"A New Walk Part IV" By Brother Parrish Lee January 25th,
2015
I
just want to give honor to those
who have gone before us; those who have gone before me.
I want to give honor to our founding pastor,
he and his family, for their work and labor.
I want to give honor to our pastor, for his work and
labor. I want to
give honor to all of y’all, who
show up, and present yourselves, and to a house, and ask God to fill,
and feed,
and answer according to His riches and glory.
And, most of all, I want to give honor to our King
of Kings, our Savior,
our Lover, our Master, our Maker, our Giver when no one else would
give, our
Provider when no one else provides, the Answer for all we have; give
honor to
the Lord Himself, God eternal. We
have already said that I don’t
have to preach a whole lot of long time today.
Amen! Thank
you all y’all that
shared. Amen. But, we know the Scripture
for the month is: John 5:11
He
answered them, He that made me whole, the
same said unto me, Take up thy bed, and walk. Of
course, our theme for the month
is “A New Walk.” A
new walk. John 5:1-13
After
this there was a feast of the Jews;
and Jesus went up to Jerusalem. Now there is at Jerusalem by the sheep
market a
pool, which is called in the Hebrew tongue Bethesda, having five
porches. In
these lay a great multitude of impotent folk, of blind, halt, withered,
waiting
for the moving of the water. For an angel went down at a certain season
into
the pool, and troubled the water: whosoever then first after the
troubling of the
water stepped in was made whole of whatsoever disease he had. And a
certain man
was there, which had an infirmity thirty and eight years. When Jesus
saw him
lie, and knew that he had been now a long time in that case, He saith
unto him,
Wilt thou be made whole?
The impotent man
answered Him, Sir, I have no man, when the water is troubled, to put me
into
the pool: but while I am coming, another steppeth down before me. Jesus
saith
unto him, Rise, take up thy
bed, and walk. And
immediately the man was made whole, and took up his bed, and walked:
and on the
same day was the Sabbath. The Jews therefore said unto him that was
cured, It
is the Sabbath day: it is not lawful for thee to carry thy bed. He
answered
them, He that made me whole, the same said unto me, Take up thy bed,
and walk.
Then asked they him, What man is that which said unto thee, Take up thy
bed,
and walk? And he that was healed wist not who it was: for Jesus had
conveyed Himself
away, a multitude being in that place. If
we could just bow our heads for
just a moment. Lord,
at this time, we
thank you for everything good you have provided for us.
God, the giver of all good and perfect gifts,
we thank You for the worship time that You provided for us, and we
thank You
for the words spoken from Your people, God, and how the new walk that
was given
to them was given to them from You, and the many, many, many, many,
many, many
things that they thank, and praise, and honor You for.
God, who but You could do all these
things? So, we
praise and thank You,
Lord, and we ask for a blessing on the reading of Your Word, as both
Your
message, Lord, that I, Your servant would be out of the way, and God,
truly
that which You would have would be done, and every word that’s spoken
would not
return to You void, but would do exactly what You sent it to do, to
accomplish
that to which it was sent. So,
we
present ourselves to You in the name of the Lord Jesus.
We do thank and claim, in Jesus’ name, and
everyone said, amen. Well,
like I said, I don’t have to
talk a whole lot of long time, today.
We
had, believe it or not, a lot of the message was given already, amen. But we do want to talk a
little bit about
this John chapter five. Now,
we talked
about a new walk, and we talked about how the man said, “The man that
made me
whole, the same said unto me, take up thy bed and walk,” and our first
message
this month was from the Book of Genesis, and it talked about Jacob. It talked about how he had
a brother, and
they didn’t get along. It
talked about
how they were going to have this big confrontation, and, on the eve of
having
the confrontation, he was caught with a man and they were wrestling in
the
middle of the night until the breaking of the day.
The man said, “Hey, you better let me go it’s
been a long time,” and Jacob said, “No, I won’t let you go until you
bless
me.” We get the
lesson that we, too, are
not to be deterred from seeking the blessing that God has for us. Not to let anything shake
us off, but to hold
on. After the
completion of that, his
walk was forever changed; everybody could see that that was a different
Jacob
after that experience. Our
next message was Brother Chris
Ulrich, and he talked his first point was about how the Lord wants us
to take
up His yoke, because His yoke is not grievous.
