“Your Relationship in God” By Bob Heirtzler May 5th,
2013
This month’s theme is, ‘Building
Ministry.’ I want
to take the
opportunity to share something real quick:
About four or five weeks ago I shared about baptism. Does anybody remember who
I said shared with
me? that’s right, Jim Ottoson, and here’s Jim Ottoson, here today. We’re talking about
building ministry, and I
remember coming across the street from the United States Navy Base; all
there
was, was North Chicago. There
wasn’t any
Norfolk, San Diego, Washington, Haiti, Sri Lanka… the list goes on and
on. When I came
that day, it was just here, with
a dream of spreading the Gospel around the world.
Truly, they were building a ministry. I am thankful to Jim
Ottoson for sharing the
Gospel with me that day. I
consider it
honor just to have you in the same room with me.
He shared with me baptism in Jesus’ name, and
I have never been the same. If
you ask
him, I was a knucklehead, I was stubborn.
He had to pull me aside, and, not physically pull my
ear, but, spiritual
yank my ear, and give a swift kick in my butt a couple of times (not
really, but
in the Spirit of God). That’s
why I’m
where I am today. Now, the subject of the month is ‘Building Ministry.’ When Parrish put this together we were talking about building your relationship in God. I posted this on Facebook, of course, I asked the question, “What does building your relationship in God mean to you?” Here are some of the responses I got:
 Jim
Martin shared: “One
of the greatest
things that will ever contribute to your life is your relationship with
Jesus
Christ. There is
nothing greater that
you will ever endure, ever experience, ever achieve in your life; there
is no
greater height, pleasure, or passion that you will ever accomplish. Through Him, we are more
than
conquerors. He died
for my sins. That
relationship will last a lifetime, and
for all eternity.” He
didn’t get a
chance to type it in, so I said I’d give him two minutes.
I like how Parrish said, “Building
Your Relationship IN God.” Not on God, next to God,
not on top of God, but
in God. I like that we’re in this
room. We’re not in
the hallway, we’re
not on top of the roof, but we’re in this room.
I’m trying to draw a picture here that we’re in God. How we in God is baptism
in Jesus name.
Then I was moving things around, and
the first message I prepared, God said no.
The second message I prepared, God said no again.
Out there, there are relationship
killers. You’re
going to be amazed at
the list; I saw a survey about relationship killers, and things that
will kill
your relationship. I
thought about this,
how I could use this, vise-versa, to talk about ways to have a stronger
relationship
with God. Here are
the seven big
relationship killers: 
And #
7–Adultery Relationship
Killers: 1.
Insecurity
The
first thing on the list is insecurity.
Unexpected bills, the job market, life has a shaky
foundation—alcohol or
a drug problem, pretending to be okay…
How many people say they’re okay, and you know
there’s something going
on? They won’t
share, but, you know that
you’ve got to pray for them. Afraid
to
ask for help; how many people do you know that are afraid to ask for
help? Your
religious belief keeps changing; you
remind me of that white bag that gets traveled all over the yard and
across the
street, it’s like your religion changes as the wind blows, the way that
garbage
bag gets blown around.
There
are a lot of people that are hitting the doorframe, and not getting
through the
door. They
get right up to it, but
their just afraid to commit. Family,
we’re building our house upon the Rock.
Some of us just went through this.
A couple of weeks ago, eight inches of rain came
down; there was a lot
of flooded property. There
was a lot of
flooded things out here; they say it was the worst in many years. If our lives are on the
Rock (and that Rock
is Christ) then we shall weather the storms.
You might not feel like it, and you might not know
what’s going to
happen, like Peter. He
said to Jesus, if
I can come out, let me come out. What
did Jesus say? okay, come out. He
walked
out on the water. As
soon as he took his
eyes off of Jesus, he immediately sank; the law of gravity took over,
right? Then he
cried out to Jesus and said, help me,
and immediately Jesus was there to help him out.
We’re going to go through storms in life that
are going to make us grow in God, we’ll go through battles that will
cause our
faith to grow stronger in God, but we’re building a relationship in God. We’re going to be tested
and tried like
gold. That’s
nothing strange that
happens to us (1 Peter 4:12). Anybody
ever build a sand castle? You
go down to the beach, and you build a
sand castle; was it there the nest day? no.
Why? the tide came in and washed it away. Was the dock still there? Was the pier still there? But not the sand castle,
right? Make sense? 2.
Trust
Issues The
number two thing, they said, was trust issues.
Someone you believed in failed, they didn’t come
through. Life is
beating you up really bad. You’re
afraid to reach out to people. Allowing
yourself to think, “I can do this on
my own.” How long
does that last? Proverbs 3:5 …and lean not
unto thine
own understanding.
I like the word, ‘in.’
The word ‘and’ is like a plus sign.
