A Clear Conscience to Hear God

 

A Clear Conscience to Hear God

Well, praise Jesus today everyone. What I wanted to talk about this morning was what we have to do to hear from God clearly. Because there's a lot of Christians that simply don't hear from God, and the biggest reason is due to sin itself. See sin blinds us from being able to have a good connection with our Father in heaven. And the more we sin, the more disconnected we become from God and the more blind we become. Sin makes the whole world blind and the more you sin, the more you become accepting towards sins, the more you can't speak out against sin because you know if you did, you'd be a hypocrite. So you just speak less and less of the truth.

If you want to hear from God clearly, the first thing you need to do is repent of your sins. You need to say, “Lord Jesus, please I want to come into your light. Please cleanse me of unrighteousness. Clean me of anything that is ungodly that's in my heart or in my mind and let me be sanctified for your purpose.” If you can start praying and asking your Father in heaven to forgive you, to purge you and purify you, then like how the Apostle Paul speaks in Romans, He's going to renew your heart and renew your mind. With a renewed mind, you have this renewed conscience. And when we have a conscience that knows the difference between right and wrong. All of us have a conscience, but some of us have suppressed it. So when we're given back this conscience to know the difference between right and wrong, then the Holy Spirit can convict our conscience and speak to us in our conscience and help us to know the difference between good and evil, right and wrong, a sheep and a goat, wheat and tares, and we can learn to hear God's voice very clearly.

Also the more we pray and practice hearing the Lord's voice, the better we get at it. When people are out of practice of anything, they lose their edge. And same with us when we stop praying and talking to our Father in heaven. I want to read to you what Jesus says about His sheep hearing His voice and this is found in John 10. This whole chapter has a lot of truth in it. We might just read the whole chapter together here. So look with me at John chapter 10. I'm going to start in verse 1. “1“Most assuredly, I say to you, he who does not enter the sheepfold by the door, but climbs up some other way, the same is a thief and a robber. 2But he who enters by the door is the shepherd of the sheep. 3To him the doorkeeper opens, and the sheep hear his voice; and he calls his own sheep by name and leads them out.” So as you can see from right here, if we want to hear the Lord's voice, well number one, we have to be the shepherd's sheep. If we're rebelling against Him, then maybe we're not even a sheep or we haven't come into His fold yet.

Verse 4, “4And when he brings out his own sheep, he goes before them; and the sheep follow him, for they know his voice. 5Yet they will by no means follow a stranger, but will flee from him, for they do not know the voice of strangers.” This is the next big problem. A lot of Christians are listening to false shepherds. Instead of listening to the Lord's voice and dedicating themselves to prayer and diligently doing what is right, they have put their ears and eyes on false shepherds. These false shepherds have told them it's okay to sin, they're teaching hyper-grace, and they're wolves in sheep's clothing, many of them, some of them are just plain wolves. But because Christians are listening to these false shepherds, they have trained their ear to hear lies and not hear the truth that's coming from the Lord. Jesus used this illustration, but they did not understand the things which He spoke to them.

7Then Jesus said to them again, “Most assuredly, I say to you, I am the door of the sheep. 8All who ever came before Me are thieves and robbers, but the sheep did not hear them. 9I am the door. If anyone enters by Me, he will be saved, and will go in and out and find pasture.” See, Jesus didn't say if you enter by the god Allah, or if you enter by Buddha, or if you enter by New Age, or if you enter by any one of these sects of religion. We have to enter by Jesus Christ. We have to get to know Jesus personally, and that happens in our prayer life by praying directly to Jesus and getting to know Him. And Jesus Himself is the door.

So He says in verse 10, “10The thief does not come except to steal, and to kill, and to destroy. I have come that they may have life, and that they may have it more abundantly.11I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd gives His life for the sheep. 12But a hireling, he who is not the shepherd”, ( this would be a hired helper, such as a pastor who is making his money to preach the gospel), “one who does not own the sheep, sees the wolf coming and leaves the sheep and flees; and the wolf catches the sheep and scatters them”. This also happens all the time in church. The pastors, because they are hirelings and don't really care about the sheep, when they see a wolf coming, they see danger and they don't warn. They want to continue to get their pay check. And they want to protect their own bodies. So they won't speak out against evil when they see danger coming.

“13The hireling flees because he is a hireling and does not care about the sheep. 14I am the good shepherd; and I know My sheep, and am known by My own. 15As the Father knows Me, even so I know the Father; and I lay down My life for the sheep. 16And other sheep I have which are not of this fold;”  He's talking about us here, Gentiles, us that are not Jews. Jesus didn't just die for Jewish people, but he died for all people of all nationalities, all tongues, whether they are Jew or Gentile, “them also I must bring, and they will hear My voice; and there will be one flock and one shepherd.” 17“Therefore My Father loves Me, because I lay down My life that I may take it again. 18No one takes it from Me, but I lay it down of Myself. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again. This command I have received from My Father.” 19Therefore there was a division again among the Jews because of these sayings. 20And many of them said, “He has a demon and is mad. Why do you listen to Him?” 21Others said, “These are not the words of one who has a demon. Can a demon open the eyes of the blind?”

See a lot of people, they just cannot accept Jesus as God. They cannot accept Him as the door. They want the church to be the door. They want some aloof god to call their Father in heaven. They want some religious sect to be god, but they cannot see Jesus as the door. They haven't made Jesus as their King and their Lord.

22Now it was the Feast of Dedication in Jerusalem, and it was winter. 23And Jesus walked in the temple, in Solomon’s porch. 24Then the Jews surrounded Him and said to Him, “How long do You keep us in doubt? If You are the Christ, tell us plainly.” 25Jesus answered them, “I told you, and you do not believe. The works that I do in My Father’s name, they bear witness of Me. 26But you do not believe, because you are not of My sheep, as I said to you.”  