His yoke is a burden, but His yoke is light, Brother
Chris said. He
talked about how the Lord sends us with
that same yoke, with that same compassion, with that same work He has
for us;
He sends us with purpose. He
sends us
with purpose. Brother
Jesse shared, last week,
when he talked about joy, and he talked about how God has a history of
giving
you where He sends you. Wherever
he
sends you, He gives you that place.
He
also talked about how we need to have joy for our journey, and we need
to walk
in love. Brother
Jesse also mentioned
that we have to be careful because there are those who would punch
holes in our
joy bucket. And
how, in the presence of
the Lord is the fulness of joy, so, if you don’t have the fulness of
joy, you
need to get back into the presence of the Lord. So,
today, we’re talking from John
chapter five, and, like I said, we don’t have to cover everything,
because most
of it was covered, believe it or not.
But, from John chapter five, we see in verse number
three, our scenario
here is that there was a pool, but there was a great multitude of
people around
this pool. The
scenario was going to be
that whoever was the first in there, the first in that pool, they were
going to
be healed of whatever the disease was.
So, all they had to do was be the fastest, but, he
Bible says in verse
number three that there was a great multitude of impotent folk; they
were blind,
they were lame, they had withered parts and limbs, and they had all
sorts of
maladies. Their
answer to them was just
to get in the pool. Now
this actually
signifies something, that God ordains places where things would happen. So God ordains—He ordained
the pool—but He
also ordains places where worship would happen, and God would bless the
worship, and He also ordains places of knowledge, and He ordains places
of
healing. But, there
is a problem with
that system, if we could just mention that, there is a problem with the
system
of it being a place. Now,
if all they
had to do was seek this pool, then why would they have a need to seek
God? So, there is a
problem with this system. This
is—actually, I have a little
sidebar, here—this is really the reason why—you know, we have prayer
meetings,
like you mentioned, and we have worship times, and fellowship—but this
is the
reason why sometimes God might pour out His Spirit really big in a
prayer
meeting or in worship, or really a lot of knowledge in a certain study
or
whatever, and, other times, maybe, not so much.
Because, the problem is, we would have a tendency to
get attached to a
place, or a person, or a certain condition, or a certain regulation, or
a
certain way that we would do things, instead of getting attached to
God,
Himself, who is the Giver. We’ve
seen
people—if you’ve been around any length of time—we’ve seen people that,
they
may come and, like our brothers and sisters shared, they would come and
they
would get baptized again. They
would
say, “I’m getting re-baptized, re-committed.”
Okay, and I’ve seen them, a few people that, I
hadn’t seen them in a
long time, and they came, and they said, “I just came here to get
baptized;
that’s all. I don’t
need nobody to talk
to me. Just come
in, just dunk me in the
water, call it Jesus’ name, and let me get up,” because they remembered
what
happened the first time they got baptized.
They remembered the refreshing.
They remembered—it seemed like the windows of Heaven
were opened and all
types of possibilities were there.
We’ve
also seen people who said, “You know, if I could just speak in tongues
again. La-la-la-la-la. If I could just
la-la-la-la loosen my mouth
so that I could speak in tongues; that’s the answer!”
“I know what it is!
So, if I could get re-baptized,” or “If I
could speak in tongues,” and the problem with that is, you seek
baptism, and
not the God who gives it. When
you see
your tongue flying all around, and not the God who releases the
language in
your mouth. And,
you know what? God has
a problem with that. He
said, “I am the
Lord, that is My name, and My glory will I not give to another.”
(Isaiah 42:8) Not
only not another person, not another
tradition, not another regulation; nothing else will God allow His
glory to go
to. Not an angel,
not a place,
nothing—He alone is the Lord. So,
we go on to verse number
five. Now, it says
here that a certain
man was lame, and he had an infirmity; he had an infirmity, the Bible
says, for
thirty-eight years. That’s
a serious infirmity. Thirty-eight—not for two
years. If I was
sick for two years, I got a
problem. Not for
five years, not ten
long years, not fifteen years, not twenty years, not twenty-five years. A sister called me
yesterday—Sister Michelle,
she’s in the hospital; I’m going to be visiting her later—she called
and said,
“I’m celebrating my silver anniversary, twenty-five years!” Wow!
I
got to thinking, “Twenty-five years?
That means I had been at work for three years.” I have been at my place of
employment for
twenty-eight years. But,
this man’s
infirmity, as long as I think twenty-eight years was, to be working
where I’m
working—I’m thankful for a job, but having to deal with some of the
people, and
their ups and downs and craziness, amen!
Thirty-eight years!
