Welcome to the Cross Power Church podcast.
You're listening to a service from our church in Campbell, TX.
We pray this message strengthens your faith and points you to the
cross. Now let's join the service.
Struggling past few days especially seem like everybody
struggles I know that but I my blood pressure has been all
messed up. It's been really, really low and
had this medication doctor put me on it's diuretic.
And so it's clearing everything out and I'm getting dehydrated
and I'll get woozy and I'll, you know, the other day I was over
there and in Paris with Bev and I had already moved to the
passenger side instead of the driver's side because I told
her, I said, in fact, at one point I opened my eyes up and I
said, where are we 'cause I can't see anything.
You know, all I could see was a little bit of structure from the
gas station nearby. Just, you know, that covered
area, you know, that little thing, it's got the big tall
columns, you know, and I can figure that out.
Well, that's the gas station. But I didn't know where we were
at, couldn't see anything. But why?
So anyway, been struggling with that.
And but it it reminded me of something.
You know, in John chapter 4, Jesus met this woman at the
well. He said I'm the one that's the,
the, the water that you need, you know, and if you drink of
this, you won't. Well, there's a lot of people
that are allowing the world to pull out of them the water that,
you know, it's it's coming out, but they're not letting it come
back in quick enough. They're not they're not abiding
where they need to abide and they're not letting the water
come in. OK.
And their vision is all messed up.
Doesn't take too long. You start seeing things wrong.
I thought, you know, may we stay with the, the water wherever
we're at. They would be seeking him.
And yeah, there's storms and they they last a long time.
Sometimes seems like the storms of life or well, they just don't
hardly ever go away. And the riding it out, sometimes
it seems like, you know, it wasn't just a matter of, of
riding it out. You've been riding it for a long
time and you're still riding it. In fact, some of you nearly felt
like just giving up because you didn't see the answers that you
were looking for. So yeah, I've prayed, I've
bawled, I've cried my heart out. You know, I've laid it all out
before the Lord. I believe that there was going
to be something different was going to happen.
It's the same old thing. Nothing's changed.
Not that I can see with my eye. I want you to take a look over
in Isaiah chapter 6. And I know some of you are well
familiar with that passage, but maybe you never really put it to
a place like I'm going to try and deliver it this morning.
Isaiah chapter 60. We'll probably read the first 9
verses or so. In the year that King Uzziah
died, I saw the Lord sitting on a throne high and lifted up, and
the train of his robe filled the temple.
Above it stood Seraphim. Each one had 6 wings.
With two he covered his face, with two he covered his feet,
and with two he flew, and one cried to another, and said,
Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts.
The whole earth is full of his glory.
And the posts of the door were shaken by the voice of him who
cried out, and the house was filled with smoke.
So I said, Woe is me, for I am undone, because I am a man of
unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean
lips. For my eyes have seen the king,
the Lord of hosts, and one of the seraphim flew to me, having
in his hand a live coal, which he had taken with the tongs from
the altar. And he he touched my mouth with
it, and said, Behold, this has touched your lips, your iniquity
is taken away, and your sin purged.
Also I heard a voice of the Lord saying, whom shall I send and
who will go for us? Then I said, here I am, send me.
And he said, go. Well, there's a lot there that
I'm not necessarily going to dwell on, but I do want to talk
about the first part of it in particular in in verse one at
the very beginning of this, you know, I don't read the King
James Version a whole lot. I do go over to it, like I go
over to a lot of other translations and check things
out and see what the wording was in the translation because it'll
vary. But I get a little bit, I don't
know, cross eyed with the old English and whatever.
And I, you know, it just doesn't really, it doesn't work as well
a lot of times for me. And there are people that, you
know, say, hey, the King James is the only way to go.
Well, if it is, then you go with it.
At least you're going with the word, you know.
But but I do look back and forth and I noticed that most all the
translations were worded without a particular little word that
the King James uses. In the King James Version, he
says that in the year that King Uzziah died, which is what he
can see about him, I saw. But in King James it says I saw
also. OK, now a little word also is
important 'cause he's not just saying I saw and he's not saying
I saw this and this he's not saying, yeah, I saw this thing
and I also saw this. OK, It's, it's, it's there to
show the contrast, OK, Where I see, and I've been singing for
years because Isaiah had reigned for 52 years when he died.
