We're going to sing a little as much when God's in it, page 397, a little as much when
God's in it.
In the harvest fields not rhymed in, there's a work for all to do.
Hark, the voice of God is calling to the harvest calling you.
Little is much when God is in it, labor not for wealth or fame.
There's a crown that you can win if you'll go in Jesus' name.
Cause the place you're called to labor seems so small and little known.
It is great if God is in it and he'll not forget his own.
Little is much when God is in it, labor not for wealth or fame.
There's a crown that you can win if you'll go in Jesus' name.
Are you laid aside from service, body worn from toil and care?
You can still be in the battle, in the sacred place of prayer.
Little is much when God is in it, labor not for wealth or fame.
There's a crown that you can win if you'll go in Jesus' name.
When the conflict here is ended and our race on earth is run,
he will say to all the faithful, welcome home, my child well done.
Little is much when God is in it, labor not for wealth or fame.
There's a crown that you can win if you'll go in Jesus' name.
Amen.
We can throw out the lifeline, page 370.
Throw out the lifeline.
On the first.
Throw out the lifeline across the dark way.
There is a brother whom someone should save.
Somebody's brother of whom they will dare
to throw out the lifeline in peril to share.
Throw out the lifeline.
Someone is drifting away.
Throw out the lifeline.
Someone is speaking today.
Throw out the lifeline with hand quick and strong.
Why do you dare me?
Why linger so long?
See, he is sinking.
Oh, hasten today.
And I'll wave the lifeboat away then away.
Throw out the lifeline.
Someone is drifting away.
Throw out the lifeline.
Someone is sinking today.
Throw out the lifeline to danger, frogman.
Sinking, relinquish where you've never been.
Winds of temptation and billows of foam will soon
hurl them out where the dark waters flow.
Throw out the lifeline.
Someone is drifting away.
Throw out the lifeline.
Someone is sinking today.
Soon will the season of rescue be o'er.
Soon will he drift to eternity's shore.
Case and my brother, no time for delay.
But throw out the lifeline and save them today.
Throw out the lifeline.
Someone is drifting away.
Throw out the lifeline.
Someone is sinking today.
Good afternoon.
We're going to have our second preaching service.
And thanks everybody for being here.
Again, thanks again for all the hard work that's gone into
throwing out the lifeline to everybody.
It's been a great trip so far.
But it's not quite over yet.
But so far we have 111 salvations.
Today we have 51 soldiers, 73 saved.
Today we have 36 out soldiers and 38 saved.
So those are great numbers.
Great job everybody.
I just want to thank everybody for coming.
And everyone from Michigan.
We had a lot of people spread out all over the place.
But they all came together and went forward to come and be here.
We appreciate that.
And some people didn't get to labor with us.
But it's nice to have you and meet you and see you here.
And I just want to say thank you also to Mountain Baptist Church for the members.
Pastor Jason Robinson lending us the hymnals.
He lent it to the Lord today.
So we appreciate that.
And his piano player.
So I don't know if you have to go home and pull code today or what.
We have another piano player.
I'm not sure about that.
But I sincerely thank you from the bottom of my heart.
And also FOVC Tucson.
Brother Corbin.
Matt Beacon-Wrestle.
We appreciate you being here.
Oh, he lives right there.
And I'm really looking forward to him preaching to us.
So I want to preach the first one so I can relax.
I'm a pastor so no.
I took the pre-med service but I'm sorry about that.
But I am excited about listening to the sermon.
And I just want to say that I appreciate and thank Pastor Anderson also for everything
that he's done to help this successful trip.
Now, we had the food already.
Dinner is going to kind of be, you know, we take over buildings.
So it's really hard for everybody to plan to go to one place.
So you're kind of fed in for yourself.
And, you know, you failed a couple places last night.
See, that's what happens.
Even just 20 people is too much for some restaurants.
Buddy's pizza.
Well, I'll let you guys make those plans.
I'm going to eat out right now.
Buddy's no longer my buddy.
I'm going to have to get a little carpet after this.
So, but also you do have free time after the service.
You know, if you just want to take the rest of that evening off, that's, you know, perfectly fine.
And, you know, we're not here to just drive you to the death.
So just some places you want to get out and see and just enjoy some free time and more.
I'm not stopping you.
So but if you want to go soloing, there's also so many maps on the table there.
And so is anybody interested in like leading a couple groups or Robert or Josh or anybody else?
Well, you guys can just hold to those guys.
You have a big enough crew you can get out on YouTube.
Just make sure you're being safe out there.
Don't leave your sewing markers, please.
That's just like and if you're with ladies, don't leave them behind in the dust.
I know you want to get people say that.
Let's be safe about it.
So and then so there's maps out there.
Please return the maps marked.
I know this is tough sometimes.
We're forgetful people.
We're simple.
Forgive me.
He will not forgive you.
Angry.
I haven't eaten yet.
He's really.
So anyway, we please make sure to mark up those maps.
Check out where you went and make sure that the other quarter.
You can do that via the team leaders for today.
They're selling tomorrow.
It's a 10 to the 1030.
1030 same coffee shop.
They'll go out from there and accept mass exodus and go one more time.
So so many materials.
I ask people to bring so many materials that doesn't look like there's enough for a lot.
So you put your cards just before you try to do that.
Most of the order.
It's not all about you.
So we have some out there.
But is there anybody from my church that brought those cards that those lights could have more.
Yes. More words.
In my back.
So are you going to be here tomorrow?
I'm not sure.
But I'll leave whatever I have.
Yeah. All right.
So just make sure everybody has enough to get out and go with.
It's kind of weird to just walk up and go.
Hi.
It's an icebreaker.
Oh, yeah.
Yeah, we'll burn those later.
Anyway, thanks again for everything you did.
Appreciate it.
And let's keep on soldier on and make sure you pay attention to brother for concern.
And that's all I have for us.
So let's go ahead and sing another song.
All right, let's open our Bibles now.
Psalm one.
Who knows?
Psalm one.
Don't know it.
Try to follow along.
Your foundation.
All.
All that work.
When the Lord turned again, the activity of Zion,
we were like them that dream.
Then was our mouth filled with laughter
and our tongue with singing.
Christ was made among the heathen.
The Lord had done great things for them.
The Lord had done great things for us.
Whereof we are glad.
Turn again our captivity,
O Lord, as the streams in the south.
Pray that so in tears shall we pay joy.
Hence the day of lovely heathen.
The Lord had done great things for them.
The Lord had done great things for us.
Whereof we are glad.
He that goeth forth and weepeth
there in precious heat
shall doubtless come again.
Shall doubtless come again with rejoicing,
bringing his sheeps with him.
Hence the day of lovely heathen.
The Lord had done great things for us.
Whereof we are glad.
Pray that so in tears shall we pay joy.
The Lord that came unto Hosea, the son of Mirai,
in the days of Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, Hezekiah,
kings of Judah, and in the days of Jeroboam,
the son of Joash, king of Israel.
The beginning of the word of the Lord by Hosea,
and the Lord said to Hosea,
Go take unto thee a wife of whoredoms,
and children of whoredoms,
for the land hath committed great whoredoms
departing from the Lord.