You got that,
right? Thirty-eight years this man had this
infirmity. The
Bible goes on to say that
Jesus, when He saw him lie, He knew that he had been there for a long
time. He knew, the
Lord knew that he had
been with that infirmity for a long time.
Most of y’all already see where this is going. He had had this infirmity
for a long time,
and so, he Lord asked him a question:
“Wilt thou be
made whole?” We
notice that the Lord didn’t ask him, “Do
you want to be healed?” He
didn’t ask
him that; he asked, “Do you want to be whole?”
Now, this word, ‘whole,’ here, actually, I looked it
up, and, actually,
this word, ‘whole,’ not only means to be restored in your body, in your
physical body, but it also means to be complete in your spirit, to be
complete,
spiritually. This
word, ‘whole,’ means,
“Will you get to the place where you have the truth of God and need
nothing
else outside of that?” That’s
what this
means. And, you
know, it would be easy
to point a finger at him, because the man, he answered Him, and he
said, the
impotent man answered in verse number seven, “Sir, I have no man, when
the
water is troubled, to put me into the pool: but while I am coming,
another
steppeth down before me.” So,
when Jesus
asked him, “Would you be made whole?” the man answered and said, “Well,
let me
tell You about my problem. I
don’t
really have transportation, and, you know, I can’t get down there,
because
people are in the way. Ain’t
nobody
helping me. I feel
kind of all
alone. And, you
know, another thing,
people keep getting in the way; they pushed me out.
They don’t care if I get healed; they’re only
worried about themselves. Yes,
and You
know what else, Lord? I,
I, I, I,
I…” The problem is,
when the Lord asked
him, all he could see was the pool.
All
he could see there, as the Lord is asking.
All he could see, and who is asking him, anyway, but
the Lord
Himself? The real
answer was asking the
question. How often
does the answer come
along and ask you the question? Verse
number eight, and this is
really the key verse, “Jesus saith unto him, Rise, take
up thy bed, and walk.”
Rise, take
up thy bed, and walk. Rise,
take up thy
bed, and walk. And,
when the Lord told
him to rise, ‘rise’ means—yes, it means to rise, but it also means to
build, to
become erect. It
also means to
produce. It also
means to make. So,
the Lord told him to rise, and it means
to rise up, not only from sleep, but it also means to rise up from
death. Whatever the
malady is, release it, and you
come up. Then He
told him, “Take up thy bed;
take up thy bed.” Now,
to paint a real
fast picture, here, this bed that this guy has, is really a place of
comfort
for this guy. Well,
after all,
thirty-eight years, he couldn’t walk, he couldn’t do anything. If he couldn’t walk, he
had to sit down or
lay down. Of
course, after a while of
sitting, you’re going to be laying down.
If you’re going to be laying down, to be
comfortable, you need some sort
of comfortable matting; you need to have some sort of bed. So, this bed, to this man,
was a place of
comfort. If I’m
going to lay down and I
can’t have my bed, I’m not going to be comfortable.
So, he associated this bed with his comfort
level. Now, his bed
was made out of
straw, but, the truth of the matter is, we’ve had beds made out of so
many
things. Some of us
here have had beds
made out of drugs; if we couldn’t have our drugs, we couldn’t be
comfortable. Some
of us have had beds
made out of alcohol. “If
I can’t have my
alcohol, I can’t be comfortable. Don’t
give me nothing else; I know what I need.”
There’s all kinds of beds!
There’s beds made out of sex; oh, yes, there it is. There’s beds made out of
depression. There’s
beds made out of wealth; there’s beds
made out of slothfulness. There’s
beds
made out of sleep. “If
I can’t have
this, nothing else is going to substitute!
I’ve got to have the source of what’s holding me
back!” Because the
bed was actually what was keeping
him from walking. ‘I
want to be able to
see how to walk, but, my bed, I’ve got to have my bed.”
And the Lord said, “Rise up, and take your
bed.” In other
words, “That which had
power over you, I'm’ giving you the power to have over it. I am giving you the power,
right now,” the
Lord says, “Rise up, take your bed.
Don’t just leave it there by the pool.
Show everybody.
Let everybody
know what I’m doing for you. Take
this
walk that I am giving you, and let the world know.
Rise up!
Take your bed, and walk.
And
walk.” Now,
when He told him to walk,
‘walk’ means to make a way, or to make progress, have a purpose, have a
direction. Walk: “Go where I send you;
listen to My
direction.” Walk: “Go and produce, and use
the opportunities
that I give you.” Walk. And
the Bible says, in verse
number nine, “And immediately the man was made whole, and took up his
bed, and
walked: and on the same day was the Sabbath.”
