Pete McKenzie 0:02
Well, thanks for finding this place today, guys. You gotta want it bad. And we do want the fellowship that we get here in the mornings and the worship and the getting to see guys. It’s really what it’s all about. And you know, we finished up that series on the five goals that we have in the wheel illustration. And Jesus is Lord of our life and going over each one of those God’s words a final authority in my life, I’m committed man of prayer. I’m linking together with like minded men, and I’m giving it away. And then we have the rim of the wheel, we talked about obedience. I’m going to start a new series, and it’s called Kingdom living. And we’re going to be looking at the Sermon on the Mount. You know, Rocky Fleming made the comment. He said, You know, there’s a lot more to God than we’ve gotten to yet. Can I get an amen from the congregation? You know, as I look around the room, I see a lot of mature guys, I see guys that have been in church a long time. You’ve been Christians a long time for the most of us. We’ve heard 1000 sermons, we’ve been to workshops and retreats, and Malibu’s and we’ve gone to marriage classes, read books, heard podcasts, listen to the preachers on Sunday. And still, there’s a lot to God that we haven’t gotten to yet. It’s a lifelong process is following Christ and being his disciple. And it’ll never end until we get to heaven. we all strive and strive to be perfect, because he is perfect, but it’s an unattainable goal here and on Earth. But you know, we need to be reminded every day and I get a chance to remind you every week of who we are, and why we’re here and where we’re going and how we’re going to get there.

So, you know, I was asking the Lord, and I happened to be asking him after I’d watched some news, which I hardly ever do, and I swore off of it again after that. But it made me hate my enemies. And so I looked at it up in the Sermon on the Mount, where Jesus was talking about that. Because you know, what he’s doing is he’s constantly calling me up higher, to live a life that he died on a cross to give me. One of the things that he did, wouldn’t teach it on the Sermon on the Mount and didn’t did it. It goes against all logic, our sense of fairness, all worldly wisdom, in ways and right practices. The sermon on the mount is talking about a new kingdom. And that’s what Jesus came to give. If you ask him why he came, it’s a I came to introduce people to a new kingdom. It’s the kingdom of God. And that’s what john the baptist preached. And that’s what Jesus preached. And they were preaching a message of repentance. They were preaching the gospel message. And that’s the message I need to hear all the time and be reminded and be grateful. I’m thankful for that I have in Christ, all that he’s done for me. And john 15, he was talking to his disciples, and they, they understood the whole process and hierarchy of, I’ve got a guru, and I’m his disciple, and I’m his follower. And the whole point of following the Guru is to listen to him teach and watch him live his life and become just like him, and have a strong family resistance to their father in heaven. And so Jesus told his disciples in john 1513, he said, Greater love has no man than this, and he would lay his life down for his friend. I have called you friends. You’re no longer servants, but friends. You know, what these young man had been taught all their life in Torah school, and all that they were taught about the Pharisees. They’ve been taught Well, I’ll get to that in a minute. Now, I want to make a few more introductory comments. Peter said, I’ll lay my life down for your sake. Jesus, I’ve been telling them and I’m going to go to Jerusalem and they’re gonna arrest me and beat me and mocked me and spit on me and humiliate me strict medicine stripped me naked and hang me on a cross and they said, Peter goes, I’m not gonna let that happen. I’ll lay my life down for you. And you know, Peter minute. And I’d like to be able to say things like that I lay my life down for you. I really believe I would for my wife. I believe I would for My children but well I for Jesus Christ. And what does that mean anyway? That I’m going to lay my life down for you? Well, Peter had a sense of the heroic magnificence. You know, something like I’m going to be a martyr, I will always stand by you and be loyal to you. And that’s what we say in our wedding vows in that I’ll be there through good times, and bad and rich times in poorer in sickness and in health, I’ll be faithful here. Well, those are the kinds of things that we say. And we really mean him when we say him, but living them out is a whole different ballgame, a man actually being that guy that’s going to be there in good times, and especially in bad and rich times. And how about those poor times, and those healthy times? But how about those sick times, and we got a lifetime of living with our wives and children. And living as faithful dads that they can depend on that they can write poems about. The sense of our duty is, is what most of us respond to, I have a duty to do this. And you know, when we’re following Christ, or you’re following someone, you have a officer and your army, or coach that you played for. And I can remember the coach who we played for when I was growing up, and I had him as a coach from time I was 11 years old until I went to college. And I would have had him for a year in college if I had gone to Florida State because he left our high school and took an assistant coaching job at Florida State. But I learned a lot from him. And he gave me a lot of truth. He gave me a little bit of grace. But he gave me a lot of truth. And he taught me a lot. He told me

not to get picked off you remember when almost got picked off in a game he had sent me into pinch Ron for a catcher that just got to hit and we were late innings in a close game. And he sent me in I was just 15. And they were most of the guys on the team right Team 1718 years old. And now I’m getting to play much but I went into pinch Ron for the catcher when he got on first base. And the guy tried to pick me off almost got me a matter of fact, it was so close, we got a call it out just as well as he did say it but he called me say and then I was brushing the dirt off and I looked up and there was a guy trotting out of the dugout. And he sent a pinch runner in for the pinch runner. It was 17,000 people there. Of course, I wasn’t embarrassed trotting back to the dugout.

But those are the kinds of lessons that we learn as we’re going. We’re going through life.

And Oswald Chambers said this, it’s far easier to die physically than to lay down my life every day, out of the sense of his high calling on my life. In other words, he’s saying it’d be easier for you to just say I just want to die, and now die for Christ. And many people have done that. But he says it’s a lot harder for me to live every day fulfilling vows and promises living the life that Jesus Christ came to give me. That’s a lot tougher assignment takes a lot of patience. It takes a lot of commitment. And he says we’re not made for the brilliant moments, but we have to walk every day in light of them. For 33 years, Jesus laid out his life to do the will of the Father and john says, We ought to lay our lives down for the brethren. But it’s contrary to human nature to do. If I am a friend of Jesus, I must deliberately and carefully lay down my life for him. It’s difficult. And thank God it is difficult. Salvation is easy, because it costs God so much but the living it out every day. And that’s what Paul said over in Philippians two, the philippian church. He says work out your salvation with fear and trembling.

God saves a man and gives him the Holy Spirit and then says to him in effect. Now work it out. be loyal to me. While the nature of all things around me would tell me to be disloyal. Jesus has called us as friends. Stand loyal to your friend and remember That his honor is at stake in your bodily life.

You know, if you look in the Sermon on the Mount in Matthew five, what you find is where Jesus was teaching this saying and and tell you the truth, or as we’re crossing, when they heard this says, Just let me read it you have to you have heard it said, that your love your neighbor and hate your enemy. But I say to you, love your enemies. bless those who curse you. do good to them that hate you, and pray for them who despitefully use you, and persecute you. Why, so that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven. For he causes his son to rise on the evil in the good and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. For if you love those who love you What reward is, do not even tax gatherers do the same. If you agreed only your brothers, what more are you doing than others? Do not even Gentiles do the same? therefore your to be perfect as your Father in heaven is perfect. So basically, Jesus is saying something that they were awestruck, I don’t think they even knew what to say or how to respond when he was teaching this. Because the Pharisees had taught that you love your neighbor and hate your enemy, and they define neighbor as Israelites. And everybody else was their enemy. So your neighbors Israelites, and they had a hard time getting along together, not to mention hate now everybody else it wasn’t it. So if you weren’t an Israelite, they hated you. And they, they justified it. But you can’t find anything in the Old Testament scriptures that link those two together that ever says, Love your enemies. Love your neighbor and hate your enemies. It’s just not there. What they did is I took a judicial thing where it’s God when he God was talking about it. And then in purgatory Psalms, where David is having all these evil, people come in against him. And these Collin fire down from heaven and asking God to judge them and to drop their crop, stop the rain and drop their crops and all the things that he prayed. It was it was a national thing. It was a judicial thing. It wasn’t a personal thing. And what the Pharisees did is they took it personally, David meant it for the glory of God judges people for Your glory, for the glory of the church. And that Pharisees took it it made it a personal thing, that now we get to and they were justifying hate and their enemies doing that. But I say to you love your enemies and bless those who curse you. The Pharisees said that neighbor was an Israelite even though the Pharisees tried to justify this teaching by the Old Testament. These two statements are not found anywhere in the Old Testament. The Psalmist is always referring to God’s church and for God’s glory. He was judicial, judging people for their sins. It was the honor of God that he was concerned about. So they deliberately destroyed the principle of God’s law, which is the great principle of God’s love. You know, my testimony about my dad is my dad was a country boy from Parish, Alabama, which is up in the hills of North Alabama. His dad died, his mom died when he was pretty young, his dad remarried. He cannot live grew up living with half brothers and step brothers and sisters. He played football in high school and had an opportunity to go to University of Alabama but by the will of God he didn’t and play football. But he didn’t even have enough money to go to college and on a scholarship. So he took the job with the Alabama power company and he worked for them for over 50 years till he retired. In the main while married mom and dad not me and my older brother. My dad was an alcoholic. He wasn’t a full blown raging alcoholic or anything like that. He was kind of a when I was growing up, it was more of a binge alcoholic. He might go two or three months without drinking and then he’d go on a tear and up on the couch in the den and have to sleep it off and where let it wear off for a week it take a week off work. But you know, my dad loved me. My dad would grab me by the leg when we’re riding in the car and go Let me show you how the horse eats corn. I’d be wiggling around. He grabbed me by the ear lobe and it said and finally one day I said dad that’s irritating. I want you to quit doing that. He said Don’t you know what that means said, Why means I love you when I do that.

So I never had a problem with dad tugging on my ear lobe anymore after that. When I was a teenager and starting to go out on dates, he had always asked me that, in a way, he didn’t have a lot of money. I can remember mom and dad one night when I heard some talk, and I crawled out of bed. And I was listening to what they were talking about. And they were talking about, she had four sisters and three brothers. Some of them are pretty successful and wealthy. And they were talking about which one they’re going to ask if they can borrow some money to pay the back rent on our apartment. So we didn’t have a lot of money, but dad worked real hard, and mom got some jobs, and we did better and later high school and college years. But you know, I told my dad one time and I wrote him a poem to I read it at the memorial service for him. But I told him in that, I don’t think I told him in the poem, but I tell I wrote about him dead. If you are drunk, and we’re sitting and I was sitting in the floor with your head in my lap, and everybody that I wanted to think well of me was surrounding us. I couldn’t be more proud of you. Love covers a multitude of sin. And my dad loved me. The Pharisees were kicking that under the bus. They were stopping it on the curb. They were violating God’s great principle of love. Love covers a multitude of sins. And I want to thank my dad. I don’t think of him being an alcoholic. I think of him loving me. Tell, you know, my air coming into all my ballgames. He worked out of town all week and come home on the weekends. And I remember playing basketball in high school and I’d be standing there. It midcourt was somebody shooting free throws, and I’d keep my eye on that door to see when he had come through the door to my game. He went to every game I ever played that if he was in town, mom carried us all over and wheel the car, fell a little lagers and take us to games. So that’s the kind of stuff I remember about dad. And what the Pharisees were doing is they were trying to trample under the kind of grace and compassion and love that God had for his children. And they made it legalistic and they turned it into hate, and bitterness and resentment, and spit known people. They felt that way about tax gatherers, they felt that way about anybody that one Jew, and they were wrong. And it caused a lot of misery in their life that caused a lot of fear. And that’s what it does. If you don’t have love, and you have Hate, hate is a terrible thing. It’ll kill you, physically kill you. It’s a burden that you don’t want to have to carry around. And we spend a lot of time trying to help men and girls. And great as a grown up to be grown men and women to still get over the wounds they have from their fathers. They get over the ones they have from their mothers, the ones that are supposed to love us and care for us and take care of us and encourage us and build us up. And they didn’t do it. And God was there all along. in every circumstance. If you read Psalm 139. He was making the difference and he makes a difference in her life today. Now you have to let him make a difference. And you have to acknowledge that difference because your mom or dad may have passed away without you ever getting things straight. ever find it in your heart to forgive them. To love them anyway. To sit to pray for them. And say Father, forgive them. They didn’t know what they were doing. Your dad’s dad probably didn’t love him. His dad probably didn’t love him the way he needed to be loved. And it’s generational sometimes. But you know, we get over all that’s those things in Christ. He comes he comes with his son and he has rain on the just in the dunk ninja so righteous and the unrighteous. So you got unrighteous guy over here and it’s rain and sunshine on his crops and they’re growing and you have a righteous cow over here and there’s rain and sunshine on his crops and they’re growing. And sometimes the this guy the unrighteous guy gets the rain and the righteous sky. unrighteous guy doesn’t get it. And then the righteous guy, unrighteous guy won’t share his water with him. And he won’t take care of him and he sees him as an enemy and so he withholds doing good. And that’s why life is if you want enemies, she has plenty of reasons and why As in times to get them in plenty of opportunities. So