So he went and took Gohar,
the daughter of Eblaim, which conceived and bare him a son.
And the Lord said unto him, Call his name Jezreel,
for yet a little while,
and thou wilt manage the blood of Jezreel
upon the house of Jehu,
and will cause to see the kingdom of the house of Israel.
And it shall come and pass at that day,
that I will break the bow of Israel
in the valley of Jezreel.
And she conceived again and bare a daughter,
and God said unto him, Call her name, L'ruhama,
for I will no more have mercy upon the house of Israel,
but I will utterly take them away.
But I will have mercy upon the house of Judah,
and will save them by the Lord their God,
and will not save them by bow, nor by sword,
nor by battle, by horses, nor by horsemen.
Now when she had weak L'ruhama,
she conceived and bare a son.
Then said God, Call his name Lohehamai,
for ye are not my people, and I will not be your God.
Yet the number of the children of Israel
shall be as the sands of the sea,
but cannot be measured nor numbered.
And it shall come to pass that in the place
where it was said unto them, You are not my people,
there it shall be said unto them,
Ye are the sons of the living God.
Then shall the children of Judah,
and the children of Israel be gathered together
and appoint themselves to my head,
and they shall come up out of the land,
for grace shall be the day of Jezebel.
Amen.
Father, thank you for how great you are, Lord Jesus,
and the privilege it is for you to God to preach.
Pray that you would build a beacon
to wrestle with your Holy Spirit in us as well.
Help us to pay attention.
Pray this in Jesus' name.
Amen.
Well, it's great to be here back in Michigan.
I'd like to say that it was great to be out again in Detroit,
but last time I was here, I was very sick,
so although this is the second time I've been to the,
I guess we're calling it the Detroit Conference,
it's actually only the first time I've been able to,
you know, complete my duties of appreciating it
and, you know, slowly, so.
It was a great, great weekend out there slowly.
It was such a great experience to go out there
and just knock these doors
and see so many people come from all different parts
of the area, from Washington, Arizona, Texas.
I don't know if you hear them from Texas.
Yeah, we did a testing weekend.
And Canada and elsewhere, everybody's coming out,
coming together for this, you know, common cause,
go out and preach the gospel,
so it's been really great to see that.
And, you know, especially for me being from Tucson,
one thing I really appreciated about Detroit
was the fact that none of the yards were fenced off.
I mean, there was a few here and there,
but in Tucson, it's a different story.
Like, every other door is fenced off.
I mean, they get into their gates down there.
They're like little mini fortresses,
so that was really refreshing to be able to get out
and at least knock the doors
and not even see so many great salvations,
so I really appreciate everybody that's come out
and made this such a great event.
Hopefully, this is something we can keep going over the years.
But, again, just thanks to everybody
that's helping that happen, the laborers,
and, of course, Pastor Thompson
and everybody that was involved in getting us going.
So, you know, I want to preach this afternoon very quickly,
just a sermon entitled Spiritual Status.
Spiritual status.
You know, we're living in a time today when people,
you know, they have lots of different ways
to kind of establish their status, right?
Sometimes people will, you know, wear certain things
to kind of show you what they're into
or how they break or what team they're into
or behaving, how much money they make or something like that,
and we're living in a very materialistic society.
You know, we're living in a time where people
want to kind of show off, you know,
their status in the world, right?
And that's not always necessarily, you know, a bad thing, right?
The Bible says,
Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do with thy might.
You know, in some areas, of course,
you know, we want to have status,
and we want to make sure we're excelling in certain areas.
Maybe we have a hobby or a pastime
or something that we're into.
You know, we want to excel at that.
That's something that we want to do well.
You know, we want to rank.
We want to have status,
but really the greatest status that any of us can have
and, you know, anybody is the status
of being called a child of God,
being the son of God.
You know, that's the greatest status.
You know, if someone were to come to you and say,
Hey, you know, what are you into?
You know, what are you about?
What is it that makes you so special?
You know, the first thing that should come to our mind,
you know, if it doesn't come out of our mouth,
at least come to our mind and say, I'm a child of God.
And this is important sometimes
because I think sometimes God's people,
you know, they kind of, one,
they're kind of sold a bill of goods
that they're kind of setting classes.
You know, they're kind of told,
other nations in Israel,
they're, you know, the Jews are God's people.
We're just an afterthought.
No, we are the sons of the living God.
We are, we have that spiritual status.
That's ours.
We're not going to let somebody take that away from us.
Or even sometimes people can get saved
and just kind of think, you know, well,
you know, who am I?
What can I really do for the Lord?
You know, when you have this great spiritual status
called being a son of God,
called being the child of God,
if you look there in Mosiah,
look at verse 10.
Yet the number of children of Israel
shall be as the sand of the sea,
which cannot be measured nor numbered.
It shall come to pass that in the place
where it was said unto them,
ye are not my people.
There it shall be said unto them,
ye are the sons of the living God.
Of course, this is very prophetic.
Obviously, there's a fulfillment
in the Old Testament Israel,
but this is something that's quoted later in Romans,
but he's showing us here, hey,
prophetically speaking,
there's going to come a time
where there's going to be a group of people
who are not called the sons of God,
which are going to then go
and be called the sons of God.
Of course, I believe that's very prophetic
of the Gentile nations,
that we're going to be reached
through the preaching of the gospel.
This applies to us.
This is something that we get to claim.
This is something that we can say,
hey, we are the sons of the living God.
This is a great spiritual status that we have.
Again, I'm not against people having
different things that they're into.
Maybe they're into some martial art,
or they want to get the black belt,
or they're into some hobby
where they want to excel in some way,
whatever it is.
They want to have some kind of status,
and I think there's something wrong with that,
but we must never forget
that the greatest thing that we can ever achieve
is being a child of God
and those spiritual endeavors,
we want to want to rank up, so to speak,
in our spiritual lives.
We want to have status, right?
Obviously, we have this status automatically
through Christ as just being God's child.
If you would,
keep something there in Mosiah
to go to Romans chapter number nine.
Romans chapter number nine.
The Bible says in 2 Corinthians chapter six,
I will receive you and will be a father unto you,
and he shall be my sons and daughters,
saying the Lord Almighty.
This is something that God brings up often.
He's always reminding us what it means to be saved.
It's not just I have my sins forgiven
and I'm not going to go to hell.
It's not just I'm on my way to heaven
and there's an inheritance.
What it means is that you have a spiritual status
as being a child of God.
You are a son of God.
You are a daughter of God.
You are a child of God today.
That's a great spiritual status
that we should never lose sight of.
The Bible says in Romans chapter nine, verse 22,
what if God, willing to show his wrath
and to make his power known,
endured with much longsuffering the vessels of wrath
but into destruction?
He's put up with that Old Testament Israel.
He put up with those people
that had rejected him all those years.
He put up with these vessels of wrath.
Why?
That he might make known the riches of his glory
on the vessels of mercy,
those that would receive Christ,
those that would get saved,
those vessels of mercy.
That's why God put up with those things,
which he had for prepared unto glory,
even us who he had called not to choose only
but also of the Gentiles.