See this is interesting guys, because these people saw many miracles from Jesus. Most of us would think to ourselves, if I met Jesus in person, and I saw the mighty works that He did on this earth, I would believe. But the people in Jesus' day saw the dead raised, the blind to see, the deaf to hear, and they did not put their faith in Jesus or believe that He was the Christ, the Savior. And we would be the same way if we hadn't truly repented. If we are living as sinners, Jesus would just be another person to give us free bread, free handouts. He would be the evening entertainment. But we would not care to really repent unless our hearts were ready to actually repent and to be led by the Good Shepherd. This is a big problem. If we don't hear the Lord's voice, it may be because we are like the religious Jews that aren't looking for the truth, or we're like the Gentiles who are so far stuck in sin in the ways of the world, that we're not ready for the Messiah. So we need to make sure if we want to hear from God, that we are prepared to let Jesus be our leader.

Jesus says in verse 27, “27My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me. 28And I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; neither shall anyone snatch them out of My hand.”  That is truly a wonderful promise that the Lord gives, that if we put our faith in Jesus, He will give us eternal life. When we die on this earth, we won't just go down to Hades or hell, we won't just vanish out of existence. But if we put our faith in Jesus Christ, He will give us everlasting life, and we will live with our Father in heaven for all eternity.

“29My Father, who has given them to Me, is greater than all; and no one is able to snatch them out of My Father’s hand. 30I and My Father are one.” Here is another great promise, that if we stay with Jesus, if we become His child and listen to His voice and hearken to His voice, then nothing will be able to snatch us out of His hand. Many Christians and false prophets have used this verse to try to prove once saved always saved, eternal security, and that there is no way that you can lose your salvation. That's just false. If you turn your back on God, and if you become a rebellious sheep, or if you never come into His fold in the first place, of course you don't have eternal security. There's no such thing as just easy hyper grace where you don't have to actually repent and follow the Lord and you're just saved and going to heaven, because when you were 8 years old you said a prayer of salvation. What Jesus is saying here in verse 29 is that if you are His sheep and you're hearkening to Him and obeying Him and walking with Him, there's no way anything is going to distract you or pull you out from the Lord's favor, His hand of protection. But of course if you rebel against Him, then Satan is going to mess with you and destroy your soul. I think we better just read the rest of this, even though it doesn't pertain exactly to hearing Jesus' voice, because there's a couple good nuggets of truth here that a lot of us don't understand. So let's read and continue this chapter, starting in verse 31.

31Then the Jews took up stones again to stone Him.  

Obviously people were mad at Jesus enough for saying that He was the Son of God, for saying that we have to just go through Him for life. The Jewish people and Gentiles, most people want there to be a different way. They don't want Jesus to be the only way, they rebel against that. That's obviously why they don't hear from God, is because they're sinners and religious. This made the people then so mad that they wanted to stone Jesus. 32Jesus answered them, “Many good works I have shown you from My Father. For which of those works do you stone Me?” 33The Jews answered Him, saying, “For a good work we do not stone You, but for blasphemy, and because You, being a Man, make Yourself God.” So they obviously got the point that Jesus is claiming to be God. He wasn't just claiming to be one of many sons of God. They obviously were upset enough to know that Jesus was claiming to be God. He was claiming to be Emmanuel God with us. And that made them so mad they thought He was blaspheming, demon possessed, and worthy to be killed right there.

34Jesus answered them, “Is it not written in your law, ‘I said, “You are gods” ’? 35If He called them gods, to whom the word of God came (and the Scripture cannot be broken), 36do you say of Him whom the Father sanctified and sent into the world, ‘You are blaspheming,’ because I said, ‘I am the Son of God’? 37If I do not do the works of My Father, do not believe Me; 38but if I do, though you do not believe Me, believe the works, that you may know and believe that the Father is in Me, and I in Him.” 39Therefore they sought again to seize Him, but He escaped out of their hand. 40And He went away again beyond the Jordan to the place where John was baptizing at first, and there He stayed. 41Then many came to Him and said, “John performed no sign, but all the things that John spoke about this Man were true.” 42And many believed in Him there.

So this verse Jesus quotes is quite interesting, that says, you are gods, and He uses that to basically prove that it is hypocritical for them to be ready to kill Him for saying that He is the Son of God, when in the Scripture it says that they are gods. So if you look at this verse, it's quite interesting. What Jesus was quoting was Psalms 82 verse 6 and 7, and it says there in Psalms, I said, you are gods, and all of you are children of the Most High. But then verse 7 says, but you shall die like men, and fall like one of the princes. Arise, O God, judge the earth, for you shall inherit all nations. Now this is interesting because it's kind of tongue-in-cheek, and you have to understand what Jesus was saying. He wasn't saying that all of us are God. However, if we are created in the image of God, we have this ability to judge correctly. And obviously, these religious Pharisees were not judging correctly like God, even though they were supposedly created in God's image and supposed to be righteous judges, but they weren't. And so in this verse, it says first you are gods, so then you can think, great, I'm like God, I am a god. But then it says in verse 7, you shall die like men. So these Pharisees would have known this verse, and they would have realized, probably picked up on what Jesus was saying, that they think that they're god, that they're going to die like flesh, they're going to die like men. These guys hated Jesus. And nothing has changed. The religious crowd still hates Jesus. They don't accept Him as the one way to the Father. They're always trying to make Jesus seem less than He is, saying He's not God, He's just a God’s son. Well, the Pharisees in Jesus' day and His time obviously didn't just think that Jesus was claiming to be one of the many sons of God. They knew He was claiming to be a deity. They knew that He was claiming to be God Almighty, and He was claiming to be on equal par with Him. And that made them mad enough that they literally wanted to kill Jesus. A lot of Christians today, they wouldn't say that they want to kill Jesus, but they spiritually do kill God. They get God out of their church. They want to live a sinful, hypocritical life. Anyone who is trying to come to God, they block so that they don't hear the truth, because they want people in church to be listening to their scribes, their Pharisees, their prophets, their biblical teachers. They would rather not anyone really hear from God personally, because if you did, you would leave their fold, and you would come into the fold of the Lord, the Good Shepherd.