they believe it’s working, there we go. If you agreed only your brothers, what more do you do and then that if you love Only those who love you, what good is that even tax gatherers do that. So what Jesus was doing is he was calling me and you up to a higher lifestyle in this new kingdom. They all things are passed away, we have a whole new ballgame now. And that new ball game requires us going up higher. And what does that mean? That means that I got to come closer. And Jesus described that in john 15, two, he said, If you abide in Me and my word abides in you, if you don’t, then if you come after me, he must deny yourself, take up your crops every day and follow me. And so it takes self denial to go up higher, you have to be done with yourself. You’ve heard it said before that you need to have tough skin and a tender heart instead of a sensitive skin to easily offended, easily hurt, easily wounded. And so Jesus was not easily wounded because he knew what was in the heart of man. It says Scripture says that he had people promising all the time, like Peter, I’ll lay my life down for you. But when it came down to doing it, Peter ran off and betrayed him and denied him three times. But he never was angry with Peter or he didn’t get resentful. He didn’t say I knew you would let me down. He never did any of that. is a God of mercy and grace and loving kindness and compassion. He’s gentle, and tender. And understanding. He accepts us away we are. So when when my dad, if and when my dad or your dad let you down. They don’t know what they’re doing. Forgive them that Father, they don’t know what they’re doing. They’ve been hurt and wounded themselves. And you start seeing life from God’s point of view. And you started watching and looking at people from God’s point of view. And God says give them grace. Do they need the truth? Yeah, sometimes. But if you’re giving them more truth than they’re asking for or ready for and you’re not giving them grace, you’re gonna have a problem. Give them counsel when they ask for counsel. Give them counsel when they’re open to counsel. But if they’re not open, don’t be throwing your pearls before swine. The Scripture says, just love them. The understanding of them, look for opportunities to serve them, that’s the new kingdom living. You don’t you love your enemies and those who persecute you, and you do good to them. When they’ve done bad to you, you do good to them. And that’s a higher up living. But to do that I have to deny myself, I have to tell myself that you’re dead to your you’re going to be dead to your own ability to be offended and hurt. Do you take it also personal because when you take everything personal, you’re going to get bitter and angry and resentful. You’re going to have pity parties. And that’s the way it takes you and that’s a road you go down. And God wants us to be free. And how do you be free by loving your enemies instead of hating and resenting and being bitter toward them? That’s a heavy burden to carry. And when Jesus says come to me all you who are weary and heavy laden, what do you think he was talking about? He wasn’t talking about guys has been working construction and lay in bricks in both flooring and they get worked up sweat and worked hard all day, although he they need rest is people that care around hate and bitterness and resentment, revenge. That’s a heavy burden. And it tears us down physically, and it certainly destroys our spiritual life. It’s so difficult to go to a prayer meeting when you just hate people. But to get over that, rather than go to Christ and repent, what we do is we justify and rationalize that. We get a resentment bank. And because that resentment bank is full of resentments things they’ve done, they’re actually guilty of it. It’s not like I misunderstood their comment, or the thing they did or did didn’t do. It’s all in my resentment bank so I can justify it. Because it’s so out there. I rationalize it. It’s okay to feel this way. It’s okay to hate them. So you just follow the fair Sacco legalistic rules of law. They deserve it.

But then you’ve if you’ve think you’re a Christian, and you’ve said that you’re a Christian and a follower of Christ, and you don’t acknowledge that this is sin, In your heart, that my bitterness and my anger is sin. And if it sin, then you need to repent. You need to ask forgiveness, you need to start doing good and looking for opportunities to serve those who despitefully use you who have, who have cheated you who have broken into your house and stoled your stuff and violated you. And that seems like too much to ask until you go to the cross, until you realize it not just all our centers, I’m a center. And I deserve to go to hell. I heard a recording, it was a 17 second recording the other day. And in that 30 years ago, the Russians tried to drill down to the center of the earth and they drilled with a drill seven and a half miles down into the core there. And then they broke through a chasm. In for 17 seconds before the microphone burned up. It called nothing but shrieks and crying and yelling, the most horrible things you could ever hear. And so you get the idea that matter broken into hell. Where I deserve to be. If I’m judged on my merit, I deserve to be in hell. I’m judged by my spirit, heart and attitude that’s fallen and sinful, insensitive and easily wounded, and wants revenge, and sarcastic and critical spirit, and contempt, and all those things that go along with it, then I deserve to go to hell. I can’t be good enough, I can’t keep the rules enough to get myself into heaven. So what I deserve is hail. And until I understand that what I deserve is hail. I’m not going to be a patient with you. But I think I deserve heaven. And I’ve worked hard and I’ve been a good boy. And I’ve given and I’ve served and that’s going to get me into heaven. I’m not going to be patient with you. Matter of fact, I’m going to judge you because you’re not doing as much as I’m doing. You’re not laying off the drinking or the smoking or the chewing or the profanity or the jokes. They still are filtered and salted in. So I’m going to judge you for that rather than pray for you rather than encourage you. Because judging if you want to judge them, are they guilty? Yeah, they’re guilty. The word God say, love those people that persecute you, that have attacked you. You need to start with your wife, and your children. And you can’t do anything right now about their heart towards you unless you know what you’ve done and you guilty and you need to go back and ask forgiveness and make it right the best you can. Maybe you can maybe you can maybe they’ll forgive you, maybe they won’t. But it’s up to me and you to go back and make it right if we know we’ve been wrong, and name our sin and ask forgiveness and hope that God will mend the relationship. And I mean, if it’s just a small thing, and they’ve they’ve there, they’ve got a wheelbarrow full of stuff they’ve done they need to ask forgiveness are but that’s not your business has trained them and God, your business is to take care of that one thing you got in your world, there are two or three. And that’s why God has called us to be and if you don’t do that, what good are you? Here’s an opportunity to go back and give grace where they’ve not given Grace is an opportunity to do good when they don’t wish your well. Here’s an opportunity to come up higher and live a lifestyle that the world takes notice of. And he goes ahead in this passage and says if they slap you on one cheek volunteer to turn the other cheek if they forced you to go one mile volunteer to go to. And we’ve talked about this before, but we need to be reminded that God calls us up to a higher place. And when I go that first mile I’m that’s a law. That’s what I have to do that. But when I volunteer to go to they don’t Well, they wonder what I’m all about. Why would you ever do that? That’s unusual. I have never had anybody volunteer to go the second mile. And I just slapped you on one cheek and you just turn the other? How could you do that? Most people feel the room for uppercuts. They curse they say I’ll get even but you didn’t do that. You turn the other cheek. Why would you do that? For the sake of my father in heaven so that you know that I’m a son of My Father in heaven. And when I slapped him on the cheek, he turned the other cheek. When I spit on him he did not curse me in return.

And when I put nails in his hands, he prayed for me and said Father forgive him. And when I jam the thorns on his head, it nothing Not enough, none of this teaching in the kingdom of loving your enemies is never going to make sense if you don’t go to the cross, if you don’t see yourself putting the nails in his feet in his hands, is the one that was Romans one those Jews, it was me driving the nail in his feet. It was me driving the nails in his hands. He was me sticking the sword in his side. And if I can’t get to that place, I’m never gonna love my enemies. because that’ll crush me. If I really own that, I really understand that it was my sin that nailed Him to the cross. He did it for me, so I wouldn’t have to carry around hate and bitterness. I could love those who don’t love me. He called me up to set me free. And this is a truth that sets men free. It’s the truth who can live and have peace in that peace that surpasses all comprehension, that grace, that patience and goodness and gentleness. Back in the GOP, I love people. I don’t just have to be arrows and that doesn’t last or phileo friendships and that doesn’t last. I can have a gap a love for people. Unconditional Love Love that can leap over any building or any offense or any wound. I don’t have to be wounded. I don’t have to be hurt. I don’t have to be insensitive. Are they wrong? Did they hurt me? Yes. How am I going to receive that? How will I respond? And if you’re not abiding in Christ, and if you’re not going to the cross, if you’re not spending time in his presence, if you’re not a real man of prayer, if you’re not hanging around with guys that are seeking to live higher lifestyles, higher meaning Holy Christ, like their life does. Jesus said you’re the salt of the earth, the the light of the world, let your light shine before men in such a way that they all see your good works and glorify your Father in heaven. What are your good work, so they start teaching them out there in the Sermon on the Mount and he started with this. You’ve heard it said you could hate your enemies in love your neighbor. And Jesus says, but I say that’s not Kingdom living. That’s just the opposite. And that’s why one at one time he looked at the Pharisees and says, your of your father, the devil and your desires to do His will. And every time you open your mouth, all you can do is lie because that’s your native language. You’re a brood of vipers. And then the chosen the other night they john the baptist was talking and Jesus was talking to him and he says that brood of vipers got man that was classic. He says, You know what a viper. He says, don’t use it. Yeah, they’re they threw their mother’s stomach to be born, and they kill their mother in the process. And you call them a brood of vipers. You’re going to be nice to those guys or not. And so Jesus saw them they were trampling underfoot this lifestyle that he came to give us the Pharisees were just tearing it apart. And Jesus called them a brood of vipers, set my people free. Let them be free from all this hurt and bitterness and anger and resentment. You don’t need to live that kind of life. Jesus came to give us another life a higher life, more fruitful life, a peaceful life where our hearts are at ease before him. And he gives us power the Holy Spirit when the Spirit is come upon you you’ll receive power to do this and live this kind of life. And people will want what you’ve got. And what do we got, we got Jesus Christ. We have the Holy Spirit. We have Father God. We have a father, our earthly father may not have been the perfect guy I’ve yet to meet that guy. But we can still honor them and love them, we can still have a heart of respect for them when they’re not even respectful. We can still choose to do that. We get to choose how we live the decisions we make what we let in our heart and what we don’t. And we’re gonna let a lot of selfish sayings go in our heart. We’re going to get hurt, we’re gonna get wounded. We want to get even will but gossip and slander and

we do that stuff. But we also need to ask forgiveness and keep our conscience before God clean and clear. When you say Lord, I feel this way and I’m hurt. And I don’t want to be hurt and I don’t want to hate him. Would you change my heart? Oh God, make it ever true. Change my heart. Oh god. Make up like you. These are the lifestyles you go to church every Sunday you go to Bible study, you count a men’s group, you go to harvest Crusade, you listen to Christian music, and the world is not impressed. They don’t care. Go, that’s a stupid thing to do anyway. But you turn the other cheek, go the second mile, pay their debt for them. They owe you money, you give it to him, don’t loan it to him. You don’t give it to him at high interest rate you if they ever need give it to them. If they have to haven’t paid you back, forgive them. Love them anyway. They expect you to co shoulder him to feel different around him and you’re giving him a hug and greeting them when you see him. They don’t understand that. And have gone to church in Luton, our Bibles and come into men’s group and come into prayer group doesn’t change our life and we’re not living our lifestyles and what’s wrong? Are they the 10 suggestions? Are they the 10 commandments. So that’s what God wants to know. It doesn’t make any difference if we’re not living the life. And God has called us up higher. So what are we going to do and the turmoil and the chaos and the craziness that’s going on today we’re going to live higher lives. We’re going to bless those who persecute us. We’re going to pray for our enemies, we’re going to crawl through our own blood kiss defeater, the guy that beat us and hate and hates us. Father, I just pray right now that in my own heart, as I’m sharing this with these men, I get convicted. Because there are people in my life that I just don’t want to pray for. I want to I want to be like the Sons of Thunder and call fire down from heaven. But that’s not who you are. And that’s not who you created me to be. And that’s not what you want me to do it pray. What you want me to do is humble myself and ask forgiveness. And so father I do.

If there’s anything we men need, Lord, it’s humility before you and before each other. We need to make peace reality that apart from you, we can’t do any of this. But you’ve called us to live our lifestyles as fathers as husbands, his friends, his employees and employers. His guys on the freeway making peace everywhere we go. And so Lord, we ask you right now to drive this message home to our heart cause us to repent. Give us that gift. If we need to forgive someone and we’ve been hating someone or we’ve been treating them awful the way they treated us. What good is what do we do more than others? So Lord, help us is man your man in such a time as yes to be your disciples that that are following you that are putting our life on the line so that they may see that we’re sons of our Father in heaven. And we have a strong family resistance there yes to his patience and his goodness his love his mercy and may we be showered receive it in great portion so we can give it away. And in the process we want people that come to know you we want you to name to be lifted up. There is no god like our god there’s no king like arcane. And so Lord, may we even do it even today as we go about our business in Jesus name. And all God’s men said Amen, guys, get them heaven out there.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai

Christian Casualties

A disciple is a disciplined follower. Jesus said, “follow me.” The disciplined walk follows the master in order to master the fundamentals. When Jesus is Lord, he is the center, the hub that transfers the power of the Holy Spirit as we obey his will. Influence means that we must influence our own hearts and minds to follow him.

In order to allow His word to guide us, we must first humble our hearts in obeisance, bowing our hearts in respect, reverence and awe. Obedience starts with obeisance, deferring our will to his will. Life is a series of choices. As Joshua said, “choose ye this day whom ye shall serve. As for me and my house, we shall serve the Lord.” Jesus said, “I have come that they might have life and have it more abundantly.” He is the way, the truth and the life. Therefore, choose life.

Prayer aligns our heart with God’s heart. Prayer is the outpouring of praise and thankfulness from a heart filled with love and gratitude. Prayer is confession which means “same word.” When we pray, we make His word our word. What is it that we need? In prayer, we come to know him intimately that all I need is thee. I need thee every hour most gracious Lord… O bless me now my savior, I come to thee.

In church, casual Christians become casualties in the spiritual warfare. To approach the throne of God’s grace, we must forsake the man code of a world that preaches self sufficiency with the emphasis on self. However, they that approach the Lord must forsake their pride and enter his presence with a heart of meekness and humility.

Jesus the Saviour saves when men are desperate and sinking in the crises of this life. He is our lifeline because our life is hid with Christ in God. When he saves us from the darkness of this fallen world, we become eyewitness of his mercy, love and grace. With a heart of thanksgiving, our calling is to call others to the Lord who saves.

Jesus said, “Go ye therefore and teach (make disciples of) all nations…. teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you. And lo, I am with you always even unto the end of the age.”