He’s telling us not to lean unto our own
understanding. Let’s
go back to the first
part: “Trust in the
Lord with all thine
heart.” That’s a
challenge, but, once
you do it, then you realize that God answers prayers, and things start
flowing.
Another reason, I think,
that God put, “…lean not unto thine own understanding…” there is, for
me
personally, sometimes I think, “I got this,”
and then realize I don’t.
“Okay,
God, I prayed, and I gave it to you, but, let me take it back.” I’m guilty.
I don’t think I’m the only one, but I’m guilty. Isaiah
26:4
Trust
ye in the LORD for ever…
God is giving us everlasting
strength. Make
sense? Another
thing about trust issues is: Matthew
11:28–30
For my yoke is
easy, and my burden is light.
Jesus said, “Come unto Me, and I
will give you rest.” Even
in the midst
of storms, I’ve found peace. In
the
midst of the battles, you can find peace if you just stop, pause, raise
your
hands to God and say, “God, get me through this.”
Such a peaceful Spirit comes over us; the
Spirit of God moves over us. All
of the
sudden, we get this grit in our craw and you just stand. “Okay, God, You got this;
I’m giving it to
you.” Satan
flees from that. Satan
would like to get us chasing our own
tail like a dog chases his, in circles over and over again. 3.
FaceBook Can
you believe that; “FaceBook” is
considered a relationship killer!
I
can’t believe what my own personal family post on their pages. They share everything! They don’t realize that
everybody’s reading
it. Then they get
mad when they get
judged by my family. But
they put it on
there. They get all
upset. Also, they
can’t wait to take a picture of
something that happens so they can post it, and gossip about it. They get joy out of that. The only thing that came
to my mind here is,
you’re going to reap what you sow!
You
put somebody else’s business out there, God might put your business out
there;
let everybody know. Galatians
6:1–10
…whatsoever
a man soweth, that
shall he also reap…
If ye see a brother or a sister
overtaken in a fault, ye which are spiritual, please post it on
FaceBook right
away. I don’t think
so Tim. Because
that temptation—you have to restore
that person, or you’re going to be tempted also.
You’ve got to restore that brother or sister
that comes to you asking for prayer.
We
don’t even need to know what it is.
You
just have that prayer; let God deal with it.
It ain’t none of our business.
We
understand that if you plant corn, you're going to get corn. If you plant tomatoes,
you’re going to get
tomatoes. If you
plant apple trees, you
are going to get apple trees. If
you
plant hatred, you’re going to get hatred. If
you plant love, you’re going to get love. If
you plant, we’re going to reap what we
sew. God told us
that we need the fruits
of the Spirit in our lives. Make
sense? We’ve got to
stay away from
everything else. Don't
give up. Jim
Ottoson told me that so many times, “Don't give up.” I’ve
told him, too, “Don't give up.” I
need you.
You know?
Paul was sharing to us that we have
to do good unto all, especially they of the household of faith. You have to do good to
your natural and your
spiritual family, right? 4.
Jealousy On
the list, I wrote down, “Mad because
someone else has it better. Desire
something that does not belong to you.
If you can’t have it, they can’t have it. I can do a better job of
it than that; why do
they always pick him to do that?”
I
didn’t ask to be one of the preachers.
I
didn’t say, “Pick me! Pick me! Pick me!”
No, I was asked to be up here, by Pastor Paine. I was trying to stay away
from it. I prayed
about it, and I said, “Pick
Jesse.” We that
have been around, we
have had a lot of different leaders up here.
The right thing to do is to support them. That’s the right thing to
do. These guys have
been given the
responsibility; you need to support them.
Don’t try to figure out a way to get them fired. We need to support them
and pray for
them. Why did God
pass you? I don’t
know, ask Him. Maybe
next time. Maybe
God’s got something for you somewhere
else; I don’t know. When
Brother Ken
stepped down, and Brother Andy and Brother Parrish were picked to be
the new
fellowship leaders, I committed to supporting them just as much as I
supported
Brother Ken, just as much as I supported Pastor Wilson, and Pastor
Saniatan,
and every other leader all the way back to day number one, Pastor Davis. Anybody in that leadership
position, I don’t
want to touch it.
There’s
a story—it’s not in my notes, but I’ll share it right quick—King Saul
took his
own life because he didn’t want the enemy to take his life. Some young guy ran to
David and said, “Hey, I
wiped out Saul for you. He’s
taken care
of.” King David
said, “You touched the
Lord’s anointed?” What
happened? The guy
got killed. David
said, on the spot, “Your blood be on
your head; you confessed with your mouth.”
Me, I respect the leaders of the church, because I
don’t want to touch
it, at all. God put
them there. It’s
not my business. Make
sense?
That was for free; thank you very much.