And so that's what I want to encourage you to do today. Leave the false shepherds. Leave those who are leading people astray, leading you astray, and come to be led by the Good Shepherd, not by a hireling, not by one of these false shepherds. But be led by Jesus, and it starts with a real and genuine prayer life, truly repenting of your sins, and just saying, “Lord Jesus, please come into my heart, purify me from unrighteousness, open my blind eyes and my deaf ears. I want to humble myself before You, Lord Jesus, and make You my one and only Teacher, and I want to receive the power of Your Holy Spirit.” If you can just start praying these simple prayers as a child, the Lord Jesus will come into your life, He will purify you, He will purge you from evil, and He will become your Teacher and your Leader, your Father, and the One who guides you every single day.

So I hope that someone watching this today turns from evil, turns from their sin, puts their faith in the Good Shepherd, and has eternal life. “Lord Jesus, I do pray for those who have an ear to hear. I pray that those who do have an ear to hear would be brought into Your fold and out of the shackles and bondage of sin. I pray that You purify Your church, that You wash us completely free from everything that is sinful, that all of that dirt of the world would fall off of us, and we would be completely clean and ready to live for You, and die to ourselves and pick up our cross. So I pray for those who are listening today, that they would be pure in heart and in mind, and really learn how to pray, that they would practice praying, that they would practice hearing Your voice and being led by You, that they could grow in their faith and truly be Your sheep that are led by You alone, Lord. In Your name we pray, Amen.”

Keep You Eyes on Jesus

 Keep Your Eyes on Jesus

Well, praise Jesus today guys. I just wanted to make a short message about how we as disciples of Jesus need to keep our eyes on Him. We know the story about Peter, what happened when he was in that boat and they saw Jesus walking on the water. They thought He was a ghost. But after they realized that He was their Messiah, Peter says, “well, if you are the Messiah, command me to step out on the water and walk to you.” And Peter starts to walk to Jesus. But then as he looks at the waves, he becomes fearful and he sinks and he says, “Lord, save me.” This is a perfect analogy of what happens to us when we're walking well with Jesus, everything's going good, and then a storm of life happens and then we look at the storm or we look at people around us. And as soon as that happens and our eyes are off of Jesus, we start to sink into the world, sink into despair, sink into fear. We lose confidence that we can walk with the Lord because now the situation in front of us looks too scary.

And a lot of these waves or bumps in life would have easily been overcome if we didn't worry about that little bump, that little whoop in the road, that little wave coming in. We wouldn't have been concerned about it at all if we were not comparing ourselves to others or thinking about the world or worried about the news or worried about our image in the world. If we were really focused on Jesus and what He says, for example, seeking first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and then everything else will be added to you. If we were about our Father in Heaven's business, then we would still be walking on water as Peter would have still been walking on water if he didn't take his eyes off of the Lord.

Now this sounds very juvenile, very basic. It's one of the basic principles of walking in our faith, keeping our eyes on Jesus. But sometimes the very basic things have to be mastered. If we don't master the very basic things, then we can't accomplish anything else. Some of the very basic things of the faith are love, loving the Lord your God with all your heart, I mean true love for Jesus Christ, true love for your neighbor, having genuine faith and keeping your eyes on the Lord, keeping yourself unstained from the world. If we can master these very basic things with Jesus, we will be doing good.

But as soon as you are not mastering these things, you're going to let demons quickly come into your life. And when these demons are coming into your life, you're quickly going to allow sin into your life, bitterness, hatred, envy, jealousy, fear, doubting, and you're going to start sinking so fast, you're not going to be able to help anyone because you're going to be the one reaching up your hand just hoping someone pulls you up.

So I want to encourage you to walk the straight and narrow path with Jesus by keeping your eyes on Him. You know, people understand how to keep their eyes on things of the world. If they want to keep their focus on making money, they know how to do that. If they want to keep their focus on health, they know how to do that. Or winning a physical race, they know how to do that. But it seems like when it comes to keeping our eyes on Jesus, that becomes too aloof of an idea for people to understand.

So if this concept of keeping your eyes on Jesus seems too hard to understand, where do you start? I encourage you to start by reading the Gospels and praying directly to Jesus. Say, “Lord Jesus, please open the ears of my heart, open the eyes of my eyes, that I can see you and hear you and give me the ability to walk in righteousness with you, that nothing may hinder me from going forward in my faith.” So read the Gospels. Pay attention to what Jesus said in Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. If you pay attention to what Jesus said and then you apply it to your life, you're going to be going the right direction. And if you ask Jesus for His guidance, the guidance of His Holy Spirit, He's going to start teaching you right away.

Some people have asked me, well, how if I'm in sin and haven't received the Holy Spirit, how can I even pray? God won't hear me until I've received the Holy Spirit. That's not true. If you as a sinner right now want to repent, God hears the prayers of those with a contrite heart, with those of a heart wanting to live holy, and He will start purifying your heart. He will start the renewing process on you today. He will start purging you of sin and evil, but you have to choose to go with Him each step. You have to choose to really repent of things that you know are wrong. If you want to start hearing God clearly, listen to your conscience. God gave every single one of us a conscience. We know the difference between right or wrong. And listen to your conscience because your conscience is your spiritual ear to hear. Your conscience isn't the Holy Spirit, but if you listen with your conscience when you pray, then Jesus can start to speak to you. He can speak to you while you're going throughout your day, while you're dreaming at night, and He can convict you of what's really true, and He can point you the right direction.

If you're not listening to your conscience and you're doing things that you know are evil and trying to get away with everything, then you're going the wrong direction anyway. So go the right direction with Jesus, Listen to your conscience, Read the gospel. Pay attention to what Jesus said and be quick to have feet to run to obey, to do the things that Jesus said, and you surely will be going in the right direction. May the grace of Jesus be with you.