James said, “Be ye doers of the word and not hearers only deceiving your own selves.” The promises of God are accepted by obedience according to his word. Following the Lord Jesus Christ is on God’s terms, not ours. His promises are unilateral. For nothing really matters in this world except believing faith in action that worketh in love.

Pete recalls that a man in his church came to Pete because his wife had written him a note, “If you want to save this marriage, then go see Pete.” He had the courage to follow his wife’s instruction. Pete said, “Are you willing to do whatever it takes to save this marriage?” In honesty, he answered, “Probebly not.” In order to come to the Lord, we must first confront our own hearts. The heart of man is “desperately wicked.” Repentance requires that we come to understand that we need to be delivered. When we realize that we cannot make it on our own, Then we will run to the saviour and not away from him.

The crises of life produce pain and suffering. When we understand that we cannot alleviate the pain on our own, then we can approach the great physician with an attitude of meekness. When we follow the doctor’s orders, we can appropriate the remedy… the joy of the. Lord. As Suzan said, joy is not the absence of pain, rather joy is the presence fo the Lord.

Jesus had prayed in the Garden of Gethsemane, “if it be thy will, let this cup of wrath, pain, death, and the weight of the sin of the world pass from me.” Then he prayed, “Nevertheless, not my will but thine be done.” Prayer is not asking God to align his heart with my heart but rather aligning my heart with His heart and my will with his will. The answer to Jesus’ prayer is in Hebrews: Jesus Christ, who for the joy that was set before him, endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated on the right hand of the throne of God. The answer to Jesus’ prayer was his Father’s revelation of the joy of your redemption and mine.

When we pray, we come to realize Jesus’ words, “what shall it profit a man if he gains the whole world but loses his soul?” In prayer we realize that it’s not about the cost, the price we pay but instead it’s about the value of loving God above all. Esau sold his inheritance for a bowl of stew. However, those who hunger and thirst after righteousness shall be filled with the power of God’s Holy Spirit.

According to Micah, does the Lord require the blood of animals and even our own children? Micah 6:8 says, “He hath showed thee, O man what is good. And what doth the Lord require of thee, but to do justly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God?”

Confession that Jesus is Lord is to confess that God loves me. God is love and God is his word. When we come to know the love of God and the word of God we can run to the Lord and not away from him. Obedience is to walk circumspectly under the banner, the canopy of the protection of our loving Lord.

As Christian soldiers we are in the midst of the spiritual battle. Casual Christians are casualties of spiritual warfare. We wrestle not against flesh and blood but against the rulers of the darkness in high places. Therefore take the initiative to influence our own minds by putting on the whole armor of God. For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but spiritual to the pulling down of (spiritual strongholds.) The battlefield is for hearts and minds. Therefore, casting down imaginations, and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God, bring every thought captive to the obedience of Christ.

In spiritual warfare we must share our mission with our Commander in Chief, the Lord Jesus Christ. The question is not whether God is on our side, but rather, whether we are on God’s side. Stand up, stand up for Jesus. Stand in his strength alone. The arm of flesh shall fail you, we dear not trust our own.

Beneath the standard, the banner, the shadow of the Almighty’s flag, He will fight our battles against the darkness of this fallen world. For who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? Nay, in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us…

… That we may ever live to the praise of the glory of His grace!
Your brother in Christ,
Michael

Who’s Influencing Whom?

Who’s influencing whom? Do Christians influence the world or does the world influence Christians? Romans 12:1-2 says, “I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service. And be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God.” Before we can influence the world, we must deliberately, purposefully and intentionally influence our own minds to follow Christ. Jesus said in John 8:31-32, “If you continue in my word, ye shall be my disciples indeed. And ye shall know the truth and the truth shall make you free.” A disciple is a disciplined follower of Christ. Jesus said, “I am the vine and ye are the branches. Apart from me you cannot bear fruit. Abide in me and I in you and you shall bear much fruit.” When Christians attach themselves to Christ and continue in his word as disciplined disciples, Jesus said, ye shall be witnesses unto me unto the uttermost part of the earth.

There is nothing casual about a disciplined follower of Christ. The balanced Christian walk is deliberate and intentional. Casual Christians become casualties in the spiritual battle. 2 Corinthians 10:3-5 says, “For though we walk in the flesh, we do not war after the flesh: (For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty through God to the pulling down of strong holds;) Casting down imaginations, and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God, and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ…”

There are five fundamental principles for a balanced Christian walk. These principles are also the five pillars of Influencers. The first priority is that Jesus is Lord of our lives. When we get our vertical connection with God in proper alignment, then our horizontal relationships will be blessed. The vertical relationship depends on the next two fundamentals, the Word of God and prayer. The Bible is the inerrant revealed word and will of God and it is our sole source for faith and practice. Third, we are men of prayer. Therefore, be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known unto God; and the peace of God which passes all understanding shall keep your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus. The Fourth principle is: we link together with likeminded men. God has called us into his church, the body of Christ. We each have a specific purpose to walk according to the path that he’s prepared in advance for us to walk in fellowship with Him and with one another in the household of faith.

The fifth principle is, we give it away. In order to serve others with a heart of love and gratitude, we need to empty ourselves of ourselves. Humility is the prerequisite for serving others. The devil takes God’s greatest promises and perverts them to serve his own evil purposes. When the culture embraces the doctrine of The “me generation,” the Bible says, “Pride goeth before a fall.” Pride appeals to the self-serving fallen nature of the flesh that we inherited from Adam’s original sin.

When we forsake our pride, come to the Lord with a heart of meekness and humility, and make Jesus Lord of our lives, he creates in us a new spirit of life in Christ. For the law of the spirit of life in Christ has made me free from the bondage law of sin, guilt, iniquity, and death.

Jesus said, those who have been forgiven much, love much. They realize God’s mercy, grace, and loving kindness that delivered them from the powers of sin and iniquity. The darker the night, the brighter the light shines. God said to Israel after their captivity in Babylon, after seventy years in captivity, I will give you a heart to know me. Repentance means to turn around, to change direction from the darkness of this fallen world and unto the glorious light of the gospel of truth. The gospel message is salvation by grace alone through faith alone in Christ alone.

Receiving the spirit of God in Christ in us is the new birth. This is the beginning of our new life. Before we can serve others, we need to be empowered by the Holy Spirit. Unless we’ve fed on the Word of God, the fellowship with the Lord, and the communion of believing believers, we cannot influence our own hearts and minds. Unless we’re fed, we cannot feed others.

Jesus trained twelve disciples and an inner circle of three men to follow in his footsteps. Obedience is submission to the command and authority of our Lord. The submission is from a heart of love. Jesus said, “if you love me, keep my commandments.” The prophet said, “taste and see that the Lord is good.” To huger and thirst after righteousness is an acquired taste. When we partake of the word of God as the prophet said, I crave the word more than my necessary food.” I found thy words and I did eat them, and they became the joy and rejoicing of my soul.

Psalm 48 says, “I desire to do thy will, O Lord.” The bondservant of His lord says, “My wish, my delight is your command. I live to serve you Lord from a heart of love.” We love him because he first loved us. He loved us enough to send his son, Jesus Christ to pay our debt of sin… For he who was without sin was made the perfect sacrifice for sin on our behalf, that we may be made the righteousness of God in him.

Submission in obedience to the Lord is a daily moment by moment decision. God allows us a choice to love our lord by obeying his command. Jesud said, if you love me you will keep my commandments. Galatians says, nothing really matters except believing faith that works in love.

According to Matthew 16, he who loses his life shall find it…. What shall it profit a man if ye gains the whole world but loses his soul? Jesus said, if anyone wishes to be my disciple, he must deny himself, take up his cross daily, and follow me. Following him is not a chore if motivated by love. Love energizes believing action in obedience to the Word of God.

The Christian walk does not mean that we will be sinless. However, we will sin less. We still have to deal with the nature of the flesh. However, there is no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus…. For the spirit of life in Christ has made me free from the law of sin and death.

Worldly men feel uncomfortable around strong Christians. For he that doeth evil hateth the light, neither cometh to the light lest his deeds should be reproved. But he that doeth truth cometh to the light that his works may be made manifest that they are wrought of God.

The truth of the Word of God is paradoxical to the world’s logic. To find life, we most lose it. To gain the abundant life, Jesus said, blessed are the poor in spirit. For God to lift us up, we must become lowly. To be set free, we must surrender our hearts in captivity to Christ. To be filled with his spirit, we must empty ourselves. We must decrease for him to increase. The fist shall be last and the last shall be first. As Bonhoeffer said, “When Jesus bids a man come, he bids him come and die.” For I was crucified with Christ, nevertheless I live, yet not I but Christ liveth in me. And the life that I now live I live by the faith of the son of God who loved me and gave himself for me. (Galatians 2;20)

Ezekiel 33:31 says, “And they come unto thee as the people cometh, and they sit before thee as my people, and they hear thy words, but they will not do them: for with their mouth they shew much love, but their heart goeth after their covetousness.”

Casual Christians become casualties in the spiritual battle. Casual Christians are lukewarm. They are undisciplined, double minded,and unstable in all their ways. Therefore be careful who your enemies are, but even more careful who your friends are. Evil company corrupts good morals. Who are your three and who are your twelve? Do you want to learn to become just like Jesus? You’re most like the men with whom you affiliate… with whom you spend time. Men whose heart’s desire is to serve the Lord find other men who are in hot pursuit of their Lord Jesus Christ. They are blessed to choke in the dust of the Rabi.

The Christian walk is intentionally following in Jesus’ steps with a heart of love, respect, reverence, and joy. For what doth the Lord require of thee, but to do justly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God.

It’s important to remember those who loved us enough to demonstrate the love of God with the word of God… those mentors who have their bibles shod with shoe leather. I’d rather see a sermon than hear one any day. We’re the only bibles some people will ever read… For we came not unto you with enticing words of men’s wisdom, but in demonstration of the spirit and with power of the Holy Spirit…

… That together, we may live to the praise of the glory of Thy grace!
Your brother in Christ,
Michael

We Give It Away

Jesus said, “If you continue in my word then you shall be my disciples indeed and ye shall know the truth and the truth shall make you free.” The Apostle Paul said by inspiriation, “That which you have heard of me among many witnesses, the same commit thou unto faithful men that will be able to teach others also.”

These two verses summarize Jesus’ great commission in Matthew 28:19-20 which he spoke to his disciples before he ascended into heaven: “Go ye therefore and make disciples of all nations… teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you, and lo, I am with you always, even unto the end of the age.” In Acts 1:8 he said, “Tarry ye here in Jerusalem and you shall be endued with (clothed with) power from on high not many days hence.” Jesus had told his disciples in John 14, “I have to leave you so that the Holy Spirit can come. The Holy Spirit is the comforter, called along side you and within you to teach you all (spiritual) things.”

In our own ability we have no power to share the gospel of the good news of salvation by grace alone through faith alone in Christ alone. Without the power from on high we cannot help but sin…. to miss the mark of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus. The power from on high is the spirit of God we received when we were born again, not of biological seed of the flesh we inherited from Adam. Instead, we were born again of God’s Holy Spirit, a spiritual new birth by the Word of God which liveth and abideth forever.

As followers of Christ, we’re called to share the gospel of salvation. This message is in John 3:16, for God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son, that whosoever believeth in him shall not perish but have everlasting life.” Jesus Came not to condemn the world but that the world through him might be saved. According to 1 John 5:11-13, “And this is the record, that God hath given to us eternal life, and this life is in his Son. He that hath the Son hath life; and he that hath not the Son of God hath not life. These things have I written to you that believe on the son of God and that ye may know that you have eternal life and that ye may believe on the name of the son of God.”

No one can call Jesus Lord except by the Holy Spirit. When we’re born again of God’s seed, our spirit bears witness with God’s spirit that we are sons of God. When any man is in Christ he is a new creation. The new creation is the spirit of God in Christ in us.

Jesus said to his disciples in Galilee, “Follow me and I will make you fishers of men.” They had dedicated their lives to be fishers of fish. Jesus changed the purpose of their lives…. to be fishers of men. He taught them to be nodes in God’s fishing net…. the fishing network that would spread unto the uttermost part of the earth. Jesus poured his life into twelve disciples and an inner circle of three: Peter, James, and John. The power of God is spread through an exponential explosion to the power of three.

Jesus said, ye shall know the truth and the truth shall make you free. You shall know the word of God and Jesus Christ, the word of God made manifest in the flesh. The truth shall make you free. Galatians 5 says, Therefore, stand fast in liberty wherewith Christ has made you free and be not entangled in the yoke of bondage (of the Old Testament law of sin and death.) The freedom is not an occasion to sin… to run wild, but instead it is the freedom to serve one another in love.

God chose men and women who hunger and thirst after righteousness. They will be filled with the power of God, born again of God’s incorruptible seed. They will be disciples, disciplined followers of their Lord Jesus Christ. As sons of God and followers of Christ, He’s called us to be witnesses of God’s power in manifestation. Paul said, for we speak not ourselves but Jesus Christ and him crucified. “I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me.” (Galatians 2:20)

John said, “walk in the light as he is in the light and the blood of Jesus Christ will cleanse us from all unrighteousness.” The light of the Son of God is a disinfectant cleansing us from infectious pathogens… the darkness, destruction, and decadence of this world. The cleansing is in walking with Christ. When we walk according to the spirit of Christ, then we exercise Christ’s feet behind our feet, his eyes behind our eyes, his ears behind our ears, his hands behind our hands…. his heart behind our heart.

You’re most like the people with whom you spend time.. Who are your twelve and who are your three? Be careful who your enemies are, but even more careful about who your friends are. Bad company corrupts good morals. Therefore find a man of God and come along side him. Then hang on his screen door like a cat clinging desperately to a screen door slamming in a windstorm.