Back
to jealousy. Exodus
34:14–17
the LORD, whose
name is Jealous, is a jealous God... He’s
telling us not to worship anything else but Him.
What is Satan’s job? get us to worship
somebody else besides Jesus. It
could be
a person; it could be a place; it could be a thing.
Anything that can separate us from God. If Parrish Lee came in
every day—I’m going to
pick on him cause he’s in the front row—no, I’m not, he’s got the
anointing;
I’m going to leave him alone. If
Jason
came in every day, and all he talks about is an F-150; every day he
talks about
an F-150. What do
you think his god
would be, eventually, if he allowed it?
The F-150. You
see what I’m
saying? We have to
be careful about
idolatry. We’ve got
to be careful about
serving other gods besides Jesus.
We’ve
got to stay far away from that. Make
sense, church? 2 Corinthians 11:1-4 …so
your minds should be
corrupted… Paul
shared the Gospel of Christ, and we listen to our Father’s text. The Gospel teaches us that
we need to be pure
before God in the Day of Judgment.
I’d
rather have my sins before me, to take care of them, than to drag
something
behind me from ten years ago that didn’t get fixed.
Get things right with God as they come
up. I don’t have
to—anybody here never
made any mistakes? We
need to take care of our newborns in Christ.
Satan’s trying to get them on a whirly-wind
believing everything that’s
going by. Those of
us who are up there
solid should be sharing with those people, working with those people,
so that
they won’t fall. We
need to encourage
them. When you
first got saved, you made
mistakes, right, or am I the only one?
Somebody helped us up and encouraged us; same thing. We’ve got to work with
them and teach
them. Also, have a
jealousy about you
that you love God, and you don’t want nobody messing with our family. 5.
Lack of
Communication Number
5 was
lack of communication. Lack
of
communication is a relationship killer.
Some people have poor communication skills. They’re telling the wrong
people. If I’ve got
something against Jimmie Martin,
I shouldn’t be telling Parrish Lee about it.
If I have something against Sonia, I shouldn’t tell
Malcolm about it.
If I have something against Mark Lanier, I
shouldn’t tell Brent about it. Who
should I go to? that individual, right?
It says to communicate, it doesn’t say put it on
FaceBook. You’re
not asking questions to get the
truth. Story: I was in the stock room
one time, and we had
a bunch of stuff from Germany. I
could
not pronounce those words; those words were terrible, fifty-two letters
long. I’m checking
the stuff—I have to pronounce
them to the driver so that he can check them off.
Somebody on the other side of the wall
thought I was cussing and swearing.
Our
supervisor said, “Bob doesn’t swear, he’s probably checking in that
German
stuff.” It’s a good
thing I had that
testimony, because we can’t let our good be evil spoken of. Another story: There was a Walgreen’s
drugstore and a liquor
store side by side on Sunset Avenue and I had to pick up some stuff
from
Walgreen’s. At the
time, I was the
superintendent of the Children’s Church here.
There’s no parking spot in front of Walgreen’s; the
only parking spot
was in front of the liquor store.
Guess
what I did? I went
into Walgreen’s, got
my stuff in a brown paper bag. A
vanload
of kids came by and saw me walking with a bag in my hand. They didn’t see me walk
out of Walgreen’s,
they just saw me in front of the liquor store with a brown paper bag
getting
into my car. Guess
what I do now? I
don’t park in front of the liquor store.
I stay away from it.
I don’t want
my good evil spoken of. You’ve
got to be
careful of what you do. There’s
a lack
of communication there, huh?
When
I came out of that tank, I didn’t cuss no more, I didn’t swear no more,
I
didn’t tell bad jokes no more… My
whole
life changed when I got baptized.
I put
off the old man; I put on the Spirit of God.
When we get baptized, we still make mistakes—I do—I
ask God to forgive
me. Not one of
those, “Oh God, forgive
me” prayers. No, if
I messed up, I want
to make sure that I hear, “You’re forgiven.”
No corrupt communication.
So, if
we’re having fellowship at “It’s All Good” and we’re sitting at the
table and
we’re gossiping about somebody, that’s not fellowship.
That’s a gossip-fest.
So-and-so did this, so-and-so did that… When we get together at
“It’s All Good”
coffee shop, we want to talk about the Word of God.
One person, Bianca, said, “I come here
because, sometimes, I just need to vent.”
That’s a good thing; she gets it off her mind. She talks to some of the
sisters there, and
they pray, and talk it out. Sometimes
we
need that human being to talk to.
You
can take things to God in prayer, but, sometimes you just need a human
to talk
to that’s not going to judge you, that’s not going to post it on
FaceBook. Lack of
communication is a relationship
killer. We have to
communicate. If
you’re not going to be here and you’re an
usher or you work with the ministry, give Andy or Parrish a call, let
them know
that you’re not going to be here.