 

Crazy Church Dream

 

Crazy Church Dream: WARNING: Verbally Graphic Content

I wanted to share with anyone who is listening a dream that I had last night that was quite interesting to me and pretty crazy. So in this dream I found myself in a Pentecostal sort of church, the sort of church that they believe in lifting your hands in worship, dancing around the church. In this particular dream the church that I found myself observing in was televised and everyone was really dressed up in nicer clothes like the men with white shirts and black ties, the women were wearing nice white long dresses and kind of like how you would see people dress on easter. So really nice apparel and I found myself kind of in the middle observing this. I don't know to what extent I was part of this, but I was an observer in the midst of this congregation, and I saw people at the very front of this church, and they were the worship arts leaders and these worship arts leaders started the congregation in worship. When I heard the music at first, I wanted to lift my hands like everyone else and praise God. It sounded like it was music that was glorifying to Jesus. And so in a heart of worship I tried to start worshiping, but as I listened to the music that the professionals were putting on from the stage, I noticed that the music was shifting from being music that was glorifying to Jesus to a shift of it glorifying the people on the stage. So instead of it saying you know like praise be to the glory of God, it was more like, praise be to the glory of our church, Lord brings us power, give us the money that we need let our congregation, give enough money to us that we may support the things that we want to do. It became very self-centered and as the music became self-centered. I felt this force field that was kind of like a rainbow but invisible that was behind all of the people standing up in this Pentecostal church. And this force field started pushing everyone from the back of the room towards the front of the stage. And I realized at this point it was false worship, so I leaned back against that force field and dug in my heels into the floor. And this force field continued to push everyone forward. And I realized it was all to look good on tv and to look good to people from the outside so they would think that everyone was just on their own desire going forward to the front of the stage to worship God, it was all for show on TV right. So I dug in my heels as hard as I could. And when I did that, I noticed that the worship arts leader, the pastor people like that, saw that I was resisting, so they put some of their ushers and people around me or whoever it was, so that when the cameras panned, they would not be on me showing resistance to their little Pentecostal show. So as I continue to observe this then led directly into the time of giving and tithe where they were asking people for money, and people felt compelled to give by this force field that was forcing everyone to the front was making people feel guilty to not give. You would feel extremely condemned if you didn't empty your pockets. Because this force field was literally forcing everyone to the front of the room by the power of this rainbow force field.

So the next interesting thing that happened in this dream was the feeding of the flock. And I perceive this to be when the time in a church where the pastor feeds that's what they call it when the pastor gives the sermon, they call it eating the flock. But anyways in this particular dream, they were actually feeding people food. However, the food when it would leave the stage by the ushers and the leaders of the church, it wouldn't go out how Jesus fed the five thousand or anything like that. Somehow the people on the stage had physical food on kind of like beans and rice or spaghetti and meatballs. They had that in pots and things on the stage but how they would deliver it to the congregation was also through this force field that you couldn't see. And when they would deliver it, this food would basically go out I guess spiritually or intravenously, and it would enter all the men and women in the congregation as they were preparing this food from the stage. And so I would see them making the food the beans the meatballs and it would then intervene asleep go into all the people. And I had already realized at this point that all of this was garbage that it wasn't something I wanted to receive so I was still digging in my heels. And at this point of the dream, I also perceived that my wife was by me. She was by my side, and she was also seeing the same thing. And I remember in my dream in particular seeing some women one in particular was a younger girl maybe 12 13 years old. And I could see that she was intravenously taking that food like into her veins they were preparing that food on the stage. And she was taking that food. So here's the crazy part the disgusting part was these people that were receiving this food then got explosive diarrhea. And as soon as they had finished eating this food that was been given to them, they exploded with diarrhea all over their dresses. I saw this 13-year-old girl just explode diarrhea all up and down her dress. I saw women in the congregation who had explosive diarrhea, the diarrhea from the food that they were feeding with all over their beautiful easter dresses. I saw the men and everyone that was wearing all the nice clothes, they had diarrhea, they had the beans in the rice the meatballs all over their clothing diarrhea everywhere. And I turned and I saw my wife trying to help one of the women in the church scraping off all the diarrhea. And I just realized at that point there is no helping these people. Because as much as we try to help them, they're still taking this food intravenously by their choice. And that was my exit out of the church. We left the church. We got out of that Pentecostal church and realized that it was totally from Satan. This is a perfect image of what is happening in the false churches today. They are manipulating you for your money. They have false worship the force field is of the devil. It creates manipulation, manipulation to worship in the so-called church, but the worships no worship at all. They try to control you and manipulate you to give your every last penny to their organization. They prepare spiritual food from the stage to try to feed people. But at the end of the day all the congregation all the people are defiled. They have defiled and soiled their garments. All their works are as filthy rags. This is what the gospel speaks of when it speaks of all our righteousness is as filthy rags. The so-called righteousness of the church, the so-called worship is filthy in the eyes of God.

 If we want true repentance, we have to put on the robes of righteousness and we can't continue to take intravenously the garbage that is coming from the pastors and the elders and the ushers in dead religion in church. You have to get your family out. There's not enough cleaning that you can do to your family to keep them pure, because as you're cleaning them, they're going to continually be eating food that is giving them diarrhea. They're going to be exploding out the end. The churches are completely wicked. They're not preaching the true gospel. They're not nurturing people with the truth of Jesus Christ. They're giving them poison. I want to encourage you as a brother in the Lord to get out of dead religion, get out of the wicked church. It doesn't matter if it's Pentecostal, catholic, so-called Christian on non-denominational, you need to come out of the church, come out of sin, disconnect from what is disloyal to God, and start worshiping in spirit and in truth, get to know Him that He can clean you and purify you from this unrighteousness, from all this undefiledness, and that then you can have life in Him and your family your sons and your daughters can be pure. They won't be defiled by all of this, all of this nasty discharge. So I hope this makes sense to you.

I know this dream is crazy and disgusting. But this is how God sees the church today. The false church they are putrid, they're full of their own dung. And if we want to be pure and holy before God, we have to come out of this whorehouse which is defiling our men and our women. “Lord Jesus, I pray that people who are listening today would come out of the defiled church that is defiling themselves and defiling others. I pray that people would truly repent of dead religion, that they'd repent of evil, that they've repent of witchcraft and that they would come out and be separate from what's ungodly, that they may be filled with your Holy Spirit and cleansed from the inside out. I pray this, Lord Jesus, in your name.”