When we come to know Jesus Christ, we will understand the love of God. For it is the goodness, the loving kindness and tender mercy of God that calls a man to repentance. When we surrender our lives and make God’s desires our desires, his delight our delight, and his purpose our purpose, then he will work with us and within us to will and to do of His good pleasure.

A wise man said, most men can overcome adversity. However, only one of ten men can handle success. The temptation is that the trappings of worldly success become their god. The problem with the rich young ruler is that he had the wrong lord. He was not willing to forsake his worldly riches to follow the Lord Jesus Christ. America is a rich nation. There is irony in the motto of the United States: “in God we trust.” This motto is printed on our currency. The Irony is that money is the god in which most Americans trust.

Jesus calls us where we are for such a time as this. God works best with people whose hands are empty. The harvest is plentiful but the laborers are few. America today is like the opening line from Dicken’s A Tale of Two Cities: It is the best of times and the worst of times. Because America is emerging from the global pandemic, many Americans are desperate for deliverance. God has called us to spread the good news of deliverance from the bondage of the troubles of this world. He has given us the ministry of reconciliation… to reconcile God’s people back to him. He has called us as ambassadors from our home in heaven, empowered with the word of reconciliation to deliver a peace treaty from our Sovreign Lord. We are the only bibles some people will ever read. For ye are our epistles, God’s love letters, known and read of all men. This is our mission and our great commission: Go give ‘em Heaven…..

…that together we may live to the praise of the glory of His grace!
Your brother in Christ,
Michael

We Give It Away

The fifth foundational principle of Influencers is that we give it away. Jesus said, It is better to give than to receive. Philippians 1:27 says, “Only let your conversation, (your manner of living, your witness, your citizenship as citizens of heaven,) be as it becometh the gospel of Christ: that whether I come and see you, or else be absent, I may hear of your affairs, that ye stand fast in one spirit, with one mind striving together for the faith of the gospel…”

Paul said to Timothy his son in the faith in 2 Timothy 2:2, “That which thou hast heard of me among many witnesses, the same commit thou unto faithful men who shall be able to teach others also.” There are four generations in this one short verse. How do we share the gospel of Christ? In order to give it away, first we need to receive it into our hearts.

The Romans Way is one method to share the gospel of salvation. According to Romans 3:23 says, “All have sinned and come short of the glory of God.” Romans 6:23 says, “For the wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.” Hebrews 9:27 says, “it is appointed for all men once to die, and then comes the judgement.” The question is, “when you die, where will you go?” Jesus said, “I am the way, the truth and the life. No man cometh unto the father except by me.” Jesus Christ is the exclusive way. Salvation is and eternal life is on God’s terms, not ours.

According to 1 John 5:11-13, “And this is the record, that God hath given to us eternal life, and this life is in his Son. He that hath the Son hath life; and he that hath not the Son of God hath not life. These things have I written to you that believe on the son of God, and that ye may know that you have eternal life, and that ye may believe on the name of the son of God.”

God called some according to his election. Jesus said, whosoever will may come. For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. God in his foreknowledge knew those who would accept his invitation for salvation by grace alone through faith alone in Christ alone.

What about the people who have never heard the gospel of Jesus Christ? Jesus said in his Sermon on the Mount, Those who hunger and thirst after righteousness shall be filled. God is a God of justice, grace, and mercy. Without God’s grace, his divine favor, there is no salvation. According to Ephesians 2:8-9, For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: not of works lest any man should boast.

Most men will not attend a training session on evangelism. They don’t make it their priority to be able to share the gospel of Christ. However, we are all called to be witnesses. The witness is in the power of the Holy Spirit. Jesus said in Acts 1:8, “But ye shall receive power, after that the Holy Ghost is come upon you: and ye shall be witnesses unto me both in Jerusalem, and in all Judaea, and in Samaria, and unto the uttermost part of the earth.”

Jesus had trained his followers for several years. After his death and resurrection, he was seen by multitudes of people. The last thing he shared with his disciples was in Matthew 28:18-20: “And Jesus came and spake unto them, saying, All power is given unto me in heaven and in earth. 19. Go ye therefore, and teach (make disciples of) all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost: 20 Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you: and, lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world. Amen.”

Jesus said in John 14 that he would need to leave, but that he would send them the comforter to come alongside them to help them. The comforter is the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit is what communicates the revelation of God’s word. According to 1 Corinthians, the natural man (of body and soul without the spirit of God) understandeth not the things of the spirit of God, neither can he know them for they are spiritually discerned.

Witnessing is simply what John the Baptist’s followers reported after they had seen Jesus: We cannot but speak the things which we have seen and heard. Like Peter’s brother Andrew said to him, “come and see the one I’ve met.”

Jesus had a unique message. According to Matthew 4:19, “Follow me and I will make you fishers of men.” To follow Jesus is to pursue him as a disciplined follower of a new and different way of life. As followers of Christ we are nodes in God’s fishing network. To follow means to accept Jesus’ authority as lord of our lives.

To follow Christ, we must come with a heart of meekness and humility. We must follow him on his terms, not ours. Jesus said, he who loses his life for my sake shall find it. Christianity is a rescue effort for desperate men. In order to repent, to turn from ourselves unto the Lord Jesus Christ, we must “come to ourselves” like the prodigal son. As the Apostle Paul said, “in my flesh dwelleth no good thing.” Mother Theresa said, “God works best with nothing.” In order for God to fill us, we need to get to the point that our hearts and hands are emptied of ourselves.

Suzan had broken up four times with Pete while they were in college at Auburn. Even though they wore each other’s fraternity and sorority pins pledging to become engaged, she took off Pete’s pin when she and her family took an extended summer trip to Mexico. There she had met a new beau named Armando. He swept her off her feet wooing her with kindness, affection, and charm. He even serenaded her with beautiful Spanish songs. She came to Rocky Mount, NC where Pete was playing minor league baseball. Pete knew that there was tension between them. Suzan said, “I’ve met a new beau in Mexico. His name is Armando and I’m going back to Mexico to visit him during the Olympics in Mexico City. I still want to move here so we can date, but then when he comes to visit me in North Carolina, I’ll be with him instead.”

Suzan expected Pete to respond in a jealous rage. That would have been the “old Pete’s” reaction. However, She was taken aback by his gracious response. He simply said, “I’ll pray for you.” She asked him, “what changed your outlook and your attitude?” Pete had recently committed his life to Christ. After reading The Bobby Richardson story about an All-star baseball player who gave his life to Christ, Pete had prayed, “Lord, I know I’m not the man you meant me to be. Please Lord, make me that man.” Suzan found herself falling in love with the new man Pete had become.

There is good news and bad news about the gospel of Christ. If you come to understand that the heart of man is desperately wicked, then the good news of Christ is the gospel of deliverance from the bondage of sin and death. If you want to learn to become just like Jesus, this is a prayer that God is blessed to answer. Jesus said in his sermon on the mount, “those who hunger and thirst after righteousness shall be filled.”

A disciple is a disciplined follower of his Lord. Some children ore coachable and some are not. Those who are meek and teachable are the ones who become disciplined followers.

In Pete’s senior year at Auburn, the baseball players on his team were all coachable. Their coach taught them the fundamentals of the game and they were all eager to master the basics. The winning team is the one who makes the fewest mistakes. Even though their team consisted of ordinary players and one all star, they had an 18 game winning streak and finished the year as number two in the nation. They won their conference and made it to third place of the college World Series.

If we live our lives allowing God to work in us to will and to do of His good pleasure, we will learn the meaning of Phil 1:27: Only let your conversation, your behavior, your manner of living, your citizenship as citizens of heaven be as it becometh the gospel of Christ.

What is God’s plan? We are the plan. He has given us the ministry to reconcile God’s people back to him. He has committed unto us the word of reconciliation. God has empowered us with his Holy Spirit and enabled us to speak his word, the message of deliverance….the message of salvation by grace alone through faith alone in Christ alone.

We are called as His ambassadors from our homeland in heaven to deliver a peace treaty from our Sovreign Lord. This is our charge, our mission, and our commission… Go give ‘em heaven!

In spreading the good news of the gospel of salvation,
May we ever live to the praise of the glory of His grace!
Your brother in Christ,
Michael

Amen.

Pete McKenzie 0:09
Well, if I didn’t wake you up, I don’t know what we’ll

we’re going through a series, which is absolutely crucial actually. And in the life we live in Christ. Every guy needs to be committed with the other guys that are belong to Jesus, we need to be committed to the same thing. We share a common vision. We all need to know what our job is, what gifts if God given us, you know, we come off the bench, what are we doing? What contribution are we making? Now, not everybody like Dave, my brother back there has a gift of evangelism. I watch him in action. And I’m just in awe when I see how he relates to people and talks to people and shares the gospel and some people have a gift. We’re talking about evangelism today we’ve talked about Jesus being Lord of your life. We talked about the God’s word being the final authority in your life, we talked about becoming men of prayer. We talked about the fellowship and how desperately we need fellowship and brotherhood in the Christian life. You’ll never be the man of God, you could be and should be without other godly men in your life. And today, we’re talking about evangelism. In other words, what’s the end game for Jesus being Lord of your life? What’s the whole point of being a man of prayer and a man of the word? What’s the point of gathering together in fellowship to lift each other up and encourage each other? How does it what’s the end game in this is the end game, that Jesus Christ might be glorified that in people’s hearts, we call it the Great Commission. I’m sure you’re familiar with the verse in Matthew 28, where we see the Great Commission, Jesus had spent three years with his disciples. He had been building into their life teaching rebuking, correcting training, he had, they saw him in action, they didn’t understand a thing, but they saw it. And in Matthew 28, Jesus had one last thing to say before he ascended into heaven. And basically, it was what we call the Great Commission. And Jesus came up and spoke to them and said, All authority has been given to me and heaven and earth. Go therefore, and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I commanded you. And lo, I am with you always, even till the end of the age. Now, if he hadn’t said that last sentence, I think none of the rest would have made any difference. Because it’s not me are you who lead people to Christ is the Holy Spirit. In Acts one, eight, another goodbye word that he gave to his guys. And he had told him before, I’m where I’m going, you can’t go, I’m going away. And where I’m going, you can’t go. But later on, you follow me. And they didn’t understand that. Understandably, they didn’t understand that. But he always told him, I’ll send you a comforter, I’m leaving, but the Holy Spirit is coming. And an x one eight, he said, but you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you. Now if there’s anything that men are after its power, and control, and we’ve talked about this before, and hear what’s going on in the world today, what’s going on in America today, what’s going on in every city and council meeting today and mayor’s office is power, power and control. And that’s why we do what we do. Now, there’s nothing wrong in itself in power. There’s nothing wrong with a dictator as long as you have a benevolent dictator. I have no problem with Jesus being my dictator. But I got a problem with some others being my dictator. Because I know that they’re doing it selfishly, for their own power and control. They don’t care about the people. And it’s all about doing whatever it takes to gain that power and control with the Holy Spirit wants to be controlled me too.

Don’t be drunk with wine that’s dissipation, but be feel controlled by the Holy Spirit. And that’s the challenge of our lives and growth in Christ. The reason we want to be man of God, and so the Holy Spirit can control our lives and we’ll know without a doubt what we’re supposed to be doing what we’re striving for in character, and ethics as a Christian man, but you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you. I think that saying you don’t have any power, power to share the gospel power to live the life. We’ve said many times in here the Christian life is not hard. See impossible. You cannot live the Christian life on your own. Only the Holy Spirit can live the Christian life in you and me. When we come to know Jesus Christ, He gives us a Holy Spirit. I don’t understand all I know about that. But I know it’s true. happened to me. Maybe it’s happened to you that I came to know Christ one day and he gave me power, power to do stuff I couldn’t do before I couldn’t quit a lot of the sin and I was doing, I had a bad streak of sin and live in is a song said, and I couldn’t control it. I couldn’t stop long enough or start long enough that things I should do and shouldn’t, shouldn’t do. And so I was on a very frustrating road. Maybe you’ve been there yourself.