And as he saith, verse 25, also in Elsie,
so again, he's going back to Hosea
and he's making this application to,
ooh, to the Gentiles,
not just the Jews but also to the Gentiles,
saying, I will call them my people,
which were not my people,
and her beloved, which was not beloved.
You know, that is us.
We are God's people.
We are beloved in God.
Gentiles and Jews alike.
It's a great spiritual status that we have.
It goes on and says in verse 26,
and shall come to pass
that in the place where it was said of them,
you're not my people,
there they shall be called the children of the living God.
And I kind of want to preach this today
because of the fact that obviously
there's a lot of people, you know,
that are from the surrounding area
that maybe don't have, you know,
a new IFB church to go to.
And they have a good church,
and they go there, but, you know,
they don't have that red-hot, you know,
solely powerhouse that you have
in other areas of the country.
You know, they don't have
a sure foundation Baptist church.
They don't have a faithful word Baptist church.
They don't have some great lighthouse in the area
that's just all about going out and winning souls, right?
There's not a lot of people in the world today
that are willing to just, hey, let's pack up everything
and go spend a bunch of money
to just go out and knock a bunch of doors
and just preach the gospel.
A lot of pastors and other people
would look at that and say,
well, I mean, are you trying to build a church?
Where are you sending them though?
They're just interested in getting people in the doors
so they can get the tithing interested,
you know, get the money out of them, right?
Not everybody has what we have
in the churches that we have.
Obviously, there's nothing wrong
with trying to get people in the church.
There's nothing wrong with tithing,
but that should not be our primary focus.
We should be out there knocking the doors
of the poor and lowly,
those that have nothing to offer,
and bringing the truth of the gospel.
There's not a lot of people that want to do that.
There's not a lot of churches out there like this,
like the churches where different people are coming from.
Some people are coming from churches
and maybe they don't even have a church.
I want to preach this and remind them,
don't get downtrodden, don't get discouraged.
Don't think, oh, I can't do much
because I don't have a church.
You're still a child of God.
You're still a son of the living God.
You're still a God of the living God.
You still count.
You still have great spiritual status,
a great standing in Christ.
Maybe you're in a church where
you're being kind of, as I said earlier,
kind of downplayed as a child of God.
You're kind of being told,
oh, you know, the Jews over there in Israel
they're the real children of God.
We're just an afterthought.
We're just God's plan B, as has been said out there.
Don't let these Judaizers,
don't let these other people
demean your standing in Christ.
I'm not saying be confrontational.
I'm not saying get in their face about it.
But I'm saying just you, for yourself,
know that no matter what some man said,
like the other man in the pulpit,
and say, hey, we're not really that important to God.
We're kind of God's step-children.
No, we are the people of God.
We are God's children.
Don't let them take that from you.
Honestly, you need to keep that in front of you,
to understand your spiritual status.
The Judaizers, the true Israel cults that are out there,
that's taken out in many different forms.
It used to be the only one I argued about
was the Anglo-Saxon lost tribes
and all these Europeans.
These white Europeans are the lost tribes of Israel
or whatever.
That's been out there.
Now you've got the black Hebrew Israelites.
It's just funny to me how every race has tried to claim
being the true Israel.
What they don't get is that being the true Israel,
it's not about skin color.
It's not about genetics.
It's not about the blood that's flowing in your veins.
It's about the blood that Christ shed for us.
That's what makes the true Israel.
You would go to Revelation 5.
It's going to be clearer in the scripture.
The Bible says so they, which are a faith,
are blessed with faithful Abraham.
They then are a faith.
Not that they're trusting in their lineage.
Not that they're trusting in some genealogy.
Not that they're trusting in some half-faith theory
about what happened to lost tribes of Israel.
They were scattered in all nations.
It's not a mystery to the Bible fellows.
They were scattered by the Romans.
They were scattered by the Assyrians.
They were scattered by the Babylonians.
They came and went out of their land.
It's not a mystery to us what happened to those tribes.
The Bible details it clearly for us.
The Bible says in Romans chapter 2, we all know this,
where he's not a Jew, which is one outwardly,
neither is that circumcision which is outward in the flesh,
but he is a Jew which is one inwardly,
and circumcision is that of the heart, in the spirit,
and not in the letter,
whose praise is not of men, but of God.
It's the inward circumcision that makes us a Jew,
not the flesh.
The Bible says he had the aid of one blood,
all nations, for men to dwell upon the face of the earth.
That's what always slays me about these
black Hebrew Israelites,
the Anglo-Saxon, European lost tribes.
It's like, have you ever just considered the fact
that God made all of us?
We ran into one yesterday, briefly,
and we could see him.
We were walking back.
We were done soloing,
and we saw the guy come out on the porch,
and he'd taken the thing up your hand on the little card,
and he had it crumpled up, and his hand folded,
and he's got the big, propped-in cross,
or whatever it is,
and he's got some kind of staff up there.
When I walk with brother Randy,
he's like, oh, that's one of them right there.
And he's waving at us for like six houses down.
I'm going to go, okay.
Because they're very confrontational.
He wanted to get into it.
We just say, hey, how's it going?
What are you doing?
I said, we're out preaching the gospel.
Oh, that's the gospel.
I said, it's the salvation by grace through faith.
He wanted to stop us and slow us down,
and I said, hey, we're going to keep moving here.
We're not going to get caught up in this
just stupid argument about who's going to do what.
Who's going to get real.
And I'll tell you right now,
when they think it's not the white man.
Right?
Like the devil.
Not Native American, first of all.
That's a whole lot of story.
I'll tell you some of it.
But it's just such a dumb argument.
And it's like they're not even...
The only thing you can think of
is the fact that the natural man
received without the Spirit and Godhead
can know that they are spiritually discerned.
People just can't see something.
It's just so plain in Scripture.
just kind of walk away and think to yourself,
they must not be saved.
Right, right.
And you know, in most instances, they probably aren't.
But here and there in Revelation chapter five,
I mean, the Bible just, you know,
reiterates this over and over in verse nine,
talking about our spiritual status that we have in Christ.
It says in verse nine,
and they sung a new song, right,
this great throng in heaven saying,
thou art worthy to take the book and open the seals thereof,
for thou hast slain and hast redeemed us to thy God,
by thy blood, out of every kindred and tongue
and people and nation.
Every kindred, every tongue, every nation, every people.
Nobody has a corner on being, you know, God's child.
You know, it's open to everybody.
Black, yellow, white, it doesn't matter.
We're all welcome in the kingdom of heaven
through the blood of Christ.
Right?
Go to Revelation chapter 14.
That's why Jesus said, going into all the world, right?
He didn't say, hey, only go to this certain demographic.
Only go to people of this skin color.
Only go to people with this certain background.
He said, go to all nations.
Go to all of them.
Because the blood of Christ is for everybody.
Nobody has a corner on being a child of God for everyone.
Look at Revelation chapter 14, verse six.
I saw another angel fly in the midst of heaven,
having the everlasting gospel to preach in the 12 years.
So this is, you know, towards the end,
God's pouring out his wrath and all that.
And he's still preaching the gospel
that to them that dwell in the earth.