 

Profile of a Christian

 

Profile of a Christian

Well, praise Jesus today everyone. Have you ever thought about what it means to be a Christian? Or maybe think of it the other way. What do people in the world perceive a Christian to be? A lot of us have put Jesus in a bad light through being a hypocrite or a bad testimony. But all of us in some way represent Jesus Christ if we call ourselves Christians. So the best profile of a Christian is actually you to someone else that you are influencing. We can say that what it means to be a Christian is a Christ follower, or someone that keeps a set of morality, or someone that goes to church or reads their Bible or just does good in their community. But at the end of the day, the light is you. Jesus said, “you are the light of the world. Let your light so shine before men that they may see your good deeds and glorify your Father in heaven.” You are a light to someone and you are an example to someone. And the profile of a Christian is your channel, your Facebook, your face on the internet, your face at work, your face at home. You are the example of what a Christian is.

And if you are giving Christianity a black eye, you will be held accountable to setting up an example of a Christian in a false manner. You will be held responsible for your hypocrisy. That is why Jesus hated hypocrites more than sinners, more than people that the Pharisees thought …were sinners. Jesus was against the hypocrite. I remember when I was in high school, all four years I did track and field. And I wasn't always the best influence to my friends. However, there was a certain young man who came from a hard background, possibly gang related, that he joined our track team. And at that time, I was in a certain church and that high school student also started going to my church. And the best I could, I tried to be a good example to him. And again, I wasn't the best influence always when I was in high school, but I was trying to live my faith in a genuine way. And when that guy, his name was Daniel, saw me choose to do things that were moral, he took note of it even though he never told me. Some years later, my mom told me that she had a conversation with that guy's godfather, or the people that were taking care of him. And that kid Daniel had made a comment about me that really made me think. It was a blessing to me to encourage me in the right way. And Daniel had said something to the extent of, if you want to know what to do that's right, just look at Andy Tiner. And that meant a lot to me because it made me want to be a real profile of a Christian, someone that really stood up for Jesus. It made me want to do what was right more because I knew even though I didn't think people were watching me, people were watching me to see what a Christian was really all about. I had become the definition of what a Christian was. So if I was drinking alcohol, then it was okay for Christians to drink alcohol. If I was going to take part in theft, it was okay for Christians to sometimes steal. But if I stood against marijuana, if I stood against theft, if I stood against profanity, then that's what it meant to be a Christian to my classmates, to my peers, to those that were on the track team. And when I realized that, that made a huge difference for me.

And so what I am here to tell you today is you are that profile also of a Christian, either for good or for evil. Either you're a good example to your peers, to the people that live around you, or you're a bad example for Jesus. Because for some people, the only Christian they will see, for example they will see of Christ is you. Maybe you are the only good influence in their life. Or maybe you're the only one that claims to be a Christian in their life, but you're a poor example and you're basically making a black eye for Christianity. And if that's the case, you really need to shape up and repent so that you can start serving Jesus and being a good example. I want to read to you what Jesus said in regards to this, and what the profile of a true believer should be. And this is found in Luke chapter 6. So you can look at this with me. This is Luke chapter 6. And I'm going to start in verse 20.

20And he lifted up his eyes on his disciples, and said, Blessed be ye poor: for yours is the kingdom of God. 21 Blessed are ye that hunger now: for ye shall be filled. Blessed are ye that weep now: for ye shall laugh. 22 Blessed are ye, when men shall hate you, and when they shall separate you from their company, and shall reproach you, and cast out your name as evil, for the Son of man's sake. 23 Rejoice ye in that day, and leap for joy: for, behold, your reward is great in heaven: for in the like manner did their fathers unto the prophets. 24 But woe unto you that are rich! for ye have received your consolation. 25 Woe unto you that are full! for ye shall hunger. Woe unto you that laugh now! for ye shall mourn and weep. 26 Woe unto you, when all men shall speak well of you! for so did their fathers to the false prophets. 27 But I say unto you which hear, Love your enemies, do good to them which hate you, 28 Bless them that curse you, and pray for them which despitefully use you. 29 And unto him that smiteth thee on the one cheek offer also the other; and him that taketh away thy cloak forbid not to take thy coat also. 30 Give to every man that asketh of thee; and of him that taketh away thy goods ask them not again. 31 And as ye would that men should do to you, do ye also to them likewise. 32 For if ye love them which love you, what thank have ye? for sinners also love those that love them. 33 And if ye do good to them which do good to you, what thank have ye? for sinners also do even the same. 34 And if ye lend to them of whom ye hope to receive, what thank have ye? for sinners also lend to sinners, to receive as much again. 35 But love ye your enemies, and do good, and lend, hoping for nothing again; and your reward shall be great, and ye shall be the children of the Highest: for he is kind unto the unthankful and to the evil. 36 Be ye therefore merciful, as your Father also is merciful. 37 Judge not, and ye shall not be judged: condemn not, and ye shall not be condemned: forgive, and ye shall be forgiven: 38 Give, and it shall be given unto you; good measure, pressed down, and shaken together, and running over, shall men give into your bosom. For with the same measure that ye mete withal it shall be measured to you again.

These have to be the virtues we have as a Christian. This has to be our profile, doing good to others even if they are not doing good to us. Loving others even if they don't love us. Praying for our enemies, praying for those that speak evil of us, not returning evil for evil, but returning good even when people do evil to us. So think about Jesus' words here. Are you aligning with this gospel? Are you aligning with these words? Because this is what Jesus spoke. And if we are not aligning with this, this needs to become our new attitude. It needs to become the people who we are, not the people that we just think about that we want to be. But this is the profile of a Christian, a Christ follower.

So how can we become these people? We have to receive the Spirit of Jesus Christ. Now there are some people who receive a false spirit, a false spirit of giving that comes from manipulation. Or even a spirit of feeling that we need to give because an organization asked us to. So it's giving out of this compulsion of guilt rather than giving out of love. And there are some Christians that really think that they should always be physically poor because that's how they translate Luke chapter 6. David was not poor, he had money. Solomon was not poor, he had money. And a lot of the patriarchs had a lot of money. But what separates a good man from an evil man is if they are doing the will of Jesus Christ. And someone that is poor spiritually, meaning they realize they need God, they will cry out to the Lord, they will say, Lord I need more of your virtues, I need your salvation, I need your help. And if we are poor in spirit and we are asking the Lord for his virtues, that is the kind of person we need to be. Not the kind of person that says, I'm already good enough, I'm already wealthy enough, I don't need you, Lord. So that is why Jesus here in Luke says, blessed are the poor, blessed are those who hunger now. He's not talking about just being poor, not having an American dollar, or being physically hungry, but that we hunger for righteousness. And that we are poor in the manner that we are asking the Lord for our provision, not being filled with the things of the world. See a lot of people, a lot of Christians are full on religion. And they feel like they don't need anything. They're the ones that Jesus said that he didn't need to come for because they're already healthy, they're already rich. Jesus didn't come for the rich and the healthy, but he came for those that needed a physician, those that know that they're spiritually sick and need true repentance.

 So if you are truly seeking for the Lord, you will know that you need something from God. You won't be the kind of Christian that says, I don't need you Lord, I already have enough money, I already have enough spirituality, I have all of this figured out, I don't need you. If you really are a disciple of Jesus, you know that you need the Lord, and without him you are poor. So that needs to be our heart guys. We need to daily be coming before the Lord saying, Lord I can't do it on my own, without you I have nothing, I need you to fill me up, I need you to give me the true riches from heaven, that I will be spiritually rich in you, because you have blessed me with riches, but it's not me that have filled myself up with religion of the world, or just thoughts that I have from the Bible, or from a pastor at church, or something like that. We need to be gaining our wisdom and our love from heaven, from the Holy Spirit.

Now as you read through this, you will notice some things that a lot of Christians don't have. A lot of us just want to do good to those that do good for us, or we want to give to those that we know will give back. And Jesus says when you give, make sure you are giving to people that you know are not going to give back to you. When you are inviting guests over for dinner, do things that are good for people that can't repay you. Now in the world, you never do that. If you have a business, you make sure that you do business favors to clients that you know are going to give back to you, and it's all so that you will be able to build your business and your image in the world. Now with Jesus, it's a completely different kingdom. We're not supposed to be becoming anything in the world, but we're supposed to be becoming everything in Jesus Christ. Jesus has called His disciples out of the world to be separate from the world, so that we can serve Him in His kingdom. So either we're about our Father in Heaven's business, and working on this profile for Jesus being the people He wants us to become, or we're working on our profile and our image in the world, and doing something in the world.

As for me, I want to make sure that I'm nothing in this world. I'm not built up by this world. I'm not trying to become something that people respect in this world in the worldly sense, but that really I'm getting glory from God because He is giving me riches from Heaven, and giving me what I need to promote the gospel and to be a good example of what it means to be a Christian. The second verse, or verses that I wanted to look at, was Luke chapter 6 verse 43. So Jesus says this, starting in 43,

“43 For a good tree bringeth not forth corrupt fruit; neither doth a corrupt tree bring forth good fruit. 44 For every tree is known by his own fruit. For of thorns men do not gather figs, nor of a bramble bush gather they grapes. 45 A good man out of the good treasure of his heart bringeth forth that which is good; and an evil man out of the evil treasure of his heart bringeth forth that which is evil: for of the abundance of the heart his mouth speaketh.”

You know, a lot of Christians are focused on the world, and one day of the week on Sunday or on Wednesday they get together and they try, as they might, to be Christian. They try to uphold an image of Jesus one day a week, but as soon as they're out of the context of church they slip up, they start cussing, cursing, taking the Lord's name in vain. They start gossiping, speaking evil of others, and the reason why that is, is because they are literally bringing the evil out of the evil treasure of their heart. A good tree produces good fruit, but a bad tree produces bad fruit. And you can know each Christian's fruit by what they are saying. If a Christian is cursing, using profanity, taking the Lord's name in vain, gossiping, speaking evil jokes, talking about things that are pornographic, or just speaking about things that are worldly and nothing to do with the kingdom of God, you can know that they are an evil tree that is producing evil fruit.

We need to make sure that we are a profile of a true Christian, not the false Christians that just look Christian outwardly. We have to make sure that we are different. And we need to make sure that we separate ourselves from false Christianity, the sort of Christianity that says you can be a Christian one day a week, or you can just be part of a social club and be a Christian. Rather we need to be a Christian by our deeds. We truly need to be a good tree that has good fruit. A lot of Christians will say, you can't know my heart, brother. Only God can know my heart. But that's not what Jesus said. Jesus plainly says that you will know a tree by its fruit. And it's impossible to have bad fruit but a good heart. So if you know someone is producing bad fruit, that is coming from a bad tree.

If you realize today that you have bad fruit but you are calling yourself a Christian, evaluate your heart and repent of your sins. Repent and get right with Jesus that you may actually be salt and light and be a good testimony to people. Because again, how the world perceives a Christian is not going to be out of the Webster's dictionary. They are going to perceive a Christian defined by your life. You are the definition of a Christian. And so is that definition hypocritical? Does it mean you are a liar? Does it mean you don't keep your word? Does it mean you are actually hateful or bitter or you are very, you know, you are just short with people and you don't have love in your heart? Or do you truly represent what it means to be a Christian? When people think of a Christian, would they actually say your name and go, this person is a Christian? Would they bring you up in conversation as someone that is truly living for Jesus? Because if they wouldn't, maybe you are actually a bad tree with bad fruit. Maybe you have fallen from grace. Maybe you are straight up working for the devil.

A lot of Christians are working for the devil and they are just trying to appease God by giving tithe through a church, by listening to sermons, by reading their Bible. But we actually need to uphold what it means to be a Christian. Are you right with the Lord? Are you encouraging others to really live for the Lord? Well, I want to pray for you today, if you want your life right with Jesus Christ and if you want to be right with God, so that you yourself can be saved, that you can be edified but also that you can start edifying others and bringing people into the true church.

 “Lord Jesus, I pray for my fellow brothers and sisters. I pray that someone truly repents of their sin and that they come into the light of your truth, that they stop playing the hypocrite, that they would not be a bad example of a Christian but that they could start acting in a way that the world around them knows that they are different. So I pray that people can break the chains of addiction and false religion, hypocrisy, all the sins that are in this world and that we could be severed from ungodliness, that we could cleave to you, that we could be filled by your Holy Spirit and truly be a temple of the Most High Living God. I pray that you indwell us and that we could live without the leaven of hypocrisy and that we could do good work for you Lord. I pray that you bless your children, that they could get their eyes set on you and off of other brothers and sisters and what other people are doing and what other people are saying, that they could stop seeking people for counsel and that they would start praying out of the sincerity of their heart in the quiet place and waiting on you Lord to hear from you, that they may hear your voice, that they would hear your word and then obey you. In your name I pray Lord Jesus, Amen.”