But I received power one day, and it was power to live the life power to turn the other cheek and go the second mile and bless those who persecute you. The power through the Spirit of God, to love the unlovely, to pray for your enemies. I had no power. I can’t do that. Not consistently, not with a good joyful attitude. I can’t turn the other cheek. on my own. I’m going to feel the room for uppercuts or profanity or warnings or bitterness and resentment in retaliation. I mean, that’s what’s in my heart. I don’t have to work it that it’s in there it comes out. I have to work is suppressing it. I have to put another spirit in there. That’s stronger than my fleshly spirit. You will you’ll receive power and what was the power all about? You shall be My witnesses. Well, we don’t all have the gift of evangelism. But we all are called to be witnesses. And there’s two ways that I can witness or you can I can have, I can study and get a presentation. I like to ask guys, what’s your favorite way of sharing the gospel? And three out of four, if not nine out of 10 have no favorite way to share the gospel. What are some ways Well, you can learn the bridge illustration, which basically says God’s over here and man’s over here and man’s sinful he separated from a holy God. He’s at center, the wages of sin is death. He faces assure judgment after he dies. That’s the bad news. And we’ve always said the bad news is not bad and less The good news is really good. And the good news is good. If the bad news isn’t that bad. So if you know Sand Hill death in judgment, you’re thinking I got I’m in a pickle here. I got problems. What’s the answer? Well, God so loved the world. He gave His only Son that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life. We’re saved by grace through faith. It’s not of ourselves. It’s a gift of God, not a result of work. So no man can brag about it. And so that’s the we’re crossing over the bridge from sin, hail death in judgment to that shall not perish and live forever. And then john 1010, I came to to my have life and have it abundantly. First, john 511, through 13. And the testimony is this, that God has given us eternal life, and this life is in his son, he who has a son has life who does not have the sun does not have life. It’s simple as that. I write you these things, Brethren, and this is a real one of the best verses in the Bible for me, I write you these things, Brethren, who believe in the name of the Son of God, that you may hope you have eternal life. You may wish you had eternal life. Oh, does it know. checking you out there, jack? That you may know for sure without a shadow of a doubt not because you’re good, but because God’s good. Not because you give grace but because God gives grace. I can know for sure without a shadow of a doubt, I’m going to heaven. And everybody doubts it who’s based in their salvation on works, you’ll never know you have eternal life. If you’re basing your salvation on how good you can be told you can’t be good enough. All it takes is one sin to make you a center. And now all it takes is one drop of Jesus’s blood to make you righteous in his side. And so that’s the gospel you’ll receive power to be my witnesses both in Jerusalem and Judea, and Samaria, and even the remotest parts of the earth. Well, that would be a swathe of remotest parts of the earth from where Jesus was talking about. It’s a worldwide religion. It has no ethnic boundaries. It has no weight boundaries, no size boundaries. It’s a worldwide religion and whosoever will may come it’s for everybody everywhere. And Jesus died for every one of us. Paul little says this about the Holy Spirit. It’s the Holy Spirit not us who converts another person. We the privilege ambassadors of Jesus Christ can communicate a verbal message, we can demonstrate to our personality and life message, what the grace of Jesus Christ can accomplish. That never let us naive Lee think that we have converted a soul and brought him to Jesus Christ. No one calls Jesus Lord, except by the Holy Spirit. All I am all you are, we’re just messengers. We just bear the message. You’ll be my witnesses. Witnesses is to witness to the grace of God, the love of God.

The wonder of God, and all the adjectives we can think of that represent God. He said, I can give you a verbal message, I can give you a presentation, I can read the four spiritual laws that bill bright came up with a Billy Graham’s booklet on evangelism. And maybe you have your own way of sharing your faith. Maybe it’s your personal testimony, how you came to Christ, that’s probably the best way. Because I can argue with all the theology we give them. They can’t argue that once I was blind, and now I see, you can argue with me and tell me my life hadn’t changed. I’m a different man. If any man’s in Christ, he’s a new creature. You can argue with that. Not only because I can tell you I’m different. You can see that I’m different. I’m living the life not because I’m gutting and straining, but because when I’m walking in the Spirit, the Spirit gives me life and that life represents his character and his nature. It helps me do what I cannot do. It gives me a love for the word. It makes me a man of prayer teaches me how to pray prays in me and through me. So it’s all about him and the Holy Spirit. No one calls Jesus Lord except by the Spirit. Probably my favorite verse about evangelism in the Bible is Matthew 419. And that’s where Jesus was walking along the Sea of Galilee. And he saw some fishermen there, Andrew and Peter. And James and john came along after and follow me and I’ll make you fishers of men. And immediately they left their nets and followed him. Follow me and I will make you fishers of men. Can you be a fisherman without Jesus making you a fisherman, only Jesus can make a disciple. And only a disciple can make another disciple. That’s a multiplication aspect of the gospel and evangelism. AB Bruce wrote a classic book called the training of the 12th. And he broke down all the different things that Jesus expose, and train the disciples in. And I want to read a few comments about him from that book, the founder of the faith desire not only to have disciples, but to have about him men, whom he might train to disciple others. And you may remember that’s what Paul said in Second Timothy, two, two, when he was passing the baton to Timothy, his protege, and ball at the end of second Timothy said, I fought the good fight, I’ve run the race, I finished a course, he knew that he was ready to go to heaven and Philippians he was in jail, he didn’t know if he’s going to be killed or not. But he had an idea, I think God had showed him that he’s going to hang around a little longer. But in Second Timothy, he realized his time was up, he was fixing to be executed and go to heaven. And he was turning the church over to Timothy. And he said, Timothy, the things which you have heard from me in the presence of many witnesses, and trust these to faithful men, who will be able to teach others also, as for generations, we got four men. And if those four men in that form m group are multiplying, where we had four, now we got eight, where we had eight, and then we have 16, where we have 16. Now we have 32. And that’s the way the Christian life is lived. And that’s what multiplication in the great Commission’s all about. AB Bruce goes on to say the careful painstaking education of the disciples secured that the teachers influence on the world should be permanent. The Gospel has been entrusted to me and you and Jesus pass it along to us. And he entrusted you with the most precious thing in the whole world. Name one thing that’s more precious in the Gospel of Jesus Christ, if it in fact, is the gospel that separates man from Heaven and Hell, that gives me an hope in life. If it gives me an insight and wisdom and understanding, is there anything more important in life and it could be entrusted to you than the gospel of Jesus Christ, to pass it along to give it away? And that’s what we say in the last After all, the Be a man of God and prayer and chase after men who chase after Christ. The last thing is give it away. Now what kind of men are going to be chosen to give it away? those on whom so much depended it plainly behoove to possess a very extraordinary qualifications. The mirrors must be finely polished that are designed to reflect the image of Christ. Are you being finely polished right now? Are you going through a difficulty or trial something you wish you didn’t have? Oswald Chambers said I feel sorry for everybody doesn’t have something they wish they didn’t have gone on in their life.

You’re because your mirror is not being polished if it’s not. That’s how mirrors in Christ that’s how you become Christ. You don’t get patients by taking a pill. You get patients by being in circumstances that require patience, goodness, gentleness, kindness, the love the unlovely to go the second mile to bless those who persecute you. It’s all mirror polishing. It’s all reflecting the nature of Christ in you and to build in it in training you and correcting you and rebuke in you. So that you may reflect the nature of your father you may have a strong family resemblance resemblance to your Father in heaven. They were to receive rare spiritual endowment for it would be a religion for all nations. Therefore, its apostles must be free from Jewish narrowness and have sympathies as wide as the world. It is a spiritual religion. Therefore, its apostles must be emancipated in conscience from the yoke of Jewish ceremonial lism. It’s a religion which is to proclaim the cross its harrows must be superior to all conventional notions of human and divine dignity, capable of glorifying in the cross of Christ, and willing to bear the cross themselves. The humble fishermen of Galilee had much to learn before they could satisfy these requirements. They also had much to unlearn which was bad, as well as learning what was good and they were slow both to learn and unlearn. They were poor man of humble birth. Low stations in occupations, who had never felt the stimulating influence of a liberal education, or social intercourse with persons have cultivated minds. Throughout this work, great prominence was given to the moral and spiritual defects of the 12th. Everything may be hoped of men who would leave all for Christ’s cause. Where there is a noble soul there’s an indefinite capacity for growth. Where there is a noble soul there is an indefinite depth, definite capacity for growth. With all their imperfections, one distinguishing virtue was their Cardinal virtue. It’s a virtue of Christian character. They were animated by devotion to Jesus, into the divine kingdom which made them capable of any sacrifice, believing him to be the Christ come to establish God’s kingdom on earth. They immediately left their nets and joined his company. ambition is a motive, but it was not their motive. You see, ambition needs a temptation. It does not join a cause that is obscure and struggling, and whose success is doubtful. It joins in when success is assured. The cause of Jesus had not yet reached that stage. Their hearts were fired. Their heads were tuned and turned by dream about a divine kingdom to be set up in Israel with Jesus of Nazareth as its King. That dream possessed them ruled over their minds and shaped their destinies, compelling them to leave their Kindred in their country and to go forth on what might appear beforehand to be a fool’s errand. They were possessed by the idea of the kingdom, where it was no fool’s errand on which they went forth, leaving their nets behind the kingdom they saw it turned out to be real. But not one day imagined. The fishermen of Galilee did become fishers of men, on a most extensive scale, and in the power of God gathered many souls into the church, as such as should be saved. They cast their nets into the world, and the world would never be the same. What kind of man does God choose to represent him? men who are passionate they have fire in their hearts, the fire is for the kingdom. in that series have chosen Nicodemus asked Jesus, what are you doing? Why are you here? He said, establish a new kingdom. And that’s the kind of language he used with his disciples. They had longed to see the Messiah and they thought the Messiah was going to kick the Romans out and then he would sit on the throne and he would be a very different Messiah than the the Messiah that came from Nazareth. He was lowly in heart and had lowly mom and dad, nothing to brag about no extensive education, although at 12 years old, he was teaching the Pharisees in the temple. He came already ready. He came as God become man.

And then he said to me, and like me, and you follow me and I’ll make you fishers of men. What’s it mean to follow? It means to come after come after me. What a arrogant guy, he must have been. What a benevolent man, he was in King, follow me, come after me. It means to engage in as a calling or a way of life. There are some people that are called to be pastors, some to be missionary, some to be professional Christians, if you will. But very few are called comparatively. Most of us are called to be witnesses right where we are. Right in our own homes. Right in our business in our neighborhood. Jesus moved into the neighborhood when he came in, would it be great if we could say that of every Christian, the Christian moved into the neighborhood, to make a difference to shine a light in the darkness. Follow means to proceed along and it’s a process. The disciples had a lot to learn, they had a lot to unlearn, and they were slow in both directions. They were slow on the uptake. Slone understanding Sloane getting the real message, but they got it. But you know, they didn’t get it until they received the Holy Spirit at Pentecost. And then everything Jesus taught started making sense, remains to pursue and obey, to follow in order to become like, follow me, and I’ll make you fishers of men. Now, if you want to become like a strong Christian that you know, then follow them hang on their screen door. Find guys that love Jesus more than you do. And don’t let them shake you off. And there’s plenty out there like that compared to me. In other words out, and there’s a lot of screen doors I’ve made to and I’ve had over the years, I’ve had a lot of mentors and guys in my life who either modeled it for me or took me under their wing. And I just watched how they you know, I had a model of a pastor in Birmingham, Frank Barker. And I said, and when I when I became a pastor, surprisingly, the first thing I do is put Frank’s picture on my wall to remind me of what a pastor looks like what how pastor x. Pastor treats people, I preaches his high, loves his wife and raises his children high response when he misses a three foot pipe. So I had a chance to have Frank Barker, then I got Chuck Singletary. And Chuck this model for me what a missionary spirit, heart and attitude was all about commitment to the Great Commission. And that’s all he talked about. He had all kinds of sayings. But they all involve the Great Commission. And I had a chance to sit at his feet and follow Him and be his friend. He believed in me that was probably the thing I would say that he imparted to me that was the most valuable to me when I didn’t believe in myself and I was disqualified. I hadn’t lived up to any other standards. He believed in me, he saw something in me I couldn’t see in myself. And that’s what Jesus saw in his disciples. He saw he saw men in them that they couldn’t see in themselves. He saw where they were headed, what they would become like, what difference they would make, what contributions I would make, found in churches discipling, teaching, correcting, rebuking, and then dying for their faith and dying for Christ. It means to pursue and obey it means to follow in order to become like, when Jesus calls a man Dietrich bond, hopper said he bids in come and die. Follow me. He told Peter said Peter, right now you come and go whenever you want to, but a day will come when they will tie you up and make you go where you don’t want to go. He was predicting Peters martyrdom. And Peter didn’t understand that at the time either. But he remembered it when he was being led to the chopping block, or the crucifixion to be crucified upside down. Follow me. What Is that me? Who is me? If you’re going to follow someone and someone says follow me? Don’t you want to know who they are? Where are you going? It’s kind of like this tombstone in Indiana. 100 years ago, God died. He says it stranger as you pass by, don’t think that you’re just passing by where I’m going, you’re going. So prepare yourself to follow me. And then right under it, someone scratch to follow you, I’m not content until I know which way he went.

When Jesus calls a man a bids him come and die. That doesn’t just mean come and die and be a martyr. It means dad yourself, it means I’m crucified with Christ. It’s no longer I who live, we’re not going to be very good witnesses if we hadn’t crucified the flesh. If we don’t crucify it every day, if we don’t say no to the things we should say no to, and yes, and when we fail, and I say yes to the no and no to the Yes, then I have a recourse. We talk about this all the time. We repent, were broken before God, a true Christian is always broken over sin. He didn’t get used to it, he can get lazy, he can make friends with the enemy, he can sign peace treaties with the devil. But he’s never going to be content there. He’s always going to come to a point sooner or later, like David David after running from God for a year when Nathan stuck his finger in his chest, and God will always come and stick a finger in your chest in my chest. He’s done it many times. Thou art the man. And that’s the point where David broke and repented, wrote Psalm 51, we have a recourse when we don’t live up to the standard, we can confess our sin. And we have a faithful and just and righteous God, who will forgive us, put it behind him as far as the easiest from the west and say, Come on, we got work to do. Don’t be beating yourself up, I’m not beating you up, quit beating yourself up, God is really tired of people beating themselves up. I remember, I had a vision, one time God gave me of walking into the gym over here at the Boys and Girls Club, where we were having a church and all the chairs were pushed up against the bleachers or push up against a wall. And there was a circle of people about 10 people stand in the middle at half court. And there was somebody on the floor and they were in a circle. And they were kicking someone on the ground and middle of them. So I went over and I joined in the kick and said, who we kick in, I looked down it was me. And Jesus said to me at that point, he said, Pete, you’ll notice I’m not in the circle. And I’m tired of you kicking yourself. I’ll never forget that. If you’ve been kicking yourself lately, you’re not going to be a very good witness. If you’re kicking yourself all the time. If you’re beating yourself up, if you’re listening to the devil tell you, you’re never going to make it and you’re no good and you’re never going to stop this sin. You got to quit listening to that and listen to the God who said, Come to me. And I’ll give you rest from all that. I’ll give you victory over that sin. I’ll give you a desire not to do it again. I’ll make it distasteful for you. I’ll help you with that. And we’re not going to be witnesses for Christ. Unless we really let the Holy Spirit loose in our life and not be afraid of him. Let him do what he is going to do give him permission to help himself. He’s going to help himself anyway. Right? So might as well give him permission. And if you give him permission, you can really learn and be taught and rebuked and learn from it. But if you’ve never given God permission, you’re gonna see I’ve been attacked by the devil, devils after me and he is and mainly He wants you to think that God’s displeased with you, God’s not your friend. God’s disappointed in you. And that’s it. That’s what he comes along to say he wants to if he can steal our image and concept of God and he’s one because if you if God’s traffic cop behind a billboard, why would you come to Him and follow Him? But if he’s a benevolent dictator, if he forgives us when we sin, if he’s got our best interests in mind, if he believes we’re valuable enough to down the cross for us, why wouldn’t we follow him? What’s he done? Which, which one of his nail prints of discus you the most? What which one of his hands and feet they were driven spikes through makes you the most upset? What did he do? To give you the idea, you can’t follow it and trust him. That’s what it means to follow. And we have to know who we’re following. We’re following the Lord of all the Messiah, the Christ. And so be careful who you follow. And you know the what we’ve talked about many times, be careful who you follow.