OK, So it wasn't something where that Isaiah saw something that
he had never seen before. He'd been seeing some problems
with the nation for years. Because see, during his eyes
reign, there was, he had a personal devout loyalty to the
Lord for a while, but he allowed things to take place in the
nation that shouldn't have been there.
He allowed the, the high places and the mountains and so forth
where that they would go up and they would offer sacrifices to
other gods. Now these were Jewish people.
They were God's people, sort of. But they would go up there on
the mountainside and they would offer to this God and to that
God. And then they would come back
from their paganism and, and try and do the rituals on those days
that they would have with the the church, with the Jewish
faith and honor the real guy. So it's just kind of a mix.
And I'm sure that that troubled Isaiah because along the way he
could see that the nation wasn't going right.
And then this king of his eye, I don't know how much you know
about him, but he was a real mastermind at military and that
type of thing. So he was able to build up their
defenses and make a strong military of over 300,000 people.
I've read before a few places, something like that.
So he had a strong military, he built up the border and he did a
lot of good things, created a lot of prosperity in the land
where the people had a lot of money and where they're living
pretty good. OK.
They kind of liked having him for the king, but he kind of
liked being the king too. And so pride comes along because
of prosperity. And then when you add pride and
prosperity together, well, what's Scripture say about pride
in the 1st place? It's going to lead you to a
fall, right? So he sort of put himself over.
He thought too highly of himself, and he did some things.
I mean, he was God's man. He's in charge of the Kingdom,
right? So he made a few exceptions so
he could do a few things that he thought he wanted to do that God
said you're not supposed to do. Sometimes we have a tendency to
do that too. I've been going to church.
I know the Bible. I'm tied with the Lord.
It won't hurt if I do this one little thing here.
There's one little thing there, but it hurt him.
It caused him to have leprosy, and he had leprosy and had to be
isolated from the palace into into a place where that, you
know, he wasn't going to expose everybody else to the disease.
And his son came after him and was actually reigning or ruling
even though Uzziah hadn't died yet.
OK. I mean, you couldn't say that
Uzziah is dead. So he was the his son was the
king. But somebody has to run the
place, right? And so that was the situation.
And Isaiah has seen this develop over the years and he's
realizing, you know what? I have prayed about this and
I've prayed about this and I've prayed about this, and it's not
getting any better. In fact, I thought for sure that
God would have healed him by now.
And he's been tucked away in that hold out in that isolated
isolation area for however many years, 7 + 7 years, anyway,
maybe 10. He's been put away.
And now I find out that our one hope, and this was not just his
feeling, but I'm sure it was the feeling of a lot of people in
the land. Our one hope is dead.
And we've been praying about this for a long time.
Well, you know, why didn't God send revival?
Why didn't God just heal our our king and, you know, get a hold
of his heart and turn him around and, and, and then heal him and
everything will be great again. And now what do we've got?
We've got nobody really on the throne.
I mean, he's got his son there, but he probably wasn't even
sworn in or whatever they did back then.
OK, But he wasn't really officially the king yet.
All he saw was. And it isn't working out.
It's not supposed to be going this way.
I've prayed about it and I've prayed about it and I've prayed
about it, and I'm going to go pray again.
And so he goes to the temple, and he cries out to the Lord,
because while he was there, he also saw something.
And that's the way it works. If you stop crying out to the
Lord, you're not going to see much again.
In fact, your vision will get all messed up, right?
It's when that water's flowing and you're communicating with
the Lord, that's when you're able to see.
And so he goes back to the temple, to the House of the
Lord, and he cries out to the Lord.
And he also sees that the Lord was high and lifted up, that he
was not concerned about all the little things that are going on
down here that we take the heart and think are huge because
they're not big to him. Let me say it again.
All those problems you've been dragging around for years
worrying about and praying about, and you hadn't seen
anything change. And you're about to give up and
say, well, maybe there is no God after all.
