, running from
the
call, running from the things that God wants you to do, that God has
for us.
This is why we have to be violent. We have to be able to turn around
and say, “Devil,
you've done kept me from what I've been needing to have, what God has
had for
me. It is time for me to get flat-out violent. It is time for me to say
no
more! Devil, you might have had me on the ropes for a while, but your
time is
up! From now on, anytime you try and take anything from me, you've got
a fight
on your path, and my God is bigger than anything that you bring up.
Anything.”
So, did you know that we have to press our way to the blessing? The
victory is
already assured, but we have to do our part and pressing our way in,
yes. You know, there ain't going to be nobody—you've
got to press your
way to get into Heaven. There ain't nobody going to be in Heaven that's
surprised to be there. There ain't nobody going to be saying, “Hey, you
know
what? I don't know how I got here. I was just walking down the street.
Ha! I
can't believe I'm in Heaven. Imagine that.” That ain't going to exist.
The
people who are going to be going to Heaven, want to go to Heaven. The
people
who are going to go to Heaven are making up their minds that they're
going to
go to Heaven. There's going to be no surprises. You might be amazed,
you might
be taken aback, you might be overwhelmed but, somewhere along the line,
you
said, “Jesus is Lord of this life, right here.” That is going to be—so
we have
to get violent, we have to get violent against the devil. We have to
get
violent in our prayers. Violent means you’re pressing your way. We have
to get
violent in our prayers. We have to get violent in our fellowship, and
claim a
blessing of God when we Fellowship. We have to! We have to we have to
get
violent in our worship. And not just, “Anything we just have, blah,
blah…” No! There
is a blessing in our praises, and in our worship. We have to snatch it,
we have
to take it. Because it is part of the kingdom of God that God has
provided for
us. We have to get violent and take every harp that we have hung up.
Yeah, I'm
one of the number. I'm one of the number. There are trees that I have
hung
several different harps on. And God deals with me, and said, “Okay, go
get it,
go get it and bring it back to Me. Sing Me a song of thank You’s. Sing
me a
song of praise. Yeah, I built that relationship back with your dad that
was
torn up for over thirty years, I did that. You bring that harp back and
sing me
a song. Yeah, I did this for you. You had asthma for almost forty
years, I
healed you in the altar. Not a nickel breaker, but I healed you! You go
get
that harp back, and you bring me my praise.” Every time God is doing
something
for us, He says, “You get that harp off of that willow tree, and you
bring it
back and you sing Me My praise. And let Me inhabit and bless you.” So,
we do.
We have some worshippers here today. The Word is, the message is, take
back
your harp and worship God. We have some evangelists in the house today.
The Word
is, take back your harp and proclaim His Word every place you go. We
have some
peace givers in the house, and we have some prayer warriors in the
house today,
take back your harp, and bring peace into situations. And pray, because
now is
the time for prayer. Take back your talents and your gifts, and tell
the devil,
“No! I can use this for God. I'm not going to listen to your excuses no
more!”
Tell the devil he can't have your family. Tell him he can't have your
job. Tell
him he can't have the covering that God promised over your life. Tell
him no! God
ain’t looking for a crowd today, He's just looking for us. He's just
looking
for us. It is time, Saints, it is time to begin to pray the prayer of
faith.
The time has come to not be afraid. The time has come for some of us to
dust
off our Bibles. Yeah, get the lotion up on our knees, and say, okay,
callous
time, all over again. The time has come to reach out to people that we
know,
brother Hector. I’ve already, I’ve already—God dealt with me about
claiming
some Souls. I claim triple digits that I'm going to share with and see
saved in
2018. I claimed it. I don't know how, I know I have claimed it. God
open my
eyes, God, open my heart. God, take me every place You want me to go.
Throw me
out there; when I get rebellious, throw me out there. Let me be
afflicted, so I
can learn it and then, let me do Your will. Yes, yes, yes. So, it's okay to be afraid of God in Some
things. And, you know
what, we wouldn't be in bad company, if we got afraid in God. Moses got
afraid,
when he said, “I exceedingly quake and fear.” The Bible says it is a
fearful
thing to fall into the hands of the Living God (Hebrews 10:31). You
know what
the answer to that is? Fall into His hands, anyway. Part
5: We
Have Nothing Left to Wait For You know, it's okay to approach God, not knowing
what the answer
is going to be. It's okay to approach Him, and come to Him, and begin
to look
to Him, not knowing which way he's going to lead, and say,
“Nevertheless, not
my will, but Thy will.” It's okay to be hesitant and keep coming. It's
okay to
be a little concerned. It's okay, but it's not okay to say no. It is
not okay
to say no. We have nothing left to wait for, so the question becomes,
what are
we, what would we, what could we be waiting for? That is stopping the
blessings
of God, stopping us from receiving the blessings of God? The lame man,
he
waited for the waters to be troubled. The waters have already been
troubled.
The blind man, he waited for the Lord to make clay out of spittle. He
has
already made clay out of spittle. The woman at the well waited for an
answer, and
she said, I am waiting for Messias to come. Messias has already come.
And He's brought
the answers. Lazarus waited for Him to call his name. And He is calling
everybody's name. The Word is, what, what, what would keep us would
keep us
from coming and receiving the blessings of God? There's nothing that's
keeping
us from receiving the blessings, but us ourselves. Book of Romans, chapter eight, and I will close
after the Scripture. Romans
8:35-39
Who
shall separate us from the love of Christ? shall tribulation, or
distress, or
persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? As it is
written, For
thy sake we are killed all the day long; we are accounted as sheep for
the
slaughter. Nay, in all these things we are more than conquerors through
him
that loved us. For I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor
angels,
nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come,
Nor
height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us
from
the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord. We've had altar calls all last month. We had
altar calls even last
week. We've had altar calls for people who were sick. We've had altar
calls for
financial issues. We've had altar calls for couples. We've had altar
calls for
anything that you might want to bring before the Lord, but, today,
we're going
to have an altar call that's a little different. And, when Andy comes,
he'll
wrap up, and they'll be a dismissal, and we're going to have an altar
call that's
going to be a little bit different, today. Today, we're going to have
an altar
call for those of you who know that your calling is not complete; that
you're
still waiting, or even wrestling with that calling that God would have
for you.
We having an altar call, today, specifically for your calling in the
Lord. I
don't know what it is. But you and the Lord do. Maybe, it's not
completely
clear yet. That's the time to have prayer. Maybe, it hasn't come to
full
fruition yet. Maybe you don't feel worthy. Maybe you don't feel strong
enough.
That's a time that we have prayer. Amen.
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