Because whatever they’re like, you’re going to be just like and wherever they’re going, that’s where you’re going. Where’s Jesus going? And what’s he like? Is he worth following? I think that’s a good question. Are you following him today? Are you reading the Word? Are you praying? Are you in constant contact? Are you praying without ceasing? No, you involving him? And all that goes on? Are you trust in Him? All he wants to know is you trust me? Do you trust me? Oh ye of little faith when in these in the boat and the storms about to sink them. And finally, after bailing and bailing, and they couldn’t, they had no answer to their problem, we’re going to die here and he’s sleeping in the bow of the boat. So they woke him up. And the first thing he says is, oh, ye of little faith. did not say we’re going to the other side of the lake. If I said it, the no storm is going to keep you from getting there. So we raised his hand and he said, Peace Be still. And this is a guy I want to follow. I don’t know who you want to follow. But I want to follow the guy that can raise his hand and say peace be still over the chaos and storms and rain in my life. I want a guy that can give me peace, it The past is our comprehension. I want a God that cares. He’s with me all the time. He never leaves or forsakes me. I want a God that laid his life down and hung on a cross so that I may not have to hang on that same cross. That’s who I want to follow. Who do you want to follow? Who are you following. Because you’re not going to be a witness for Jesus Christ. If you’re following something else. If you’re following ambition, or money or job or success in the marketplace. That all comes after you get your heart right. You can be trusted with that some guys cannot be trusted with success. They fight for success. They want to make money, nothing wrong with making money. But if you’re doing it with the wrong motive spirit, heart and attitude, there’s something wrong with it. If you’re doing it for your own glory, if you’re doing it for your own status and recognition, there’s a problem there. And you’re doing it. So if you have more resources to give and to build the kingdom and to support missionaries, and to build a church. That’s a good reason. That’s a good motivation. And the disciples is a brew said, we’re not driven by ambition, ambition, needs temptation. You got to be tempted to get rich to glorify yourself to be successful. And so that’s a temptation and they weren’t tempted by all that they were fired up by the vision of the kingdom that you were going to be able to build in one movie for a TV they made about Jesus when he had shown said, Peter cast your net on the other side of the boat, and he had this amazing catch. And Peters’s asked him He says, Where are we going? What are we going to do if I follow you, he said, we’re going to change the world. That’s what fired him up. We’re going to see men’s lives change, your marriages heal, their bodies heal, we’re going to see God do miraculous things. Follow me. And I will express his confidence that he is able to make a commitment to them. It’s my match natural tendency, Jesus said, I will make you I can make you don’t worry about how you’re going to be made, and what I’m going to use to shape and form and build you into a man of God. But I will make you fishers of men. You’re still going to be fishers, you’re just going to not be fishing for fish in the sea of Galilee. You’re going to be fishing for men from now. I’ll make you I’ll bring you into being by teaching coaching, forming, shaping, altering, training, adapting, correcting rebuking. That’s a long list of things that God’s doing in our lives every day. At least he wants to do he’s trying to do are you teachable? Are you coachable? He wants to train you. Are you trainable? Do you ever coached a team? You got some kids, you can show them all day long what to do, and they can or won’t do it. They’re not coachable. They need to be teammates. They’re trying to be stars in their own right. And you need a quarterback that’s going to be a team man. That’s going to build a team. Encourage your team farther team up, believe in his players

that some guys aren’t coachable. They’re in it for their own glory. They’re not team players. And Christianity is a team sport they say. So I’m going to make you I’m going to make you fishers of men. You’re still going to be fishing. You’re a professional fisherman. I want you to be professional man catchers. I want you to know what bait to use. I want you to know how to relate to them. I want you to know how to pray for them. I want you to be the reason that I brought people to Christ was because of your life is a watched you live it out. Because of the time you had a chance to ask them questions. I mean, when I was wet behind the ears, Christian now I was in a church it was this vehement element evangelism. So Matter of fact, several people might walk up to you at church or during the week, say at some gathering. And the big question was, who have you led to Christ lately? And so man, I felt the pressure, I better have a story, because I didn’t have a lot of those stories. So they had these convenience stores that were just opening. And they were staying open all night. And because they were open all night, they were being robbed on a regular basis all over town. So I was on my way home one night, and Susan had asked me to bring some bread home and I stopped by the convenience store. This me in the store, it was late, around 10 o’clock. And there was this gal behind the register, and she was checking me out. And I just thought, Man, maybe I can share the gospel with her here. And I asked her, if you died today, where did you spend eternity? And she jumped back against a cash register. She said, Why? Scared may scared her. I didn’t answer a question. I just paid and got the heck out of there. I’m sure she remembers that though. And God’s gonna use it in her life, even if he didn’t use it in line.

I want a clutch hitter at that point. They had a new target man, Jesus used the language that Peter and James and john understood. I’m gonna make you fishers of men. What’s it gonna take to fire us up? Come here, David. Dave here is fired up. I don’t know, more fired up guy than Dave Harris. And I don’t want to miss this opportunity teaching on this.

Give us a word.

Unknown Speaker 36:58
You know, I just this morning I was highlighted again, that whole word back from Chronicles about the sons of issachar. And what did it say about the sons of issachar. They knew the season that they were in, they knew the seasons, they they were discerning. And I believe right now, guys, I don’t care where we were six months ago, I believe we were sewing. But what we’re seeing right now, just since we’ve been back in Orange County, is that it is a season of harvest people that six months ago didn’t want to hear anything. They have ears to hear now. And and really, I believe last night a group of us gathered. And it was like, throw the net on the other side of the boat. And I promise you, you’re gonna catch stuff. It’s just there’s something, there’s been a shift, there’s been a change, even as we’re contending for change, all across this nation from the top down in every sphere, I believe that there’s been a shift evangelistically and I believe if you will open your mouth. That’s just we are called to be witnesses, and to give an answer to the hope that’s within us. You know, and the way I know this is that, you know, just last week I was training I trained down south Laguna 1000 steps. The Lord gave me a word for this, this woman that was also training a bunch of people do their exercise there. And I, you know, went up and, and said, hey, my wife and I were in ministry or pastors and I just feel like the Lord would say to you that he wants to heal you from betrayal. That’s what the word The Lord gave me wasn’t, you know, and she sat there and she just freaked out like, what? Then she said, I’m looking for a church, I thought she was a Christian. She called my wife, not a Christian, full New Age mystic looking for a church calls my wife and our on the phone. That’s the shift in season, we give out our number all the time, and people don’t call back. But now they’re calling back. You know what that business card you guys all know y’all have a business card. It never produces business. It’s a great tool for people to get back to you evangelistically give out your business card so that people will call you back. Okay, granted, if they want to do business with you great. But that business card, I have a business card too. It’s never used for the purpose that it was intended. But it’s used for people to find their way back to me that have questions about the gospel. So I just believe guys, we’re in an hour and a shift in season. And I promise you, you guys, take me up on this. You’ll come back next week and say it’s true. There’s a shift. It is a season of harvest. It’s there’s always a harvest going on. I often think the church that Pete started new harvest, you know that name, new harvest. I don’t know how much new harvest we had. But I believe that if you’re going to name a church today, that would be a great name, to rename a church in this hour that there is a new harvest that’s coming in. And we would all agree guys, there is nothing that this nation needs more than to repent. Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and stop the sin and I love that song, you know, just the bad living anyway. God bless you guys.

Pete McKenzie 40:08
Thank you, David.

Well, what are you gonna do about that? You know, guys, you might be sitting there going well, I’m no Dave Harris. I don’t, I can’t speak like he speaks and not as bold as he is. I’m not I don’t have the gift. And all you got to do is live the life and ask God to use you. God will give you a word just like he gave David, for that gal betrayal. There are people out there that are going through everything in the world. And we’ve got to be and I’ve got to be and learn to be bolder in my faith. This we this redeem the time God has given us a epidemic to prepare a man’s heart for the gospel. Listen, don’t let it go buy this. Don’t waste it. Hey, man. Let’s pray. Father, we just thank you for the word today that we got from your word that we could follow you and become fishers of men. And, Lord, we want to be those men that are teachable that you can pass a baton to. When the crisis comes in, it is common courage is required and it is required. Help us to be bolder. God expects his men who have been entrusted with the gospel, to have such confidence in him that will be the reliable ones to carry the gospel to the four corners of the earth. Thank you for all the missionaries we have in here. Thank you The ones that are serving like Craig today and we pray blessing on him and Irish in and draya Sue’s taken off for Honduras yesterday and Lord, all those missionaries that were able to support and encourage thank you for the men here who participate in that. The Lord help us even today to be aware of our antennas up to share the good news with all the people that need it so desperately and we pray you do that in Jesus name And all God’s men said give them heaven guys

Unknown Speaker 42:06
much

Transcribed by https://otter.ai

Pete McKenzie 0:00
Way to go. It’s always good to get caught up a little bit, you know, this group is what we call a face to face group are guys that sit over here and never met guys sit over here have no idea what their name is. And besides that they don’t care. So it’s good to meet new guys. And you might see each other at the police station and hey, I know that guy. You never know where where you’ll run into people are on the golf course and say that guy goes to our men’s group can’t believe he just threw his club. That would be me. Worst when you teach a men’s group?

I know you said something new. But I’ll get to what it was later. Yes, indeed, warrigal. There’s a man of God, right? There. We are, we’re going through a series guys. And we’re nearing the end of the basics, the foundational basics of the Christian life. And what are those basics in we’re unpacking them a little bit, because we’ve been talking about them for years. But it was time now as the Lord told me that there’s just take each one of them and unpack them. The way illustration is basically the navigators, little illustration to show us what the basics are. And what Bill went over with you this morning, is depicted in that illustration. And I’ve shared this with you before, but let’s go over it again. There’s a wheel and picture wheel. And in the middle of the wheel, there’s a hub. Now the power comes from the hub, it emanates right out of there, and the hub in the wheel in this spiritual wheel is Jesus is Lord of your life. And then there’s two vertical spokes and two horizontal spokes in the wheel. The vertical spokes have to do with our relationship with God be that foundational word in prayer. So the foundational, vertical, foundational spokes a word and prayer, then you have horizontal spokes, that has to do with our relationship with each other in relationship with people witnessing and fellowship. Last week, we talked about fellowship. And so this week, we’re going to talk about witnessing, and we call it giving it away. God didn’t give me the gospel, so I can hold it for myself, he gave it to me and changed my life so I can help others get changed. And that’s the way it works. It’s always a multiplication process. It’s not an addition. In the Christian life, Paul told Timothy, Timothy, these things you’ve seen and heard me in the presence of many witnesses, pass on to faithful men who will teach others also. And therefore generations in that in that verse, which shows you It’s Paul and Timothy and faithful men, and who will teach others. So you have four generations. And that’s the way God designed it to work. Unfortunately, it gets aborted. Because of that I shared with you many times, there are two things that men don’t attend. We found over the years, when we when we put on different workshops and events. One of them is they don’t come to prayer meetings. And we’ve talked about that when we talk about prayer and the reasons that men are reticent to come to prayer meetings. The second thing they don’t come to is evangelistic training. And so what we’re going to find out as we go through this this morning, there are a couple of ways that you can share the gospel, you can share it through a presentation where you’ve learned the Roman road is some call it are the four spiritual laws that bill has, the Albright had with the Crusade, and Billy Graham had a similar little booklet that he had. And so there have been so many pamphlets and booklets. And so all saying the same thing, sometimes coming at different illustrations and angles. But it’s all talking about the gospel that that there’s a bad news and the good news. And the bad news is that man is a sinner All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. The further bad news is the wages of sin is death. And that’s a spirit not just the physical death, but a spiritual death where you’re separated from God for all eternity. And then a place called hell that Jesus talked about a lot. And then there’s they may get back to my train of thought, yeah, Hebrews 927. It’s appointed on demand to die once and then comes judgment. So the bad news of the gospel and if the bad news in really bad if you don’t really think your center If you don’t really understand the wages of sin, his spiritual death, we have two roads, one is going to heaven and Christ and the other is going to hell without Christ. And people are asking that question all the time. Are you telling me that if I don’t believe in Jesus Christ as my Lord and Savior, I’m going to hell? And that question was asked this week. And I said, Well, that’s what the Bible says, and I believe the Bible. Jesus talked about that a lot. And then another person said, and I told him, I said, Jesus said that this is that he is away the truth in the life and no one comes to the Father, but through him. And I had a gal respond to me, a couple I was talking to, and she said, Well, that’s so exclusive. I said, if you bond belong to the country club, that’s exclusive to.