Maybe he's just abandoned me. Maybe he's hard at hearing.
It starts sounding a lot like, you know, the Mount Carmel
whenever you have Elijah going up there, you know, kidding
those other guys about their gods, right?
Hey, maybe he had to go to the restroom.
Can't hear you, right? That's how we can feel too
sometimes. Especially if your eyes focused
on the problems that are around you and the things that you
think are so terrible. Instead of being focused or
fixed on Christ, now you got to have your eyes focused on
Christ. So in the midst of Isaiah's
emptiness and his natural hopelessness while he's in the
temple, he discovers a few things.
One is that the situation that we face here on this earth,
whatever that storm is that we're singing about and
listening Brother Lance talked about a minute ago, those
situations are not a struggle nor a worry for the King of
Kings. He's the Lord of Lords.
He's the alpha and Omega. He's the Ancient of Days.
There is nothing they can, they can trouble him and him go, oh
Gee, what am I going to do? I mean, he doesn't do that.
With him, all things are possible.
And you say, yeah, I know that. That's why I've been praying for
it. But if you didn't see a change,
just keep on praying and keep on going and keep on trusting the
Lord and keep on putting your eyes not on the things of the
earth, but the thing, you know, raise them up.
Look up. All right, Look at him.
When trials abound, you go up before the altar of sacrifice
and you draw near to the Lord and he will draw near to you.
You say, well, I, I, I don't feel him.
Sometimes I've tried and I've I've found my prayer closet and
I've tried to pray and I don't feel any presence of, of the
Lord. But if you go back and read the
word in James chapter 4 verse 8, it says something.
It says if you'll draw near to me, I will draw near to you.
And that's not a lie. He's not a man that he should
lie. He's not son, a man that he
should retract his word and go, oops, that wasn't something I
meant to do. I was supposed to have been over
there. I forgot about you.
He hadn't forgot about you. He knows right where you're at.
He knows where your eyes are focused.
And if they're not on him like they should be, he knows that
too. There's another thing.
Whenever Isaiah came and called out to the Lord, there was
revelation that came. See, God revealed something to
His people, and I may be getting ahead of myself, I don't know,
but I'm going to tell you this anyway if I can.
I've seen the cupped hands of God above this place.
I have seen God's hands above you and I've seen in His hands
that there was milk and there was honey.
It's the same thing that his children were supposed to be
going to whenever they wouldn't go the first time and it took
him an extra 40 years because their eyes were on the wrong
thing. Their eyes were not focused on
him. Their eyes were not saying we're
going to trust in the covenant promises of God.
Their eyes were on how big the problem was and they wouldn't go
in and get it. And now God says, hey, I'm
holding honey, I'm holding the milk, I'm holding the blessings
that I want to give to you, and I'm holding revelation in my
hand and I'm going to give it to you if you will.
But look at me. If you'll keep your eyes focused
upon me, if you will look, not look back, but you'll look
forward and look to me. He desires to pour out upon you
the, the blessings and the revelation.
And some of you say, well, I've been seeking that for a long
time. Keep seeking it and look to him.
Sometimes all we do, we think we've been, we think we've been
in the right spot because occasionally we've prayed about
something. But just going to the church
once in a while to pray about something or every now and then
throwing that in your prayer list isn't the same as day by
day seeking the Lord with all your heart and keeping your eyes
focused and fixed upon him. There's a difference.
So I mentioned the children of Israel a while ago and you can
look at Numbers 13 and Numbers 14.
You can look over and Deuteronomy chapter 1 and you
can find how that they allowed just what I said their eyes were
were fixed upon the problem instead of fixed upon him.
You know, if you're walking with the Lord and he's not only with
you, but he's in you, you got no problems.
You really don't. He said, Oh yeah, I do.
I got this. Not really.
I mean, life's short. It goes fast, right?
And what David say, he said it's like a, you know, a passing
shadow or a fleeting vapor and and you go, well, during that
time, you know, I'll go. No, you don't.