Is he selecting a certain group only?
Saying, oh, preach only to the Jews.
Oh, only go to a certain race.
Go only to a certain nationality.
Is that status of being a child of God
open to only a select group of people?
No, he said, go and preach to the gospel to every preacher.
He said here that to every nation
and kindred and tongue and people.
That's what we're supposed to preach to.
Right.
You know, and the only reason that we are,
have that spiritual status today is because of that fact.
You know, there's a mixed group of people here today.
There's people from all kinds
of different ethnicities here today.
And, you know, we all are welcome in the kingdom of heaven
because of the fact that Jesus died for everyone.
It's a status that has been shared with us.
And the application I want to make, you know,
what can you do with that knowledge?
Maybe that's enough to just kind of encourage you
and remind you of what you are and who you are in Christ.
You know, maybe you don't have somebody
that's going to value you for what you can do for Christ,
you know, in your church.
You know, maybe you go to church
where they kind of throw the wet blanket on Soledad.
You know, maybe you go to a church where, you know,
they just want to put out the door hanger.
Maybe, you know, maybe they don't value you
for what you can do for a church like that.
Maybe they don't value the fact
that you take the great commission seriously.
Right.
Well, at least you can be encouraged that God sees you.
God still knows your, God knows your heart.
God wants you to continue to do the work
that he's called us all to do.
You know, that part's for the encouragement, right?
But here's the practical application
of when it comes to having a spiritual status.
You have a spiritual status
because why can't somebody share that with you?
You know, none of us got saved on our own.
We all have a testimony, you know,
and often in this type of a crowd,
that testimony is, oh, I heard the vital way to heaven
on the end of a certain video.
You know, I heard Pastor Anderson preach the gospel.
I heard this pastor preach the gospel in the video.
That's a great testimony.
Some people have a different testimony.
Hey, someone came and knocked on my door.
You know, somebody came or went to a church
or someone there led me to Christ there.
The point is this, is that the only reason
you've got that status as a child of God
is because somebody shared it with you.
And that's what we need to do.
And obviously I'm kind of preaching to the choir here,
but it's really easy to get all excited
here at the Detroit Soul Enigma then.
But what about when you go back home?
What do you go, what about when you go back
to South Tucson where all, that everything faded off?
Right, what about when you go back,
maybe to a less receptive area?
What about when you go back to those regions
and it's not like, it's not as good
as it was here this weekend?
Well, you know, we still have to endeavor
to share the gospel with other people
so they can partake in that same,
and have that same rank with us as a child of God.
You know, that's something we have to,
we'll share with us.
It's something we have to share with other people.
If you would go to Hebrews chapter number two.
Hebrews chapter number two.
I mean, think about what a great thing it is
to be a child of God.
Why wouldn't you want to share that with somebody, right?
Because a lot of times when people think about status,
right, the way the world uses status
is they kind of demean other people, right?
You know, they want to make more money
and have nicer things so they can make
everybody else look poor.
You know, how much do you think, right?
That's a big status symbol, right?
Obviously there's nothing wrong with working hard
and making money, but it shouldn't be held
over the heads of other people.
It shouldn't be used to put other people down
and lift yourself up, you know?
So think about the status that is shared with us in Christ.
Think about what a great thing that it is
that's been shared with us and we should want
to share that with other people.
Why would we want to keep that to ourselves?
So we can walk around and say, well, I'm a child of God.
Now we're no different than the black Hebrew Israelites.
Now we're no different than the European lost tribes.
Now we're no different than all the Zionists out there
who just say, oh, it's only for this select group
of people that have the status.
You know, if we keep that to ourselves and don't share it
and want to bring that to other people,
how are we any different to them, right?
I mean, think about how great it is.
We'll just jump to verse 10 here in Hebrews chapter two.
It says, for it became him for whom are all things,
and by whom are all things,
in bringing many sons unto glory.
Not a few, not a select few, many sons unto glory
to make the cap of their salvation perfect through
sufferings, for both he that sanctified
and they also are sanctified are all of one.
For which cause he is not ashamed to call them for ever.
I'm not Christ.
I mean, think about what a powerful statement that is,
that Christ is not ashamed to call us for ever.
You know, I don't know about you,
but sometimes when you think about how great God is,
how holy Christ is, you think about how perfect he is,
sinless, everything, you know, we can't even comprehend it.
You know, sometimes I kind of feel like I'm not even worthy
to be called, you know, a son of God.
I'm not even worthy to be called a brother of Christ.
But you know what?
That's not how God looks at us.
You know, that's not our spiritual, you know,
God, our spiritual status of God is that he looks at us
and says, I'm not ashamed to be called a brother.
I'm not ashamed to have you as a co-heir with Christ,
because obviously, you know,
it's obvious not because you're being good at us.
We know that as Paul said, in us, there is no,
in us, well, no good thing that is our flesh.
But in Christ, you know, we have been made a new man.
You know, he looks at us through the blood of Christ,
that sacrifice that was made,
brought many sons into glory for him through his sufferings.
And because of that, we have that great spiritual status
that God looks at us and says,
I'm not ashamed to be called your brother.
That's powerful.
I think Paul says that, I'm not ashamed of you.
It's powerful.
Look at verse 12, he says,
saying, I will declare thy name unto my brethren
in the midst of the church,
whilst he craves unto thee.
You know, he's not ashamed of us.
We should not be ashamed of that spiritual calling.
We should want to share that spiritual status
that we have with other people.
If you would go to 1 John chapter three,
we all know this verse, 1 John chapter three.
We're gonna look more at 1 John,
and we'll come back later.
I know I've probably gotten bookmarks
in several places already,
but you know, if you get a paper cut,
pour some lemon juice on it, it'll be better.
But it says in 1 John chapter three, verse one,
behold, what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us
that we should be called the sons of God.
I mean, we read that so often,
we might quote that out solely,
but you know, sometimes we need to just let it stop
and let that sink in, what that really means.
You know, if we go back to some church
that isn't a faithful word,
if we go back to some church
that isn't sure foundation of the average church,
if we go back to some church
that isn't everything that we want it to be,
well, you know what?
It still doesn't change your spiritual status.
It still doesn't change the fact
that God isn't ashamed to call you brother.
It doesn't change the fact that God still loves you so much
that he has called us the sons of God.
We who were no people have been made the people of God.
None of that changes that.
Nobody can take that away from us.
No false prophet, no watered down creature,
nobody can take away our spiritual status
that we are the sons of God.
You know, sometimes we get reminded this,
that we encourage the fact that we are God's children.
You know, this status has privileges too.
This is what I love about it.
I mean, we say, hey, son of God, good enough for me.
Child of God, that's enough, that's all I need.
And amen, you know, that is really all.
I mean, what a great privilege just to be going to heaven.
You know, this status comes with privileges, right?
This, you know, we talk,
we hear a lot today about privilege, right?
How some people are more privileged than others, right?
Well, you know what?
I don't know about all that.
I don't know about the politics involved there,
but I know one thing,
that my status as the son of God comes with some privileges.
Here and now and yet to come as well.
If you look there in verse two, verse John three,
it says, beloved, now we are the sons of God.