 If you're hearing this message today and you know that you're not right with God, maybe you're wondering, will God hear my prayers if I'm a sinner? The answer to that is yes. God will hear your prayers even if you're a sinner, even if you have not repented yet, if you desire repentance. God came for the sinner. He sent His Son for you. Jesus wasn't sent for the righteous but for those who are poor of heart, just like you, that know your prayers have not been answered, that know that you have made mistakes, that you have offended God, that you have offended the children of God and that you need a new life, that you need to be regenerated. Jesus is for you and He will hear your prayers and answer you if you have a contrite heart, if you have a humble heart before Him to say, “Lord please save me from my sins, please cleanse me from my unrighteousness and please come into my heart.” If you can pray this simple prayer as a child, the Spirit of God will come into you, He will cleanse your heart, He will purify you from your unrighteousness, He will give you a new mind and a new heart, He will regenerate you that then you can come alive and be a true son or daughter of the Kingdom of God. So I pray for you that you can really repent and enter into God's Kingdom. None of us know how much time we have left. We don't know when Jesus is going to return, when we're going to die and have to stand before God. And so we need to make sure that we get our lives in order today. May the grace of Jesus be with you.

Don't Support Hollywood, Disney Etc...

 

Don't Support Hollywood, Disney Etc...

I was thinking while I was praying the other day about how a lot of people on YouTube when we're watching their videos and watching their content or subscribing to their channel those people or that channel producer sees us as one of their followers. You're one of their numbers. And the same is true for Hollywood or Disney or whatever organization is putting out content. Even if you think you don't agree with that publisher, with that that person, that person sees you as someone who is donating to their cause. You're giving your money to them. Your eyes are on them. And they love that.  Even if you don't agree with everything they put out, you are still one of their followers. And it's crazy to me how Christians will say “we're against idolatry” “we’re against abortion” “we’re against homosexuality”. They're against all these things Yet they will willfully pay for all the movie actors to promote all this garbage in Hollywood and in all the movies that they're watching. These Christians will not commit these atrocities themselves outwardly because they want to look good in church. 

But they're willing to pay their good money at the movie theatre to watch movie actors rape people, kill people, and do all these wicked things in these comedies and in these murder mysteries and in all of these violent movies that come out. And Christians are addicted to this junk, they love it, they are totally into this fantasy. And all of these movie actors and all of the producers know that even these Christians they have control over their minds because they are part of their number.

Now I don't consider any of you that watch my videos my followers.  I don't make followers of myself. I make followers of Jesus Christ. I don't have any followers. I point people to Jesus to follow Him. And if you're not here today to want to follow Jesus, then there's a bazillion other channels on YouTube that you could be following. But I'm not here to promote myself. I'm not here to promote other people. I'm here to promote the kingdom of God that people will come into a relationship with Jesus Christ and be saved.

Too many people are promoting wickedness. They love just entertainment That is why you see all these videos with millions if not billions of views and it's the most ridiculous stuff. It's because people love to be entertained by nonsense. But Jesus Christ is not nonsense, He has the words of everlasting life, and if we put our faith in Him we will be saved and lifted up on the last day.

Too many Christians are deceived by all of this garbage on the internet, on the TV, with Hollywood, with Disney.  We know guys right from wrong, so why are we choosing wrong daily, why are we paying money to see all of this hatred of God, and laughing at the things that God despises?

In case you did forget right from wrong, I want to read to you what the Apostle Paul writes about this in Galatians chapter 5. I'm going to start in verse 16. “I say then, walk in the Spirit, and you shall not fulfill the lust of the flesh. For the flesh lusts against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh. And these are contrary to one another, so that you do not do the things that you wish.” See, you wish to be holy and righteous, you wish to follow God, but you also want to see that movie that came out. So instead of being holy and pure, you go and see that comedy, and it mocks God, it blasphemes God's name. There's sexual perversion in it. And suddenly you're doing things that you wish not.

“But if you are led by the Spirit you are not under the law”. Of Course you're not under the law because you're being led by the Spirit of God which would not lead you  against the law or against His truth. “Now the works of the flesh are evident which are adultery”, which is sex outside of marriage with your wife or your husband, “fornication”, which is having sex with someone and not being married at all, “uncleanness, lewdness, idolatry, sorcery”, which is drugs, “hatred, contentions, jealousies, outbursts of wrath, selfish ambition, dissensions, heresies, envy, murders, drunkenness, revelries”, which are wild parties, and the like, “of which I tell you beforehand, just as I told you in a time past, that those who practice such things will not inherit the kingdom of God”.

Well that just sums up pretty much all of Hollywood, Disney, all of the TV, everything that you see on the television. If you are part of these things, even if you call yourself a Christian, you will not inherit  the Kingdom of God. “But the fruit of this Spirit is love, joy, peace, long suffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. Against such there is no law. And those who are Christ's have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. If we live in the Spirit, let us also walk in the Spirit. Let us not become conceited, provoking one another, envying one other.” We have to be separate from the world, from ungodliness, from all of this junk that is on the TV and on the internet.  This will pollute your children; it will pollute your heart. You will be eliminated from the race of the righteous if you allow this into your life.

I encourage you as your brother in the Lord to repent of this if this has captivated your ears and your eyes. Take your children away from the TV. Take them away from the cell phone. Get yourself away from anything that is perverted. Any of these producers that are following the devil, most all of them are, and they think, and they know that you are their disciple if you are watching their content. Don't watch them. Get your eyes on Jesus Christ. Be holy. Stick with Him and do what is right, otherwise you're going to be eliminated from the Kingdom of God. May the grace of Jesus be with you.   

Repent of Sexual Immorality

 

Repent of Sexual Immorality

Well, one big problem in the American church today is sexual sin. And that manifests in many different ways, whether it's broken marriages, divorce, just lustful hearts of men and women, pornography. This sort of thing totally destroys people's lives. People end up dead over this. I want to encourage you that you need to actually repent of this sin. Most men are addicted to pornography. And if they're not addicted to porn, they can't control their thoughts whenever they see a woman. Later they lust over the woman that they saw, they can't push out these thoughts because they haven't learned to cast out demons. They haven't learned to take control of every thought. But as disciples of Jesus, we have to have the fruit of the Holy Spirit in our life. Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.

Maybe most of those you could imagine yourself having until you get to self-control and then you realize, I don't have the fruit of the Holy Spirit if self-control is not manifesting in my life. See, if you cannot cast out evil thoughts, lustful thoughts, hateful thoughts, then you will be given over to all these sins. Whenever a devil tries to tempt you through a woman, through pornography, through AI technology that's also manifesting as these demons of lust, you won't be able to control yourself. You'll just be led away by this demon of lust. You have to overcome in Jesus' name if you want to be part of those that enter into the Kingdom of God. I want to read to you what Jesus said in Matthew chapter 5. “You have heard that it was said to those of old, you shall not commit adultery. And I say to you that whoever looks at a woman to lust for her has already committed adultery with her in his heart.” I know there are some men who disagree with this. They say, “I don't really have an intent to have sex with all these people. I just like to look.” And they try to equate it with artwork or something like that, but they are deceiving their own hearts. They are perverted in their hearts and instead of cleaning their hearts inwardly, they're trying to just look like good Christians on the outside, but inwardly they are very lustful. Lust will take us to hell. This is a grievous sin to the Holy Spirit. And if we don't repent, we are in serious trouble.

“If your right eye causes you to sin, pluck it out and cast it from you, for it is more profitable for you that one of your members perish than for your whole body to be cast into hell.” Think with me what this means. Are we to actually pluck out our eyes? If that were true, pretty much all men would be missing an eye or two. So Jesus isn't meaning to literally pluck out your eye, but we should take very seriously our life with Jesus. And if anything is causing us to sin, we need to get that out of our life.

I know there are some people who think that practicing a good diet means putting cookies on the table and resisting those cookies. And they think that by resisting something that is in front of them, they get better at resisting certain foods. This is actually not true when it comes to sexual immorality. You can't be around people who are promiscuous and be looking at them and keeping yourself sexually pure. You have to learn to avoid places, avoid things that will cause you to stumble and sin. One important thing is staying away from people and staying away from things that you know cause you to sin. But then secondly, you have to go a step farther than that and learn how to take control of your thoughts. Because what will happen is, inevitably someone at your school, at your workplace, in your city, you'll just see a billboard, something will cause you to start to stumble up into sin. And at that moment, especially later guys, the devil will come back with that same temptation to cause you to sin in your mind. He will make you or try to make you lust about an image that you saw earlier in your day.

And at that moment you have a why in the road to choose good or evil. Do you fall into lust? Do you choose to listen to those lustful thoughts? Or do you rebuke Satan in the name of Jesus and cast him out of your mind so that you can keep your mind and your heart pure before God? If you learn how to cast the devil out, then you learn how to cast your evil eye out and cast an evil ear out. That is what we need to learn to do. And anything that is causing us to fall into sin, we need to eliminate those things out of our life. A lot of us have people in our life that we do not need in our life. Of course, you need your husband or your wife, your children, those people are in your life. But a lot of people allow friends into their life that have no business being in their life. Or they allow other co-workers into their life that have no business being in their life.

So make sure that you are figuring out who is important in your life, that you need in your life, and eliminating the people that are causing you to sin that you should have no business with in the first place. So be serious to pluck out your eye, your spiritual eye, the eye that is bad, so that you can have eyes of righteousness and ears of righteousness. That's why Jesus says, “if your right eye causes you to sin, pluck it out and cast it from you. And if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and cast it from you, for it is more profitable for you that one of your members perish, than for your whole body to be cast into hell.” This sin leads people to hell all the time. I don't know how many times I was in church, and men in church would be acting as someone that is holy and pure, but I knew because I was working there, that these guys were addicted to porn, they were committing adultery with someone else, even though they were married. They were doing things that were very evil. And these things break up marriages, they destroy people. And most likely you will wind up dead. People commit suicide over this. All sorts of bad things come out of adultery. We have to figure out how to keep ourselves separate and our bodies pure for the Holy Spirit.

Paul even says that this sort of sin is a sin against our own bodies. Now obviously there are other sins against our own bodies, such as alcoholism, drugs that are entering into your body, of course suicide is against one's own body. However sexual immorality is against the body that God put together. See, with marriage God made it as a holy matrimony between two people. And those two people become one flesh. And you become united physically, but also spiritually. You should, if you are with Jesus Christ, be united by His Holy Spirit and connected to the body of Christ. But what happens when you sin sexually is you are sinning against the body of Christ and you are sinning against yourself and another person that is connected, that should be connected to the Spirit of God. It is a unique sin that leads more than one person to hell. And we need to be very careful to keep our eyes on the Spirit of God and get our eyes off of everything that is evil.

Too many men are addicted to porn on their phone. They are very lustful and instead of truly repenting of these things, they are trying to appease God by outward good deeds. Make sure that you come clean. Confess your sins. Repent of your sins. Talk to Jesus about this. Ask Him to purify your heart. Have a brother or sister pray for you. But you need to overcome this sin. If you don't, it will take you to hell.

“Lord Jesus, I pray for the body of Christ. I pray for those who are stumbling in sin and addiction and pornography and all of these sorts of sins that are leading people to hell. I pray that in Your name You can set a brother or sister free, that they can confess their sins and truly repent and be made sober and that they would be made pure and that they would put on their white robes, that they would be holy and righteous for You, walking in the newness of life. I pray that You restore people who have fallen and started to backslide. I pray that they can come back into the household of faith and stop polluting their body or polluting others. I pray that anyone who is listening today can be encouraged to truly repent of any sexual sin and anything that is taking them to hell. I pray in Your name, Lord Jesus, for sanctification of Your church. We pray that we are able to cast out demons in Your name and that we would keep our minds and our hearts pure, that we could be holy vessels to be used by Your Holy Spirit. I pray this in Your name, Lord Jesus, Amen.’