Just keep your eyes on him. You'll be out of this before you
know it. You know, remember that he is
your peace. And if you're not looking to
him, you got no peace. And you said, well, I do run
over there occasionally and I pray and I try and call on his
name. Well, good.
Don't make it occasional. Make it a daily habit.
It's an ongoing thing. Scripture said, well, Paul said
in Thessalonians, what do you say?
He said pray without ceasing. And he also said you can rejoice
that way too, because, hey, if you're praying without ceasing
and you're walking with the Lord, and he is the Lord above
all others, and he's able to take care of all things, then it
doesn't really matter ultimately what happens except for that,
that you're connected to him because he's going to see you
through. That's how you ride that storm
out, right? Yeah.
But then there was another occasion that I remember
whenever they've kind of blew it too.
And this time over in First Samuel Chapter 17, you've got a
little guy named David. He wasn't a little guy in a lot
of ways, but he was a young man, I guess, a teenager.
And you know the story about the Valley of Elah, and you have
Goliath on one side and you got David on the other.
But before David ever got there, what did you have?
You had Goliath on one side with the full army of the
Philistines, and on the other side you had every man basically
that was of age to fight. And the Hebrew nation in that,
in that land, they were there doing what?
Hunkered down, you know, going, oh, gosh, oh, I don't even want
to look. Oh, crap.
Look how big that sucker is. Oh, man.
And if you don't believe that's true, you go read there.
And when he defines or it tells you in Scripture how big
everything was, how tall he was and how big his armor was and
how much it weighed, you know why that's there?
It's to let people know that. Yeah, we were busy looking at
that, You said. Well, you you got to know your
enemy. Well, no, you know, not as much.
You got to know the one that can conquer your enemy, OK.
And so keep your eyes focused on him.
Now I get to thinking about that.
It wasn't much difference than in that case than it was over
there in numbers 13 and 14. Whenever the children of Israel
are trying to go into the promised land and get the
blessings, the milk and the honey right.
The the great things that God wanted to give unto them, they
weren't able to get because they were too busy looking at the
problem instead of the one that takes care of the problems.
They didn't believe in the promises they had received.
And some of you have received promises in your heart.
You've prayed for something before.
Maybe it's a grandchild, maybe it's a brother, or it's a wife,
or it's a husband. And in your heart, boy, that
storm's been brewing for a long time and you've been praying
about it for a long time. And I know he told me that that
something was going to change. And yet you're going and I don't
see any change, but I'll just keep on going, I guess, you
know, and, and after a while, if you're just floating downstream,
you're not going to end up and where you want to go.
You've got to keep your eyes focused upon him and you got to
draw close to him and you've got to not worry about the problem
that seems so big in your life. You can realize that he's big
enough to take care of that and hold that as well as you.
So they let the enemy seem enlarged because their focus was
on the enemy, was on the problem.
And the more you look at something, the bigger it gets to
you because you'd have been looking at it for so long,
right? And and the same is true if
you'll just put your focus on Christ, enlarge him.
You can't say enlarge him, brother, that you can't do that.
And how can we enlarge God? Well, you enlarge him in your
heart, in your mind, in your life, because you are focused
upon him. And the more you focus upon Him
and realize that He is, always has been and always will be,
that He is the one that can do all things and without Him we
are nothing. All right, If you realize that
this is the one, that's Jehovah Rapha, he's the healer, He is
Jehovah Jireh. He's your provider.
He is the great I am. And that wasn't just for Moses.
That was for all of us. You know, I was thinking about
give you a little bit of advice on a side note here because
we're talking about David, but David did two things in that
chapters, a long chapter. But if you look around, I don't
know, it's around 34th verse or so.
There's a, I'll just read it. There's 3 verses here, 3 or 4
I'm going to read starting with verse 34 and first Samuel 17.
It says, But David said to Saul, Your servant used to keep his
father's sheep. And when a lion or a bear came
and took the lamb out of the flock, I went out after it and
struck it and delivered the lamb from its mouth.
And when it arose against me, I caught it by its beard and
struck and killed it. Your servant has killed both
lion and bear apparently multiple times and this
uncircumcised Philistine will be like one of them, seeing he has
defiled the armies of the living God.