And so there’s many good, I mean, all those good people out there that never knew about Christ, and all the aborigines or 1000 years in Australia in the outback, and they never heard about Jesus, they’re all going to hell, how fair is that? And that’s a common question. Because what we try to do is pay to take Jesus in what he is and who he is, and what he’s done. And we try to bring it down to our logical, practical understanding of justice and fairness. And so the way I answer those questions in in my own heart is that does seem unfair. So there must be some answer to it. And God told me, he said, Pete, don’t you know, I know everything. I’m omniscient. Don’t you know, I created everybody. And I created some for me. And the Presbyterians called that elect you been elected, or Manian say, well, we don’t believe in election, we believe in free will. I believe in both of them. Again, I understand both of them. But I believe in both. As a lot I don’t understand about the Christian life. And one thing that keeps me from evangelism and sharing their faith is they don’t have all the answers because I can’t answer that question. They would rather not get themselves in a situation where people are asking because they do ask questions. But let’s just take the one about the aborigine. If God knows everything, and everybody if that aborigine had heard the Gospel, Jesus knows whether he would receive him or not. So let’s put it this way. There’s not anybody going to be in heaven. God goes, gosh, how did you get here? There’s no one gonna be in Halo. I didn’t mean for him to go to hell, I met him to be in heaven with me. God’s gonna call us. And there’s, there’s, I think a call that’s irresistible. Paul had an irresistible call, I believe, we might look this morning at Matthew 419, where Peter and Andrew had a call that was irresistible, do said, Follow me. And I’ll make you fishers of men. And so some people, that’s an irresistible call for others, not so much. Now, I don’t understand all I know about that. But whosoever will may come is what the Bible teaches. If you’ve heard the gospel, and then I share with guys, well, you know, I wouldn’t be so worried about that. But originally says you should be worried about yourself. You’ve heard the gospel, they never had a chance to hear the gospel, they’re going to be under the same standard, but different. Jesus knows what would happen to them. And there’s not one aborigine in hell that should be in heaven. And God sorts all that out. And my God can do that he didn’t lay that burden on me to try to understand it. I just receive it by faith and believe in my God who is faithful, and God who is loving and God who’s compassionate. So you have all kinds of situations like that when it comes to evangelism. And there’s two parts to evangelism. One part is presentation. You learn how to share the bridge illustration of the four spiritual laws are some way that you use and I like to ask guys, what’s your favorite way? It’s kind of like a crusade staff gown campus at Auburn, told me one time he’d go around to fraternity houses and share the gospel and share the gospel with people on the campus. And he took a young man with him one night to attorney house and he shared the gospel with the guys in that fraternity. And he shared the shared the Four Laws after they left. He asked the guy said, What do you think? He says, that sounds so canned. I don’t know. I wouldn’t know. I don’t like that. He says uh, what what do you do? without doing anything? Well, I like my can talk better and you’re nothing.

So guys can judge those kind of things. But when you have evangelists that training there guys, it’ll show up but the overwhelming number won’t. And there’s that reason and others that they don’t come to learn how to share the gospel. But you know, if you have the gospel, if you’ve received gospel if any man’s in Christ, if you’re in Christ, then sharing the gospel is the most natural thing in the world. You want to know how to share it, you’re eager to do that. Now some guys have a gift of evangelism, I think. And they and just everywhere they go, people are coming to Christ, and they are winsome. They have pretty good theologically. They know how to relate to people, they share, they share their faith. And some don’t know they’re not that gifted with other people. But when they share the gospel, people prayed to receive Christ with them. And I think they have a gift. But every one of us call to be witnesses. When you and the Holy Spirit is calling upon you, you receive power to be my witnesses, he said. So there are some people that are gifted evangelists. I don’t think any of us going to get up like Billy Graham and have his anointing. But there are other people that have anointings of evangelism. And I think what they have to do is be careful, they don’t judge everybody else by their gift. And by their anointing that everybody should be sharing, like they’re sharing and seeing fruit like they’re seeing an evangelism coast where a lot of us are just not. So in Matthew 28, is where this whole evangelism worldwide missions Global Mission started. Jesus had spent those close to three years with his disciples, and now they had murdered him on the cross. They had buried him he had resurrected. And you know, the lot of the all the accounts of his resurrection and showing himself to people and appearing in the room with the disciples and being on the beach with his disciples and on the road to a mass and all those appearances he had after he had resurrected. And the last thing that Jesus said to the his disciples, the very last thing if and if we said that, Jesus, okay, you’ve been here three years, you’ve taught the Sermon on the Mount multiple times, you’ve healed all kinds of people, hundreds, if not 1000s, you preach unbelievable messages. What’s the last thing you’re going to share with your disciples? What are you going to leave him with? And he is in Matthew, 2819, and 20. And Jesus came up and spoke to the I’m saying, All authority has been given to me and heaven and earth. So Jesus is the king of kings in the Lord of lords. And God gave him all authority. That means when he says, For a demon to get out, that demon gets out. When he says, For the Holy Spirit to come in, the Holy Spirit comes in, when he says, Get up, and you cripple get up and walk, then they get up and walk, he has authority to do that, and He will give His disciples, those who love Him and follow Him and serve him certain power to be able to do those things. Power to live it out power to turn the other cheek. Power to go the second mile and volunteer to do it. Power to pray for your enemies and bless those who persecute you when you receive. And there’s a big underlying in my Bible of when, when you receive the Holy Spirit, the when you receive the Holy Spirit, you will be my witnesses, and at the end all over the world, in Judea, and the uttermost parts of the world sumeria all over this known world. But today Now we find where the outermost part of the world when he was given this 2000 years ago, and we’re living in the other most part of the world. So that’s where it all started, go and make disciples of all nations. And so how do you do that? baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all I commanded you. And lo. And if he hadn’t said this, all the rest with I think been worthless, lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age. So I’m not sending you out on your own alone for your giftedness and your wisdom and all your great stuff to get the job done. I’m going with you My Holy Spirit, he had told him and trying to prepare them for him leaving and being resurrected and leaving them here. He said, I’ll send you where I’m going, you can’t go but I’ll send you a comforter, the Holy Spirit that lead you into all truth.

And so he’s done everything he needed to do to help us become evangelists if you will, help us become good witnesses for him. So there’s a sharing of Christ when you presented in the biblical setting held out in judgment and then patients to eight nine were saved by grace through faith is not of ourselves. It’s a gift of God. It’s not a result of work, so no one can brag about it. And then, of course, john 316, For God so loved the world He gave His only begotten Son. There’s I mean, john 524. Anybody know john 524. I don’t either, so don’t feel too bad about and then an x one eight. But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you. And you shall be My witnesses. Both in Jerusalem and Judea, and Samaria, and even the remotest part of the world. Paul little said this, he wrote several books on evangelism and Paul said, it’s the Holy Spirit not us, who converts another person. We the privilege ambassadors of Jesus Christ, can communicate a verbal message. We can demonstrate through our personality and life message, what the grace of Jesus can do for one. But never let us naive. Lee think that we have converted a soul and brought him to Jesus Christ. No one calls Jesus Lord except by the Holy Spirit. So I don’t care how slick we are, how great illustrations and presentations we have. If the Holy Spirit in doing his work in it, and through it, nothing’s gonna happen. Nobody’s coming to Christ. All I am all you are as a Christian, if you know and love Jesus, all you are as an ambassador, you’re a messenger you sent from God. And the, you know, at the basic messages, Jesus saw a blind man and he healed him in a crippled man, and he healed him. And the Sanhedrin called a man because unfortunately for Jesus, he had done it on the Sabbath, and you just don’t go helping people on the Sabbath in their religiosity. And so they were questioning the blind man, and they were trying to get evidence against Jesus to arrest him. And so they said, they held you. He said, Yes, he did. He said, they did it on the Sabbath yesterday. Well, don’t you know that it’s wrong to do that on the Sabbath. And the blind man saw where they were headed with this. And he says, Look, guys, you’re the Pharisees, you’re the guys that are supposed to know all things. All I know is once I was blind, and now I see you figure you go tell me whether that’s right or wrong. Jesus broke all the manmade rules that the Pharisees had, they did it casually but on purpose. And he just stuck it right in their face. And john the baptist and the chosen, ask him, you just can’t be nice to everybody. He said, probably not. He said it so casually. But when he looked at the daymond, john, the Baptist had already said, You brood of vipers, Who told you to come to flee from the wrath to come? They were pretty tough on the Pharisees, and who are the Pharisees are the legalist. They’re the ones that put loads on your shoulder, they won’t even care themselves. They’re hypocrites. And Jesus and john the baptist both undressed them in publicly. So they cut down the Baptist head off and put Jesus on the cross. Jesus requires a lot of those who follow him. He requires us to live out what we say we believe because it’s very evangelistic when we do that. When you are slapped on one cheek and people are watching and then you just turn the other cheek people are amazed when you’re slapped on one cheek and you feel the room fuller uppercuts and nail the guy with a good right cross after he slapped you on the cheek that surprised and impressed. But when you turn that other cheek, and you volunteer to go that second mile, that’s very evangelistic, you know what they want to know what that point? Where did you get the power to do that?

How could you become that kind of person, and in their heart of hearts are saying how can I be the kind of person they wanted in their hearts. They just need somebody to show it to somebody to prove to them living in the power of the Holy Spirit that that life can be lived that there’s power in this life to live out the Christian life that he’s given us and that’s extremely vangelis stick. Jesus wouldn’t have told us to do that. If it wasn’t evangelistic. He will tell the scope protect yourself defend yourself. vindicate yourself, explain yourself. He told us to do just the opposite just shut up. So what he did when he was reviled, he reviled not when he suffered he effort under no threats. And then my favorite verse in when it comes to evangelism is Matthew 419 Follow me and I’ll make you fishers of men. Well, he was talking at this point to fishers, Andrew and john and James and Peter. And he put things in their language. That’s reason he said, Follow me. And I’ll make you What? engineers to me, now fishers of men. And these guys were pro fishermen. That word follow means to come after come after me, it means to engage in as a calling or a way of life. And that’s what he was calling these men, I’m calling you to a different way of life. And they were going to be set apart to be church planners, to be leaders in the church. So it was a calling that he was giving them, that God doesn’t call everybody to be preachers, or full time ministers or even full time missionaries, but he’s called all of us to be witnesses, witnesses in our homes, in our jobs in our neighborhoods. Come and it means to proceed along the way. Come and follow me. And as we go along, you’ll proceed, you’ll evolve into maturity, you’ll see and see a breakthrough. Now this really happened not before, but after Pentecost, when they received the Holy Spirit. And then they began to grow in Christ and understand all those things. He was teaching that they didn’t understand the parables and they’d get him off to the side and go, No, what is this thing about the sower? What’s the seed falling on and he explained the seed and the sower, the seed in the ground it fell on and what that represented. But they didn’t get that until they got the Holy Spirit at Pentecost. It means to act in accordance with come and follow me and act in accordance with how I’m living and what I’m teaching you. That’s what he was saying to these guys to accept his authority. following me means you’re going to put yourself under my authority, you’re going to make me Lord of your life. And that’s a big order. Cause in our sinful nature, and the the root of the sinful nature was when he was, the devil tempted her with the fruit on the tree of righteousness. And she looked at it and she It was beautiful fruit. And she had just said, you know, if you eat that fruit, you’ll be just like God, you could be your own God. That appealed to her. It appeals to me, it appeals to you. You’re in total control of your life, the coming in the going expanding in the saving, the speaking in the band quiet, they go, go where you want to go, do what you want to do. You’re the ruler of your own life, you’re the captain of your own ship. That’s what the devil tells you and me. And that’s, that’s the mo emanates out of a sinful, fallen nature. We just want to be Lord, we want to be in control. And there’s a lot of guys that hear the gospel, and they’re tempted by the Spirit to follow Christ, but they don’t. Because they don’t want to surrender their way of life. They want to they don’t want to give up. They’re not Las Vegas, in their gambling. They’re drinking their party in their language, the way they treat their wives, the way they do business on it with integrity and honesty. They don’t want to give that up. That’s the only life they know and they enjoy that life. But one day when they become desperate enough, and when I’m sharing Christ with a guy and he’s this kind of guy, he’s not ready. He still wants to hold on, he won’t let go or surrender or repent. I tell that guy Well, the day may come when you’re desperate. This happens with guys. They’re on the top of the heap. They’re on the bottom of the heap. They’re doing great. They have a great loss. They just had a guy this week, I have no family. I have no friends. No one ever calls me.