On the same day was the Sabbath.
Now, right quick, the Sabbath Day, the Sabbath Day,
is, of course, the
Lord’s Day. Now,
this lame and
impoverished man was told to take up his bed and walk on the Sabbath
Day. There was a
law that you couldn’t do any
work. Now, here is
where the problem is
coming in: having
religion in the way of
God’s progress. They
associated, “Well,
if you’re taking up your bed and walking,” rather than seeing the
miraculous
thing that’s coming forth; they’re missing the whole will of God, here. When He said, take up your
bed and walk; show
the evidence. Show
the evidence of your
deliverance. He
didn’t tell him to go
out and preach a message. He
didn’t say
stand on the corner and shout. He
didn’t
say beat them over the head with your Bible.
He said, “Take up your bed and walk.
Every place you go, make sure people can see what
I’ve done in your
life. Let it be
known. As you walk
with that bed, they’re all going
to know, because they remember, they remember what you were before.
This is what’s going to make the difference. And
so the Jews therefore, in verse
number ten, “The Jews therefore said unto him that was cured, ‘It is
the
Sabbath day: it is not lawful for thee to carry thy bed.’” No matter what your malady
was, “Hey, you
know what? You
weren’t in your right
mind!” “You know
what? You were
addicted!” “You
know what? You
always had a problem; you had an angry
spirit!” But it’s
not lawful for you to
be healed. “You
know what? You seem
always depressed.” “Whatever
state you were in, I’d rather you
go back there, than have this glorious walk that you have now with the
Lord
Jesus Christ.” Yeah,
that’s what the
world will do; that’s what religion will do; it will confine you, but
the Lord
says, “Rise up, take up your bed and walk.” The
problem with that was, there
was a multitude around the pool, and they were all still seeking the
pool,
while Jesus was there. They
were all
looking for some other way, that they thought was right, while Jesus
was there
to deliver; that’s the problem. Our
next-to-the last Scripture,
and we’re going to be pretty quick about this, a Scripture that we love
to go
when we talk about encouragement: 1 Samuel 30:6 And David was
greatly distressed; for the people spake of stoning him, because the
soul of
all the people was grieved, every man for his sons and for his
daughters: but
David encouraged himself in the LORD his God. Now,
I’d like to speak a word to
anybody here that might feel left out at times.
Maybe you feel like, “Everybody else can get their
blessing, but I seem
to keep missing it! Why
does everybody
else want to talk about their great things, and what happens to them in
God? I need to have
some of those great
things myself!” If
anybody ever feels
like, “I’m still waiting for my touch.
I’m still waiting for my deliverance.
I’m waiting for the Lord to come by my way, and to
tell me to rise up,
take up thy bed and walk. That’s
what
I’m waiting on; I’m waiting for the Lord to come to me, personally.” The truth is, God’s
already there. He’s
already there, and he is there for
you. He is there
for every one of
us. Now, we just
have to make sure that
we don’t become like the multitude, who sat around the pool, and, as
Jesus was
there, sought something other than what the Lord Himself would provide. He was the answer. The
Bible says, David was greatly
distressed and he encouraged himself.
Have you ever had to do that?
I’m
about to close. Have
you ever had to
encourage yourself? I
mean, really.
You’ve got a wonderful wife, but she couldn’t do it
for you. And your
husband; you’ve got a great husband,
but he couldn’t do it for you. You’ve
got a nice family, but your family wasn’t giving you the encouragement
that you
needed to have. Your
job couldn’t do it. Your
car couldn’t do it. Your
house couldn’t do it. You
couldn’t get encouragement from anywhere but
from the Lord Himself. Have
you ever had
to encourage yourself? Well,
here is a
key; here is a key. “None
of those
things is helping me, and I need to encourage myself!”
Two things we need to do on that one: We need to remember and
claim, we need to
remember and claim, “God, I remember what you have done for me, before. I remember that You’ve
been good to me
before, and, God, I am claiming every one of Your blessings that You
have given
to me all my life.” Remember
and
claim. Remember and
claim. And,
last Scripture: Matthew 11:28-30
Come
unto
me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.
Take my
yoke upon you, and learn of me; for I am meek and lowly in heart: and
ye shall
find rest unto your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.
Can we give the Lord a
praise?
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