Now listen to this verse 37. Moreover, David said the Lord
who delivered me from the paw of the lion and from the paw of the
bear, he will deliver me from the hand of the Philistine.
OK, So what did he do? He reminded himself.
He gave a testimony of what the Lord was doing and had done
right. OK.
And I'm sure that that builds your faith.
That's my experience. The other thing is that he was
giving glory to God. So yes, he had had had problems
along the way, but guess who fixed him and and guess who had
to go up against the lion? He did.
Guess what? You may have to go up against
the lion too. When God gets ready to give you
something, a lot of times the enemy is trying to take it from
you and keep you from getting it.
That's why you got to fight. I guarantee you if you've ever
tried to minister too much to people, you've had a fight.
It might be back at your house when you're trying to prepare
because I'm telling you it happens to I, I can tell
whenever the Lord's going to move in somebody's life because
it's a bigger fight that day than it was the day before.
But I'm telling you that, you know, if you don't give glory to
God, if you don't remember the things He's done for you and
remember the promises that He's made to you and rest in that
instead of trying to take it upon your own self to fix the
problems, well, that's not going to work out too well for you.
So the first thing I want you to remember is remember where He's
brought you from. The second is give glory to the
Lord. OK, Next thing if you drop down
to verse 45, verse verse 45 through 47, there's another
point here that needs to not go unnoticed.
Says then David said to the what?
To the Philistine. Who was he talking to?
The Philistine. He was talking to his biggest
problem at the moment. OK, he was talking to Goliath,
and he says to Goliath, you come to me with a sword, with a
spear, and with a javelin. But I come to you in the name of
the Lord of Hosts, the God of the armies of Israel, whom you
have defied. This day the Lord will deliver
you into my hand, and I will strike you and take your head
from you. And this day I will give the
carcasses of the camp of the Philistines to the birds of the
air and to the beast of the earth, that all the earth, why,
that all the earth may know that there is a God in His.
That's true. Then all this assembly shall
know that the Lord does not save with sword or spear, for the
battle is the Lord's, and He will give you into our hands.
Now what did He do? This is the second thing anybody
writes anything down. This is the second thing you
need to remember to do, besides what George already talked
about, and that is he spoke to the problem.
He didn't too often. We act like sniveling, whiny,
troubled kids and and and we will come sort of to the Lord,
but we come like he doesn't even want to do anything for us.
He doesn't really have anything blessed, any blessings in his
hand that he wants to pour out upon us.
He not really going to do it because I've prayed before and
it didn't really. And we we almost don't even go.
And then when we do, we beg and we're talking to him about the
problem. He knows about the problem.
He allowed it. Oh, my goodness.
Yeah, a lot of times that's true.
He, he allowed it. Why does he allow problems?
Because it will strengthen you. And, and the quicker we learn to
to keep our eyes upon him, keep our focus stayed upon him, and
and to not let the problems rule our life, the the fear dominate
our minds, guess what? We'll be a whole lot more
peaceful and we'll be a whole lot more successful and we can
enjoy life and we can sing. Hey, I'm just riding out the
storm because I'm going to be here for a little while and then
I am out of here, Jack. I am going to where my
citizenship is and it's not here.
It's not in commerce, It's not in Hunt County, OK?
It is in heaven, praise God. Right?
So that's that's the focus. Now.
I want to move to Isaiah chapter 64 real quick.
In Isaiah chapter 64, Isaiah recalls a place called, well,
you most you probably know it is Mount Sinai.
It's also known as Horeb, but he remembers back at a time
whenever God descended. Now you got to remember at this
point, he, he'd already had this other experience where God kind
of pulled the heavens back and exposed himself in the temple
and said, hey, guess what? You know, you might have
problems all around, but you also got me filling this place.
I'm right here. My presence isn't a distant God.
I'm not in some faraway planet. I'm right here where your
problems are. Don't worry about it.
Right? That he had that experience, but
he also remembers this other experience when God came down
and he, he came down and manifested himself often.