If
you’re Sunday School teacher, let them know, “Hey, I’m not going to be
there.” It’s good
to communicate. When
God puts you in that position, you’ll
appreciate it when people communicate with you.
6.
Assumptions assumption [əˈsʌmpʃən] n 1. the act of taking something for granted or something that is taken for granted 2. an assuming of power or possession of something 3. arrogance; presumption 4. (Philosophy
/ Logic) Logic a
statement that is used as
the premise of a particular argument but may not be otherwise accepted
Compare axiom [4] [from
Latin assūmptiō a
taking up, from assūmere to assume] assumptive adj assumptively adv
The
truth shall make you free. The
truth;
the Word of God; not some fairy tale, not someone’s philosophy, the
Word of
God… The other
Scripture is in 2
Timothy. How do you
know the truth? How
can you tell what the truth is? 2
Timothy 2:14-16
shun profane and vain
babblings...
We
need to study the Word of God if we’re going to prove ourselves, and to
avoid
vain babblings. I’m
amazed at how many
people grab the newspaper and look at their horoscope and see how the
day is
going to be. I
already know how my day
is going to be; I wake up in the morning and I know God’s going to
bless me. I don’t
know what trials I’m going to go
through today, but I know God’s going to deal with them today. There’s people reading
their horoscope
saying, “Oh, there’s going to be something special in my life today. Maybe I’m going to get a
new car.” And then
it’s same-old-same-old. Why
would you put your faith in that?
When we have our faith in God, God will give
us our needs. Maybe
not our wants… Like
our parents gave us vegetables; we
didn’t want them, but we needed them.
God is going to give us our needs and not our wants. 7.
Adultery Number
7—and I
really thought this would be number 1—adultery.
This is the worst relationship killer of them all. We understand that’s when
a married man
spends time with another woman, or a married woman is spending time
with
another man. I’m
not going to get into
that. This is an
UGLY relationship
breaker. This has
afflicted my personal
family so much. The
Scripture that came
to my mind was: 2
Samuel
11:1-12:13 …Thou
art the man… King
David
stayed home that day , saw a woman taking a bath, brought her over to
his
house, did some things, he committed sin, he tried to cover it… He brought the husband
back to spend time
with her, but he slept on the front steps.
He said my brothers are out there in the battle; I
can’t go in there and
do homework. He
sent the husband back
out to the battle, caused the line to retreat and had the man killed. Then he went and got the
girl. What I’m
sharing here is, if you keep
reading, Nathan the prophet said, “I’ve got a story I want to share
with
you: There was a
rich man and a poor
man, and the rich man had everything he wanted.
He had cattle and servants and everything, but the
poor man had just one
lamb. The rich man
took away that one
sheep.” David said,
“I’ll slaughter
him!” Nathan said,
“Thou art the man.” He
immediately knew that he had sinned
against God. Why I
want to share that is
sometimes we go down the wrong road, sometimes we think that we’re too
far down
the road that we can’t come back.
We can
come back. There’s
not one Scripture
that says we can’t come back. The
Word
of God tells us this: We
have to confess
our sins before God. Not
some guy
sitting on the other side, you’ve got to let God know.
King David shared with this prayer:
Psalms
51:10-13
Create in me a clean
heart… Create
in me a
clean heart; renew a right spirit within me.
I’m angry today, God, I can’t walk in like this. I need to change this,
now, God, because I
might snap and say something I shouldn’t say.
Create a right spirit in me, God, so that if I walk
up and tell this
brother that offended me, or sister, that we won’t be angry and we can
talk it
out. God, I just
want to make sure that
I’m right before I go to that person.
I
don’t want to cause more damage. Does
that make sense, church? We
have to ask
God daily to create a new spirit in us.
I
shared that nothing stops us from going back to God, not mistakes that
were
made or wrong decisions. There’s
nothing
to stop us from coming back to God.
The Prodigal
Son came home. He
was willing to be a
servant, but the Father saw him coming home, and He ran to him, put a
ring on
his finger, put a coat on him, said, “This my son who was dead, is
alive again.” When
God sees you about to turn the corner to
ask for forgiveness, He is immediately there to comfort. He is immediately there to
answer your
prayers. He is
immediately there to
encourage you. Make
sense? Romans
8:35-39
…nor
any other creature, shall be able to separate us... We’re
conquerors. When
something comes against
us, nothing can stop us. We’re
like that
lighthouse that weathers the storm, taking a beating, but still shining
for
Jesus. It doesn’t
say should or would or
could, it says shall. The
only person that
can separate you from Him is yourself.
That’s it. We
can’t play
church.
I
am so thankful to be here today. Thank
you very much.
Sermon notes by Pete Shepherd |
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