I mean, that's now, right now.
You're not gonna become the sons of God.
That's not something that's gonna happen later.
No, right now, you are a child of God.
You believed under Christ, you have that spiritual status.
Look, that comes with certain privileges here and now.
We have access to the throne of grace
that we can find help in time of need.
We can go to God boldly before the throne.
We can pour out our heart unto Him, the God of all comfort.
And we know that if we ask anything
according to His name, He hears us.
If we pray according to His will,
no, that will be done for us.
And wherever two or three of God in His name,
there He is in the midst of us.
That's a great privilege that we have right now
as God's children.
That's a here and now.
But wait, it gets better.
There's more.
You think, oh, I'm gonna have a child of God.
That's enough.
Oh, I can have, I can go to the throne of grace.
Oh, God cares about me.
God's gonna help me.
Yeah, that's great, too.
But you know what?
It gets better.
I mean, that's why it says, you know,
the manner of love, behold what manner of love, right?
It's just kind of gloss over there.
John 3, 16, for God so loved the world, right?
We forget sometimes how much God really loves us
and how good the grace of God is toward us as His children
and towards the lost as well.
He says, now, you know, He says,
now we are the Son of God.
Right now, that's a privilege we enjoy.
And it doth not yet appear what we shall be.
Meaning there's another privilege that's yet to come.
Look, this status gives you something else,
not just the fact that you're the Son of God here now,
but you're also going to appear,
and you do not appear where we shall be,
but we know that when He shall appear,
we shall be like Him, and we shall see Him as He is.
I mean, that's such a profound verse to think about,
that we shall be like Him.
What's he talking about?
He's talking about the Lord by body.
Amen.
You know, that's something we see through a glass darkly.
That's not something we fully comprehend.
We get a few glimpses of what that might be like
through the scriptures, through, you know,
the stories about the resurrected Christ
appearing in the midst and eating the honey and the fish
and everything else.
We can, you know, we can kind of project some things
based on that.
You know what?
We don't know what it is that we're going to be in Christ,
but we know that we shall be like He is glorified.
And that's a privilege that is yet to come.
This is what it means to have the status of the Son of God.
So whatever, you know, however you might feel
you're getting sold short, you know,
in the world right now, maybe, you know,
your Christian life isn't everything you wish it could be.
Maybe you think your church isn't everything
you want it to be.
You know what?
You still got this coming.
You still got this great privilege, this great status
of being a child of God here and now.
You still have this great privilege of the fact
that one day you're going to be as Christ.
You're going to be like Him.
You know what then?
If you think about that, if you let that sink in,
you dwell upon that and that'll change an attitude real fast.
That'll just cause us to praise God for everything
that we have, the spiritual status that we have in Christ.
Now, obviously that doesn't,
that's something that's to come, right?
A lot of the privileges that we're going to enjoy
in this Christian life, you know, are here and now,
but there's a lot of things
that we're going to have to wait on.
You know, and really being like Him is something that's,
you know, probably one of the greatest privileges
that there are.
You know, that's something you have to wait for.
You know, when you read that, I think about that
and I feel like that's, every morning is Christmas morning.
It's like, I'm constantly looking at some present
under the tree and it's just like, oh man,
I can't, the anticipation of what it's going to be like
when He comes is going to be like, you know,
these are the things you have to think on.
These are the things that will keep you encouraged.
These are the things that will keep you out there
doing what?
Sharing the same privilege that we have with other people.
That's what's going to keep you going out there
and sharing the gospel and wanting to bring other people
into this fellowship and bring other people to partake
in this spiritual status that we have.
We don't have to sit on that.
It's a great treasure that we have.
But you know, it's something that's going to come,
you know, obviously later and in the meantime,
we're going to have to go through some things.
Things are going to be tough.
Things aren't always going to be what we want them to be.
Paul exhorted them to what?
Continue in the faith and that we through much tribulation,
through much tribulation, that we must through much
tribulation enter into the kingdom of God.
You know, the way to the kingdom,
the way to that glorified body, you know,
if Christ carries is going to be through tribulation.
Right? I wish somebody would read that
to a lot of these pre-tribbers, right?
He's not avoiding us on the rat.
Yeah, well, you know, that's two different things.
Tribulation and rat, right?
It's pretty good.
And Paul's like, hey, we're going to go through tribulation,
right?
Well, God would never suffer his children, you know,
go through anything hard.
It's like, go tell that to the apostle Paul.
That's a whole other sermon, but anyway.
Go back to Romans chapter number eight.
You know, we have this, the status,
the spiritual privilege of being God's child,
having this glorified body that's coming to us
to be like he is.
And the Bible, you know, ends there in second,
first John three, and every man that hath this hope
in himself, that should in him purify himself,
even as he is pure.
You know, if we have that hope,
that's going to cause us to want to have a closer walk
with God.
That's going to cause us to want to, you know,
take advantage of that status,
that privileges that we have as God's people.
You know, if we have the privilege of being able to read
and understand and know the Bible, as I quoted earlier,
you know, that the natural man receiveth not the things
that are free of God, neither can he know them,
for they are spiritually discerned.
You know, if we're the child of God,
we have the ability to read the Bible
and to know what it means.
Obviously, we're not going to understand everything.
You know, we can get clean understanding.
We can read the word of God and it makes sense to us.
You know, sometimes we might take that for granted.
You know, but I'll think about one of the first times
I ever tried to read the Bible before I got saved.
And I was living down on St. Croix,
which is an island in the Virgin Islands, down in Caribbean.
And down there, they never need any lightning.
And I was, and I'll come into that's an important factor
that's going to come to come back to that.
Because at that time, you know, I was not saved,
but I was searching.
You know, I was looking at the Hinduists.
I'm not, you know, I fly down there to visit my dad
and the Hindus would always find me at the airport.
I'd go to Chicago and hear one of the busiest airports.
And I know, you know, the Hindus that come,
they try to sell you the book,
you know, it's got the beagles on it or whatever.
No one's been ever approached by these people.
Well, they're like, I hear Krishna's.
You hear Krishna's?
You know what I'm talking about?
Maybe they're not a thing as much anymore.
But they would track me down.
They would find me at the airport.
I mean, you know, they didn't even know what to do.
Oh, it's free.
I think it was funny.
You know, I would start reading these books
about, you know, Buddhism and hearing Krishna
and all this stuff, Hinduism and things like that.
You know, so I was searching.
You know, and I'm living down there in the Virgin Islands,
you know, and I was, you know,
looking at all these different things.
I was looking everywhere but the Bible.
I had already ruled the Bible out.
I said, you know, I'm not going to,
I don't want to have anything to do with Christianity, right?
I hadn't kind of written that off.
And I remember one night I was,
this thunderstorm came in and it woke me up
at like two in the morning down in the Virgin Islands.
And again, as I said, it never,
there was never lightning down there.
I mean, that I can remember.
I never would rain, just torrential rain would come in,
but very rarely was there ever a thunderstorm.
And I woke up and just clapped, man.
I was like, boom, like where it shakes the glass
in the window frame.
And I just remember I could just put the fear of God
in the thunderstorm.
And I thought, I got really scared
because it was just so close, this thunderclap.
And so I said, you know, I'm going to meditate.
I was going to try and calm myself.
This is embarrassing goodness.
This is, you know, this is the unsaved, you know,
I was maybe 20 years old at this point,
gave me some grace.
I was confused young man, I was in trouble.
So I got down and instead of, you know,
assuming the lotus position or whatever,
I actually got my hands in my knees.
I had my face down and I just remember,
I'm not saying this is God talking to me,
but I remember this thought came into my head.
I was like, what's going to happen to you when you die?
And I came up with some, you know,
half a tear brain thing, whatever it was.
I was like, well, I'll be like an ancient,
because that's what you saw growing up, right?
When you die and they die,
and alluding to this little ancient thing out of the body,
the heart floated up the head, right?
I was like, well that's just going to happen.
As soon as I thought it, I just, boom!
I just thought of it, you're not going to get it.
That's all I thought about.
And I remember I got up off my knees
and I went out the door
and this was like a studio apartment
that was detached from the main house
where my dad was living.
And I'm banging on the door at two in the morning.
He said, what?
I knew my stepmom was in there
and she had a key change Bible.
I'd seen it.
I said, I need a Bible.
So here's his teenage son, you know,
in the middle of the morning, you know,
middle of the night, banging on his door,
asking for a Bible, and going to his door.
Who knows what was going to happen.
So he gets in the Bible and says, you know what?
I've looked at everything else,
every other religion that's out there.
I'm going to go ahead and take the time to read the Bible.
My middle name is John, so I thought,
hey, John's a good place to start.
I didn't start that night.
But you know, the next day or two,
I can't remember one short half of that, you know,
I decided to read the book of John and I got it.
And you know what I understood about John?
Nothing.
I didn't understand any of it.
What's the point of the story?
I'm kidding you right now.
I didn't understand any of it.
All I read about was some guy, you know,
I don't mean to be, you know,
I hope I'm not being sacrilegious or something.
I don't mean to be irreverent towards the word of God.
I'm just telling you, this is what my attitude was like,
that as an unsaved person who didn't have the privilege,
the ability to understand and read
and have the Holy Spirit speak to me through the word of God.
When I read the book of John as an unsaved man,
I didn't have the spiritual status.
And all I read about was a guy, you know,
wearing panels here eating bugs in the desert.
That's all I was like, what's this about?
And I put it away.
You know, and praise God, he's had mercy on me.
And you know, a short time after that,
other things transpired.
That's a whole other sermon, right?
And I ended up getting saved.
You know, but now I can pick up that same book
and I can read about John.
I can read about him being in a voice crying
in the wilderness, you know,
making a straight path for our God.
You know, I can make sense of that.
You know, I can read those same passages
in the Old Testament, saying, oh, he's quoting,
and he's prophesying, and it speaks to me.
Why is that?
Because of the spiritual status that I have
as God's child.
Amen.
You know, we have that great privilege.
Nobody can take that from us.
Amen.
You know, no matter what kind of situation you're in,
no matter what you're going through in life,
no matter what other people might try to tell you,
you have a great spiritual status
to be able to read and understand the word of God.
Don't take that for granted.
Amen.
You know, understand that you have this great privilege
in reading and knowing and understanding the word of God.
In the vast majority of this world,
they read that book, they're just like me that night.
They're just like me, sitting there saying,
what, I don't get it, and just giving up.
Yeah, right.
You know, we have the status to know here and now
what the word of God says.
We know we're gonna go through some things
to enjoy those other privileges, right?
When we can get that glorified body
to rule and reign with Christ, I mean, wow.
You know, but in the meantime,
there's gonna be some things that we go through.
Look at Romans, if you're still there,
verse eight, or chapter eight, verse 15.
For you have not received the spirit of bondage
you get into fear,
but you have received the spirit of adoption
whereby you cry, Adam, father.
You know, that's the privilege that we have,
to be able to call God, Father.
The spirit itself bears witness with our spirit.
The spirit doesn't bear witness with everybody.
It bears spirit with our spirit.
That what?
That we are the children of God.
This is our spiritual standing.
This is our privilege.
And if children, then heirs.
Oh, and not only am I a child of God, I'm an heir.
I'm an heir, there's an inheritance coming to me.
There's an inheritance coming to you.
That's what it means to have a spiritual status.
Then heirs, heirs of God,
not heirs of some long lost uncle,
you know, who's gonna give you, you know, a couple of Gs.
You're gonna go get a Bentley,
you know, whatever, whatever your God is.
You know, no, an heir will die.
He's gonna give me a mansion and a crown and a robe,
maybe a heart, I don't know.
I'm gonna go spread the streets of gold.
You know, I'm gonna be there with the angels
and the great multitude and ruling rank.
We're heirs of God.
This is the privilege that we have.
Joint heirs of Christ,
and so that we be that we suffer with him.
You know, the more we go through, the more we suffer,
the more we endure on this earth,
the greater our reward in heaven.
That I may know, you know,
that's why Paul said that he was willing to suffer
the loss of all things, right?
That he may know then the power of his resurrection.
He wanted to attain him to a better resurrection.
That meant he was willing to go through the suffering,
go through the, you know,
that's the privilege that's yet to come.
He goes on, it says in verse 18,
for I reckon that the sufferings of this present time
are not worthily compared with the glory
that should be revealed in us.
But whatever we're gonna go through in this life
for the cause of Christ,
we're gonna laugh at it in heaven.
You know, and that's easy to say,
and it's not a thing to go through it.
You know, but even those things
that we've gone through here, you know,
as pastors or even as people who've been in churches
that have been persecuted, or maybe, you know,
you endure, you know, a church that's not fully on board
with everything that you believe,
maybe persecution that you've received
from family and friends for the things that you believe,
maybe those types of things.
Whatever, however much that bothers you,
however much you feel like you've suffered,
you get to heaven in glory,
and you see all of that, and that glorified body,
you're gonna look at those things and just like,
you're gonna be, it's like, what?
And that's nothing.
You're gonna laugh at it all, as the hymn says.
You're just gonna laugh at it.
The things that I suffered in Earth's conflict,
in heaven, I'll laugh at the cross, right?
That's what John R. Rice wrote.
He said, that's what Paul said,
for I'm repping the sufferings of this present time,
they're not even worthy to be compared.
They're not even worthy to be compared
to the glory which shall be revealed to them.
And that's Paul saying that,
because that carries a lot of weight,
because that's somebody who suffered a lot
in his present time, more than we ever will go through.
Oh, some relative coming off.
Look, it's hard.
I'm not downplaying that.
It's difficult.
I've had that happen.
You know, I got fired from a job.
Look, it's tough.
You know, I've got people harassing me, berating me.
I've got protesters out in the church going,
that stuff happens, I'm not downplaying anything.
But man, when you get to heaven,
to compare that to the glory that's gonna be revealed to you,
it's gonna be like walking a primrose path, right?
It's not gonna be even worthy to be compared.
So we have this great spiritual status,
we have this great privilege of being a child of God,
by the grace of God.
We enjoy privileges right here and now.
You know, we can understand the word of God.
We can, you know, pray and know that we're heard of God.
We have the feeling of the Holy Spirit if we want it.
We have the ability to understand the deep things of God.
And, you know, also we have the privilege
of bringing other people into the fold.
Amen.
When we go into the gospel,
that is a privilege that we have.
We go out that we are ambassadors for Christ,
that we get to go out and beseech others
to be reconciled to God, right?
That's a privilege that we have.
And we have to remember, it's our spiritual status.
It's not this elitism, right?
There's a difference between having status
and being elitist, right?
It's not this elitism as the world would think.
You know, this superior attitude, this, you know,
this behavior that's just makes you more,
we're just better than everybody, right?
We kind of already addressed that.
You know, people that think like that,
they got it all wrong.
They can't see what the Bible says plain as day.
You know, this spiritual status that we have
should be shared with other people.
We don't want to sit on that.
We want to share that with others.
If you would, go over to Philippians chapter number two.
Philippians chapter number two.
This is an example that Christ set.
I mean, why is it that any of us in this room
this afternoon has the spiritual privilege that we do?
Why do you have the spiritual status that you do?
Because Christ gave it to you.
Because Christ was not an elitist.
And look, if there's anybody that can just sit back
and say, well, I'm an elitist, it's Christ.
Because obviously, you know,
we're going to be co-heirs with him.
We're going to be as he is,
but you know, none of us is ever going to be,
you know, a part of the Godhead.
You know, we're never going to be the son of God.
We're just going to share in that glory.
It's his glory that we're sharing, right?
So if anybody gets to be an elitist, it would be Christ.
However, that's not the example that he set for us, right?
Philippians two, you know, this passage, verse three,
let nothing be done through strife or great glory,
but in the lowliness of mind,
let each esteem other better than themselves.
That's the opposite of being elitist, isn't it?
Esteem others better.
The elitist says, no, I'm better than you.
You know, but that's not what spiritual status,
that's what having privilege means to us.
Does it make us an elitist?
It makes us, you know, able to minister to other people
in a way that other people can't.
Let us esteem the other better than themselves.
Look down every man of the total things,
and also the things of others,
that this mind became you,
which was also in Christ Jesus.
So this is how Christ thought about these things.
This is the mindset that he had.
It's not that of an elitist, right?
Who being in the form of God, right?
He's God, despite the fact that he was,
he thought it not robbery to be equal with God,
but made himself with no reputation
and took upon him the form of a servant
and was made in the likeness of men.
And he talked about the condescension of Christ.
Come on this earth and take on a robe of flesh
such as ours.
And that's a vague condescension.
Look at verse eight.
And being found in fashion as a man,
he humbled himself, became obedient unto death,
even the death of the cross,
wherefore God hath highly exalted him,
and hath given him a name which is above every name.
Right, so he is in a elite category.
His status is greater than anybody else's.
You know, he's got that name that's above every name.
But he doesn't look down his nose at us, does he?
No, he says, I love you.
He says, I'm not ashamed of you.
He says, you're an heir with me.
He says, you are my ambassador.
So you're gonna care for me.
You're gonna be like I am.
I'm gonna give you the same glorifying body.
I'm gonna give you these great privileges.
God has exalted in every name, it says there, excuse me,
and first sent that the name of Jesus.
Every name he shall bow.
Name of things in heaven and things on earth,
things under the earth.
And every tongue is going to confess that Jesus Christ
is God, the glory of the Father, every single one of them.
But that is, you know, something that's reserved for Christ.
But what was his mindset?
What was his attitude?
What was the mind that Christ had
to condescend him in a full estate?
To become a servant for the sake of others.
To bring people into that same status that he has.
Obviously not to this degree, right,
but to make that way into heaven forth,
to make them also what?
A son of God, a child of God.
That's what Christ did for us.
That's what we need to do.
Don't let our spiritual privilege
turn into this elitist attitude, right?
Go out there and win souls.
And look, I'm all for counting, I'm all for keeping track
of what we're getting accomplished and filling in maps.
You know, and believe me, if I didn't believe in map making,
I wouldn't have spent the time I did making maps.
All right, I was closing my eyes.
I saw Detroit streets in my sleep.
You know, you used to play a video game,
you'd see Mario jumping in your sleep.
You'd close your eyes and you'd still have it, like,
burned in your retina.
Then there's Detroit, and there's, like,
all these, you know, these houses that you fly over
and you look at them like you saw the satellite images.
So I believe in all that, you know?
I'll burn the image in my retina.
You know, I believe in, you know, keeping track of numbers.
Not many people came, not many people got saved,
but that's not why we do what we do.
We do what we do because we have the privilege
of sharing that spiritual status with other people,
because we're not a legal system.
We want other people to partake
in the same benefit that we have.
Soul wedding is not for our benefit.
And man, I wish some pastors in this country
would get this through their head.
They think, oh, soul wedding, what does it,
what does it, what does it for the church?
Who cares?
Yeah, that's right.
You know, and here's the thing,
God will bless a soul wedding church.
I believe that.
You know, God will build a soul wedding church.
If there's a pastor out there that's just on fire
for soul wedding and is just giving people out there
and going out on himself,
and that that's the primary motive to go out there,
you know, God will bless that church.
Right, that's right.
You know, but these pastors just have,
oh, we're really gonna go to a certain zip,
we're really gonna go to a certain income.
We don't, only that one should potentially benefit us.
Look, look, soul wedding is not for your benefit.
Right, right.
You know, it's not to brag about how many souls we got saved.
It's not to build some church.
We do that because that's what Christ did for us.
He took upon himself the form of a servant
and said, I'm not just some elitist,
I'm actually somebody who's going to condescend
the men of all estate
and share this great privilege with other people.
I mean, that's probably one of the greatest rewards
of heaven.
You know, to get to heaven and see the souls that you saved.
To see the souls that your partner saved.
I was there when so-and-so led you to Christ.
I was there when I came and knocked on your door.
That's gonna be a great privilege.
You know, somebody mentioned,
and I've never thought about this,
but somebody mentioned just recently,
and we were all soul-wedding,
I can't remember what it was,
the fact that there might be people that got saved
that have died and gone to heaven already.
Think about that.
You know, isn't that crazy?
I've never thought about this.
That's amazing to think that there's already people
that hadn't been waiting for you.
And for you.
You know, if you go soul-wedding,
that's a powerful, powerful thought.
But why do we do that?
Because it's for their benefit, not for ours.
For our benefit, or excuse me, for their benefit,
not for us.
I've got that completely backwards.
I almost did the entire sermon right at the end.
If you had just woken up and listened to that one point,
I'd say, well, I don't know about thinking that.
I think you've got some folks from Soul Searching again.
But no, it's for their benefit, not for our benefit.
You know, in our spiritual status,
it was not earned by our own merit.
If you would go back to Hosea, we're gonna end there.
Little Hosea 10, Hosea 10,
just add the zero on that one there.
You know, as many as we seem to have,
there may be powers to become a son of God,
even in that belief on his name.
You know, the spiritual status that we got came in that day,
in Christ, and it was imparted unto us through Christ,
through believing on his name,
which were not born of blood,
nor of the will of the flesh,
nor of the will of man, but of God.
You know, that spiritual status was not earned
by our own merit.
It was something that was imparted unto us through faith.
And that's what we wanna do.
We wanna go out there and share that same spiritual status
with other people.
We wanna bring other people in that same fold.
We wanna press toward the mark,
hold it toward the height of the calling and prize
in Christ Jesus.
We wanna press towards that, okay?
Look at Hosea 10, verse 12.
This is kind of what I wanna just say in the meantime.
You know, obviously we got this great privilege
coming to us in heaven.
And there's things we enjoy now.
Well, what should we do in the meantime?
I love Hosea 10, verse 12.
Sow to yourselves righteousness, right?
He kinda gives us this great kind of three point,
four point sermon.
He says sow, read, break up, and seek, right?
There you go.
There's a whole other sermon right there.
But he's saying sow to yourselves.
You know, even if you're in a church
where sowing isn't the main thing,
you're not into it.
You know what?
Sow to yourselves that.
Go out there and keep sowing.
Go out there and keep knocking doors.
Oh, the pastor's not on board with it.
He's not into it.
Well, you know what?
Sow to yourselves righteousness.
God will still bless you.
Don't let somebody else take,
don't let somebody that maybe wants to be
a little bit more of an elitist
take away that great privilege that we have
of bringing others into the kingdom of God.
Sow to yourselves righteousness.
Yeah, that's good.
Oh, you're not, you're not,
you know, we're not the real Israel.
You know, don't let them tell you that.
You know, you read your Bible.
You learn about the things of God for yourself.
Oh, I go to a church where the pastor,
you know, it's half a verse and 10 minutes
of him trying to recall somebody's,
his best friend's name from high school or something.
I've been to that church,
hang on, sat in church like that for years.
What was his name?
Nobody cares.
Nobody knows.
He's like, where's the gnosis person?
They tell a story that goes nowhere.
You know, they don't have no,
they just kind of just ramble on.
No doctrine, no meat on the bone,
no encouragement, no zeal, no fire.
That's where I go.
That's all I've got.
Well, you know what?
Sow to yourself.
That's the best you can do.
And look, it's a privilege to be able to do that.
It's a privilege to be able to have
the Holy Spirit still in you.
Sow to yourselves righteousness, reap in mercy.
You know, you sow to yourself,
God, you will still reap in mercy.
God will sow more mercy.
Right.
You know what I'm saying?
Oh, I don't have a soul winning powerhouse
that you have in Phoenix.
I don't have a soul winning powerhouse
that you have in Vancouver, Washington.
Well, you know what?
God will still, you still go out and sow in yourselves,
God will still grant mercy and you will still reap.
Amen.
Because the gospel still has power.
Amen.
It's not about where you're being sent from.
It's not about who's behind the pulpit on Sunday morning.
It's about what you're doing with the status
that you have as God's child.
Reap in mercy, break up your fall of ground.
Right again, I know I'm preaching this wire here.
If you came here to partake in the Detroit right testimony,
maybe there will be a time, you know,
where you just say, well, it just seems like the new IFP
is never going to get to the Midwest.
It just seems like the new IFP
is never going to get to the East Coast.
You know, what's the point?
You know, that's, that's your hard, hardening.
That's your hard, hardening.
You need to break that up.
Don't let that happen.
Get those claws of bitterness out.
Because you can still sow to yourselves
and God will cause you to reap in mercy.
I mean, think about that.
God's probably going to show more mercy to a person
who's faithful to the soul-winning,
more mercy to the true things of God
in a church where maybe that's not being encouraged as much.
You know, meanwhile, you've got some people
that are sitting in a church, like Faithful Word,
like Church Foundation, that don't want to do anything.
You know, that's sad.
And God's probably going to hold that more accountable
for people that aren't getting the encouragement
that they could be getting.
So don't give up on it.
Keep sowing and keep reaping.
You will reap.
Break up that photograph, for it is time to seek the Lord.
And that's true for every single one of us.
That's what we're supposed to be doing right now.
Look, we have this great status.
We've got the privileges that we enjoy right now on this earth.
The Bible reading, the prayer, the fellowship,
the witness of the Spirit, we enjoy all that now.
We've got the privileges of what's to come,
the glorified body, the ruling, the reign, all of that.
But right now, what we're supposed to be doing
in this status is to seek God.
Seek God, seek His face.
Read the Bible, keep praying, keep going out there,
keep sowing that ground, and keep reaping in mercy.
You know, keep taking advantage of that spiritual status.
That's what we have in the Word of prayer.
Your Lord, again, thank you for this great group
of people that have come out, Lord,
to go out and preach the gospel.
I thank you for every one of them, Lord.
I thank you for this shared burden that we have,
Lord, to see others safe.
Lord, I pray that you help us to leave this place
and continue on in the spirit of wanting
to see other people safe, Lord,
and to never allow the zeal to be quenched in our hearts,
Lord, but that we would always be a desirous
to preach the gospel, Lord,
and whether it's a receptive area or an unreceptive area,
Lord, that you help us to understand the great privilege
that we have, that you need to be able to go out
and preach the gospel, to share with others
and meet other people, even if it's been shared with us.
We thank you for all that you've accomplished,
Lord, this weekend.
And Lord, we pray that you would just, again,
bless all the efforts that are being going forward.
Yes, in Christ's name, amen.
Okay, we'll go ahead and sing one more song.
All right, let's turn to page 374.
Let's sing Send the Light, page 374.
Send the Light.
["Send the Light"]
Page 374 on the verse.
There's a call comes ringing o'er the restless wake.
Send the light, send the light.
There are souls to rescue, there are souls to save.
Send the light, send the light.
Send the light, the blessing gospel light.
Let it shine, we're sure to shore.
Send the light, the blessing gospel light.
Let it shine forevermore.
We have heard the Macedonian call today.
Send the light, send the light.
And the golden offering at the cross we raise.
Send the light, send the light.
Send the light, the blessing gospel light.
Let it shine, we're sure to shore.
Send the light, the blessing gospel light.
Let it shine forevermore.
Let us pray that grace may everywhere about.
Send the light, send the light.
And the Christ-like spirit everywhere be found.
Send the light, send the light.
Send the light, the blessing gospel light.
Let it shine, we're sure to shore.
Send the light, the blessing gospel light.
Let it shine forevermore.
Let us not grow weary in the work of love.
Send the light, send the light.
Let us gather jewels for our crown above.
Send the light, send the light.
Send the light, the blessing gospel light.
Let it shine forevermore.
Send the light, the blessing gospel light.
Let it shine forevermore.
And pull your resources, happy soul hunting.
Again, thanks everybody for coming.
If you're taking off after this, just make sure to stop by and see me.
You're going to just want to shake your hand and see y'all.
All right, let's please dismiss the word of prayer real quick.
Dear Lord, again, thank you for the great privilege we have to serve you.
And thank you for the fellowship that we have in you.
And praise your soul.
Bless us if you part now, God, so Christ's name, amen.
Thank you for coming, brother Brad.