It's been a very powerful way upon this mountain.
And when he did, there was lightning and Thunder and you
see, it's pretty intense. And, and guess what?
Anybody that's carelessly came upon that mountain, that wasn't
the thing to do because they die.
Because after all, he's a holy God, right?
He's holy and righteous and the people are sinful people.
Romans 323 says that we've all sinned and fallen short of the
glory of God and and without the covering that Christ brought
later, what happens? You die.
You can't. Nobody that knows, not Jesus can
expect to go to heaven and enter the presence of God and live
there forever. And we got a whole world of
people going. What?
Hey, well, thank God. Well, you know, at least he
doesn't have that cancer anymore.
He's he's gone to heaven. Well, probably not.
I'm just saying that's what the word of God says.
Probably not. It sounds good.
It makes you feel better. But guess what?
We have the truth, and the truth says what?
What does the word say? It says that that abroad is the
road to destruction and most people aren't on it.
OK. And he's remembering back to
this time and the first 3 verses.
These are the words we find Isaiah calling out to the Lord
saying, oh, that you would rend the heavens.
What's that mean? It means tear them apart, open
this heavens up because there's this barrier between where you
seem to be at and where I'm at that you would come down that
the mountains might shake at your presence as fire burns
brushwood, as fire causes water to boil, to make your name known
to your adversaries, that the nations may tremble at your
presence. So he was calling on God to come
down so that God could be glorified and people would come
to know him, right? And he goes on verse 3 says,
when you did awesome things for which we did not look, you came
down the mountain, shook at your presence like Isaiah.
I believe there's those here who've cried out to the heavens
to the Lord and said, Lord, we're in the heavens.
Tear those those clouds back, whatever it is the separate, I
don't feel your presence and I want to know your presence.
And there's good things that the Lord gives you whenever you're
rightfully are able to get into his presence.
But I got to thinking about this, you know, here he is
praying this thing. And yeah, there have been
experiences in the past, but there was 1 still ahead because
there was one day whenever the Lord decided, OK, the fullness
of time has come and I myself, I'm going to go down to where
the people are AT. And he came as a man that he
might. It wouldn't be the before it was
the men that got on the mountain with the Lord and they weren't
ready. They're dead now.
It's the other way around. He comes down to be with the
people and he's going to give, he's going to die.
Why? So that we might live and we
wouldn't have to die, right? He was coming with blessings in
His hand. He was coming with eternal life
in His hand. He was coming with the greatest
of all blessings, that you might be able to enter in to the
presence of Almighty God without hesitation.
Because up to that point, and even at the time that Christ was
here, guess what? In the temple there was a place
called the Holy of Holies, right?
And in that temple, the Holy of Holies, there was a divide.
You remember that you can't just walk back in there to where the
presence of God is. And I got to thinking, because
Jesus Christ died on the cross, because he took what wasn't his.
He took our sins, the whole world sin, put it upon himself
and nailed it to a cross and gave his life and took it back
up again. That picture of that heaven's
being rent, That's exactly what happened.
The heavens were torn apart. And if you don't believe it,
take a look over in Matthew chapter 27 verse 51.
It says at that moment, at that moment, what moment?
The moment that he gave up his ghost and he said it's finished,
right, OK. At that moment, the curtain of
the temple was torn in two from top to bottom.
The earth shook and the rocks split.
Even the hardest of places in the rocks, even the hardest of
hearts, they can break before an almighty God if they will get
their eyes focused on him, right?
And and because of that, there was blessing, there was
revelation, because now we can have enter into a a new
relationship with God that they couldn't have before we can get
nice and personal. And that's why over in Hebrews
in chapter 4, it says in verse verse 16, Let us therefore come
boldly unto the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy and
find grace to help in time and need.
You can just go right on up there like you would your daddy
and jump in his lap. You can in fact, in if you go a
little bit further and dig into the Scripture, you'll find out
that Christ who died for you and ascended to the right hand of
the Father is already seated by the Father, right 'cause he's at
the right hand of the Father and we are seated with Him in
heavenly places there. OK, why is that or how is that?
Because the same Spirit that's in him is in US, right?
If we've accepted Christ, we've accepted his Spirit into us.
We are part of the body of Christ.
We are part of the bride of Christ.
That's what Scripture says. We're one with Christ.
Think about that. Whenever somebody gets married
down here, whatever we say. Well, and they, the 2 become one
flesh. Yeah.
Well, guess what? When you marry the groom, you
become one with him, right? And if you're really married to
him, you should be looking to him, not to all the other staff
that goes on in this world. There's plenty to get riled up
about and worried about. But why?
You're married to the groom. You're one with him, and he can
do anything. That's right.
I'm going to say this real quickly.
In Psalm chapter 24, verse eight, you don't have to turn
there particularly, but in Psalm 24 verse 8, it says who is this
king of glory? This one that Moses said, let me
see your glory, right? This one who Isaiah said rend
the heavens that I might see. He wanted to see the glory of
God. Who is this king of glory?
The Lord strong and mighty, the Lord mighty in battle.
Who is this king that Isaiah encountered and what glory is
there for him? Now think about this real
carefully. What glory is there for him?
If one, we never encountered a storm or an enemy, if you never
encountered any problems like you'd kind of like, I'm kind of
that way too. How much glory is he going to
get? Because it's not real evident
that he was able to conquer any problems.
You never really had any, right? Just saying.
Second thing is what glory is there for him if the enemies
that we conquer are so weak that we can conquer them?
If, if the problem that you face is within your ability to fix,
what glory does God really get if it gets fixed?
I mean, you could have done that, right?
So naturally, when we should be expecting that if we're going to
give greater glory to God, we should be facing all kinds of
hardships. We should be facing all kinds of
problems, you know, whether it's financial or relationships or,
or whatever it is health. I don't know what all you're
facing. I'm telling you one thing
shouldn't be some big shock. You shouldn't be all down in the
Molly Grubs or whatever. You thinking?
Well, I guess you just forgot about.
He hadn't forgot you. Scripture says that his eye is
constantly going to and fro across the earth, that he might
strongly support those whose heart is wholly his.
Your heart can't be wholly his if your heart is all wrapped up
in this problem and that problem and this thing you love and that
thing you love instead of the one that you should be loving
on. OK.
Yeah, when you think about that. In our weakness we are made
strong not because we are strong, because we are weak.
But what happens whenever we realize that we are weak.
We call upon the one that we know is strong, and the one
that's strong works through us right and changes things.
For though we have an adversary, the devil, and in first Peter
5/8 it says the devil goes around like a roaring lion
seeking who he can devour. Right.
OK, let me say that again. The devil runs around as or like
a lion seeking who he can devour.
But Jesus is not like, but is the lion.
He's the lion of the tribe of Judah and he is our strength.
In Genesis chapter 3, verse 15, you might recall this a real
quick light, but it's the the fall's taking place, right?
And God comes over to talk to him and he looks over at Eve and
Eve says, what you know, or no, actually it was Adam.
And Adam says, hey, Eve gave it to me.
So then he looks over at Eve and Eve says, well, yeah, that was
the that serpent over there. He, he told me, you know what?
I just fell through the trap or whatever.
OK. And and while this is going on,
there are curses that are pronounced because of their
disobedience. It's always a good idea, even if
you don't understand what's going on and it seems like
there's a storm in your attention that seems to want to
drift away. Stay in obedience and I, I will
put enmity. This is verse 15, God speaking,
he says I will put enmity between you and the woman and
between your offspring and hers, and he will crush your head and
you will strike his heel. OK, he will.
That word seed is singular. And so there's really only one
who was able to crush the enemy that we can't conquer ourselves.
His name is Jesus, right? OK, he's the one.
However, that word is not only singular, it is a collective
noun. Now, if you remember from back
in, you know, middle school or whatever, when they ever had
English, a collective noun represents a whole group.
So it's kind of like saying I've got a fish.
You know, you can say fish, and it means singular, right?
Yeah. But you can also say I've got
fish. And what's that mean?
It means you got a bunch the same word, but it means a lot.
It's a collective noun, you know.
So what I'm telling you is that not only is has Christ crushed
at the cross, the head of the enemy that wants to keep you
bound, OK? And Christ has already set you
free. You just got to accept that
That's one of the blessings that coming to him.
OK, but here's the other thing. If you get the collective noun
part, that means that we who are in Him are also able to crush
the head of the enemy, not because we're so big and strong,
because we're weak, but He is strong.
He is our strength. OK, And if you think, oh you're
making that stuff up, just look over in Romans chapter 16 in
verse 20. In Romans chapter 16, verse 20,
it says the God of peace will soon crush Satan under your
feet. Now this was Paul writing.
He was writing to believers. He wasn't talking about Jesus
going to crush it under his foot only for if we are united with
him, then it's under our foot too.
He, the enemy is under our foot. All those problems that we face,
we can just put our foot on it and say, Hey, my, my, God's
bigger than that problem, right? I'm in him and I don't care
about anything else. I know I've got victory in him.
Now it seems to me that plenty of people can take this idea or
these thoughts that I've brought and then say, yeah, those that's
good things. We we need to fix our gaze on
him. Yeah, that's right.
We need to speak directly to the enemy.
Yeah, that's right. But you'll walk out of here and
routine and habit and ruts that we've allowed to develop.
A lot of times it seems like we'll hear from the Lord and it
doesn't impact us. You know, it was good for a
moment, but I know better. No, you don't.
That's the problem. A lot of times
the Lord wants you to know he's still in control and he's still
on the throne. He's still alive, nothing has
missed his sight. There's nothing he can't do, and
he loves you. And last week I was sitting in
here and the Lord gave me a word last week about this church.
That's why I've seen things this week about this.
I'm talking about you, OK? And then the guy next to you, if
you're in this church, I'm talking about you.
And the Lord told me. He said, I am.
I am the God that heals. I am the God that delivers.
I am still the Ancient of Days. I am still the one who rules and
reigns, right? That's what he's saying.
And he says, I've got blessing in my hand and I am going to
pour it out upon them. If they will continue telling
you to look at me, if they'll fix their eyes upon me, if
they'll let the problems of this world go to the side and focus
on me, I've got good things for them.
I've got revelation that they've called for and they've cried in
their hearts and said, oh, would you just split those heavens
apart, Lord, and come and reveal yourself?
I've got that in my hand and I am going to let them have that.
But there's got to be a storm. There's got to be a trial.
There's got to be something that looks big that because in the
process, if you're facing that storm, realize this, he's
allowing the storm to happen to get you refined.
It's a refiner's fire. If I am in pottery and I'm going
to make something better that I've been working on, and I
don't expect it to last very well, what do I have to do with
it? I got to stick it in the kiln.
Some of you have been in the kiln a long time.
You're probably tired of the kiln.
I don't blame you. Keep your eyes on him.
He's the one that's going to pull you out of the kiln.
He's the one that's going to see you through, right?
Yeah. I hope you're hearing what I'm
saying. God bless you.
He will continue to bless you if you'll continue to look to him.
Brother, come here. This guy here, he knows about
the kiln, He might not tell you about the kiln all the time
because his eyes aren't fixed on the kiln that his eyes are fixed
upon the Lord. And the Lord's going to pour out
blessing upon him and cause him to multiply and grow.
He'll see strength that he is not head, and he will walk in
ways he's never seen before, and revelation will be his portion.
And I believe this with all my heart.
I thank you, Lord, for it. And I ask Lord that you would
use him, my God, each day to draw these people closer to you,
to focus their attention upon you, that their eyes might be
fixed and stayed upon you. And may this church thrive, and
may it grow. And may the power and presence
of the Holy God move in a way that has not happened in the
past, for there is yet a tomorrow when the kiln door is
open. In Jesus name I thank you, Lord,
I thank you. Thanks for listening to the
Cross Power Church podcast. May you know that true hope,
peace, and salvation can only be found in Jesus.
If you're near Campbell, TX, we would love for you to join us in
person. You can find service times at
crosspowerchurch.com.