Got $300 in the bank, and I got no place to live. He’s desperate. He’s a good candidate. God lets us get desperate sometime because Christianity is a rescue effort for desperate men. Look for desperate man. men that are on top of their game they’re using not interested in the Gospel man who don’t have need. But when they see a guy that seems to have it together, and when they look at you and they walk across the room and go What Are you some kind of pastor or something? say why he asked you have such a piece about you? SWAT a guy said to me not long ago, and I don’t I don’t know what that means really. I don’t see where he got that. I’m not aware of that in my own life. But see men look at you. And if you got the smell of your father on you, if you have the, the aroma of Christ, they know it. They know it when you walk by they know it when you carry on business and conversation, the expressions on your face. And you can’t fake that you either got it or you don’t know you can fake it for a while, but you can’t fake it forever. And they’ll know it’s really true. When you have a reason not to have peace, and you still have it. And they see in tight situations I see You humiliated, slapped, made fun of Mark left out neglected. And they watch how you respond. It’s very evangelistic to have the Holy Spirit. And that’s the reason we need to be filled with the Spirit. not drunk with the wine, but be filled with the Spirit. Why? Because it’s a Spirit in us, his character comes out. If any man’s in Christ, he’s a new creature, what’s new about him, he’s got the Holy Spirit. He’s got a new attitude in life. He’s got self control of his language in his thinking. And he takes every thought captive. He prays about everything and prays without ceasing. He does does it naturally, it’s who he is in Christ. But you have to nurture that and that’s what discipleship is all about. You have to be a man of the word, a man of prayer, you have to be a man in fellowship with other growing believers who are chasing after Christ. And then you find yourself living the life, not because you’re gutting it out and just beating yourself up. And but because you’re drinking like that tree and someone by the rivers of life, and you’re soaking up the word, you’re soaking up the fellowship, you’re soaking up the spirit and acknowledging his presence and nurturing that in you. And then it just naturally comes out or, or not. The anger just doesn’t come out. If Susan had told me about Armando, before I came to Christ out, I had a totally different response, believe me, and that’s reason she didn’t want to come up and tell me about him. And you’re wondering who’s a mondo, some of you, as there’s somebody at your table, it knows the story, but I know it better so I’ll tell it again. Anyway, Susan, we’d been dating for years. She goes on vacation to Mexico with her with her family, they’re camping out all the way down to Acapulco, and back, they did this area that year, they went to Alaska and back two years before that, they went to California and back from Birmingham. The two years before that, now they were going to Mexico well, while she was going to Mexico I was going to Rocky Mountain North Carolina to play baseball. And she ran into a guy now before she left she said we were paying that means engaged to be engaged. She was wearing my fraternity pan on campus at Auburn. She took it off and said why we’re why let’s just not be pinned. I wanted to stay pinned And may I go ahead and read between the lines she was basically moving in direction and breaking up with me because I was such a wild man at parties and other things. And she was Miss keep the rules. She was tired. She broke up with me four times in college because I was such a crazy night. And I don’t blame her but always somehow talked her back into getting together promising I’d never do what I knew I’d do again. She meets Armando Armando is a student at the University of Mexico and he starts wine and dine in her around Mexico City. Darren thorns offer roses serenade and they’re talking in that irresistible broken English tears. This is not irresistible with some of you guys. But for Armando it was. And she they really got a thing going so she comes back and Birmingham, they’re home from the trip and she’s supposed to come out and see me in North Carolina.

And I’ve been missing her all summer and couldn’t wait to see her and so they get up there and check into a motel come see me play that night. Then we went out afterwards and talked and I could tell you know when you can tell that something out right here. alloga tell someone right. So we start talking and she started telling me about Armando. Now she knew how it was gonna respond. She knew that I would tell her and Armando where they could go and what they could do when they got there and I’d say a bunch of stuff I would regret. And I didn’t. She thought I’d be angry and I wasn’t. I was disappointed. But I wasn’t angry. I didn’t say things that I shouldn’t say. And this confused her. She didn’t know what’s going on. I can’t even remember what I told her. I said you read the bobby Richardson story. Maybe it happened to you Maybe you could have this same thing I have. I was pretty green behind the ears and sharing the gospel. But the gospel was shared with her through the way I responded to her. In 48 hours, she went from telling me that she and her mom, she was going down to see your mando the next summer for a week at the Olympics, which would be unhealed in Mexico City. And he was going to come up and spend a week with her to Auburn. And that was more and more disappointing to hear. And she the second night we went out she was crying, and she couldn’t figure out what was happening. And what would what had happened to me. And I’m ever going back to my room that first night and saying God, of all the people in the world I thought would never disappoint me. Let me down. I thought Susan would never let me down. But I know you won’t. You’ll never let me down. So went out the next night. She had told me about all this stuff going on with him and her. And then she just out of nowhere said well, when we get back to Auburn, I still want us to date might we have been? I said, I don’t know about that. Let me get this straight. You and I are going to date steadily like we have been that Armando is going to come up for a week and I want to take a week off. I said I might be a Christian, I ain’t that strong. That ain’t happening. She said, Well, I just want to stay up here with you. I said that ain’t happening either. And then she said this amazing thing. She says why don’t we just get married? I said, I gotta pray about that. Okay. We got married five weeks later, happily for 50 years. But what made the difference in 48 hours, God changed her heart from telling me that she and Armando Rimando. We’re going to be item to ask me to merrier. And it’s all because of Christ is diamond is perfect. And I realize a lot of this when I wrote the book, toga heaven. And this started, God started putting the pieces of puzzle together for me and understanding it better when we went through that. But the point of the story is that God changes us and we become new people in Christ, and that’s attractive to other people. And that’s what the gospel is all about. Follow me, Jesus is Savior and Lord, he’s the Messiah. And it has everything to do with our concept of God. I’m almost 100% positive that Peter and Andrew had been exposed to Jesus before he came along in walked with a stranger on the beach, he is already starting to get a reputation of healing people. And they were starting to think maybe this is the Messiah. And then he comes along and says, follow me. Now in understanding those days, gurus, spiritual, holy man they had and rabbis, if you will, they had followers, they had disciples. And what you do is these disciples, like john the baptist, have been some of these guys that became disciples of Jesus, were following john the baptist, and john the baptist gave them to Jesus. He pointed him to Jesus one day when Jesus was walking by he said, Behold, the Son of God. And the disciples started following Jesus at that point.

And so he said, Follow me, the Savior, the Lord the Messiah, and be careful who you follow. And we’ve talked about that align. Who you following you following somebody, but you got to be careful who you follow because of two things. One is because of wherever they’re going, you’re going. And whatever they’re like, you’re going to be like, and there’s a guy right there. It’s been the guy again, via walking witness to following the wrong people and finding what the right people are. But a lot of us in here can do the same thing. I was going down one trail of fraternity guy and athlete and living in the jock dorm, and then I became a new creature in Christ. And all my fraternity brothers used to quit invite me to their parties, because I wasn’t any fun anymore. I wouldn’t drink anymore. And no drunk wants to be around sober people. We had two guys in our fraternity that didn’t drink and we spent all of our time trying to get them drunk, and we were very successful. They became two of the biggest drunks in the tourney house. But if you don’t want a sober guy around when you’re acting like a fool, and he’s not follow me and I will. What does that mean? It expresses confidence to be able to make a commitment. I will make you fishers of men. I have the ability to do that. Follow me and this is what you’re going to end up. We’re going after man. You’re a very expert fisherman. I’m going to make you an expert. Catching man. I’m a makeup expert spirited getting it on your heart a passion to go after guys. Now not many guys have a passion to go after man, not many churches have even a men’s ministry. But Jesus when he called a man to come, he says we’re going after men. Now you could throw women in there too. But we’re going after men, we’re focusing on men in this ministry. Now to focus on men you have to help them in their marriage and so we do a lot of that too. But maybe Jesus has said do something like that to you follow me and we’ll make our will make you expresses an inevitable outcome. You follow Jesus Christ, the inevitable outcome is that you’re going to be a fisher of man, you’re going to have it on your heart to share what you’ve got with other guys. And if you care enough, and if you’re passionate enough, you want to be trained. You wanted someone that is reasonably love the class into seven series It teaches that bridge illustration God’s here man see are the bridge the gap is a cross. See unhealed death in judgment. That’s man’s condition. Over here, it’s came that you might have life and have it abundantly. Anyone professors may with their mouth and believes in their heart, they will be saved. God so loved the world that he gave his only son that if you believe in Him, you’ll never perish but have eternal eternal life. That’s the good news. But if you don’t understand the bad news, the good news Ain’t that good. If you’re living in, in paradise in Southern California, haven’t done look as good the you got the houses and the cars and the life. Heavens not looking as good the but when you really understand the despicable nature of man, man, the heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked, who can understand it? If you really understand that to understand, and you’ve been the victim of that, and you’re in perpetrating and victory or It’s same time, then the good news sounds pretty good at some point. We want to find those guys. And you never know who they are a lot on putting on facades. It’s a it’s a determined goal, I will because I’m capable of doing it. And Jesus is still making disciples and he’s still calling men to follow him. I’ll teach you how to become just like me. And that’s the third question and becoming a man of God. Do you want to spend the rest of your life learning to become just like Jesus? Absolutely. Or why? Why do you want to become just like Jesus is a selfish reason because I’ll have less pain in my life. If I’m like Jesus, because I’ll make fewer stupid mistakes, and suffer the consequences. I make better decisions. If Christ is in my life. If I’m following him and getting the fruit of the Spirit, if I’m getting hope and joy and love and goodness and gentleness and kindness and patience and self control, then I’m going to have a fuller life. I came that you might have life and have it abundantly, not just a little good, but abundant life rising above the fray. Hard to attend.

sharing the love of Christ with people being that kind of guy, given them hope lifting them up being an encourager seeing the best and guys think they’re losers. And tell them their best days are ahead of them. That’s what Jesus said to guys. Come and follow me and your best days are ahead of you. He didn’t tell him at that point, you’re gonna die. A martyr’s death and now I’m dead but john. But then that was they got a special place in heaven because of that. Follow me and I will make you fishers of men. I’ll make you I’ll bring you into being and teaching I’m coaching you form a new shape and you alter a new training you adapt and you correct a new review Can you is a lot to making us disciples, making us have lives that make other people hungry for Christ. That’s very evangelistic. The question is, and all this teaching and coaching Mr. teachable. I don’t know if you’ve ever coached the team or not. But if you ever coached a team and I have I’ve coached a few over the years, not lately, but in my younger years. And you find some kids that are very coachable. They’re just listening to everything you say. And when you say I want you to grip the bat like this, or this is how you throw a curveball. Or this is how you feel the ground ball or this is how you bought yo you bat here. Don’t do it do Don’t drop the head because it’ll always pop up. Keep that bat that angle. And if it’s down, keep it at that angle. If it’s over, keep it at that angle and the balls always going to go down when You do that. There’s some kids listening to that kind of coating and some kids don’t. And find you found some kids are coachable and some are not that I guess a question for you and me as Mr. coachable? Are you teachable? Are you hungry? Do you want to be a good ballplayer, the guys that want to succeed and be good ballplayers and get better and better listen up. And they’re coachable and teachable. But the guys that think they don’t need that. It’s like when coach next took me into the in Auburn. And he and I was a first baseman he was going to, he needed a second baseman in my sophomore year, and he says, I want you to be a second baseman, he sent all the guys out on the field, get warmed up, and he kept me in the training room. He is a blackboard there. And he said, Drew footprints on the board. And I’m sitting there looking at it. He goes, Pete, when a pitcher gets ready to pitch, here’s where your feet are. And then when the balls hit at you, this foot goes here and this foot goes here and your gloves on the ground. Now that glove on the ground, right on it. Because 90% of the balls, he misses and go between your legs. So get that glove on the ground and look at right in there. If that ball, take a bad hop, it hits you in the forehead, not in the nose, if you’re looking at in there, which happened a few times. And I’m sitting there thinking what is his footprints on the board I’ve been playing since I was nine years old. I know how to do all this. And then he took us out on the field and put us in game situations. I’ve got a gown first and second guy hits a ball up the left center alley, what do you do? What do you do shortstop? What do you do first baseman. And we all knew our positions. And he taught us the basics. And we were coachable enough to have a 16 game winning streak my senior year and be number two in the nation and go the College World Series. Not because we were just all exceptional athletes because we knew how to play the game. We knew how to hit cut off man we knew out of button move a man over pitchers threw strikes and didn’t want people we could still basis. We knew how to hit and run. We knew the game because we had a coach who was teaching us and we were teachable. And we wanted it we have one thing in common Let’s win this conference championship. And we did. And every winning team has that. Every winning team knows every guy knows their job. I knew how to play second base. And I think I shared this with you last week that my coach walked out to me coat snakes and he stood at second base with me doing some batting practice. I was taking some ground boss. He said Pete, you do your job. You can’t do Scottish job. It’s shortened Greg’s job at third or Frank’s job at first, you’d play second base and get your job done. Everybody on this team is depending on you to do your job.

So learn your job and do it. And I thought that set me free. For some reason. I thought Boy, that’s a burden off. I just I’ll focus on doing my job, which is on a team. And this is a team that’s Christian life. It’s a team sport. And so you just do your job and what is your job? Do you know your job? I knew my job at Sega base. Now No, my job is a Christian where I fit in on what contribution I can make. How can I help this team win? How can we better be better Christians and encourage each other in the Lord and not forsake the assembling together but encouraging each other all the more sad days drawn there. And that’s what we have to do today pull together as a team spirit evangelistic when we do that. I’ll make you fishers and you know what that means? pro fishers, I’m gonna make you a pro man catcher. I’m going to teach you how to go and get guys. And then you know what your target is? Well, guys, I think that’s all the time we got today. But I think I’ve said pretty much all I need to say about evangelism. You knew a lot of this. We just need to be stirred up again. And again. We need to be reminded again and again and what we’re about if you live your whole life, and it’s not a matter of leading people to Christ, it’s sharing the message. It’s God’s Holy Spirit job to get people saved. Our job is to live the message and share the message. Hey, man, Bill, pray for us as we close.

Bill Kauble 44:18
Are we just thankful for this message and thank you for the power of your gospel. We pray Father that we would receive that what you want us to do we want to be witnesses for you. By that we mean that the power and the blood of Jesus Christ,

Pete McKenzie 44:30
amen. Amen. Go get in heaven, guys.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai